Two-electrode DFB laser filter used as a wide tunable narrow-bandFM receiver: tuning analysis, characteristics and experimental FSK-WDMsystem

Characteristics of a two-electrode DFB laser filter are studied both theoretically and experimentally. Using a matrix analysis of spontaneous emission, a continuous tuning range of 6.7 Å is achieved by changing both net field gains of the two electrodes. A total discontinuous tuning range of over 10 nm comprising alternating mode jumps and continuous tuning range of 4 Å are measured experimentally. The laser filter presents a FWHM bandwidth of 5 GHz which depends on the optical input power. In addition, it is demonstrated that a DFB laser filter can act as a frequency discriminator/photodetector, i.e., a narrow-band FM receiver, with a uniform bandwidth of 1.5 GHz. Using the two-electrode DFB laser for both transmitter and receiver, a two-channel FSK-WDM transmission system utilizing the discontinuous tuning range is reported. The advantage of such a device is the simplicity as compared to the heterodyne technique     

Antioxidant and anticholinesterase activity of essential oils and ethanol extracts of <Emphasis Type="Italic">Thymus algeriensis</Emphasis> and <Emphasis Type="Italic">Teucrium polium</Emphasis> from Algeria

This study aimed to investigate the cholinesterase (ChE) inhibitory and antioxidant activities of essential oil (EO) and ethanolic extract (EE) of two Lamiaceae medicinal plants from Algeria: Thymus algeriensis Boiss. & Reut. and Teucrieum polium subsp capitatum. The chemical composition of EOs analyzed by GC and GC–MS revealed the presence of carvacrol (43.2%), p-cymene (18.7%) and γ-terpinene (14.8%) as major compounds in T. algeriensis, while germacrene D (25.0%), bicyclogermacrene (10.4%), β-pinene (11.3%) and spathulenol (5.8%) were the most important components in T. polium oil. The best inhibitory activity on acetylcholinesterase (AChE) was exhibited by the EO of T. algeriensis. On the other hand, T. polium oil was more efficient against butyrylcholinesterase (BChE) than against AChE, whereas EEs showed weak or no inhibitory effect, particularly against AChE. Antioxidant activity was evaluated by β-carotene bleaching, ferric and cupric reducing powers and inhibition of ABTS^?+, DPPH^? and superoxide radicals. EOs showed different antioxidant trends depending on the assay used while ethanol extracts had high activity with all tests.     

Cocaine craving, euphoria, and self-administration: A preliminary study of the effect of catecholamine precursor depletion.

The authors used the acute phenylalanine-tyrosine depletion (APTD) method to test the effect of transient catecholamine precursor depletion on cocaine craving, euphoria, and self-administration. Eight nondependent, nontreatment-seeking cocaine users self-administered 3 doses of cocaine (0.6, 1.5, 3.0 mg/kg, taken intranasally) following ingestion of (a) a nutritionally balanced amino acid mixture, (b) APTD, and (c) APTD followed by L-dopa/carbidopa (2 × 100 mg/25 mg). APTD decreased both cue and cocaine-induced drug craving but not euphoria or self-administration. APTD + L-dopa also decreased drug craving, possibly reflecting the ability of L-dopa to transiently decrease dopamine cell firing. Together, these preliminary results suggest that the craving elicited by cocaine and cocaine cues is related to changes in catecholamine neurotransmission. Euphoria and the self-administration of freely available drugs by regular users, in comparison, might be better accounted for by other mechanisms. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Wavelength reuse scheme in a WDM unidirectional ring network usinga proper fibre grating add/drop multiplexer

An experimental optical WDM ring network is proposed. It uses a proper add/drop multiplexer based on a fibre grating filter. Both-way transmission using a wavelength reuse scheme is successfully demonstrated without any crosstalk     

Dynamic Modeling of a Class of Continuum Manipulators in Fixed Orientation

A novel simultaneous localization and mapping (SLAM) technique based on independent particle filters for landmark mapping and localization for a mobile robot based on a high-frequency (HF)-band radio-frequency identification (RFID) system is proposed in this paper. SLAM is a technique for performing self-localization and map building simultaneously. FastSLAM is a standard landmark-based SLAM method. RFID is a robust identification system with ID tags and readers over wireless communication; further, it is rarely affected by obstacles in the robot area or by lighting conditions. Therefore, RFID is useful for self-localization and mapping for a mobile robot with a reasonable accuracy and sufficient robustness. In this study, multiple HF-band RFID readers are embedded in the bottom of an omnidirectional vehicle, and a large number of tags are installed on the floor. The HF-band RFID tags are used as the landmarks of the environment. We found that FastSLAM is not appropriate for this condition for two reasons. First, the tag detection of the HF-band RFID system does not follow the standard Gaussian distribution, which FastSLAM is supposed to have. Second, FastSLAM does not have a sufficient scalability, which causes its failure to handle a large number of landmarks. Therefore, we propose a novel SLAM method with two independent particle filters to solve these problems. The first particle filter is for self-localization based on Monte Carlo localization. The second particle filter is for landmark mapping. The particle filters are nonparametric so that it can handle the non-Gaussian distribution of the landmark detection. The separation of localization and landmark mapping reduces the computational cost significantly. The proposed method is evaluated in simulated and real environments. The experimental results show that the proposed method has more precise localization and mapping and a lower computational cost than FastSLAM.     

Detailed modeling of the evaporation and thermal decomposition of urea‐water solution in SCR systems

This work is aimed to develop a multicomponent evaporation model for droplets of urea‐water solution (UWS) and a thermal decomposition model of urea for automotive exhausts by using the selective catalytic reduction systems. In the multicomponent evaporation model, the influence of urea on the UWS evaporation is taken into account using a nonrandom two‐liquid activity model. The thermal decomposition model is based on a semidetailed kinetic scheme accounting not only for the production of ammonia (NH₃) and isocyanic acid but also for the formation of heavier solid by‐products (biuret, cyanuric acid, and ammelide). This kinetics model has been validated against gaseous data as well as solid‐phase concentration profiles obtained by Lundstroem et al. (2009) and Schaber et al. (2004). Both models have been implemented in IFP‐C3D industrial software to simulate UWS droplet evaporation and decomposition as well as the formation of solid by‐products. It has been shown that the presence of the urea solute has a small influence on the water evaporation rate, but its effect on the UWS temperature is significant. In addition, the contributions of hydrolysis and thermolysis to urea decomposition have been assessed. Finally, the impacts of the heating rate as well as gas‐phase chemistry on urea decomposition pathways have been studied in detail. It has been shown that reducing the heating rate of the UWS causes the extent of the polymerization to decrease because of the higher activation energy. © 2011 American Institute of Chemical Engineers AIChE J, 2012     

A cost-effective approach to introduce an optical WDM network inthe metropolitan environment

A case study shows that an optical wavelength division multiplexing (WDM) network can be employed in a metropolitan network in a cost effective way. In part, cost savings are realized due to the total number of line terminals required and the fact that the dimensions of the electrical nodes decrease when exploiting optical cross connects (OXCs) to a large extent. Optical WDM rings are also an important building element when designing a metropolitan network. A number of the properties of WDM rings are classified, resulting in eight different ring architectures. Additional requirements arise when considering ring-to-ring connections. The extent of the rings chosen for the case study is validated from the transmission point of view by a simple model. Finally, as an alternative to an all-optical approach, an opto-electrical approach is presented