Effects of Al:Si and (Al + Na):Si ratios on the properties of the international simple glass,part II: Structure

High-alumina containing high-level waste (HLW) will be vitrified at the Waste Treatment Plant at the Hanford Site. The resulting glasses, high in alumina, will have distinct composition-structure-property (C-S-P) relationships compared to previously studied HLW glasses. These C-S-P relationships determine the processability and product durability of glasses and therefore must be understood. The main purpose of this study is to understand the detailed structural changes caused by Al:Si and (Al + Na):Si substitutions in a simplified nuclear waste model glass (ISG, international simple glass) by combining experimental structural characterizations and molecular dynamics (MD) simulations. The structures of these two series of glasses were characterized by neutron total scattering and ²⁷Al, ²³Na, ²⁹Si, and ¹¹B solid-state nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy. Additionally, MD simulations were used to generate atomistic structural models of the borosilicate glasses and simulation results were validated by the experimental structural data. Short-range (eg, bond distance, coordination number, etc) and medium-range (eg, oxygen speciation, network connectivity, polyhedral linkages) structural features of the borosilicate glasses were systematically investigated as a function of the degree of substitution. The results show that bond distance and coordination number of the cation-oxygen pairs are relatively insensitive to Al:Si and (Al + Na):Si substitutions with the exception of the B-O pair. Additionally, the Al:Si substitution results in an increase in tri-bridging oxygen species, whereas (Al + Na):Si substitution creates nonbridging oxygen species. Charge compensator preferences were found for Si-[NBO] (Na⁺), ^[3]B-[NBO] (Na⁺), ^[4]B (mostly Ca²⁺), ^[4]Al (nearly equally split Na⁺ and Ca²⁺), and ^[6]Zr (mostly Ca²⁺). The network former-BO-network former linkages preferences were also tabulated; Si-O-Al and Al-O-Al were preferred at the expense of lower Si-O-^[3]B and ^[3]B-O-^[3]B linkages. These results provide insights on the structural origins of property changes such as glass-transition temperature caused by the substitutions, providing a basis for future improvements of theoretical and computer simulation models.     

Real-time simulation of time-of-flight sensors

Today’s time-of-flight (TOF) sensors measure full-range distance information by estimating the elapsed time between emission and receiving of active light in real-time. Such sensors are inexpensive, compact, and they have a high performance, which especially fits real-time applications, e.g. in the fields of automotive, robotics, 3D imaging, and visualization. The simulation of such sensors is an essential building block for hardware design and application development. Therefore, the simulation data must capture the major sensor characteristics.This paper introduces a simulation approach, which is motivated by physics, for the Photonic Mixing Device (PMD) sensor which is a specific type of time-of-flight sensor. Dynamic motion blurring and resolution artifacts such as flying pixels as well as the typical deviation error are prominent effects of real world systems. Flying pixels arise when an area of inhomogeneous depth is covered by a single PMD-pixel whereas the deviation error is based on the anharmonic properties of the optical signal. The modeling of these artifacts is essential for an authentic simulation approach. We present a detailed comparison between a real PMD-device and the simulation data regarding the sensor characteristics.The proposed algorithms are implemented in a hardware accelerated solution which makes use of the programmability of modern Graphics Processing Units (GPUs). This way, an interactive simulation feedback is provided for applications and further data processing. The simulation takes place in real-time and thus all required control mechanisms are accessible in real-time, too.     

High-level user interfaces for transfer function design with semantics

Many sophisticated techniques for the visualization of volumetric data such as medical data have been published. While existing techniques are mature from a technical point of view, managing the complexity of visual parameters is still difficult for non-expert users. To this end, this paper presents new ideas to facilitate the specification of optical properties for direct volume rendering. We introduce an additional level of abstraction for parametric models of transfer functions. The proposed framework allows visualization experts to design high-level transfer function models which can intuitively be used by non-expert users. The results are user interfaces which provide semantic information for specialized visualization problems. The proposed method is based on principal component analysis as well as on concepts borrowed from computer animation.     

Characterization of Micro-Powders for the Fabrication of Compression Molded THz Lenses

We investigate different micro-powders that can be used as base materials for THz lenses fabricated by compression molding. For this application materials with a very weak THz absorbance and low dispersion are required. By measuring the THz absorption coefficient and refractive index of pellets pressed from the different micro-powders, we identify several materials that are well suited for the fabrication of compression molded THz lenses (CMLs). In addition, a considerable range of the refractive index is covered by the samples, which will allow for the fabrication of CMLs with different focal lengths for one and the same lens design.     

Numerical Simulation of the Head/Disk Interface for Patterned Media

The use of patterned media is a new approach proposed to extend the recording densities of hard disk drives beyond 1 Tb/in.². Bit-patterned media (BPM) overcome the thermal stability problems of conventional media by using single-domain islands for each bit of recorded information, thereby eliminating the magnetic transition noise (Albrecht et al., Magnetic Recording on Patterned Media, 2003). Considering steady state conditions, we have transferred the pattern from the disk surface onto the slider surface and have investigated the pressure generation due to the bit pattern. To reduce the numerical complexity, we have generated the bit pattern only in the areas of the slider near the trailing edge, where the spacing is small. Cylindrical protrusions were modeled using very small mesh size on the order of nanometers to obtain the flying characteristics for the entire slider air bearing surface (ABS) using the “CMRR” finite element Reynolds equation simulator (Duwensee et al., Microsyst Technol, 2006; Wahl et al., STLE Tribol Trans, 39(1), 1996). The effect of pattern height, pattern diameter, slider skew angle, and slider pitch angle on flying height of a typical slider is investigated. Numerical results show that the flying height decreases for a patterned slider and the change in flying height is a function of the pattern height and ratio of the pattern diameter to the pattern pitch. In comparison to discrete track media, the flying height loss is larger for a patterned slider disk interface for the same recessed area of pattern.     

Enol cation radicals in solution. 4. An improved Synthesis of 4,6,7-Trimethylbenzofurans by oxidation of β-mesityl substituted enols

An improved synthetic access for the construction of 4,6,7-trimethylbenzofurans ( B1–B8 ) through the one-electron oxidation of mesityl-substituted enols ( E1–E8 ) is presented. The transformation can be accomplished in good to excellent yields by using various oxidants; i.e. tris(1,10-phenanthroline)iron(III) hexafluorophosphate, FeCl₃, Ce(NH₄)₂(NO₃)₆, Cu(OTf)₂/Cu₂O or anodic oxidation.     

Reliability of design approaches for axially loaded offshore piles and its consequences with respect to the North Sea

In the near future, several offshore wind farms are planned to be built in the North Sea. Therefore, jacket and tripod constructions with mainly axially loaded piles are suitable as support structures. The current design of axial bearing resistance of these piles leads to deviant results regarding the pile resistance when different design methods are adopted. Hence, a strong deviation regarding the required pile length must be addressed. The reliability of a design method can be evaluated based on a model error which describes the quality of the considered design method by comparing measured and predicted pile bearing resistances. However, only few pile load tests are reported with regard to the boundary conditions in the North Sea. This paper presents 6 large-scale axial pile load tests which were incorporated within a new model error approach for the current design methods used for the axial bearing resistance, namely API Main Text method and cone penetration test (CPT)-based design methods, such as simplified ICP-05, offshore UWA-05, Fugro-05 and NGI-05 methods. Based on these new model errors, a reliability-based study towards the safety was conducted by performing a Monte-Carlo simulation. In addition, consequences regarding the deterministic pile design in terms of quality factors were evaluated. It is shown that the current global safety factor (GSF) prescribed and the partial safety factors are only valid for the API Main Text and the offshore UWA-05 design methods; whereas for the simplified ICP-05, Fugro-05 and NGI-05 design methods, an increase in the required embedded pile length and thus in the GSF up to 2.69, 2.95 and 3.27, respectively, should be considered to satisfy the desired safety level according to DIN EN 1990 of β = 3.8. Further, quality factors for each design method on the basis of all reliability-based design results were derived. Hence, evaluation of each design method regarding the reliability of the pile capacity prediction is possible.