Enhanced corrosion performance of magnesium phosphate conversion coating on AZ31 magnesium alloy

Magnesium phosphate conversion coating (MPCC) was fabricated on AZ31 magnesium alloy for corrosion protection by immersion treatment in a simple MPCC solution containing Mg²⁺ and PO^3?₄ ions. The MPCC on AZ31 Mg alloy showed micro-cracks structure and a uniform thickness with the thickness of about 2.5 µm after 20 min of phosphating treatment. The composition analyzed by energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy revealed that the coating consisted of magnesium phosphate and magnesium hydroxide/oxide compounds. The MPCC showed a significant protective effect on AZ31 Mg alloy. The corrosion current of MPCC was reduced to about 3% of that of the uncoated surface and the time for the deterioration process during immersion in 0.5 mol/L NaCl solution improved from about 10 min to about 24 h.     

Design of high efficiency interleaved active clamp zero voltage switching forward converter

A high efficiency interleaved active clamp forward converter with self-driven synchronous rectifiers for a modular power processor is presented. To simplify the gate drive circuits, the n–p MOSFETs coupled active clamp method is used. An efficiency of about 90% for a load range of 50-100% is achieved. Details of design for the power stage and current mode control circuit are provided, and also some experimental results are given.     

STRESS CONTROLLED FERROELECTRIC (BA0.5Sr0.5)TiO3 THIN FILMS PREPARED ON GD2O3/SRTiO3(001) BY A PULSED LASER DEPOSITION

ABSTRACT

Stress controlled epitaxial ferroelectric Ba_0.5Sr_0.5TiO₃ (BST) films have been deposited on Gd₂O₃/SrTiO₃ by pulsed laser deposition with oxygen background pressure of 200 mTorr at the deposition temperature of 750°C. In order to control the stress in BST films, oxygen pressures for Gd₂O₃ buffer layers have been varied from 0.1 to 100 mTorr, while that of BST films have been fixed at 200 mTorr. It has been found that the lattice parameters of the BST films deposited on Gd₂O₃ were changed. Furthermore, microwave properties of co-planar waveguide (CPW) fabricated on BST films were investigated by a HP 8510C vector network analyzer from 1–20 GHz. Large dielectric tunabilities were observed from the CPW's fabricated on BST films deposited on Gd₂O₃ layers deposited at low and high oxygen pressures, 0.1 and 100 mTorr, respectively.     

Small signal modelling for the PWM series resonant converter

A discrete time domain modelling is presented for the pulse-width modulated series resonant converter (PWM-SRC) with a discontinuous current mode. This nonlinear system is linearized about its equilibrium state to obtain a linear discrete time model for the investigation of small signal performances such as the stability and transient response. The usefulness of this small signal model is verified by dynamic simulation.     

Nano materials for microelectronic and photonic packaging

This paper addresses the state-of-the-art nano-science and technology regarding next generation high density microelectronics and photonics packaging applica-tions, including carbon nanotubes (CNTs) for electrical/thermal devices, and molecular wires for electrical interconnects, etc.     

Effects of poly‐γ‐glutamic acid on the physicochemical characteristics of skim milk yoghurt

The physicochemical and sensory properties of skim milk yoghurts containing poly‐γ‐glutamic acid (PGA) at different levels (0.0025, 0.005 and 0.01%) were evaluated. Addition of PGA up to 0.01% to reconstituted skim milk (11%, w/v) did not affect the growth of lactic acid bacteria or the development of titratable acidity in yoghurt, whereas full‐fat control yoghurt had reduced acid production. No changes were found in viable cell counts of PGA yoghurts during storage (4 weeks at 4 °C). The addition of PGA (0.005%) significantly decreased syneresis in skim milk yoghurt and did not cause any undesirable effects in sensory acceptability.     

DEVELOPMENT OF A BIOSENSOR WITH IMMOBILIZED L-AMINO ACID OXIDASE FOR DETERMINATION OF L-AMINO ACIDS

The objectives of this research were to investigate conditions for immobilization of L-amino acid oxidase (LAAO) on a preactivated nylon membrane, and to develop an enzyme sensor which can detect ammonia. LAAO was immobilized onto a preactivated nylon membrane. Optimal immobilization conditions were 0.3% glutaraldehyde, 1 mg bovine serum albumin, and 1.6 units of enzyme with 2 h coupling time. The enzymic membrane and an ammonium selective nonactin membrane were attached to an ammonia electrode to fabricate an L-amino acid sensor. L-amino acids were enzymatically degraded by immobilized LAAO, and the ammonia generated was measured by a potentiometric electrode at pH 8.5 and 45C. The sensor showed high relative activities for L-amino acids, and the responses of the sensor for phenylalanine and isoleucine were linear to 10 mM with a detection limit of 0.05 mM. The L-amino acid sensor was applied for monitoring increases in amino acids levels, expressed as L-isoleucine equivalents, during yeast autolysis. Determination of L-amino acids was complete in 3 min. Moreover, the activity of the enzymic membrane was stable for at least 260 assays, and did not noticeably decline for 2 months.     

Genetic-based fuzzy control for half-car active suspension systems

In this paper, a fuzzy controller is designed for automotive active suspension systems. A half-car model is used in order to consider the pitch angle of the body and the coupling dynamics of front and rear wheels. It is assumed that the three measurements of body acceleration, front suspension deflection and rear suspension deflection are available. The fuzzy control rules are separately designed for each measurement. After the fuzzy control rules are determined, a genetic algorithm is applied to tune the membership functions of these control rules. To measure the performance of the designed genetic-based fuzzy active suspension system, three road disturbance models are designed to simulate actual road conditions. The performance of the designed system is evaluated with respect to these disturbance models, and it is shown that the designed active suspension system provides good performance in improving ride quality and maintaining vehicle maneuvrability. It is also shown that the designed active suspension system shows robust performance with system model uncertainties.     

Signal processing for real-time identification of similar metals by laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy

Laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy(LIBS) is regarded as a promising technique for realtime sorting of scrap metals due to its capability of fast multi-elemental and in-air analysis. This work reports a method for signal processing which ensures high accuracy and high speed during similar metal sorting by LIBS. Similar metals such as aluminum alloys or stainless steel are characterized by nearly the same constituent elements with slight variations in elemental concentration depending on metal type. In the proposed method, the original data matrix is substantially reduced for fast processing by selecting new input variables(spectral lines) using the information for the constituent elements of similar metals. Specifically, principal component analysis(PCA) of full-spectra LIBS data was performed and then, based on the loading plots, the input variables of greater significance were selected in the order of higher weights for each constituent element. The results for the classification test with aluminum alloy, copper alloy,stainless steel and cast steel showed that the classification accuracy of the proposed method was nearly the same as that of full-spectra PCA, but the computation time was reduced by a factor of 20 or more. The results demonstrated that incorporating the information for constituent elements can significantly accelerate classification speed without loss of accuracy.