On IEEE P1500's Standard for Embedded Core Test

The increased usage of embedded pre-designed reusable cores necessitates a core-based test strategy, in which cores are tested as separate entities. IEEE P1500 Standard for Embedded Core Test (SECT) is a standard-under-development that aims at improving ease of reuse and facilitating interoperability with respect to the test of core-based system chips, especially if they contain cores from different sources. This paper briefly describes IEEE P1500, and illustrates through a simplified example its scalable wrapper architecture, its test information transfer model described in a standardized Core Test Language, and its two compliance levels. The standard is still under development, and this paper only reflects the view of six active participants of the standardization committee on its current status.     

Ni-doped TiO2 hollow spheres as electrocatalysts in water electrolysis for hydrogen and oxygen production

This work represented the electrocatalytic properties of Ni-doped titania hollow sphere materials in hydrogen and oxygen evolution during water electrolysis from acidic media. Titania hollow sphere particles were synthesized using poly(styrene-methacrylic acid) latex as template material, and various amount of nickel were doped over the sphere using nickel (II) sulfate as the precursor of nickel. The presence of rutile TiO₂ and NiO phases were revealed during XRD analysis, indicating the critical growth of nickel on the surface of the hollow sphere catalysts. BET surface area results also shown the 166.76 m² g^?1 value for 30 wt% Ni/TiO₂ hollow sphere sample. The SEM and TEM images were confirmed the hollow sphere structure of the catalysts with diameter of 0.8–0.9 μm. The cyclic voltammetric studies proved the presence of both hydrogen and oxygen evolution peaks for all the hollow sphere samples. The anodic peak current density value, which usually represents the oxygen evolution phenomenon, was revealed as 13 mA cm^?2 for 25 wt% Ni-loaded sample; whereas, the hydrogen evolution peak was most intense for 30 wt% Ni/TiO₂ material with cathodic peak current density of 32 mA cm^?2. The average value of ?1.42 were determined as the reaction order of the system irrespective of the nickel loading and heating duration in the synthesis of hollow sphere materials. During photocatalytic water splitting, 30 wt% Ni/TiO₂ hollow sphere sample yielded the highest amount of hydrogen in all irradiation time span.     

Stabilising Cobalt Sulphide Nanocapsules with Nitrogen-Doped Carbon for High-Performance Sodium-Ion Storage

Conversion-type anode materials with a high charge storage capability generally su er from large volume expansion, poor electron conductivity, and sluggish metal ion transport kinetics. The electrode material described in this paper, namely cobalt sulphide nanoparticles encapsulated in carbon cages(Co9S8@NC), can circumvent these problems. This electrode material exhibited a reversible sodium-ion storage capacity of 705 mAh g^-1 at 100 mA g^-1 with an extraordinary rate capability and good cycling stability. Mechanistic study using the in situ transmission electron microscope technique revealed that the volumetric expansion of the Co9S8 nanoparticles is bu ered by the carbon cages, enabling a stable electrode–electrolyte interface. In addition, the carbon shell with high-content doped nitrogen significantly enhances the electron conductivity of the Co9S8@NC electrode material and provides doping-induced active sites to accommodate sodium ions. By integrating the Co9S8@NC as negative electrode with a cellulose-derived porous hard carbon/graphene oxide composite as positive electrode and 1 M NaPF6 in diglyme as the electrolyte, the sodium-ion capacitor full cell can achieve energy densities of 101.4 and 45.8 Wh kg^-1 at power densities of 200 and 10,000 W kg^-1, respectively.     

Application of artificial bee colony algorithm for inverse modelling of a solar collector

This paper deals with the inverse analysis of a double-glazed flat-plate solar collector using the artificial bee colony (ABC) optimization algorithm. In domestic water heating, both low and high heat output from the solar collector is undesirable, so the solar collector is required to supply the hot water at a particular temperature only, which in turn requires a given distribution of heat loss factor. With this criterion, the present analysis is aimed at predicting feasible dimensions and configurations of a solar collector satisfying a prescribed distribution of heat loss factor using ABC algorithm. It is observed that many feasible alternatives of unknowns exist which satisfy a prescribed requirement, and using the ABC algorithm, the size of the solar collector can be minimised by 6–32% with reference to the existing records. The effects of changing ambient conditions are also studied. Furthermore, a comparative study of the ABC algorithm against other heuristic algorithms reveals its suitability and efficacy for the present estimation problem.     

Second Order Training of a Smoothed Piecewise Linear Network

In this paper, we introduce a smoothed piecewise linear network (SPLN) and develop second order training algorithms for it. An embedded feature selection algorithm is developed which minimizes training error with respect to distance measure weights. Then a method is presented which adjusts center vector locations in the SPLN. We also present a gradient method for optimizing the SPLN output weights. Results with several data sets show that the distance measure optimization, center vector optimization, and output weight optimization, individually and together, reduce testing errors in the final network.     

Application of combinatorial tests in video game testing

Video games comprise a multi-billion-dollar industry. Companies invest huge amounts of money for the release of their games. A part of this money is invested in testing the games. Current game testing methods include manual execution of pre-written test cases in the game. Each test case may or may not result in a bug. In a game, a bug is said to occur when the game does not behave per its intended design. The process of writing the test cases to test games requires standardization. We believe that this standardization can be achieved by implementing experimental design to video game testing. In this research, we discuss the implementation of combinatorial testing, specifically covering arrays, to test games. Combinatorial testing is a method of experimental design that is used to generate test cases and is primarily used for commercial software testing. In addition to the discussion of the implementation of combinatorial testing techniques in video game testing, we present an algorithm that can be used to sort test cases to aid developers in finding the combination of settings resulting in a bug.     

Synthesis and Characterization of ZnO/CuO Nanocomposites as an Effective Photocatalyst and Gas Sensor for Environmental Remediation

Journal of Inorganic and Organometallic Polymers and Materials - Current study delineates the synthesis and environmental applications of ZnO/CuO nanocomposite in photocatalysis and gas sensing....     

An energy efficient stable clustering approach using fuzzy extended grey wolf optimization algorithm for WSNs

Wireless Networks - Wireless sensor network (WSN) is a cost-effective networking solution for information updating in the coverage radius or in the sensing region. To record a real-time event, a...