Effect of crack-growth mechanism on the prediction of fracture load of adhesive joints

This paper presents observations regarding the cracking behavior of tensile-loaded structural adhesive joints. Experiments showed that fracture occurred by the development and propagation of a damage zone, rather than a single, sharp crack, and that the presence of the adhesive spew fillet did not affect the fracture load of the adhesive joints studied. For joints bonded with the mineral-filled epoxy Cybond 4523GB (American Cyanamid), there was approximately 5 mm of subcritical crack propagation prior to final fracture. Fracture-load predictions based on the initial uncracked geometry made in previous papers were unaffected by this small change in geometry. For joints bonded with the rubber-toughened epoxy Permabond ESP 310, approximately 50 mm of subcritical crack propagation was observed. It was again found that predictions made in previous papers on the basis of the initial geometry gave a good estimate of the final fracture load even though this subcritical crack propagation significantly altered the geometry, and thus the applied energy release rates. The effect of shear deformations of the adherends was also investigated, and it was found that shear deformations could be neglected in engineering calculations for joints subject to remote tensile loading.     

Tabletability of Maltodextrins and Acetaminophen Mixtures

Tabletability of five types of maltodextrin, a filler/binder excipient, was studied by testing their loading potentials with acetaminophen. The formulations consisted of excipient and acetaminophen at five different ratios and magnesium stearate at a 0.5% concentration. These mixtures were compacted employing an Integrated Compaction Research System at a constant punch velocity of 100 mm/sec. under varying applied pressures from 50 to 450 MPa. Compaction data were evaluated using the total work of compaction vs applied pressure plots whilst the post-compaction tests included the measurements of crushing force, disintegration time, and friability of the resulting tablets. Both the energy involved during the compaction of a formulation and the crushing force values of the resulting tablets decreased as the amount of the maltodextrin in a formulation was reduced. Maltodextrins exhibited adequate binding potential at acetaminophen drug loading levels of only up to twenty-five percent. The disintegration times of the tablets containing maltodextrins were generally prolonged and this was found to be due to the formation of a “gel” layer around the tablet which formed on immersion into water. The tabletability of maltodextrins were also compared to that of Fast-Flo lactose, and the compactability of these excipients were found to be similar.     

Smart cars, smart highways

Advanced electronics is being used to unclog the transportation network and allow private vehicles, trucks, buses and trains to move further faster. already a range of technologies and ideas have been explored, deployed, and tested as part of the Intelligent Vehicle Highway System programs in the United States and Japan, and in the Road Transport Informatics program in Europe. The authors describe how these latest electronics for automobiles and roadways herald far fewer traffic jams, greater safety, and perhaps even a decline in pollution     

Approximation of certain functions given by integrals with highlyoscillatory integrands

There is often a need to approximate integrals of highly oscillatory functions when studying scattering and diffraction of electromagnetic waves. This paper presents a method of estimating certain types of these integrals by evaluating one interpolating function and performing one or two relatively easy numerical integrations. The method is demonstrated for the case of a Fresnel integral     

A theoretical and numerical analysis of the measured equation ofinvariance

The measured equation of invariance (MEI) has been previously introduced to efficiently and accurately handle the boundary truncation for finite methods. The present authors give a theoretical analysis that provides several important insights into the capabilities of the MEI. From the numerical study, they can explain why the MEI works better than one would expect. Both the theoretical and the numerical analyses demonstrate that the accuracy of the solution is dependent on the electrical size of the geometry as well as the distance between the mesh boundary and the geometry. From the analysis, the authors propose a new set of metrons that is less sensitive to the excitation than the previously proposed sinusoidal metrons     

Scattering by spherically stratified microwave lens antennas

A comprehensive treatment of scattering by sources in the region of a spherically stratified object composed of discrete shells is presented and compared with measured results. The work encompasses the developments necessary for a thorough understanding of the focusing mechanism of a spherical lens. The method used is a modal technique that employs separation of variables in order to determine an eigenfunction representation of the incident and scattered fields. This formulation provides the Green's function required for the calculation of the scattering from a multiple layered sphere excited by an infinitesimal current element. The algorithm allows both near- and far-field predictions. The scattering by more complicated source field distributions is modeled by applying superposition with the appropriate coordinate transformations. From a practical standpoint, the present analysis allows the limitations of spherical lenses to be determined while providing the information required to optimize the lens design. A system was built based on the new design data, and its measured radiation characteristics are compared to the theoretical predictions. Excellent agreement is observed in most cases     

Combined statistical study of joint angles and ground reactionforces using component and multiple correspondence analysis

The purpose of this research is to propose a general methodology to draw gait patterns when including hip, knee and ankle angle excursions in the sagital plane and the three components of the ground reaction force. The multidimensional signal analysis procedure is divided into three main stages: 1) describing the six signals of each step through sliding averages computed for successive time windows, 2) analyzing separately the six step-by-window tables obtained for each signal through principal component analysis to reduce the excessive quantity of data, and 3) analyzing the most informative time windows of the six signals at the same time. To emphasize both linear and nonlinear relationships between the respective time windows, the signal range within a window is cut into fuzzy modalities such as, “low” “medium” and “large.” The resulting table is investigated using multiple correspondence analysis. The outcomes are gait patterns combining both time and space aspects. The factor planes obtained from multiple correspondence analysis constitute initial data models so that new data obtained from pathological gait can be directly projected onto them. Such an operation can be used to show how the rehabilitation of a particular subject evolves in relation to normal gait patterns     

Experiments on hot electron noise in semiconductor materials forhigh-speed devices

Experimental results on noise temperature and spectral density of current fluctuations (electron diffusion) at high electric fields in silicon, gallium arsenide, and indium phosphide are presented. The dominant noise sources are discussed in their relation to electron scattering mechanisms. Physical backgrounds of high speed-low noise performance (noise-speed tradeoff) are considered. Suppression in short samples of the fluctuations having long correlation time constant and (or) high threshold energy is discussed