Lessons from the Kaufman Assessment Battery for Children (K-ABC): Toward a new cognitive assessment model.

When the Kaufman Assessment Battery for Children (K-ABC; A. S. Kaufman & N. L. Kaufman, 1983a, 1983b) was published just over 10 years ago, it had many unique features, including its information processing model and specific recommendations for educational remediation. Although the test has received much attention because of these characteristics, the K-ABC has also been the subject of much controversy. Through consideration of some of these arguments, lessons that researchers in the field of child assessment may learn from the K-ABC and their implications for future directions are identified. Based in part on lessons from the K-ABC, an alternative assessment model for the evaluation of children with reading problems is proposed at the end of this article. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)     

InSe Schottky Diodes Based on Van Der Waals Contacts

2D semiconductors are excellent candidates for next‐generation electronics and optoelectronics thanks to their electrical properties and strong light‐matter interaction. To fabricate devices with optimal electrical properties, it is crucial to have both high‐quality semiconducting crystals and ideal contacts at metal‐semiconductor interfaces. Thanks to the mechanical exfoliation of van der Waals crystals, atomically thin high‐quality single‐crystals can easily be obtained in a laboratory. However, conventional metal deposition techniques can introduce chemical disorder and metal‐induced mid‐gap states that induce Fermi level pinning and can degrade the metal‐semiconductor interfaces, resulting in poorly performing devices. In this article, the electrical contact characteristics of Au–InSe and graphite–InSe van der Waals contacts, obtained by stacking mechanically exfoliated InSe flakes onto pre‐patterned Au or graphite electrodes without the need for lithography or metal deposition is explored. The high quality of the metal‐semiconductor interfaces obtained by van der Waals contact allows to fabricate high‐quality Schottky diodes based on the Au–InSe Schottky barrier. The experimental observation indicates that the contact barrier at the graphite–InSe interface is negligible due to the similar electron affinity of InSe and graphite, while the Au–InSe interfaces are dominated by a large Schottky barrier.     

Effect of inclination on gas-fluidized beds of fine cohesive powders

Results are presented of an experimental investigation on how bed inclination affects the fluidization and sedimentation behavior of fine cohesive particles. In contrast with the expected Geldart C behavior, and due to self-agglomeration, these fine particles are uniformly fluidized by gas in a vertically oriented bed, displaying a fluid-like regime and expanding smoothly as the gas velocity is increased. When the gas flow supply to the bed is suddenly stopped, the initial sedimentation velocity of the vertically oriented bed is similar to the fluidizing gas velocity as corresponds to uniform fluidization. The main effect of inclination is to induce fluidization heterogeneity. The local gas velocity increases in the adjacent region to the upper wall at the expense of the region adjacent to the lower wall. This situation anticipates the onset of local bubbling in the region adjacent to the upper wall. Meanwhile the region adjacent to the lower wall remains in a solid-like state and does not reach the fluid-like state until values of the gas flow are applied much higher than those needed in a vertical fluidized bed. As a consequence, the expansion and fluidization uniformity of the tilted bed are hindered. If the gas supply to the inclined bed is suddenly stopped, and because of induced heterogeneity, sedimentation takes place at a decreased rate as compared with sedimentation velocity in the uniformly fluidized vertical bed.     

Adaptive attenuation of unknown and time‐varying narrow band and broadband disturbances

In many classes of applications like active vibration control and active noise control, the disturbances can be characterized by their frequency content and their location in a specific region in the frequency domain. The disturbances can be of narrow band type (simple or multiple) or of broad band type. A model can be associated to these disturbances. The knowledge of this model allows to design an appropriate control system in order to attenuate (or to reject) their effect upon the system to be controlled. The attenuation of disturbances by feedback is limited by the Bode Integral and the ‘water bed’ effect upon the output sensitivity function. In such situations, the feedback approach has to be complemented by a ‘feedforward disturbance compensation’ requiring an additional transducer for obtaining information upon the disturbance. Unfortunately, in most of the situations, the disturbances are unknown and time‐varying and therefore an adaptive approach should be considered. The generic term for adaptive attenuation of unknown and time‐varying disturbances is ‘adaptive regulation’ (known plant model, unknown, and time‐varying disturbance model). The paper will review a number of recent developments for adaptive feedback compensation of multiple unknown and time‐varying narrow band disturbances and for adaptive feedforward compensation of broad band disturbances in the presence of the inherent internal positive feedback caused by the coupling between the compensator system and the measurement of the image of the disturbance. Some experimental results obtained on a relevant active vibration control system will illustrate the performance of the various algorithms presented. Some open research problems will be mentioned in the conclusion. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Compartments for Synthetic Cells: Osmotically Assisted Separation of Oil from Double Emulsions in a Microfluidic Chip

Liposomes are used in synthetic biology as cell-like compartments and their microfluidic production through double emulsions allows for efficient encapsulation of various components. However, residual oil in the membrane remains a critical bottleneck for creating pristine phospholipid bilayers. It has been discovered that osmotically driven shrinking leads to detachment of the oil drop. Separation inside a microfluidic chip has been realized to automate the procedure, which allows for controlled continuous production of monodisperse liposomes.     

Comparative study of the effect of sulfur on the morphology and rheological properties of SB‐ and SBS‐modified asphalt

The modification of asphalt with styrene‐ butadiene block copolymers and sulfur was studied to elucidate the effect of the molecular characteristics of the polymer, polymer content, and sulfur/polymer ratio on the physical properties of modified asphalts. Two types of styrene‐butadiene copolymers were used (SB and SBS), which differed considerably in terms of their chain architecture, average molecular weights, and size and distribution of their polybutadiene and polystyrene blocks, as shown by gel permeation chromatography, infrared spectroscopy, nuclear magnetic resonance, and differential scanning calorimetry. Sulfur/polymer/asphalt blends were prepared by a hot mixing process and characterized by conventional tests, fluorescence microscopy, and rheology. The results revealed that the morphology of the blends is strongly dependent on polymer concentration and sulfur/polymer ratio. In‐depth rheological characterization showed that the thermomechanical properties changed considerably upon addition of small amounts of sulfur. Collectively, these results suggest that sulfur increases the compatibility between polymer and asphalt by crosslinking polymer chains. Interestingly, the rheological behavior of blends prepared with a combination of SB and sulfur was similar to that exhibited by blends prepared with SBS either in the presence or absence of sulfur. This is explained by assuming that the addition of small amounts of sulfur to SB‐modified asphalt facilitates the formation of an elastomeric network that resembles the one found in SBS‐modified asphalt, effectively contributing to asphalt reinforcement. Nonetheless, the exact dosage of sulfur must be carefully controlled to prevent gel formation. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Appl Polym Sci, 2010     

A Spanish Inter-laboratory Comparison on the Characterization of Sterilization Autoclaves

Sterilization autoclaves are devices used to sterilize equipment and supplies; their users require a periodic determination of their performance to ensure that the required temperature is reached and maintained for the predefined time interval. Within the ENAC (Entidad Nacional de Acreditación, Spanish national accreditation body) Temperature and Humidity Technical Subcommittee, it was decided to carry out an inter-laboratory comparison on the characterization of sterilization autoclaves aiming to demonstrate the equivalence among the test procedures of the different participants. This paper presents the data processing and the results of this comparison that showed some discrepancies in the stability and uniformity measurements due to different parameter definitions and a probable underestimation of some uncertainty sources. The results show good agreement among the participants in the estimation of the set-point correction, while the estimation of the device stability and uniformity was not compatible in some cases. The use of wired or wireless sensors did not bias the results, but the laboratories that used pt-100 obtained results that underestimated the value of the thermal stability, probably due to their higher thermal mass and response time.     

A New Constitutive Strain-Dependent Garofalo Equation to Describe the High-Temperature Processing of Materials—Application to the AZ31 Magnesium Alloy

A new strain-dependent equation derived from that of Garofalo is developed in this work. This equation describes mathematically the deformation behavior of materials as a function of strain, strain rate, and temperature and is valid over a wide range of strain with good statistical accuracy. An explicit expression s( e) = f( e,T,[(e)\dot] ) \sigma \left( \varepsilon \right) = f\left( {\varepsilon ,T,\dot{\varepsilon }} \right) is introduced that reproduces stress-strain curves. Statistical tools for determining the validity of the equation have been applied. Predictions from this expression were compared with torsion data obtained in AZ31 magnesium alloy that was deformed at various temperatures and strain rates. Analysis of the strain dependence of the Garofalo parameters allowed us to establish a steady state at strains of about 0.6. It also allows drawing conclusions about the microstructural changes that occur during deformation of the alloy. In addition, the characteristic points in the evolution with strain of the parameters of the equation are related to the most significant values that characterize the microstructural processes occurring during deformation of the AZ31 alloy. The observed decrease of Q and n as a function of strain is attributed first to a softening process due to dynamic recrystallization and grain size refinement and finally to flow localization. The predicted values obtained with the new constitutive equation and the experimental values for the AZ31 alloy are in good agreement with an average relative error of about 6.5 pct.