Spatial variability of soil hydraulic and physical properties in erosive sloping agricultural fields

It is essential to minimize soil quality degradation in sloping agricultural fields through stabilization and improvement of soil hydraulic properties using sustainable soil management. This study aimed to analyze the impact of different tillage practices, including conventional tillage (CT), minimum tillage (MT), and zero tillage (ZT), on soil hydraulic conductivity in a sloping agricultural field under maize–wheat rotation. The results showed that the highest runoff volume (257.40 m³), runoff coefficient (42.84%), and soil loss (11.3 t) were observed when the CT treatment was applied. In contrast, the lowest runoff volume (67.95 m³), runoff coefficient (11.35%), and soil loss (1.05 t) were observed when the ZT treatment was adopted. The soil organic carbon and aggregate mean weight diameter were found to be significantly greater (with mean values of 0.79% and 1.19 mm, respectively) with the ZT treatment than with the CT treatment. With the tilled treatments (CT and MT), substantial changes in the saturated soil hydraulic conductivity (k_s), near-saturated soil hydraulic conductivity (k), and water-conducting porosity (ε) were observed between two crop seasons. These three soil parameters were significantly higher in the period after maize harvesting than in the wheat growing period. In contrast, no significant difference in these soil parameters was found when the untilled treatment (ZT) was carried out. With regard to the slope positions, k_s, k, and ε showed different behaviors under different treatments. The toe slope position showed significantly lower k_s and ε values than the summit and middle slope positions. Of the evaluated tillage practices, ZT was found to be the most promising means to improve the soil hydro-physical properties and effectively reduce surface runoff and soil erosion.     

Synthesis of Cherry Stalk Extract Based Organic@Inorganic Hybrid Nanoflowers as a Novel Fenton Reagent: Evaluation of Their Antioxidant,Catalytic, and Antimicrobial Activities

First time in this study, organic@inorganic hybrid copper nanoflowers (Cu NFs) were synthesized by using cherry stem extract as an organic component and Cu²⁺ ion as an inorganic component. For this purpose, cherry stalk extracts were obtained by using ethanol and water solvents. Cu NFs were synthesized in different amounts of extract (100–1000 µl) and under various pH (7.4–9) conditions. The morphologies of the synthesized Cu NFs were evaluated by field emission scanning electron microscope (FE-SEM). The functional groups in the cherry stem extract, which play an active role for the synthesis process, and the crystal structure of NFs were investigated by Fourier transform ?nfrared spectroscopy and X-ray diffraction techniques, respectively. It has been determined by the FE-SEM analysis that ethanol and water based cherry stem extracts are suitable for Cu NFs synthesis in a wide range of pH (7.4–9). This data is crucial for overcoming important limitations for NF synthesis, such as narrow-range medium pH. The catalytic, antioxidant, and antimicrobial activities of Cu NFs were evaluated. It was revealed that Cu NFs have catalytic, antioxidant, and antimicrobial activities. It is recommended that, cherry stem extract and different inorganic components are functional to synthesize numerous NFs and to evaluate the adequacy of use in biomedical fields.

     

An optimal linear and elliptical antenna array design using black widow optimisation for 5G communication

This research illustrates a precise linear and elliptical antenna array design for synthesising the optimal far-field radiation pattern in the fifth-generation (5G) communication spectrum using a meta-heuristic optimisation technique known as black widow optimisation (BWO). 5G communication is an emerging technology with revolutionary changes in the wireless communication system with ultra-high data rate, enhanced capacity, low latency and good quality of service. An accurate antenna array design for an ideal far-field radiation pattern synthesis with a suppressed side lobe level (SLL) value and half power beam width (HPBW) is the most crucial aspect of 5G communications. A suppressed SLL is necessary to reduce interference in the entire side lobe region, whereas a low HPBW is required for long-distance communication. Here, the BWO is employed to find the optimal feeding current to each array element to lower the SLL and the HPBW value. The BWO algorithm sustains impeccable equity between the exploration and exploitation stages to impact different potential regions of the search space and generate new solutions to attain the global optima by evading the trap of local optima. The design examples of the linear antenna array (LAA) and elliptical antenna array (EAA) are illustrated in this article by applying the optimal feeding currents to each array element. Compared to the uniform antenna array and methodologies described in the recently published literature, the results obtained utilising the BWO algorithm for designing the LAAs and EAAs demonstrate a substantial development in the reduction of SLL and HPBW.     

Evolving Guide Subdivision

To overcome the well-known shape deficiencies of bi-cubic subdivision surfaces, Evolving Guide subdivision (EG subdivision) generalizes C² bi-quartic (bi-4) splines that approximate a sequence of piecewise polynomial surface pieces near extraordinary points. Unlike guided subdivision, which achieves good shape by following a guide surface in a two-stage, geometry-dependent process, EG subdivision is defined by five new explicit subdivision rules. While formally only C¹ at extraordinary points, EG subdivision applied to an obstacle course of inputs generates surfaces without the oscillations and pinched highlight lines typical for Catmull-Clark subdivision. EG subdivision surfaces join C² with bi-3 surface pieces obtained by interpreting regular sub-nets as bi-cubic tensor-product splines and C² with adjacent EG surfaces. The EG subdivision control net surrounding an extraordinary node can have the same structure as Catmull-Clark subdivision: two rings of 4-sided facets around each extraordinary nodes so that extraordinary nodes are separated by at least one regular node.     

Performance Assessment of Graded Channel Gate-Stack based Double Gate MOSFET for Bio-sensing Applications

Silicon - In this paper, the performance of the Asymmetric Gate Graded Channel Gate-Stack Double Gate (AG-GCGS-DG) MOSFET-based biosensor has been investigated for dielectric-modulated (DM)...     

Comparison of the Microstructures and Mechanical Properties in the Overlapping Region of Low Carbon Steel Additive Bead Fabricated by WAAM and FSP

Metallurgical and Materials Transactions A - The periodic structural characteristics of the grains in the overlapping region of the WAAM deposited additive bead translate into spatially dependent...     

Quadratic-Attraction Subdivision

The idea of improving multi-sided piecewise polynomial surfaces, by explicitly prescribing their behavior at a central surface point, allows for decoupling shape finding from enforcing local smoothness constraints. Quadratic-Attraction Subdivision determines the completion of a quadratic expansion at the central point to attract a differentiable subdivision surface towards bounded curvature, with good shape also in-the-large.     

Role of Process Parameters on Microstructural and Electronic Properties of Rapid Thermally Grown MoS2 Thin Films on Silicon Substrates

Silicon - Miniaturization of the semiconducting materials propelled the discovery of low dimensional transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDC) thin films. In this work, MoS2 thin films have been...