Semantic Mediation for Standard-Based B2B Interoperability

The authors discuss a semantic-mediation architecture to advance traditional approaches for standards-based business-to-business (B2B) interoperability. The architecture is supported by the Athena Knowledge Representation and Semantics Mediation tool suite. Initial experimentations with the architecture and the toolset offer discussions of key architectural and functional aspects and suggest directions for future tools enhancements.     

Thermoplastic polyurethane elastomers from modified oleic acid

Two novel potentially biodegradable thermoplastic polyurethane elastomers with unique structure and morphology were prepared from modified oleic acid. The hardness and mechanical properties were controlled by adjusting the soft segment concentration (SSC). Epoxidized methyl oleate was converted to methyl‐9‐ or ?10‐hydroxystearate (hydroxystearate) by catalytic hydrogenation. The formed hydroxystearate was transesterified with 1,6‐hexanediol to obtain polyesterpolyol with molar mass 2500. Segmented polyurethanes with 50% and 70% SSC were prepared using the prepolymer method by reacting polyesterpolyol with diphenylmethane diisocyanate and 1,4‐butanediol as chain extender. Thermal and mechanical properties of the polymers indicated good micro‐phase separation. Both soft and hard segments displayed a certain degree of crystallization. Tensile strengths were 18 and 2.4 MPa for samples with 50% and 70% SSC, respectively. Elongations of 130% (50% SSC) and 43% (70% SSC) were somewhat lower than in comparable materials, presumably due to lower molar mass. © 2014 Society of Chemical Industry     

Stress, race, and body weight.

Objective: Stress has been identified as a significant factor in health and in racial/ethnic health disparities. A potential mediator in these relationships is body weight. Design: Cross-sectional and longitudinal relationships between stress, race, and body weight were examined in an ethnically diverse sample of overweight and obese women with Type 2 diabetes (n = 217) enrolled in a behavioral weight loss program. Main Outcome Measures: Stress (Perceived Stress Scale) was assessed at baseline only and body weight (body mass index) was assessed at baseline and 6 months. Results: Stress was not related to baseline body weight. With every 1 unit lower scored on the baseline stress measure, women lost 0.10 kg ± .04 more at 6 months (p     

On the Capacity of IEEE 802.11 DCF with Capture in Multipath-Faded Channels

In this paper, we estimated the influence of capture effect over the capacity of IEEE 802.11b DCF within a single picocell. The channel utilization is examined analytically by introducing two capture models based on Rayleigh-distributed envelopes of the captured and the interfering frames divided into two local-mean power classes. Simulations in a pure Rician-faded channel depict the conditions under which both Rayleigh-faded capture models can be used to accurately predict the peak network capacity. Unlike the RTS/CTS handshake access mode, Basic access mode is significantly sensitive to the capture ratio, i.e., the receiver design. The packet size threshold over which it is convenient to switch from Basic to RTS/CTS handshake access scheme is also sensitive to the capture effect.     

Simulation of melt jet breakup and debris bed formation in water pools with IKEJET/IKEMIX

The objective of the development of the code system KESS is simulating the processes of core melting, relocation of core material to the lower head of the reactor pressure vessel (RPV) and its further heatup, modelling of fission product release and coolability of the core material. In the scope of the code development, IKEJET and IKEMIX were designed as key models for the breakup of a molten jet falling into a water pool, cooling of fragments and the formation of particulate debris beds. Calculations were performed with these codes, simulating FARO corium quenching experiments at saturated (L-28) and subcooled (L-31) conditions, as well as PREMIX experiments, e.g. PM-16. With the assumption of a reduced interfacial friction between water and steam as compared to usually applied laws, the melt breakup, energy release from the melt and pressurisation of the vessel observed in the experiments are reproduced with a reasonable accuracy. The model is further applied to reactor conditions, calculating the relocation of a mass of corium of 30 t into the lower plenum, its fragmentation and the formation of a particle bed.     

Implementation Issues in Turbo Decoding for 3GPP FDD Receiver

In the Frequency Division Duplex (FDD) mode of the Third Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) standard, implementation of the turbo decoder, especially for the mobile equipments, faces design decisions related to computational complexity, power efficiency, and memory requirements. In this paper we compare different approaches of low complexity implementation of the turbo decoder, with emphasis on the issues of signal scaling and quantization, the sliding window operation for memory size reduction and the iteration stopping algorithms. The demodulated signal at the output of the RAKE receiver may have a wide dynamic range and it may require many bits of precision. In order to overcome the numerical precision problem and to prevent Log Likelihood ratio (LLR) metric overflow, a scaling algorithm must be used. Our simulation results indicate that the Average Absolute (AA) algorithm using dynamic scaling outperforms other scaling schemes and it is less sensitive to the channel conditions. One of the major challenges in the implementation of a practical turbo decoder is optimization of memory requirements. In this paper we evaluate the performance of the sliding window algorithm using different main and guard window sizes. We show that the bit and block error rate performance of the sliding window scheme mainly depend on the guard window size rather than the main window size. The simulation results indicate that small guard window sizes can significantly decrease the iteration gain for large frames in fast fading channels. Iteration stopping algorithms reduce the power consumption and the latency of the decoder and help to dedicate more resources to other functions of the receiver. The block error distribution in the fading channels makes it even more essential to use an iteration stopping rule. Our simulations conclude that a rule called the minimum absolute value appears to be a very effective, low complexity and robust algorithm. Mohamadreza Marandian Hagh was born in Tabriz, Iran on January 1974. He received the B.S. and the M.S. degrees in electrical engineering from Tehran University with honors in 1996 and 1999, respectively. He is pursuing the Ph.D. degree in electrical engineering at Northeastern University, Boston. His research interests includes information theory, channel coding and iterative techniques for wireless communication systems. His current research is focused on low complexity designs for iterative receivers using Space-Time coding in time-dispersive channels. He is also interested in Exit-Chart analysis of iterative receivers. From 1996 to 1999, he was with Sana Pro Inc. as a system engineer, developing simulation tools for OFDM, WCDMA, CDMA2000. He is currently with Airvana Inc. in Chelmsford, MA and working on 1xEVDO wireless systems. Masoud Salehi received BS degree (Summa Cum Laude) from Tehran University and MS and Ph.D. degrees from Stanford University all in Electrical Engineering. Before joining Northeastern, he was with the Departments of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Isfahan University of Technology and Tehran University. From February 1988 to May 1989 Dr. Salehi was a visiting professor at the Information Theory Research Group, Department of Electrical Engineering, Eindhoven University of Technology, The Netherlands, where he did research in network information theory and coding for storage media.In 1989 Dr. Salehi joined Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Northeastern University. Professor Salehi is a member of the CDSP (Communication and Digital Signal Processing) Center. His main areas of research interest are network information theory, source-channel matching problems in single and multiple user systems, data compression, turbo coding, coding for fading channels, and digital watermarking. Professor Salehi’s research has been supported by research grants from the National Science Foundation (NSF), GTE, NUWC, CenSSIS, and Analog Devices. Professor Salehi has also done consulting to the industry including Teleco Oilfield Services and AT&T. Professor Salehi is currently a member of the Editorial Board of The International Journal of Electronics and Communications.Professor Salehi is the coauthor of the textbooks “Communication Systems Engineering”, Prentice-Hall 1994, 2002, “Contemporary Communication Systems Using MATLAB and Simulink” Thomson 1998, 2000, 2004, and “Fundamentals of Communication Systems”, Prentice-Hall 2005. Abhay Sharma received B.E. (Hons) Electrical and Electronics Engineering degree from Birla Institute of Technology and Science, Pilani, India in 1996 and M.S. Electrical Engineering degree from Ohio State University, Columbus in 2000. From 2000 to 2005 he was working with Analog Devices, RF and Wireless Systems Group, Wilmington, USA, where he was working on design and implementation of algorithms for the emerging cellular communication standards. Currently he is working with Allgo Embedded Systems, Bangalore, India, in the area of wireless networks and systems based on the emerging W-PAN wireless technologies. Zoran Zvonar received the Dipl. Ing. degree in 1986 and the M.S. degree in 1989, both from the Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Belgrade, Yugoslavia, and the Ph.D. degree in Electrical Engineering from the Northeastern University, Boston, in 1993.From 1986 to 1989 he was with the Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Belgrade, Belgrade, Yugoslavia, where he conducted research in the area of telecommunications. 1993 to 1994 he was a Post-Doctoral investigator at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, Woods Hole, MA, anconducted research on multiple-access communications for underwater acoustic networks. Since 1994 he has been with the Analog Devices, Communications Division, Wilmington, USA. He is the Manager of the Systems Engineering Group focusing on the design of algorithms and architectures for wireless communications, with emphasis on integrated solutions and real-time software.He was a Guest Editor of the IEEE Transactions on Vehicular Technology, the International Journal of Wireless Information Networks and the ACM/Baltzer Wireless Networks, Associate Editor of the IEEE Communications Letters and a co-editor of the books GSM: Evolution Towards Third Generation Systems, Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1998, Wireless Multimedia Networks Technologies, Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1999 and Software Radio Technologies: Selected Reading, IEEE Press, 2001. Dr. Zvonar is currently Co-Editor of the Radio Communication Series in the IEEE Communications Magazine.     

Microstructural, XRD and electrical characterization of some thick film resistors

The microstructural and electrical characteristics (sheet resistivities, TCRs, and noise indices) of some 1 k/sq. and 10 k/sq. thick films were evaluated. The conductive phase was determined by X-ray diffraction (XRD) analysis. The microstructures of fired resistors were investigated by scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and analyzed by energy dispersive spectrometry (EDS). Some resistors were fired for a relatively long time at the highest temperature, i.e., 6 h at 850 °C, to allow the reactions in the material to reach equilibria. Sheet resistivities, temperature coefficients of resistivity, and noise indices of these resistors were compared with normally (10 min at 850 °C) fired resistors. After 6 h firing absolute temperature coefficient of resistivity (TCR) values of most resistors increased significantly, while sheet resistivities decreased. Complex impedance analysis showed that in most cases resistors with low noise indices showed nearly ideal resistor response while those with higher noise had a larger imaginary part.     

On multidimensional generalized homogeneous random fields inR n

Theory of Computing Systems -     

A characterisation of thick film resistors for strain gauge applications

Some commercial thick film resistors with sheet resistivities from 1 kohm/sq. up to 1 Mohm/sq. were evaluated for strain gauge applications. Temperature coefficients of resistivity, noise indices and gauge factors (GFs) were measured. For the same resistor series GFs and noise indices increase with increasing sheet resistivity. However, both GFs and noise indices are different for resistors with the same nominal sheet resistivity but from different resistor series. The results indicated that the microstructure rather than the different chemical composition of the conductive phase in thick film resistors is the primary reason for the different gauge factors.