Study on business models of distributed generation in China

Along with the implementation of electricity sales-side reform and incremental power distribution investment liberalization under China's new round of electricity market reform, the main subjects of distributed generation investment, construction, and operations have become more various, and the approaches as well as the ways that distributed generation takes part in the market have been more flexible. How to operate distributed generation economically and efficiently in this market environment has become an urgent issue to be addressed. Based on the domestic development situation of China's distributed generation, this paper introduces typical existing business models of distributed generation, and elaborates the correlation between electricity market reform and business models of distributed generation in depth in combination with the contents of electricity market reform. At last, several business models of distributed generation which are feasible to be implemented in China have been proposed under the new electricity market reform based on successful international distributed generation operation experiences in the terms of stimulating stakeholders' participation in the investment and operations of distributed generation. Characteristics of these recommended models are compared and analyzed as well.     

Highly ordered uniform single-crystal Bi nanowires: fabrication and characterization

A mechanical pressure injection technique has been used to fabricate uniform bismuth (Bi) nanowires in the pores of an anodic aluminum oxide (AAO) template. The AAO template was prepared from general purity aluminum by a two-step anodization followed by heat treatment to achieve highly ordered nanochannels. The nanowires were then fabricated by an injection technique whereby the molten Bi was injected into the AAO template using a hydraulic pressure method. The Bi nanowires prepared by this method were found to be dense and continuous with uniform diameter throughout the length. Electron diffraction experiments using the transmission electron microscope on cross-sectional and free-standing longitudinal Bi nanowires showed that the majority of the individual nanowires were single crystalline, with preferred orientation of growth along the [011] zone axis of the pseudo-cubic structure. The work presented here provides an inexpensive and effective way of fabricating highly ordered single-crystalline Bi nanowires, with uniform size distributions.     

Review: Investigation of Partially Pre-mixed Charge Ignitions (PPCI) Engine Mode

This paper embraces the key points of unpolluted internally combusted engine emissions. Core objective is focused on the recent effort to improve compression ignition(CI) and spark ignition(SI) engine to have fuel-efficient and minimized pollutant emissions. There are many advanced internal combustion engines to overcome the challenges of conventional compression ignition engines of the high level of particulate matter(PM) and oxides of nitrogen emission. One of the latest options on which many ...     

Targeting Lipocalin-2 in Inflammatory Breast Cancer Cells with Small Interference RNA and Small Molecule Inhibitors

Inflammatory Breast Cancer (IBC) is an aggressive form of invasive breast cancer, highly metastatic, representing 2–4% of all breast cancer cases in the United States. Despite its rare nature, IBC is responsible for 7–10% of all breast cancer deaths, with a 5-year survival rate of 40%. Thus, targeted and effective therapies against IBC are needed. Here, we proposed Lipocalin-2 (LCN2)—a secreted glycoprotein aberrantly abundant in different cancers—as a plausible target for IBC. In immunoblotting, we observed higher LCN2 protein levels in IBC cells than non-IBC cells, where the LCN2 levels were almost undetectable. We assessed the biological effects of targeting LCN2 in IBC cells with small interference RNAs (siRNAs) and small molecule inhibitors. siRNA-mediated LCN2 silencing in IBC cells significantly reduced cell proliferation, viability, migration, and invasion. Furthermore, LCN2 silencing promoted apoptosis and arrested the cell cycle progression in the G0/G1 to S phase transition. We used in silico analysis with a library of 25,000 compounds to identify potential LCN2 inhibitors, and four out of sixteen selected compounds significantly decreased cell proliferation, cell viability, and the AKT phosphorylation levels in SUM149 cells. Moreover, ectopically expressing LCN2 MCF7 cells, treated with two potential LCN2 inhibitors (ZINC00784494 and ZINC00640089) showed a significant decrease in cell proliferation. Our findings suggest LCN2 as a promising target for IBC treatment using siRNA and small molecule inhibitors.     

Physical characterization of anhydrous and hydrous forms of the hydrochloride salt of BVT.5182 a novel 5-HT(6) receptor antagonist

The physicochemical properties of 1-benzenesulfonyl-4-(piperazin-1-yl)-indole hydrochloride, a novel 5-HT₆ receptor antagonist for the treatment of obesity were characterized. Two solid state forms were identified at ambient conditions (23°C): an anhydrate form (1) and a hydrate form (2), with 1.5 moles of H₂O. The latter easily dehydrates and rehydrates without affecting the crystal morphology. Investigations of the propensity for interconversion between the two forms reveal that a) conversion of 2→1 takes place above 145°C and that b) conversion of 1→2 only occurs after crystallization from supersaturated aqueous solutions at a water activity ≥0.94 or in the presence of comparable amounts of crystals of 2 in water at ambient conditions. However, in an equimolar suspension of 1 and 2 at 37°C no phase transformation was observed. Thus, the difference in chemical potential between the two forms is small. Form 1 was shown to have overall favorable solid state properties and, hence, considered the preferred form for continued pharmaceutical development. The characterization was performed by means of light microscopy, scanning electron microscopy, powder X-ray diffraction, FTIR/NIR-spectroscopy, differential scanning calorimetry, hot stage microscopy, thermogravimetry, dynamic vapor sorption, Karl Fischer water content determination, phase stability studies of suspensions, solubility, and intrinsic dissolution rate measurements.     

Determination of Surface Residual Stresses in Brittle Materials by Hertzian Indentation: Theory and Experiment

Hertzian indentation has been used to determine the surface residual stress levels in brittle materials. In this method, a hard sphere is pressed into the surface of the material: at a critical load a preexisting surface-breaking crack in the neighborhood of the contact will propagate. There is a threshold load below which no such crack, of whatever size, can be propagated. The presence of a residual stress in the surface will lead to a shift in this threshold load. The effects of residual stresses on the minimum load to produce Hertzian fracture are predicted for alumina and glass, assuming that the variation of the residual stress over the length of the crack is small. Two methods of analysis (one approximate, one more general) are presented that enable the residual stress to be calculated from the shift in threshold load; the only further information required is a knowledge of the radius of the sphere, the elastic constants of the sphere and substrate, and also the fracture toughness of the substrate (or use of a stress-free specimen as a reference). No measurement of any crack length is necessary. Experimental results are presented for the residual stress levels determined in glass strengthened by ion exchange. Indenting balls of a variety of materials with a range of elastic mismatch to the glass substrate were used, so as to evaluate the effects of elastic mismatch and interfacial frictional tractions on the results obtained. The results obtained by Hertzian indentation are consistent with residual stress levels determined by differential surface refractometry. We also present results on alumina specimens with induced surface stresses.     

A PSO-ANFIS based Hybrid Approach for Short Term PV Power Prediction in Microgrids

This paper proposes a hybrid approach based on a combination of particle swarm optimization (PSO) and adaptive neuro-fuzzy inference systems (ANFIS) for one-day-ahead hourly photovoltaic (PV) power generation prediction in microgrids. The increasing penetration of solar PV energy into electric power generation systems imposes important issues to address resulting from its intermittent and uncertain nature. These challenges necessitate an accurate PV power generation forecasting tool for planning efficient operation of power systems and to ensure reliability of supply. In this paper, a combination of PSO and ANFIS is used to develop a PV power prediction model. To demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method, it is tested based on practical information of PV power generation data of a real case study microgrid in Beijing. The proposed approach is compared with two other prediction methods. Evaluation of forecasting performance is made with the persistence forecasting method as a reference model, and results are compared with actual scenario. The proposed approach outperformed back propagation neural network and persistence based forecasting methods, demonstrating its favorable accuracy and reliability.     

Electrical and mechanical properties of carbon nanotube‐epoxy nanocomposites

In this work, electrical conductivity and thermo‐mechanical properties have been measured for carbon nanotube reinforced epoxy matrix composites. These nanocomposites consisted of two types of nanofillers, single walled carbon nanotubes (SW‐CNT) and electrical grade carbon nanotubes (XD‐CNT). The influence of the type of nanotubes and their corresponding loading weight fraction on the microstructure and the resulting electrical and mechanical properties of the nanocomposites have been investigated. The electrical conductivity of the nanocomposites showed a significantly high, about seven orders of magnitude, improvement at very low loading weight fractions of nanotubes in both types of nanocomposites. The percolation threshold in nanocomposites with SW‐CNT fillers was found to be around 0.015 wt % and that with XD‐CNT fillers around 0.0225 wt %. Transmission optical microscopy of the nanocomposites revealed some differences in the microstructure of the two types of nanocomposites which can be related to the variation in the percolation thresholds of these nanocomposites. The mechanical properties (storage modulus and loss modulus) and the glass transition temperature have not been compromised with the addition of fillers compared with significant enhancement of electrical properties. The main significance of these results is that XD‐CNTs can be used as a cost effective nanofiller for electrical applications of epoxy based nanocomposites at a fraction of SW‐CNT cost. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Appl Polym Sci, 2010