Nitrites Derived From Foneiculum Vulgare (Fennel) Seeds Promotes Vascular Functions

Abstract: Recent evidence has demonstrated that nitrites play an important role in the cardiovascular system. Fennel (Foneiculum vulgare) seeds are often used as mouth fresheners after a meal in both the Indian sub‐continent and around the world. The present study aims to quantify the nitrite and nitrates in fennel seeds as well as elucidating the effect of fennel derived‐nitrites on vascular functions. Results from our study show that fennel seeds contain significantly higher amount of nitrites when compared to other commonly used post‐meal seeds. Furthermore our study confirmed the functional effects of fennel derived‐nitrites using in vitro and ex vivo models that describe the promotion of angiogenesis, cell migration, and vasorelaxation. We also showed that chewing fennel seeds enhanced nitrite content of saliva. Thus our study indicates the potential role of fennel derived‐nitrites on the vascular system. Practical Application: This study is focused on determining the effect of fennel‐derived nitrites on angiogenesis (the formation of new blood vessels from pre‐existing ones), cell migration, and vasorelaxation (dilation of blood vessels) thereby preserving cardiovascular health.     

Influence of plastic deformation in flexible pad laser shock forming – experimental and numerical analysis

Flexible Pad Laser Shock Forming (FPLSF) is a new microforming process using laser-induced shock pressure and a hyperelastic flexible pad to induce high strain-rate (~10⁵ s^?1) plastic deformation on metallic foils to produce 3D microcraters. This paper studies the effect of two significant process parameters of FPLSF, flexible pad material and its thickness, on the deformation characteristics of the metal foils using experiments and finite element analysis. A finite element model is developed to simulate the FPLSF process. The stress-strain distribution across the foil and the flexible pad at different process stages of FPLSF are studied using FE analysis. Flexible pad materials including silicone rubber, polyurethane rubber, and natural rubber with thicknesses ranging between 300 μm and 3000 μm have been investigated in detail. Experimental results highlight that both the hardness and thickness of the flexible pad significantly influence the deformed crater geometry, thickness distribution across the formed crater and surface hardness at the crater surfaces. The experimental results are correlated with the stress-strain distributions from finite element analysis to study the underlying behaviors.     

Towards Deployable,Distributed ISP Traffic Filtering for the Cloud-Era

Traditionally Internet Service Providers (ISPs) have used a centralized traffic filtering architecture, wherein unwanted traffic heading towards a customer who subscribes to their filtering service is diverted to a security data center (SDC); from where only traffic deemed wanted is re-routed back to the customer using an overlay network of tunnels. Given the huge volumes of traffic that are being seen today, this centralized architecture’s scalability is already being stretched from a network capacity point of view. Moreover, the traffic diversion mechanism used necessitates configuring and maintaining tunnels, which is a network management overhead. We argue that this centralized architecture and tunnel necessitating traffic diversion mechanism will not scale as we move further along into the era where ISPs are becoming or providing connectivity to cloud providers. We propose a distributed architecture with multiple SDCs that scales from a capacity perspective, and describe how a standardized router capability, Border Gateway Protocol—Flow Specifications, can be used to selectively propagate traffic diversion routes which eliminates the need for tunnels. Furthermore, we show how the assigning of arriving traffic to specific SDCs can be modeled and solved as a mathematical optimization problem, which enables automated instantiation of the filtering service and also helps quantify the benefits of the distributed architecture from a capacity utilization perspective.     

Novel 1,3,4-oxadiazole derivatives as efficient sensitizers for dye-sensitized solar cells: A combined experimental and computational study

We have synthesized and characterized donor–π–spacer–acceptor type molecules in which 1,3,4-oxadiazoles are π-spacers, triphenylamines are the donors and cyanoacetic acid are the acceptors for use as sensitizers in dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs). Detailed absorption, emission, electrochemical, photoelectrochemical and computational studies have been carried out on five novel derivatives. The dyes have an absorption range of 377–388 nm, and an emission in the range of 494–540 nm. There is a large charge transfer from the donor side to the acceptor side on excitation. The propeller shape of the triphenylamine and the bulky substituents on it help in reducing the dye-aggregation on TiO₂ surface. The dyes exhibited good overall conversion efficiency (2.79–3.21%). Plane wave calculations indicate that the dye has a reasonably strong binding to the TiO₂ surface and the generated DOS picture shows an overlap of the molecular orbitals of the dye and the TiO₂ bands. We conclude that the dyes have a promising role as sensitizers in DSSC.     

Carbothermal nitridation process of mechanically milled silica sand using Taguchi's method

This paper reported on the work performed to study the formation of silicon nitride and silicon carbide whiskers using the carbothermal nitridation process. A distinctive aspect of the present study lies in the use of the mechanical milling method to alter the regularity of the crystalline network of the silica sand. In order to optimise the processing parameters for the synthesis of silicon carbide, the concept of Taguchi's Design of Experiments was considered, the analysis being based on Taguchi's signal to noise ratio and variance techniques to obtain optimum combination of process parameters. Important factors influencing the formation of silicon carbide were the duration of the mechanical milling, followed by temperature, time and heating rate.     

Influence of Microstructure and Surface Activation of Dual‐Phase Membrane Ce0.8Gd0.2O2−δ–FeCo2O4 on Oxygen Permeation

Dual‐phase oxygen transport membranes are fast‐growing research interest for application in oxyfuel combustion process. One such potential candidate is CGO‐FCO (60 wt% Ce_0.8Gd_0.2O_2?δ–40 wt% FeCo₂O₄) identified to provide good oxygen permeation flux with substantial stability in harsh atmosphere. Dense CGO‐FCO membranes of 1 mm thickness were fabricated by sintering dry pellets pressed from powders synthesized by one‐pot method (modified Pechini process) at 1200°C for 10 h. Microstructure analysis indicates presence of a third orthorhombic perovskite phase in the sintered composite. It was also identified that the spinel phase tends to form an oxygen deficient phase at the grain boundary of spinel and CGO phases. Surface exchange limitation of the membranes was overcome by La_0.6Sr_0.4Co_0.2Fe_0.8O_3?δ (LSCF) porous layer coating over the composite. The oxygen permeation flux of the CGO‐FCO screen printed with a porous layer of 10 μm thick LSCF is 0.11 mL/cm² per minute at 850°C with argon as sweep and air as feed gas at the rates of 50 and 250 mL/min.     

Electrical and Dielectric Properties of Non-magnetic Al<Superscript>3+</Superscript> Substituted Ni–Zn Nano Ferrites for High Frequency Applications

The effect of Al substitution on electrical and dielectric parameters of Ni–Zn ferrite has been discussed in the present work. The phase identification, surface morphology was studied using X-ray diffractometer (XRD), scanning electron microscope (SEM), respectively. The XRD patterns confirm the single-phase formation of these ferrites. With Al³⁺, substitution lattice parameter decreases due to smaller Al³⁺ ions replacing Fe³⁺ ions. The average grain size obtained from SEM results are in the range of 390–27 nm. The DC resistivity was observed to increase with increasing Al³⁺ ions concentration due to the unavailability of Fe³⁺ ions. Dielectric constant (\(\upvarepsilon ^{\prime }\)) and dielectric loss tangent (tan δ) have been studied as a function of frequency (1 kHz–10 MHz) and temperature (50–300 °C). The observed results are explained on the basis of interfacial polarization as predicted by Maxwell and Wagner.     

Formulation and characterization of hybrid polymeric/ZnO nanocomposite coatings with remarkable anti-corrosion and hydrophobic characteristics

In this study, ZnO nanoparticles ranging from 1 to 8% (w/w) were introduced into a hybrid acrylic-silicone polymeric matrix to achieve nanocomposite coating systems with remarkable anti-corrosion and hydrophobic characteristics. The chemical structure of the developed hybrid polymeric matrix was investigated using Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, whereas the morphology and wettability of the developed surfaces were determined using field emission scanning electron microscopy and contact angle measurements (CA), respectively. Furthermore, the anti-corrosion performance and the barrier properties over 60 days of exposure to a 3.5% NaCl solution were studied by electrochemical impedance spectroscopy. All the obtained results revealed that the presence of ZnO nanoparticles significantly influences the performance of the acrylic-silicone polymeric matrix. A coating system with 3% wt ZnO nanoparticles demonstrated the most pronounced anti-corrosion properties and also achieved the highest CA, with a value of 95.6°.     

Investigation of Subthreshold Characteristics of Negative Capacitance Single-Active Layer Double-Gate (NC-SALDG) Thin-Film Transistor (TFT)

Silicon - In this paper, for the first time, the performance evaluation of negative capacitance single-active layer double-gate (NC-SALDG) TFT is presented. In the proposed NC-SALDG TFT, amorphous...