Investigation of the changes in physical properties of PES/PVC fabrics after aging

The aim of this work was to investigate the physical and mechanical performance of architectural polyester (PES)–poly(vinyl chloride) (PVC) membranes exposed to different artificial aging conditions. Two commercially available architectural membranes were chosen as research objects. The durability of the PES/PVC fabrics was evaluated by the loss in mechanical performance, scanning electron microscopy, and X-ray diffraction analysis in order to understand the effect of the degradation agents on the surface of the membranes. The mechanical performance of the PES/PVC membranes was unchanged. Scanning electron microscopy images of the tested materials showed initial cracks after aging. The X-ray fluorescence analysis showed that at the time of aging, the amount of Cl and Si decreased slightly, while Ti decreased by half, and Ca by volume increased twice. © 2019 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Appl. Polym. Sci. 2019 , 136, 47523.     

Microstructural and compositional aspects of ZnO-based varistor ceramics prepared by direct mixing of the constituent phases and high-energy milling

ZnO-based varistor samples were prepared by the direct mixing of the constituent phases (DMCP) and sintering at 1100 °C for 2 h. The influence of the starting powder mixture's composition – the amounts of the pre-reacted varistor compounds and their composition – and its preparation, either with or without mechano-chemical activation (MCA), on the microstructure, phase composition and electrical characteristics of the varistor samples was studied. It showed that MCA improved the density and microstructural homogeneity of the varistor samples. MCA strongly affected the grain growth: it enhanced the nucleation of inversion boundaries (IBs) in the ZnO grains and the IBs-induced grain-growth mechanism resulted in uniform grain growth and hence a microstructure with smaller ZnO grains and a narrower grain size distribution. The final phase composition of the samples prepared by the DMCP method mainly depended on the presence of varistor dopants that can prevent the formation of the pyrochlore phase, especially Cr₂O₃, while MCA can affect it mostly by providing a homogeneous distribution of those dopants. The DMCP varistor samples prepared with MCA had much better current–voltage characteristics than the samples of the same composition prepared from unactivated powders.     

The rate of corrosion of concrete reinforcement and possibilities of its mathematical modelling

The paper describes a method for the mathematical modelling of steel reinforcement corrosion rate. This method is based exclusively on experimental results and expression of the influence of significant corrosion factors in the form of functional relations. The method takes into account the reality of the effects of corrosion factors, their contigency and complexity, and various circumstances occurring in practice. It represents one way towards the development of methods for the prediction of service life of reinforced concrete and structures.     

Local Binary Pattern based features for sign language recognition

In this paper we focus on appearance features particularly the Local Binary Patterns describing the manual component of Sign Language. We compare the performance of these features with geometric moments describing the trajectory and shape of hands. Since the non-manual component is also very important for sign recognition we localize facial landmarks via Active Shape Model combined with Landmark detector that increases the robustness of model fitting. We test the recognition performance of individual features and their combinations on a database consisting of 11 signers and 23 signs with several repetitions. Local Binary Patterns outperform the geometric moments. When the features are combined we achieve a recognition rate up to 99.75% for signer dependent tests and 57.54% for signer independent tests.     

Stabilization of PCC dispersions prepared directly in the mother-liquid after synthesis through the carbonation of (hydrated) lime

Various CaCO₃-based products are often used in the form of concentrated aqueous dispersions. This study investigates the stabilization of PCC dispersions prepared directly in the mother-liquid after the carbonation of (hydrated) lime through the adsorption of a commercial sodium polyacrylate dispersant. The results demonstrate that the composition of the mother-liquid, particularly the Ca²⁺ activity, profoundly influences virtually all processes pertinent to dispersion stabilization—from the initial charging of the CaCO₃ surface in base PCC dispersions, to the surface charge regulation and dispersion stabilization efficiency of the polyacrylate dispersing agent. Rising prominence of the counterion condensation effects in Ca²⁺ rich solutions limits the conditions conducive to the surface charge regulation through dispersant adsorption to an optimum pH range of about 8-11. Furthermore, dispersion stability analysis, based on the classical DLVO theory of colloid stability, and corroborated by experimental evidence in the form of particle size distribution analyses, also indicates that optimum stability conditions for such PCC dispersions are established with small dispersant doses (0.25-0.5% per dry weight) in the pH range of about 9-11.     

Formulating the template ILP consistency problem as a constraint satisfaction problem

Inductive Logic Programming (ILP) deals with the problem of finding a hypothesis covering positive examples and excluding negative examples, where both hypotheses and examples are expressed in first-order logic. In this paper we employ constraint satisfaction techniques to model and solve a problem known as template ILP consistency, which assumes that the structure of a hypothesis is known and the task is to find unification of the contained variables. In particular, we present a constraint model with index variables accompanied by a Boolean model to strengthen inference and hence improve efficiency. The efficiency of models is demonstrated experimentally.