The diffusivities of fission-created or thermally-doped tritium in UO2

The diffusion behavior of tritium in UO₂ was studied. Two methods were adopted for the introduction of tntium into UO₂: one via ternary fission of ²³⁵U and the other via thermal doping. In the former, the diffusion constants decreased with increase in sample weight. The diffusion constants obtained from the pellet with the same specification (9 mm in diameter, 5 mm high) were D″_bulk = 3.03 × 10⁻³(^+0.369_−0.003) exp[−163±43(kJ/mol)/RT](cm²/s) for fission-created tritium and D′_bulk = 0.15(^{+ 0.94}_−0.13) exp[−76±13 (kJ/mol)/RT](cm²/s) for thermally-doped tritium. The difference of the diffusion constants between two systems was discussed in terms of the effects associated with the recoil processes of energetic tritium.     

Chromium etching characteristics using a planar type plasma reactor

The dry etching characteristics of Cr film in the CCl₄/O₂ mixed gas plasma have been investigated with a variety of etching parameters in the planar type reactor with the 13.56 MHz rf power. Moreover the dry etching resistance of EB resists and variation of the feature size on a 12.5 and 15 cm Cr-Mask are described. The etch rate of Cr film depends strongly on the etchant gas composition ratio, the electrode separation and the electrode surface materials. In the cathode coupling mode with a gas pressure of 0.2 Torr, a gas flow rate of CCl₄/O₂ of 0.5, electrode separation of 80 mm and rf power density of 0.38 W/cm², the following results are obtained: (1) The etch rate of Cr film is about 30 nm/min, Paper presented partially at 23rd Annual Electronic Materials Conference, University of California, Santa Barbara, California, June 24, 1981.     

Studies on the role of platelet-activating factor in blood pressure regulation

Circulating levels of 1-O-hexadecyl-2-acetyl-sn-glycero-3-phosphocholine (C₁₆PAF) in human subjects were measured by gas chromatography/mass spectrometry using negative ion chemical ionization. The mean (±S.D.) circulating C₁₆PAF levels in patients with essential hypertension (18.1±5.3 pg/mL, n=16) were not significantly different from those in normotensive subjects (17.2±7.2 pg/mL, n=14). During a salt balance study, high salt intake (20 g/day) significantly increased the circulating level of C₁₆PAF, and changes in circulating C₁₆PAF significantly and positively correlated with changes in mean arterial blood pressure (r=0.47, p<0.05). Changes in C₁₆PAF also correlated with changes in creatinine clearance (r=0.55, p<0.05), but did not correlate with changes in plasma sodium concentration, plasma chloride concentration and plasma volume. An intravenous injection of 50 μg of human atrial natriuretic peptide (hANP) decreased circulating C₁₆PAF levels from 20.0±2.7 to 13.9±2.4 pg/mL of blood (n=10, p<0.01) in healthy subjects. The data appear to indicate that C₁₆PAF levels are changed by salt intake-induced mild increase in blood pressure, and that hANP may be an endogenous factor which lowers circulating C₁₆PAF. Based on a paper presented at the Third International Conference on Platelet-Activating Factor and Structurally Related Alkyl Ether Lipids, Tokyo, Japan, May 1989.     

Triboelectric Separation of Three-Component Plastic Mixture

The results of an experimental study on the triboelectric separation of one type of plastic from a three-component plastic mixture are presented. A triboelectric separator, which consists of a vibratory conveyor equipped with two electrodes, was used. The separation method makes it possible to avoid the adhesion of oppositely charged particles. Separation tests were performed on two kinds of mixtures. The effect of operating parameters such as electric field strength, polarity of applied voltage, and triboelectric charging time on the separation efficiency was examined. In the case of the separation of a mixture of 50% polyvinyl chloride (PVC), 50% polyethylene terephthalate (PET), and 50% polyethylene (PE), the purity of the extracted PVC was larger than 99% for a recovery rate of 94.9%. In the case of the separation of a mixture of 50% acrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS), 50% polypropylene (PP), and 50% polystyrene (PS), the purity of the extracted ABS was larger than 99% for a recovery rate of 89.4%.     

Dissimilar materials joining of metal/carbon fibre reinforced plastic by resistance spot welding

ABSTRACT

Dissimilar materials joining of metal to carbon fibre reinforced plastic (CFRP), which consisted of PA6, modified polypropylene (PP) or polyphenylene sulphide (PPS) as matrix polymer with short carbon fibre, was performed using series resistance spot welding (series-RSW). The metal plate was placed on CFRP plate as the lap joint, and electrodes of series-RSW were pressed only on the metal plate side. The metal around the electrode was heated by electrical resistance heating, and the thermoplastic near the interface was slightly melted by the heat conduction from heated metal. The objectives of this research are to confirm the possibility of direct joining of CFRP and metal, and to investigate the effects of the heat input during series-RSW, silane-coupling treatment and chemical structure of matrix plastics on the joint properties.

The direct joint formations of SUS304 to CFRP (PA6) and CFRP (PP) were accomplished, and CFRP (PPS) was not. The joining area, which corresponding to the melted area of CFRP, enlarged with increasing the welding current and welding time, therefore, the tensile shear fracture load also increased. The silane-coupling treatment for metal surface was highly effective to increase the joining strength. The maximum tensile shear strength of about 13 MPa was obtained for SUS304/CFRP (PA6) joint.     

High-resolution microencapsulated electrophoretic display (EPD)driven by poly-si TFTs with four-level grayscale

A high-resolution active-matrix microencapsulated electrophoretic display (EPD) driven by polycrystalline-silicon thin-film transistors (poly-Si TFTs) with integrated drivers has been developed for the first feasibility study of electronic paper. The poly-Si TFTs were fabricated with a low temperature process below 425°C. Microencapsulated electrophoretic material was coated on the TFT backplane, which was driven at 18 V. The resolution of the display is quarter VGA (video graphics array), and pixel pitch is 131 ppi (pixels per inch). As a result, this display offers a wide viewing angle, high contrast ratio and nonvolatilization of data. In addition, four-level grayscale images were also achieved by using an area ratio grayscale (ARG) driving method     

Effect of trimebutine maleate on emptying of stomach and gallbladder and release of gut peptide following a solid meal in man

We investigated the effect of orally administered trimebutine maleate on gastric and gallbladder emptying and on the release of gut peptide, pancreatic polypeptide (PP), and gastrin in humans for 120 min after ingestion of a solid meal. Gastric emptying was measured by a radionuclide technique. Gallbladder emptying was estimated by real-time ultrasonography. The oral administration of 200 mg of trimebutine maleate significantly shortened the lag time in starting gastric emptying (P < 0.05). Considering gallbladder emptying, trimebutine significantly inhibited the fasting emptying induced by neural reflex. Postprandially, there was a tendency toward an accelerated gallbladder emptying in the early phase. Neither the maximal percentage of gallbladder emptying nor the time of peak gallbladder emptying were affected. Trimebutine significantly blunted the post-prandial PP response in the cephalic and gastric phases, reflecting a vagal-cholinergic activity (P < 0.05). The PP response in the intestinal phase was also blunted. Gastrin release was significantly augmented only during the period of fasting after drug administration (P < 0.05). The major effect of trimebutine maleate appears to be a shortening of the lag time at the start of gastric emptying probably via its anticholinergic activity.     

Heat transfer characteristics of coal-water mixtures

The heat transfer coefficient for the laminar flow of the coal-water mixture (CWM) in a round tube was measured in a preheater which included three inner pipes of radii 5 mm and an outer pipe of radius 40 mm and a length of 1.8 m. It was found that the heat transfer coefficient for the CWM could be estimated from a Newtonian correlation within the experimental error. Furthermore, theremal conductivities of CWMs from thirteen kinds of coals have been measured. A simple and accurate method to predict the thermal conductivity of coal is proposed in this study.     

Method of robust stability analysis with highly structured uncertainties

This paper presents a method of analyzing the stability of linear time-invariant interconnected systems with uncertainties: each subsystem is single-input single-output and its vector locus lies inside a polygon at each frequency. It is shown that the convex closure of the image of the Cartesian product of these polygons under the mappingphi = det [I + FH]agrees with the convex closure of the image of the vertices of these polygons under the mapping φ. From this result the image can be estimated by a finite Dumber of calculations. A sufficient stability condition is obtained by applying this result to the multivariable Nyquist stability criterion.     

Stability margin calculation for systems with structured time-delayuncertainties

A method of calculating a stability margin of systems with uncertain time-delay elements is presented. This method utilizes the bilinear transformation of time-delay elements to obtain a multilinear function in order to compute the stability margin by applying the mapping theory proposed for the robust stability test