Experimental Determination of Fracture Toughness of CFRP in Mode II by Raman Spectroscopy

Fracture toughness of Mode II of carbon fiber reinforced plastic (CFRP) was investigated using end notched flexure (ENF) specimens and a Raman coating method. Distribution of shear strain near the crack tip of CFRP was measured by Raman spectroscopy. A thin film of PbO on the measured surface of the ENF specimen was deposited by physical vapor deposition (PVD) as pretreatment to measure the strain by Raman spectroscopy. Fracture toughness of CFRP in Mode II was determined using the Raman results. The results coincided closely with those measured by the compliance method and FEM analyses (finite element method).     

Present Status of the Nd:YAG Thomson Scattering System Development for Time Evolution Measurement of Plasma Profile on Heliotron J

A new high repetition rate Nd:YAG Thomson scattering system is developed for the Heliotron J helical device.A main purpose of installing the new system is the temporal evolution measurement of a plasma profile for improved confinement physics such as the edge transport barrier (H-mode) or the internal transport barrier of the helical plasma.The system has 25 spatial points with ～10mm resolution.Two high repetition Nd:YAG lasers (>550mJ@ 50Hz) realize the measurement of the time evolution of the plasma profile with ～10ms time intervals.Scattered light is collected by a large concave mirror (D=800 mm,f/2.25) with a solid angle of ～100 mstr and transferred to interference filter polychromators by optical fiber bundles in a staircase form.The signal is amplified by newly designed fast preamplifiers with DC and AC output,which reduces the low frequency background noise.The signals are digitized with a multi-event QDC,fast gated integrators.The data acquisition is performed by a VME-based system operated by the CINOS.     

Supplemental Literature Review of Binary Phase Diagrams: Cs-In, Cs-K, Cs-Rb, Eu-In, Ho-Mn, K-Rb, Li-Mg, Mg-Nd, Mg-Zn, Mn-Sm, O-Sb, and Si-Sr

Recent literature on Cs-In, Cs-K, Cs-Rb, Eu-In, Ho-Mn, K-Rb, Li-Mg, Mg-Nd, Mg-Zn, Mn-Sm, O-Sb, and Si-Sr phase diagrams is reviewed in this article in order to update the 1990 compilation Binary Alloy Phase Diagrams, 2nd edition, by T.B. Massalski, et al. For some systems reaction tables and crystal structure data have been included, as well. Diagrams have been checked for consistency with rules for phase diagram construction and modified when necessary. In addition, diagrams needing more work have been identified.     

Immobilization of multicopper oxidase from Pyrobaculum aerophilum onto an electrospun-aligned single-walled carbon nanotube surface via a carbon-nanotube-binding peptide for biocathode

Biofuel cells (BFCs) that produce electrical energy from organic resources through enzymatic reactions have been attracting significant attention. Owing to the high electrical conductivity of carbon nanotubes (CNTs), their modification on the electrode surface of a BFC is expected to increase the current, and their high specific surface area may be useful in increasing the power output. Previously, we constructed a biocathode by immobilizing multicopper oxidase from Pyrobaculum aerophilum (McoP) with a carbon nanotube binding peptide (CBP) sequence on the CNTs. This resulted in higher current densities than when using enzymes without CBP sequences. However, owing to the randomly stacked CNTs on the surface of the electrodes, their conductive properties were impaired and performance as biocathodes was poor. Herein, we constructed a biocathode in which single-walled CNTs (SWCNTs) were oriented one-dimensionally and McoP is immobilized on the surface of an SWNCT via CBP. The current density was successfully increased by two-fold by orienting the CNTs and orienting and immobilizing McoP on their surfaces. This technology provides insights into the development of biodevices with controlled orientation of both the SWCNTs and enzymes immobilized on their surfaces.     

A TEM study on melt-crystallized poly(butylene terephthalate)

A study was made to investigate an optimum condition for ruthenium tetraoxide staining of poly(butylene terephthalate) (PBT) with glass transition temperature as low as ca. 23 degrees C for TEM observation of melt-grown PBT crystals. The morphological study of ultrathin sections prepared based on optimum staining at 25 degrees C for 8 h revealed formation of fringed-micellar crystal nuclei in the early stage and folded-chain fringed-micellar crystals in the later stage of isothermal crystallization at 40 degrees C from melt. The fraction of chain-folded crystals increased with increasing crystallization temperature from the quantitative analysis of crystal thickness in comparison with the reported morphology using the replica method.     

Monitoring biofilm development in a microfluidic device using modified confocal reflection microscopy

The feasibility of a method to monitor biofilm development non-destructively in a microfluidic device was addressed. Here, we report that biofilm growth could be non-destructively monitored by an image analysis technique based on modification of confocal reflection microscopy.     

Iron Loss Calculation of AC Filter Inductor for Three‐Phase PWM Inverters

In recent years, remarkable advancement of new power semiconductor devices, such as SiC and GaN, enables the increase of switching frequency of power converters, and hence the volume of passive components, such as ac filters and transformers, can be reduced. However, temperature rise caused by the inductor loss is increasing, and hence iron loss evaluation of the inductor is one of the most important issues to realize high power density converters. Conventionally, an improved generalized Steinmetz equation (iGSE) has proposed in order to calculate the iron loss under a pulse voltage magnetizing condition. However, accurate iron loss calculation of the ac filter inductor used in a PWM inverter cannot be realized. The authors have proposed two methods of iron loss evaluation of ac filter inductors. The first one is a loss map method which can calculate the iron loss without using a real PWM inverter. Another one is an ILA (Inductor Loss Analyzer) which can measure the iron loss in every switching period in a real PWM inverter. In this paper, comparisons of the iron loss between the ILA and the loss map method on both the single‐phase and three‐phase inverters are studied. It is found that iron loss of the ac filter inductor in the three‐phase PWM inverter which is calculated by the loss map method cause a large error on a specific condition. In order to prevent the calculation error, the authors proposed a revised loss map method and proved the effectiveness of the method.     

Parallel processing of an object space for image synthesis using ray tracing

This paper presents a novel parallel processing system for image synthesis using ray tracing. An object space is divided into parts (subspaces), each of which is allocated to a processor. The processor detects, simultaneously the intersections of the surfaces of each object and a fixed number of rays over the whole space, and calculates the local intensity on an object in each subspace. The global intensities of pixels on a screen are calculated by the other kind of processors simultaneously. We also present the optimal data structure, based on an adaptive division algorithm, for parallel processing of the object space.     

Illuminance dependency of L/Y (lightness/luminance-factor)-ratio effect

Using a modified model for predicting the perceived lightness of chromatic object colors for various adapting illuminances, the following two kinds of predictions were done for seven illuminance levels from 2 to 3000 lx on the basis of the Wysecki data. One concerned the contour lines of equal L/Y (lightness/luminance-factor) ratios in the whole chromaticity gamut, and the other the values of L/Y ratios for spectral colors. All the colors predicted have tristimulus value Y = 20. The computed results confirmed that the difference of L/Y-ratio effect found between the Wysecki and the Sanders-Wyszecki experiment was caused by the difference of the test adapting illuminance between them.     

Fabrication of uniform Al-Pb-Bi monotectic alloys under microgravity utilizing the Space Shuttle: microstructure and superconducting properties

Al-Pb-Bi monotectic alloys with three different compositions were melted and solidified under a microgravity environment in the Space Shuttle. The (Pb, Bi) particles were dispersed uniformly in the aluminium matrix, while evident sedimentation was observed in the reference sample processed under 1 G. Slow cooling was also effective to obtain homogeneous microstructure because of the absence of Marangoni force. The alloys were cold-worked into wires and the superconducting properties of the wires were investigated. The distance between (Pb, Bi) fibres for the alloys prepared under microgravity was so small that the wires showed complete zero resistance below 9 K due to the proximity effect.