APPLICATION OF THE PARTIAL ELIMINATION ALGORITHM FOR SOLVING THE COUPLED ENERGY EQUATIONS IN POROUS MEDIA

This article discusses the solution of coupled energy equations in local thermal nonequilibrium models for porous media. The decoupled solution approach, in which the interaction between the solid and the fluid temperature fields is treated in an explicit manner, converges very slowly when the interface heat transfer coefficient and/or the specific surface area of the porous medium are large (large Biot number). An attractive alternative to the decoupled approach is the partial elimination algorithm, proposed by D. B. Spalding. In this algorithm, the discretization equations are rearranged so that the resulting equations are more implicit and take directly into account the coupling between the two phases. The convergence rates of these two solution procedures are studied with reference to convective heat transfer in a two-dimensional channel filled with a porous medium. The partial elimination algorithm converges much more quickly than the decoupled procedure, with the number of iterations required for convergence becoming constant for large Biot numbers.     

新一代高性能、低功耗模拟应用需要更高的处理能力

说起电子产品,一般人都会想起大屏幕电视、手机、计算机、DVD播放器、MP3播放器、数码相机、数码摄像机、个人媒体播放器、便携式计算机设备等。但在日常生活中还有许多其他电子产品,只是不常见而已,诸如新一     

在高速数据采集系统中采用全差分放大器设计

引言在通信、成像、检测仪器、视频和多媒体等高速数据采集应用系统中，信号的完整性非常重要。许多工程人员正在寻找全差分处理方案。全差分结构本身所固有的优势有：·可以抑制外部共模噪声源(来自电源或其它电路)。·几乎可以消除偶阶次谐波。·每个差分输出所要求的电压摆幅仅为单端输出的一半，因此，可减小失真并降低对电源的要求。所有高性能高速数据转换器现在都使用差分输入来提高性能。最常见的是，在ADC之前要求带有放大、阻抗匹配、滤波和电平转换。全差分信号处理同以前的设计过程有所不同，本文的目的是指出所存在的设计问…     

Design of an i.v. formulation of an unstable prodrug candidate for prostate cancer treatment: solution chemistry of N-(glutaryl-hyp-ala-ser-cyclohexylglycyl-gln-ser-leu)-doxorubicin

The chemical degradation of N-(glutaryl-hyp-ala-ser-cyclohexylglycyl-gln-ser-leu)-doxorubicin (henceforth referred to as doxorubicin peptide conjugate 1) was studied in buffered aqueous solution. The pH-rate profile of degradation shows that the doxorubicin conjugate is most stable between pH 5 and 6. The dependence of log k_obsd on pH in acidic medium is characteristic of specific acid-catalysis of the sugar hemiaminal of 1 (as in the case of doxorubicin). Isolation of degradates and structural determination shows that the degradation at lower pH values yields the water-insoluble aglycone doxorubicinone, supporting the mechanism of acid-catalyzed loss of the amino sugar. At pH higher than 5, a more complicated degradation pattern is observed, including the loss of the amino sugar and the aromatization of the saturated ring to give 7,8-dehydro-9,10-desacetyldoxorubicinone as one of the major products. Around the pH of maximum stability in solution, the rate of degradation of 1 is significantly greater than that for doxorubicin, which rules out the formulation of a room temperature solution product with a sufficiently long shelflife for market use. Design of a stable lyophilized formulation for sterile reconstitution based on the physicochemical properties of 1 is described.     

Functional Properties of Soy Protein Isolates Produced from Ultrasonicated Defatted Soy Flakes

This study aimed to determine the effect of pretreating defatted soy flakes with ultrasound on soy protein isolate (SPI) yield and functionality. Defatted soy flakes dispersed into water (16%, w/w) were sonicated for 30, 60 and 120 s at ultrasonic amplitudes of 21 and 84 μm_pp (peak to peak amplitude in μm), representing low and high power, respectively. The power densities were 0.30 and 2.56 W mL⁻¹, respectively. The SPI yield increased by 13 and 34%, after sonication for 120 s at low and high power, respectively. The sonication of defatted soy flakes for 120 s at the higher power level improved the SPI solubility by 34% at pH 7.0, while decreasing emulsification and foaming capacities by 12 and 26%, respectively, when compared to control SPI. Rheological behavior of the SPI was also modified with significant loss in consistency coefficient due to sonication. Some of these results could be explained by the loss of the protein native state with increased sonication time and power.     

Oxidative degradation studies of an oxazolidinone-derived antibacterial agent, RWJ416457, in aqueous solutions

The rates of oxidative degradation of a new antibacterial drug, RWJ416457, in aqueous solutions were investigated over the pH-range of 2 to 10. Two oxidative degradates were identified and the influences of pH, buffer concentration, metal ions, metal chelating agents, and temperatures were studied. The pH, metal chelating agents, and metal ions significantly changed the product distribution in addition to the degradation rate. Oxidative degradation is believed to follow a hydrogen abstraction (HAT) pathway. One degradate was the major product under acidic conditions and its predominance is attributed to a resonance-stabilized intermediate. The importance of the resonance structure was diminished under neutral and basic conditions. The product distribution changed and two degradates were formed in equal amounts. The study results guided the formulation development to minimize oxidation.     

The interaction between cytoplasmic dynein and dynactin is required for fast axonal transport

Fast axonal transport is characterized by the bidirectional, microtubule-based movement of membranous organelles. Cytoplasmic dynein is necessary but not sufficient for retrograde transport directed from the synapse to the cell body. Dynactin is a heteromultimeric protein complex, enriched in neurons, that binds to both microtubules and cytoplasmic dynein. To determine whether dynactin is required for retrograde axonal transport, we examined the effects of anti-dynactin antibodies on organelle transport in extruded axoplasm. Treatment of axoplasm with antibodies to the p150(Glued) subunit of dynactin resulted in a significant decrease in the velocity of microtubule-based organelle transport, with many organelles bound along microtubules. We examined the molecular mechanism of the observed inhibition of motility, and we demonstrated that antibodies to p150(Glued) disrupted the binding of cytoplasmic dynein to dynactin and also inhibited the association of cytoplasmic dynein with organelles. In contrast, the anti-p150(Glued) antibodies had no effect on the binding of dynactin to microtubules nor on cytoplasmic dynein-driven microtubule gliding. These results indicate that the interaction between cytoplasmic dynein and the dynactin complex is required for the axonal transport of membrane-bound vesicles and support the hypothesis that dynactin may function as a link between the organelle, the microtubule, and cytoplasmic dynein during vesicle transport.     

Atomistic visualization: Space–time multiresolution integration of data analysis and rendering

Time-varying three-dimensional scattered data representing snapshots of atomic configurations produced by molecular dynamics simulations are not illuminating by themselves; gaining insight into them poses a tremendous challenge. In order to take the advantage of maximal information offered by these simulations, we have proposed an efficient scheme, which integrates various analysis and rendering tasks together in order to support interactive visualization of the data at space–time multiresolution. Additional data produced by various analytical techniques on the fly represent the atomic system under consideration at diverse length- (e.g., nearest neighbor, next-nearest neighbor or beyond) and time- (e.g., instantaneous, finite intervals or overall averages) scales. In particular, the radial distribution functions, coordination environments, clusters and rings are computed and visualized to understand the structural behavior whereas a variety of displacement data and covariance matrices are explored to understand the dynamical behavior. While the spatial distributions of atoms need to be reproduced correctly during rendering, we take the advantage of high flexibility in rendering other attributes because of the lack of their direct physical relevance. A combination of different techniques including animation, color maps, pathlines, different types of glyphs, and graphics hardware accelerated approach is exploited to render the original and extracted data. First-principles molecular dynamics simulation data for liquid systems are used to justify the effectiveness and usefulness of the proposed scheme.     

Capacity reserve assessment using system well-being analysis

Deterministic methods are widely used in operating reserve assessment and in small isolated power system capacity planning. These approaches do not normally include any explicit recognition of system risk and do not provide comparable risks for systems of different size or composition. Many large power systems, therefore, use probabilistic methods for generation adequacy evaluation. The reluctance to utilize the existing probabilistic techniques in both large and small systems dictates a need to create a bridge between the two different approaches. This paper presents a new probabilistic method designated as `system well-being analysis', which incorporates the accepted deterministic criteria in the definition of `healthy' and `marginal' power system states. This paper illustrates methodologies to evaluate the system well-being indices of practical systems and describes how they can be used in the assessment of power system capacity reserves     

Understanding the High Performance of over 15% Efficiency in Single‐Junction Bulk Heterojunction Organic Solar Cells

The highly efficient single‐junction bulk‐heterojunction (BHJ) PM6:Y6 system can achieve high open‐circuit voltages (V_OC) while maintaining exceptional fill‐factor (FF) and short‐circuit current (J_SC) values. With a low energetic offset, the blend system is found to exhibit radiative and non‐radiative recombination losses that are among the lower reported values in the literature. Recombination and extraction dynamic studies reveal that the device shows moderate non‐geminate recombination coupled with exceptional extraction throughout the relevant operating conditions. Several surface and bulk characterization techniques are employed to understand the phase separation, long‐range ordering, as well as donor:acceptor (D:A) inter‐ and intramolecular interactions at an atomic‐level resolution. This is achieved using photo‐conductive atomic force microscopy, grazing‐incidence wide‐angle X‐ray scattering, and solid‐state ¹⁹F magic‐angle‐spinning NMR spectroscopy. The synergy of multifaceted characterization and device physics is used to uncover key insights, for the first time, on the structure–property relationships of this high‐performing BHJ blend. Detailed information about atomically resolved D:A interactions and packing reveals that the high performance of over 15% efficiency in this blend can be correlated to a beneficial morphology that allows high J_SC and FF to be retained despite the low energetic offset.