Optimizing the overlap between the stator teeth of a claw pole transverse-flux permanent-magnet Machine

The paper presents a three-dimensional finite-element analysis-based optimization of the overlap between adjacent stator teeth of a claw pole transverse flux permanent magnet machine (TFPM). Two major optimization criteria are considered: 1) the maximization of the output torque and 2) the minimization of the cogging torque. The paper shows that an overlap of almost 30% fulfills both optimization criteria.     

Modelling of Failure of Woven Composites. Part 2: Experimental and Numerical Justification of the Interzone Concept

The failure of woven composites has been examined. This study is presented in two parts:

• Modelling of failure of woven composites. Part 1: nomenclature defining the interzone concept;
• Modelling of failure of woven composites. Part 2: experimental and numerical justification of the interzone concept.

In the first part, the concepts of the interzone and the geometry of an interzone have been defined in a general way for a large panel of woven composites. In the second part, it has been shown that the failure of woven composites is well described by using the interzone concept. The load transfer between intact interzones and broken interzones has been evaluated for two types of loadings (tensile loading and loading in bending). The analysis of these load transfers explains why in the case of a tensile loading the failure is of a sudden-death type whereas in the case of bending loading the failure is progressive. The concept of failure of an interzone has been also defined.     

Cancelable Iris recognition system based on comb filter

This paper presents a novel scheme for cancelable iris recognition based on comb filtering. This scheme begins with a coarse-to-fine iris localization stage. After that, Gabor filtering is applied for feature extraction. The two-dimensional phase pattern of features generated with the LogGabor filter is distorted through comb filtering. The objective of this distortion process is to generate a cancelable feature pattern that represents the iris. The ability to reinitiate a new cancelable pattern is guaranteed through the variation of the comb filter order. The proposed scheme is compared with a cancelable random projection scheme for iris recognition. Experimental results are conducted on CASIA-IrisV3-Interval database for both random projection and comb filtering schemes. Moreover, evaluation metrics are estimated for different comb filter orders of 6, 8, 10, and 12 in addition to the case of original iris features. Hamming distance and Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) curve are estimated for both random projection and comb filtering schemes to check robustness and stability. The experimental results show a significant gain in both privacy and performance. Also, the comb filtering scheme achieves a superior performance for all orders compared to the random projection scheme. The proposed comb filtering scheme achieves the highest accuracy of 99.75% for order 6 and a promising Equal Error Rate (EER) of 0.36% for order 10.

     

International comparison of thermal noise-temperature measurementsat 2, 4, and 12 GHz

We discuss an international comparison of thermal noise-power measurements (GTRF-92-2), which has recently been completed under the auspices of the Consultative Committee for Electricity and Magnetism (CCEM). The noise temperatures of two solid-state sources with GPC-7 connectors were measured at 2, 4, and 12 GHz at the national laboratories in France, Germany, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Good agreement was found among the results from the different laboratories, with all results agreeing within the expanded uncertainties, which ranged from approximately 0.5% to 2.9%. The comparison was performed in accordance with the guidelines recently adopted by the Bureau International des Poids et Mesures (BIPM)     

Discoloration and detoxicification of a Congo red dye solution by means of ozone treatment for a possible water reuse

The objective of this study was to investigate the degradation and mineralization of an azo-dye, the Congo red, in aqueous solutions using ozone. Phytotoxicity and the inhibitory effects on the microbial activity of the raw and the ozonated solutions were also carried out with the aim of water reuse and environment protection. Decolorization of the aqueous solutions, disappearance of the parent compound, chemical oxygen demand (COD) and total organic carbon (TOC) removal were the main parameters monitored in this study. To control the mineralization of the Congo red, pH of the ozonated solution and heteroatoms released from the mother molecule such NH(4)(+), NO(3)(-) and SO(4)(2-) were determined. It was concluded that ozone by itself is strong enough to decolorize these aqueous solutions in the early stage of the oxidation process. Nonetheless, efficient mineralization had not been achieved. Significant drops in COD (54%) were registered. The extent of TOC removal was about 32%. Sulfur heteroatom was totally oxidized to SO(4)(2-) ions while the central -NN- azo ring was partially converted to NH(4)(+) and NO(3)(-). Results of the kinetic studies showed that ozonation of the selected molecule was a pseudo-first-order reaction with respect to dye concentration. The obtained results also demonstrate that ozone process reduced the phytotoxicity of the raw solution and enhanced the biodegradability of the treated azo-dyes-wastewater. Hence, this show that ozone remains one of the effective technologies for the discoloration and the detoxification of organic dyes in wastewater.     

Reed-Solomon codes for land mobile satellite channels

The performance of Reed-Solomon codes is determined for land mobile satellite communications where a shadowed Rician channel model is used. An effective coding/interleaving scheme is proposed which uses the multipath fading and shadowing statistics of the channel.<>     

Modelling of an interactive system with an agent-based architecture using Petri nets, application of the method to the supervision of a transport system

This article presents an original method using high level Petri nets for the specification and design of interactive systems. We suggest an agent oriented architecture based on the classic components of an interactive application (application, dialogue control, interface with the application). Our approach is validated via the specification and design of a human–machine interface used in the supervision of a land-based transport system (bus/tramway).     

Achieving Parity of the Sexes at the Undergraduate Level: A Study of Success

Most research about women in engineering focuses on reasons for their under‐representation. In contrast, we capitalized on an opportunity to study success: the School of Industrial Engineering at the University of Oklahoma had organically achieved parity of the sexes at the undergraduate level. To investigate this success, we adopted an ethnographic perspective, interviewing 185 students who represented four fields and four institutions as well as 12 faculty in Industrial Engineering at the University of Oklahoma. These data pointed to a combination of aspects of the discipline and the department culture as explanatory variables. Emerging from the data was a third explanatory variable: a high number of students, disproportionately many women, who relocated into Industrial Engineering from another major, underscoring the impact of broad recruiting activities. This paper emphasizes ideas that other departments can consider adapting to their own efforts to increase diversity.     

Structural,Micromechanical and Tribological Analyses of Electrodeposited Nickel–Graphite Coatings with Different Fractions of Graphite Microparticles

Nickel–graphite composite coatings were electrodeposited on a steel substrate from typical watts bath and with specific operating conditions for different weight fractions of graphite microparticles. The weight percentage of particles in coatings and the microstructure were studied, respectively, by atomic absorption, scanning electron microscope and X-ray diffraction. The influence of graphite fraction on roughness and microhardness were also investigated. It was found that roughness increases with the increase of particle content while microhardness decreases. The tribological response was examined against high chromium steel ball using linear reciprocating tribometer. The results indicated that the friction coefficient decreases when graphite content increases. This was ascribed to the development of tribo-layer on the wear track and transfer film on the counterface. However, it was found that the improvement of wear resistance was obtained until an optimal value of graphite concentration, which provided the best condition that promoted the tribo-layer stability and maintained the matrix integrity.     

Protease Substrate-Independent Universal Assay for Monitoring Digestion of Native Unmodified Proteins

Proteases are a group of enzymes with a catalytic function to hydrolyze peptide bonds of proteins. Proteases regulate the activity, signaling mechanism, fate, and localization of many proteins, and their dysregulation is associated with various pathological conditions. Proteases have been identified as biomarkers and potential therapeutic targets for multiple diseases, such as acquired immunodeficiency syndrome, cardiovascular diseases, osteoporosis, type 2 diabetes, and cancer, where they are essential to disease progression. Thus, protease inhibitors and inhibitor-like molecules are interesting drug candidates. To study proteases and their substrates and inhibitors, simple, rapid, and sensitive protease activity assays are needed. Existing fluorescence-based assays enable protease monitoring in a high-throughput compatible microtiter plate format, but the methods often rely on either molecular labeling or synthetic protease targets that only mimic the hydrolysis site of the true target proteins. Here, we present a homogenous, label-free, and time-resolved luminescence utilizing the protein-probe method to assay proteases with native and denatured substrates at nanomolar sensitivity. The developed protein-probe method is not restricted to any single protein or protein target class, enabling digestion and substrate fragmentation studies with the natural unmodified substrate proteins. The versatility of the assay for studying protease targets was shown by monitoring the digestion of a substrate panel with different proteases. These results indicate that the protein-probe method not only monitors the protease activity and inhibition, but also studies the substrate specificity of individual proteases.