A First Principle Study of Co2CrZ (Z=In, Sn, Sb) Based on FP-LAPW Method

The structural and electronic properties of Heusler alloys Co₂CrZ (Z=In, Sn, Sb) have been studied using the generalized gradient approximation (GGA) and local spin density approximation (LSDA), respectively. Among the systems under investigation, Co₂CrSb gives 100 % spin polarization at E _F . Co₂CrSb is the most stable Half-Metallic Ferromagnets (HMFs) with an energy gap 0.25 eV at the Fermi level in the spin-down channel. We have also found that the increase in the total magnetic moment as Z goes from In to Sb. The calculated density of states (DOS) and band structures shows the half-metallic ferromagnets (HMF) character of Co₂CrSb.     

Structural,electronic,magnetic and optical properties of neodymium chalcogenides using LSDA+U method

正We have studied the electronic,magnetic and optical properties of neodymium chalcogenides by performing LSDA+U and full potential linearized augmented plane wave(FP-LAPW) method.The electronic structure calculation shows that the electronic states in Nd-chalcogenides were mainly contributed by Nd-4f electrons near Fermi energy and 3p,4p and 5p state electrons of X(S,Se and Te),respectively.We have also studied the absorption of light via the imaginary parts of the dielectric function of Nd-chalcogenides.     

Structural, electronic, magnetic and optical properties of neodymium chalcogenides using LSDA+U method

We have studied the electronic,magnetic and optical properties of neodymium chalcogenides by performing LSDA+U and full potential linearized augmented plane wave (FP-LAPW) method.The electronic structu...     

The formation of MgZnO luminescent ceramics

Mg_xZn_1−xO is a promising alloy system with UV-tunable bandgap. The alloy can have the hexagonal or cubic structure depending on the composition x and growth conditions. We present studies of the optical and material properties of Mg_0.1Zn_0.9O and Mg_0.6Zn_0.4O sintered ceramics. The rationale for choosing these compositions is that alloys of both the wurtzite and the cubic phases, respectively, can be investigated. To study the alloying dynamics for the optimization of light emission, the properties as a function of annealing temperature in the range of 600–1,100 °C were investigated via micro-photoluminescence, X-ray diffraction, and imaging techniques. For the Mg_0.1Zn_0.9O it was found that a threshold temperature of ~900 °C is required in order to initiate the formation of the solid solution with the wurtzite structure. At the elevated temperature regime, the photoluminescence energy for this ceramic sample shifted from 3.25 to 3.5 eV, while the ceramic retained the wurtzite structure. The Mg_0.6Zn_0.4O was found to have a sequence of phases: initially the alloy formed with the wurtzite structure, and then a transition into the NaCl cubic structure took place. Similar to the Mg_0.1Zn_0.9O, a threshold temperature of ~900 °C was required in order to initiate the alloying process. At that temperature regime an alloy was formed with the wurtzite structure, and its photoluminescence energy was ~3.25 eV. At ~1,100 °C the alloy was found to undergo a phase transition from wurtzite to cubic structure. The photoluminescence energy at that temperature was considerably shifted into the UV-range of 4 eV.     

From symmetric AC/AC to asymmetric AC/graphite,a progress in electrochemical capacitors

Graphitic carbon instead of activated carbon has been employed as the positive electrode material in the activated carbon (AC)/carbon capacitors using organic electrolytes. The advantageous electrochemical performance of the AC/graphite capacitors has been investigated as compared with the AC/AC capacitors. The charge storage mechanism of anions on the graphite positive electrodes in the AC/graphite capacitors has been studied by in situ XRD measurements.     

Bioethanol production from renewable polymer lichenan using lichenase from an alkalothermophilic Thermomonospora sp. and thermotolerant yeast

Biomass feedstocks available decentrally will be more commodious for localized biorefinery approach than the exhaustive large scale and centralized plants driven by cost intensive technology. Lichen is present in a wide range of habitats in a distributed manner. A maximum hydrolysis of 73%-76% for lichenan from Cetraria islandica, Usnea barbata and Parmelia sp. were obtained in 24 h using lichenase from an alkalothermophilic Thermomonospora sp. wherein the hydrolysis was 100% with commercial enzyme Accellerase™1000. The synergistic role of β-glucosidase in lichenan hydrolysis was demonstrated by the exogenous addition of β-glucosidase to Thermomonospora lichenase which resulted in complete hydrolysis. The hydrolysates of lichenan obtained using Accellerase or a cocktail of Thermomonospora lichenase and β-glucosidase when fermented with free cells of Saccharomyces at 40 °C produced an ethanol yield of 0.45 g/g-0.48 g/g with theoretical conversion efficiencies of 93%-96%. The Ca-alginate immobilized yeast cells were reused eight times at 40 °C with 100% fermentation efficiency.     

Transmission loss allocation in a power market using artificial neural network

An artificial neural network (ANN)-based solution of the transmission loss allocation problem in a power market is suggested. The ANN proposed in this paper is a multilayer Perceptron network based on Levenberg–Marquardt algorithm and is capable of allocating losses to the agents identified as transactions in a power market. The network has a dynamic composition in the sense that it has to be trained afresh for determining the loss allocation of every transaction scenario instead of a network which is trained only once for all possible scenarios. The training dataset required is only a few in numbers and is filtered out from a large pool of data. The data pool includes the transactions values and their corresponding allocation of losses computed according to some established allocation method. Performance of the NN following game theoretic and proportional allocation of losses has been reported. Results are produced on standard test systems for bilateral and pool market operations.     

Preserving Privacy of Software-Defined Networking Policies by Secure Multi-Party Computation

In software-defined networking (SDN), controllers are sinks of information such as network topology collected from switches. Organizations often like to protect their internal network topology and keep their network policies private. We borrow techniques from secure multi-party computation (SMC) to preserve the privacy of policies of SDN controllers about status of routers. On the other hand, the number of controllers is one of the most important concerns in scalability of SMC application in SDNs. To address this issue, we formulate an optimization problem to minimize the number of SDN controllers while considering their reliability in SMC operations. We use Non-Dominated Sorting Genetic Algorithm II (NSGA-II) to determine the optimal number of controllers, and simulate SMC for typical SDNs with this number of controllers. Simulation results show that applying the SMC technique to preserve the privacy of organization policies causes only a little delay in SDNs, which is completely justifiable by the privacy obtained.

     

An efficient frontier for sum deviation JIT sequencing problem in mixed-model systems via apportionment

In this paper, the sum deviation just-in-time (JIT) sequencing problem in mixed-model production systems is studied relating with the discrete apportionment problem together with their respective mathematical formulations. The assignment formulation for the first problem is brieffy discussed followed by the existence of JIT cyclic sequences. Presenting the concise discussion on divisor methods for the discrete apportionment problem, we have proposed two mean-based divisor functions for this problem claiming that they are better than the existing divisors; hence, we found a better bound for the JIT sequencing problem. The linkage of both the problems is characterized in terms of similar type of objective functions. The problems are shown equivalent via suitable transformations and similar properties. The joint approaches for the two problems are discussed in terms of global and local deviations proposing equitably efficient solution.