Benign Approach of Plant-Derived Inhibitor: Assessing Their Anticorrosive Activity on Mild Steel in Acidic Media

Journal of Failure Analysis and Prevention - The dissolution behavior of mild steel in 2 M H2SO4 with various concentrations of Borassus Flabellifer Seed Food (BFSF), Musa Paradisiaca Dry...     

Design of all-optical AND,OR, and XOR logic gates using photonic crystals for switching applications

Photonic Network Communications - We propose a photonic crystal-based all-optical AND, OR, and XOR logic gates using square lattice silicon rods with air background. The design of proposed logic...     

Rule‐Based Anomaly Detection Technique Using Roaming Honeypots for Wireless Sensor Networks

Because the nodes in a wireless sensor network (WSN) are mobile and the network is highly dynamic, monitoring every node at all times is impractical. As a result, an intruder can attack the network easily, thus impairing the system. Hence, detecting anomalies in the network is very essential for handling efficient and safe communication. To overcome these issues, in this paper, we propose a rule‐based anomaly detection technique using roaming honeypots. Initially, the honeypots are deployed in such a way that all nodes in the network are covered by at least one honeypot. Honeypots check every new connection by letting the centralized administrator collect the information regarding the new connection by slowing down the communication with the new node. Certain pre‐defined rules are applied on the new node to make a decision regarding the anomality of the node. When the timer value of each honeypot expires, other sensor nodes are appointed as honeypots. Owing to this honeypot rotation, the intruder will not be able to track a honeypot to impair the network. Simulation results show that this technique can efficiently handle the anomaly detection in a WSN.     

Corrosion protective performance studies of coating systems in soda ash chemical industry

Organic coatings are widely used to protect steel structures. The performance of the coating system depends upon the atmospheric conditions prevailing in the chemical industry. Before selecting a protective system, the corrosivity of the atmosphere has to be determined. A study has been made for selecting a good protective system for a soda ash chemical industry where chemicals such as soda ash, sodium chloride and hydrochloric acid are produced by using sea water as a raw material. Under these conditions, after collecting the corrosivity rate at various places of industrial areas, coated steel panels with various paint combinations were exposed in different sites for a period of 2 years. The performance of the coatings was monitored by EIS studies besides visual inspection. The corrosion protection performance of the various coating systems of zinc rich primer with different types of under coats and top coats has been studied and the results are reported.     

A novel method for a high enrichment of human corneal epithelial stem cells for genomic analysis

Understanding the molecular mechanisms that regulate the corneal epithelial stem cells (CESCs) in maintaining corneal homeostasis remains elusive largely due to the lack of a specific marker for their isolation. This study aims to enrich CESCs from human donor limbal epithelium and to evaluate the level of enrichment based on expression of ΔNp63α, a putative CESC marker. A two‐stage enrichment of CESCs was carried out. (a) The limbal basal epithelial cells were isolated by differential enzymatic treatment and five‐fold enrichment was achieved from 2% of CESCs present in the total limbal epithelium. The CESCs were quantified on the basis of two parameters—high expression of p63/ABCG2 and nucleus to cytoplasmic (N/C) ratio ≥0.7. (b) Cytospin smears of isolated basal cells were Giemsa stained and cells with N/C ratio ≥0.7 were separated by laser capture microdissection. This strategy resulted in an enrichment of CESCs to 78.57% based on two‐parameter analysis using p63 and 76.66% using ABCG2. RT‐PCR was carried out for ΔNp63 isoforms (α, β, and γ) and connexin‐43, with GAPDH for normalization. The expression of ΔNp63α was restricted to the enriched population of CESCs in contrast to its absence in limbal basal cells with N/C ratio <0.7 and CCECs. The unique expression of ΔNp63α and 5.9‐fold reduced connexin‐43 expression in the enriched population of CESCs indicates its high purity. Further analysis of these cells will help in elucidating the molecular mechanisms associated with stemness and also in identifying a specific marker for CESCs.     

Effect of cooling rate on the solidification Behavior of Al-7 Pct Si-SiCp Metal-Matrix Composites

The solidification behavior of two composites based on Al-Si alloy has been investigated as a function of cooling rate. Thermal analysis techniques have been used to establish the relationship between solidification history and the microstructure developed. The results of thermal analysis show that the characteristic parameters are influenced by the cooling rate. A marked difference in these parameters is observed between the reinforced and the unreinforced materials at all cooling rates studied. The cooling rates used in the present study range from 0.3 to 20 K/s. Increasing the cooling rate is shown to affect the undercooling parameters both in the liquidus and eutectic solidification region. The eutectic growth temperature of the composites is observed to be higher than that of the base alloy at all cooling rates. The depression in eutectic temperature ΔT is found to decrease by 27 K for the unreinforced alloy (A356) and by 17 K for the com- posites (A356 + 10, 20 vol pct SiC) at a higher cooling rate of ≃16 K/s. The presence of SiC reinforcement is observed to suppress the Mg₂Si precipitate formation and decrease the amount of heat liberated during both primary and eutectic phase formation. Dendrite arm spacing (DAS) is correlated to the cooling rate by a relationship of the form DAS =A(T) ^-n, wheren is found to be of the order of 0.33.

     

Topological refinement procedures for triangular finite element meshes

This paper presents a topological approach to improve the quality of unstructured triangular finite element meshes. Topological improvement procedures are presented both for elements that are interior to the mesh and for elements connected to the boundary. Optimal ordering of the topology improvement operations and their efficient implementation is also discussed. Several example meshes are included to demonstrate the effectiveness of the approach in improving element quality in a finite element mesh.     

The Graham-Knowlton Problem Revisited

In the late 60s Graham and Knowlton introduced the WIP (wire identification problem) that affected electricians: match the wires in the ceiling to those in the basement while making the fewest trips. We revisit this problem and study its variants and generalizations; we provide a combinatorial characterization of the solution(s) in terms of an associated hypergraph and obtain nearly tight bounds on the minimum number of trips.     

Verification/validation of an economic process model for electric power generation in the united states

The purpose of this paper is to report how a verification/validation effort was completed for an economic process model of electric power generation in the United States. Primary emphasis in this effort was directed to replicating historical statistics in the 1965–69 and 1970–74 periods. This application effort was accomplished by working toward meaningful replication first for the South Central and Middle Atlantic Regions and second for a 16-region delineation of the contiguous 48 states. Results of both phases show least-cost solutions of the model, as revised in the effort, replicate well statistics for important categories of fuel use and capacity investments. In 6 aggregated regions, the modeling solutions explained 97% of the variance in coal use in 1969 and 93% of the variance in coal use in 1974. Also, the capacity investment solutions of the model explained 70% and 84% of the variance in coal investments in 1969 and 1974, respectively. In addition, solutions of the model seem to match unfolding fuel use and capacity investment trends very well for the 1975–85 period.