Dysprosium doped copper oxide (Cu1-xDyxO) nanoparticles enabled bifunctional electrode for overall water splitting

The production of hydrogen, a favourable alternative to an unsustainable fossil fuel remains as a significant hurdle with the pertaining challenge in the design of proficient, highly productive and sustainable electrocatalyst for both oxygen evolution reaction (OER) and hydrogen evolution reaction (HER). Herein, the dysprosium (Dy) doped copper oxide (Cu_1-xDy_xO) nanoparticles were synthesized via solution combustion technique and utilized as a non-noble metal based bi-functional electrocatalyst for overall water splitting. Due to the improved surface to volume ratio and conductivity, the optimized Cu_1-xDy_xO (x = 0.01, 0.02) electrocatalysts exhibited impressive HER and OER performance respectively in 1 M KOH delivering a current density of 10 mAcm^?2 at a potential of ?0.18 V vs RHE for HER and 1.53 V vs RHE for OER. Moreover, the Dy doped CuO electrocatalyst used as a bi-functional catalyst for overall water splitting achieved a potential of 1.56 V at a current density 10 mAcm^?2 and relatively high current density of 66 mAcm^?2 at a peak potential of 2 V. A long term stability of 24 h was achieved for a cell voltage of 2.2 V at a constant current density of 30 mAcm^?2 with only 10% of the initial current loss. This showcases the accumulative opportunity of dysprosium as a dopant in CuO nanoparticles for fabricating a highly effective and low-cost bi-functional electrocatalyst for overall water splitting.     

Surface Hardening of High-Strength Low Alloy Steels (HSLA) Dual-Phase Steels by Ball Burnishing Using Factorial Design

Burnishing is used increasingly as a finishing operation which gives additional advantages such as increased hardness, fatigue strength, and wear resistance. Experimental work based on 3⁴ factorial design was carried out to establish the effects of ball burnishing parameters on the surface hardness of high-strength low alloy steels (HSLA) dual-phase (DP) steel specimens. Statistical analysis of the results shows that the speed, feed, lubricant and ball diameter have significant effect on surface hardness.     

"Significance of serum gamma glutamyl transpeptidase in cholestatic jaundice"

In conclusion, our study showed that serum G.G.T rises in cholestasis, and the rise is significantly higher in extraphepatic cholestasis as compared to intrahepatic cholestasis. Serum G.G.T has not shown any superiority over alkaline phosphatase in the evaluation of cholestatic liver disease. However, two considerations must caution against the use of serum G.G.T. alone for evaluation of hepatobiliary disease. The first of these is the lack of specificity for hepatobiliary disease. Serum G.G.T. activity can be elevated in some non-hepatic disorders such as acute pancreatitis, congestive cardiac failure, myocardial infarction, diabetes mellitus and alcoholism. Determination of serum G.G.T. in these patients is of no value. Second, the possibility that changes in serum G.G.T. activity results from drug administration in man.     

Development of nano indium tin oxide (ITO) grains by alkaline hydrolysis of In(III) and Sn(IV) salts

Indium tin oxide (ITO) nano powders of different compositions (In: Sn = 90: 10, 70: 30 and 50: 50) were prepared by heat treatment (300-450°C) of mixed hydroxides of In(III) and Sn(IV). The hydroxides were obtained by the reaction of aq. NH₃ with mixed aq. solutions of In(NO₃)₃ and SnCl₄. FTIR and TG/DTA studies revealed that powders existed as In(OH)₃H₂O—SnO₃H₂H₂O in the solid state and then they transformed to In₂O₃—SnO₂ via some metastable intermediates after 300°C. Cubic phase of In₂O₃ was identified by XRD for the oxides up to 30% of Sn. Particle size measurements of the solid dispersed in acetone and SEM study for microstructure showed that the oxides were in the nano range (55-75 nm) whereas the size range determined from Debye-Scherrer equation were 11–24 nm.     

Wavelet based Denial-of-Service detection

Network Denial-of-Service (DoS) attacks that disable network services by flooding them with spurious packets are on the rise. Criminals with large networks (botnets) of compromised nodes (zombies) use the threat of DoS attacks to extort legitimate companies. To fight these threats and ensure network reliability, early detection of these attacks is critical. Many methods have been developed with limited success to date. This paper presents an approach that identifies change points in the time series of network packet arrival rates. The proposed process has two stages: (i) statistical analysis that finds the rate of increase of network traffic, and (ii) wavelet analysis of the network statistics that quickly detects the sudden increases in packet arrival rates characteristic of botnet attacks.Most intrusion detections are tested using data sets from special security testing configurations, which leads to unacceptable false positive rates being found when they are used in the real world. We test our approach using data from both network simulations and a large operational network. The true and false positive detection rates are determined for both data sets, and receiver operating curves use these rates to find optimal parameters for our approach. Evaluation using operational data proves the effectiveness of our approach.