Property stabilization in filled,drawn polyethylene

Mechanical properties of high density polyethylene (HDPE) extended to draw ratios in the 20–40 range have been determined and compared with corresponding properties of the polymers containing particulates including rutile, carbon black, iron oxide, and mica. Shrinkage of drawn structures was studied to temperatures near the fusion of the polymer host. The degree of interaction at polymer/additive interfaces was varied by surface coating certain of the solids with standard coupling agents. Solids were found to increase tensile moduli and to decrease shrinkage, particularly at higher exposure temperatures. The magnitude of changes due to the presence of solids was shown to depend on the apparent interaction at contacts between host and additive. In a dispersion–force matrix, like HDPE, benefits were optimized when the particulates were amphoteric or neutral, rather than having pronounced acid or base interaction potentials.     

Gravity optimised particle filter for hand tracking

This paper presents a gravity optimised particle filter (GOPF) where the magnitude of the gravitational force for every particle is proportional to its weight. GOPF attracts nearby particles and replicates new particles as if moving the particles towards the peak of the likelihood distribution, improving the sampling efficiency. GOPF is incorporated into a technique for hand features tracking. A fast approach to hand features detection and labelling using convexity defects is also presented. Experimental results show that GOPF outperforms the standard particle filter and its variants, as well as state-of-the-art CamShift guided particle filter using a significantly reduced number of particles.     

Progressive events in supervisory control and compositional verification

This paper investigates some limitations of the nonblocking property when used for supervisor synthesis in discrete event systems. It is shown that there are cases where synthesis with the nonblocking property gives undesired results. To address such cases, the paper introduces progressive events as a means to specify more precisely how a synthesised supervisor should complete its tasks. The nonblocking property is modified to take progressive events into account, and appropriate methods for verification and synthesis are proposed. Experiments show that progressive events can be used in the analysis of industrial-scale systems, and can expose issues that remain undetected by standard nonblocking verification.     

Studies on chemical resistance of polyesters

Chlorendic anhydride based polyester ( I ,) tetrachlorophthalic anhydride based polyester ( II ), dibromoneopentyl glycol based polyester ( III ,) general purpose polyester ( IV ,) blend of dibromoneopentyl glycol based polyester with general purpose polyester ( V ,) chlorendic anhydride and dibromoneopentyl glycol based polyester ( VI ), and a blend of chlorendic anhydride based polyester and dibromoneopentyl glycol based polyester ( VII ) were prepared and their chemical resistance and moisture absorption studied in various reagents, acid, alkali, and water, at 25 and 65°C. It is found that the polyester ( III ) is the least affected in the presence of the acids. In 20% NaOH, there was a decrease in weight for all polyesters at both the temperatures compared to the control except the polyester ( VII ). Increase in weight of all the polyesters was observed during the absorption of moisture both at 25 and 65°C. The increase was higher at higher temperature. Polyester ( III ) thus shows the least absorption of moisture.     

Oxidation and sulfidation behavior of Fe-20Cr-16Ni-4Al-1Y2O3 oxide-dispersion-strengthened alloy

High-temperature oxidation and sulfidation studies were conducted on an oxide-dispersion-strengthened alloy of composition Fe-20Cr-16Ni-4Al-1Y₂O₃. The oxidation studies were conducted in air and low-PO₂ environments over a temperature range of 650–1200°C. Results are also reported on the sulfidation resistance of preformed oxide scales and the influence of reoxidation of preformed sulfide scales. Detailed microstructural results and x-ray diffraction analysis data are presented to substantiate the corrosion behavior of the alloy over the wide range of conditions anticipated in fossil-energy systems. Data are also presented on the corrosion behavior of the alloy in oxygen/sulfur mixed gas atmospheres, and the results are used to compare the corrosion behavior of the present alloy with other chromia- and alumina-forming alloys.     

Adaptive image denoising using cuckoo algorithm

This paper presents a novel denoising approach based on smoothing linear and nonlinear filters combined with an optimization algorithm. The optimization algorithm used was cuckoo search algorithm and is employed to determine the optimal sequence of filters for each kind of noise. Noises that would be eliminated form images using the proposed approach including Gaussian, speckle, and salt and pepper noise. The denoising behaviour of nonlinear filters and wavelet shrinkage threshold methods have also been analysed and compared with the proposed approach. Results show the robustness of the proposed filter when compared with the state-of-the-art methods in terms of peak signal-to-noise ratio and image quality index. Furthermore, a comparative analysis is provided between the said optimization algorithm and the genetic algorithm.     

Learning to Locate Informative Features for Visual Identification

Object identification is a specialized type of recognition in which the category (e.g. cars) is known and the goal is to recognize an object’s exact identity (e.g. Bob’s BMW). Two special challenges characterize object identification. First, inter-object variation is often small (many cars look alike) and may be dwarfed by illumination or pose changes. Second, there may be many different instances of the category but few or just one positive “training” examples per object instance. Because variation among object instances may be small, a solution must locate possibly subtle object-specific salient features, like a door handle, while avoiding distracting ones such as specular highlights. With just one training example per object instance, however, standard modeling and feature selection techniques cannot be used. We describe an on-line algorithm that takes one image from a known category and builds an efficient “same” versus “different” classification cascade by predicting the most discriminative features for that object instance. Our method not only estimates the saliency and scoring function for each candidate feature, but also models the dependency between features, building an ordered sequence of discriminative features specific to the given image. Learned stopping thresholds make the identifier very efficient. To make this possible, category-specific characteristics are learned automatically in an off-line training procedure from labeled image pairs of the category. Our method, using the same algorithm for both cars and faces, outperforms a wide variety of other methods.     

A new method of reinforcing graphene nanoplatelets in glass/epoxy composites

This research aims to develop a method for the amalgamation of graphene nanoplatelets in glass/epoxy composites. The poor interface bonding between the fiber and matrix is critical and hinders the full performance of the composites. Glass fabric and epoxy were used as reinforcement and matrix in the composite, respectively. Graphene nanoplatelets were utilized as an additional nano-materials filler for the composites. Glass/graphene/epoxy and glass/epoxy composites were fabricated via vacuum infusion molding. The new method of applying graphene nanoplatelets as secondary reinforcement in the composite was developed based on proper functionalization in the sonication process. The physical, tensile, flexural, and short beam interlaminar properties of fabricated composites were examined to analyze the method's effectiveness. The results showed that density decreased by around 5 %; however, thickness increased by around 34 % after introducing graphene nanoplatelets into the composites. The tensile strength and modulus of the composites declined by approximately 19 %, on the other hand, flexural strength and modulus increased by around 63.3 % and 8.3 %, respectively, after the addition of graphene nanoplatelets into the composites. Moreover, interlaminar shear strength of the composite was enhanced by approximately 50 %.     

Ultra‐fast‐switching flexoelectric liquid‐crystal display with high contrast

Abstract— The flexoelectro‐optic effect provides a fast‐switching mechanism (0.01–0.1 msec), suitable for use in field‐sequential‐color full‐motion‐video displays. An in‐plane electric field is applied to a short‐pitch chiral nematic liquid crystal aligned in the uniform standing helix (or Grandjean) texture. The switching mechanism is experimentally demonstrated in a single‐pixel test cell, and the display performance is investigated as a function of device parameters. A contrast ratio of 2000:1 is predicted.