Testing Einstein's faux formula: fast computers+slow humans=creative brilliance

An experiment was designed for the purpose of testing the proposition that creative decision-making can be greatly improved by making use of the personal computer to solve a set of word anagrams serving as hints to a surprise phrase. The authors hypothesised that the experimental condition of students using various unscramble word jumble websites would significantly outperform the control group of students who attempted to unscramble the words and solve the surprise answer by hand. Results were mixed and the authors conclude that certain types of creative problem solving exercises might benefit more from the innate abilities and talents of the participants rather than the speed and accuracy of the computer.     

Production of fungal lipases using wheat bran and soybean bran and incorporation of sugarcane bagasse as a co-substrate in solid-state fermentation

Fungal strains were screened for lipase producing activities and 10 strains were classified as good producers. Aspergillus sp., Fusarium sp., and Penicillium sp. exhibited the highest activities when fermented in wheat bran (WB) and soybean bran (SB). No fungal growth was observed using sugarcane bagasse (CB). An experimental design was applied to incorporate CB into the fermentation process for lipase production by Aspergillus sp. and Penicillium sp., and to evaluate the best moisture content for the substrate. Strains studied achieved maximum lipase activities with 25% CB combined with 75% WB or SB at 40% moisture content. The highest lipase activities were observed for WB and SB, and for SB combined with CB using Aspergillus sp. Fermentation of 96 h was the optimum period for enzyme production.     

Photo-vulcanization using thiol-ene chemistry: Film formation,morphology and network characteristics of UV crosslinked rubber latices

The photo-vulcanization with versatile thiol-ene chemistry represents an innovative approach to crosslink diene-rubber materials both in latex and in solid film state. In this work, the structure of elastomer-based thiol-ene networks and the morphology after film formation are studied in detail using electron microscopic techniques, atomic force microscopy and multiple-quantum solid-state NMR spectroscopy. Additionally, film formation properties and corresponding macroscopic properties of photo-vulcanized natural rubber (NR) latex and its synthetic counterpart, isoprene rubber (IR) latex, are determined in dependence on the curing procedure (pre- and post-vulcanization). The results reveal that thiol-ene cured elastomers comprise homogenously distributed crosslinks with a low amount of short chain defects. Whilst photochemically pre-cured NR latex particles provide coherent films, the film formation and mechanical properties of IR are strongly governed by the crosslink density of the latex particles. In film state, photo-vulcanization promotes narrow crosslink distributions and excellent tensile properties of both NR and IR.     

Self-service reservation in the fieldforce

On-line service reservation is becoming increasingly popular in the service industry. As services become more complex, requiring co-ordination among individual actions, the planning for making service appointments is normally conducted manually by the operators, often resulting in slow responses to customers. To tackle this problem, we have developed a real-time service reservation portal that takes an order from a user and works out appointment options, based on the availability of enterprise resources, for the user to book on-line. The portal is capable of dealing with complex workflow appointing, supporting interactive fine-tuning in individual appointments, respecting customer preferences and work policies, monitoring progress of workflow, informing the customer of status changes in job scheduling, dispatching and execution, as well as handling exceptions automatically. We have integrated the portal, code-named FieldReserve, with other components in the BT fieldforce optimisation suite (FOS) that covers functions of resource planning, scheduling and execution for the fieldforce to demonstrate the feasibility and potential benefits of this technology. Benefits demonstrated are to provide customers with instant response of service reservation, to provide volume control on reservation, to break away from one-size-fits-all lead times for service fulfilment, to provide customers with equal access to service provision, and to bring transparency of service progress to customers. Currently, we are actively engaging with businesses and have obtained strong support to downstream the key values of this technology in commercial contexts.     

Improving etch selectivity and stability of novolak based negative resists by fluorine plasma treatment

Fluorine plasma treatment is applied to cross-link a novolak based negative tone optical resist (maN-2400) to achieve increased dry etching selectivity. Furthermore, fluorine plasma treatment is used to strengthen the same resist to keep it in place during a second lithography step on top of the first one. Using Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, cross-linking and passivation of the resist during plasma treatment is demonstrated. In contrast to the application of a baking process after resist development, AFM images show that fluorine plasma treatment preserves the intrinsic structure of the resist.     

Reading the footprints of strained islands

We report on recent advances in the understanding of surface processes occurring during growth and post-growth annealing of strained islands which may find application as self-assembled quantum dots. We investigate the model system SiGe/Si(0 0 1) by a new approach based on “reading the footprints” which islands leave on the substrate during their growth and evolution. Such footprints consist of trenches carved in the Si substrate. We distinguish between surface footprints and footprints buried below the islands. The former allow us to discriminate islands which are in the process of growing from those which are shrinking. Islands with steep morphologies grow at the expense of smaller and shallower islands, consistent with the kinetics of anomalous coarsening. While shrinking, islands change their shape according to thermodynamic predictions. Buried footprints are investigated by removing the SiGe epilayer by means of selective wet chemical etching. Their reading shows that: (i) during post-growth annealing islands move laterally because of surface-mediated Si–Ge intermixing; (ii) a tree-ring structure of trenches is created by dislocated islands during their “cyclic” growth. This allows us to distinguish coherent from dislocated islands and to establish whether the latter are the result of island coalescence.