Reliability worth assessment in a developing country-residentialsurvey results

This paper presents the results of a residential customer survey conducted in service areas of the Nepal Integrated Electric Power System (NPS). The objective was to determine the power interruption costs incurred by the residential customers of a developing country, and extend the customer survey approach to reliability worth evaluation in a developing environment. Interruption cost estimates were obtained using in-person interviews with 944 sample customers. The results indicate the implications of service reliability to residential customers of Nepal, and show that reliability worth evaluation in a developing country is both possible and practical     

Efficient algorithms to compute Hankel transforms using wavelets

The aim of the paper is to propose two efficient algorithms for the numerical evaluation of Hankel transform of order ν, ν>−1 using Legendre and rationalized Haar (RH) wavelets. The philosophy behind the algorithms is to replace the part xf(x) of the integrand by its wavelet decomposition obtained by using Legendre wavelets for the first algorithm and RH wavelets for the second one, thus representing Fν(y) as a Fourier-Bessel series with coefficients depending strongly on the input function xf(x) in both the cases. Numerical evaluations of test functions with known analytical Hankel transforms illustrate the proposed algorithms.     

Guest–host interaction in ferroelectric liquid crystal–nanoparticle composite system

The present paper deals with the characterization of a ferroelectric liquid crystal–nanoparticle (FLC–NP) composite system. The dielectric, electrical and polarization property of the FLC–NP composite system have been studied as a function of temperature and frequency. Ferroelectric Cu-doped ZnO (Cu–ZnO) nanoparticles have been added to the pure ferroelectric liquid crystal (FLC) Felix 17/100. The nanoparticles are bigger in size as compared to FLC molecules; therefore, they distort the existing geometry of FLC matrix and set up an antiparallel correlation with the dipole moments of the host FLC molecules. This antiparallel correlation of guest–host geometry reduces the net ferroelectricity of the composite system and modifies all the physical properties of the pure FLC. The change in properties has been analysed and explained in the light of guest–host interaction.     

Optical and electrical characterization of conducting polymer-single walled carbon nanotube composite films

The optical and electrical properties of the conducting polymer poly(3-hexylthiophene) and single walled carbon nanotube (SWCNT) composites have been investigated. The composites were prepared by dispersing carbon nanotubes in the polymer matrix already dissolved in 1,2-dichlorobenzene. The optical absorption, photoluminescence (PL) and electrical conductivity of the composite was studied as a function of SWCNT concentration in the solution. The absorption coefficient of the polymer was found to be unaffected upto a SWCNT concentration 5% w/w. However a minor decrease in the absorption in visible region was observed for higher SWCNT concentrations. The intensity of PL emission from the composite was measured and was found to decrease with the increase in SWCNT concentration. For a SWCNT concentration of 30% w/w, ∼90% of the PL was quenched, indicating an ultra fast transfer of photoinduced charges from donor polymer to acceptor SWCNT. Direct current conductivity of the composite film was found to increase rapidly with the increase in SWCNT concentration and an increase of ∼5 orders of magnitude was observed for a 30% w/w concentration. The enhancement in conductivity is explained in terms of percolation theory with an estimated percolation threshold of 2% w/w.     

Fracture toughness—microstructure investigation of hyperbarically welded joints in offshore application

The metallurgical changes have been studied in a typical offshore structure material, BS4360 grade 50E steel at various simulated depths (0–185 m) in the dry underwater welding conditions and the weld metal and heat affected zone (HAZ) fracture toughness have been related with the microstructure and micromechanisms of fracture. The results indicated substantial decrease in weld metal CTOD toughness at 185 m welding depth whereas HAZ toughness remained generally unaffected. High toughness of weld metal was found to be associated with greater proportion of the polygonal and the acicular ferrites and negligible proportion of aligned cerbide. High HAZ toughness was due to fine ferrite (6–8 μm) and absence of martensite in the structure.     

Amino acid transport in cerebral microvessels during Plasmodium yoelii infection in mice

Plasmodium yoelii infected cerebral microvessels of mice had an enhanced time-dependent, temperature-sensitive, and saturable uptake of [14C]-amino acid. viz. leucine, valine and glycine. Metabolic inhibitors caused a noticeable inhibition of amino acid uptake in normal microvessels as compared to infected cerebral microvessels indicating that the uptake of [14C]-L-leucine, [14C]-L-valine and [14C]-glycine is an energy dependent process.     

Shrinkage testimation of the shape parameter of an inverse Gaussian distribution using a (α + β)min test

In this paper, we propose a shrinkage testimator for the shape parameter λ of an Inverse Gaussian distribution when the estimated value of λ is available in such a way that either λ = λ₁ or λ = λ₂(>;λ₁) is expected. The (α + β)_min test for testing the hypothesis H₀: λ = λ₁ against H₁: λ = λ₂ is derived. The shrinkage factors are chosen to be the function of the (α + β)_min test. The shrinkage testimator is found to be more efficient (in the sense of the MSE) than the UMVUE in certain parametric space.     

Effect of doping on TSD relaxation in cellulose acetate films

Thermally stimulated depolarization current (TSDC) studies have been performed on solution grown cellulose acetate films doped with different concentrations of acrylic acid (AA) prepared at the poling temperatures (40–75°C) with poling fields (10–50 kV/cm). The TSDC spectra of pure and AA doped CA films reveal two relaxation peaks at 80°C and 180 ±2°C, having activation energies centred around 0.25 and 0.55 eV. The phenomena of the existence of these current maxima have been analyzed and discussed in terms of the molecular motion of the polar side groups and release of the remaining part of the frozen dipoles by their cooperative motion with adjoining segments of the main polymer chain. The peak currents, released charge and activation energies associated with the peaks are affected by AA doping. The effect of doping with acrylic acid on the discharge current indicates the formation of molecular aggregates     

A shrinkage testimator for scale parameter of an exponential distribution

A shrinkage testimator, based on a test of hypothesis when an initial estimate of the scale parameter is available, has been proposed. The salient feature of the proposed testimator is that, being dependent on the test statistic, it removes arbitrariness in the choice of the shrinkage factor for a given level of significance. Expressions for bias, mean square error and relative efficiency with respect to the conventional estimator have been derived. Also, it has been shown that by taking the square of the shrinkage factor the relative efficiency of the testimator can be increased.