MADE3D: Enabling the next generation of high-torque density wind generators by additive design and 3D printing

Forschung im Ingenieurwesen - Direct-drive wind turbine generators are increasing in popularity, thanks to recent project developments—especially offshore, where reliability and efficiency...     

Structure-based design of inhibitors of purine nucleoside phosphorylase. 3. 9-Arylmethyl derivatives of 9-deazaguanine substituted on the methylene group

X-ray crystallography and computer-assisted molecular modeling (CAMM) studies aided in the design of a potent series of mammalian purine nucleoside phosphorylase (PNP) inhibitors. Enhanced potency was achieved by designing substituted 9-(arylmethyl)-9-deazaguanine analogs that interact favorably with all three of the binding subsites of the PNP active site, namely the purine binding site, the hydrophobic pocket, and the phosphate binding site. The most potent PNP inhibitor prepared during our investigation, (S)-9-[1-(3-chlorophenyl)-2-carboxyethyl]-9-deazaguanine (18b), was shown to have an IC50 of 6 nM, whereas the corresponding (R)-isomer was 30-fold less potent.     

Influence of grease formulation parameters on the tribological property of rice bran oil based lubricating grease

The negative environmental impacts and depletion of resources caused due to the excess usage of petroleum based products made researchers to think about an alternative biodegradable product. In the present study, rice bran oil (RBO) was used as a base oil for formulating 16 different grease samples. The thickener used was generated in situ by mixing 12-hydroxy stearic acid (12 HSA) to calcium hydroxide at a different ratio from 1.25 to 2. The formulation parameters such as weight % of thickener, saponification time, and maximum temperature spanned the ranges 5–11 wt.%, 1–2.5 h, and 150–180°C, respectively. The tribological properties such as wear scar diameter (WSD) and friction of 16 different grease samples formulated by varying these parameters were evaluated using a standard four-ball tester as per ASTM standards. The grease samples were characterized by evaluating the penetration value using a standard cone penetrometer. The influence of these formulation parameters on the experimentally evaluated properties was also examined in this work. The results indicated that the variation of these parameters during grease formulation has a significant influence on the evaluated properties.     

Technology and circuit design considerations in quasi-planar double-gate SRAM

SRAM is likely to remain the largest, leakiest, and most process-sensitive circuit block on chip. FinFET, a width-quantized, quasi-planar, double-gate technology, has emerged as the most likely candidate to replace classical technologies around the 45-nm node. This paper studies the impact of FinFET design choices on device and SRAM circuit metrics to understand how its unique properties can be suitably harnessed. Width-quantization limits SRAM sizing choices, while quasi-planarity allows increased cell current by increasing fin height. Conversely, the latter property can be exploited to increase V/sub t/ and/or decrease V/sub dd/ to achieve exponential leakage savings at constant area and read access time. We explore both approaches to selecting the right combination of device structure, V/sub t/ and V/sub dd/ that achieves maximum stability and minimum leakage over the design space. Increasing V/sub t/ with fin height and body thickness improves stability, decreases variability, and decreases source-drain leakage exponentially. But this necessitates the use of small t/sub ox/ to control short channel effect; this increases gate leakage exponentially. On the other hand, increasing V/sub t/ and decreasing V/sub dd/ allows the use of larger t/sub ox/ to maintain short-channel effect and control gate leakage; however, this worsens stability. Careful co-design of device structure, V/sub t/ and V/sub dd/ is imperative to optimize SRAM metrics.     

Enhanced dissolution of hematite in reductive-complexing formulation under regenerative mode

The citric acid-EDTA-ascorbic acid (CEA) formulation used for the dissolution of hematite (α-Fe₂O₃) powder results in a major portion of the dissolved iron as Fe(III)-EDTA (∼80%). Since Fe(III)-EDTA does not dissociate on the cation-exchange resin due to its high stability, the on-line regeneration of EDTA during the dissolution process becomes difficult. The results reported in this study show how, in such a situation, regeneration of EDTA is made possible by introducing carbon steel coupons of known surface area in the dissolution formulation. In these powder dissolution studies, we demonstrate the enhanced dissolution of α-Fe₂O₃ (more than the stoichiometric amount) in dilute CEA formulation by adopting a regenerative mode of dissolution. The powder dissolution study reported in this work is to simulate the application of dilute chemical formulation for the chemical decontamination of a system wherein the base metal (stainless-steel)-aided dissolution is absent e.g., primary system of BWRs/PWRs. A typical case study evaluation is carried out to estimate the approximate surface area of carbon steel required to be exposed in the real system application.     

An FPGA-based parallel architecture for on-line parameter estimation using the RLS identification algorithm

A parallel architecture for an on-line implementation of the recursive least squares (RLS) identification algorithm on a field programmable gate array (FPGA) is presented. The main shortcoming of this algorithm for on-line applications is its computational complexity. The matrix computation to update error covariance consumes most of the time. To improve the processing speed of the RLS architecture, a multi-stage matrix multiplication (MMM) algorithm was developed. In addition, a trace technique was used to reduce the computational burden on the proposed architecture. High throughput was achieved by employing a pipelined design. The scope of the architecture was explored by estimating the parameters of a servo position control system. No vendor dependent modules were used in this design. The RLS algorithm was mapped to a Xilinx FPGA Virtex-5 device. The entire architecture operates at a maximum frequency of 339.156 MHz. Compared to earlier work, the hardware utilization was substantially reduced. An application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC) design was implemented in 180 nm technology with the Cadence RTL compiler.     

A High‐Throughput Screen for Chemical Inhibitors of Exocytic Transport in Yeast

Most of the components of the membrane and protein traffic machinery were discovered by perturbing their functions, either with bioactive compounds or by mutations. However, the mechanisms responsible for exocytic transport vesicle formation at the Golgi and endosomes are still largely unknown. Both the exocytic traffic routes and the signaling pathways that regulate these routes are highly complex and robust, so that defects can be overcome by alternate pathways or mechanisms. A classical yeast genetic screen designed to account for the robustness of the exocytic pathway identified a novel conserved gene, AVL9, which functions in late exocytic transport. We now describe a chemical‐genetic version of the mutant screen, in which we performed a high‐throughput phenotypic screen of a large compound library and identified novel small‐molecule secretory inhibitors. To maximize the number and diversity of our hits, the screen was performed in a pdr5Δ snq2Δ mutant background, which lacks two transporters responsible for pleiotropic drug resistance. However, we found that deletion of both transporters reduced the fitness of our screen strain, whereas the pdr5Δ mutation had a relatively small effect on growth and was also the more important transporter mutation for conferring sensitivity to our hits. In this and similar chemical‐genetic yeast screens, using just a single pump mutation might be sufficient for increasing hit diversity while minimizing the physiological effects of transporter mutations.     

Vision inspection system for the identification and classification of defects in MIG welding joints

The variety of vision inspection systems for welding defects in the present manufacturing scenario is needed for overcoming certain limitations such as the problem of inaccuracy in the images, non-uniformed illumination, noise and deficient contrast, and confusion in defects if they occur in the same spot at the surface and subsurface. Hence, it is imperative to design a new vision inspection system which will enable to overcome the aforementioned problems in welding. A sophisticated new vision inspection system using machine vision has been developed for this study to identify and classify the surface defects of butt joint as per standard EN25817 in metal inert gas (MIG) welding. In this proposed vision system, images of welding surfaces are captured through a CCD camera. Four frames of sequence of images are obtained using four zones of LEDs using the front light illumination system in this method. From these images, the regions of interest are segmented and the average gray levels of the characteristic features of these images are calculated. The same process can be extended further to four zones (four quadrants) of four types of welded joints. Finally, welded joints can be classified into one of the four predefined ones based on the back-propagation neural network. The proposed system demonstrates an overall accuracy of 95% from the 80 real samples tested.     

A fully planarized 4H-SiC trench MOS barrier Schottky (TMBS)rectifier

A fully planarized 4H-SiC trench MOS barrier Schottky (TMBS) rectifier has been designed, fabricated and characterized for the first time. The use of a TMBS structure helps improve the reverse leakage current by more than three orders of magnitude compared to that of a planar Schottky rectifier. We have achieved a low reverse leakage current density of 6×10^-6 A/cm² and a low forward voltage drop of 1.75 V at 60 A/cm² for the TMBS rectifier. The static current-voltage (I-V) and switching characteristics of the TMBS rectifier have been measured at various temperatures. A barrier height of 1.0 eV and an ideality factor of 1.8 were extracted from the forward characteristics. The switching characteristics do not change with temperature indicating the essential absence of stored charge     

Carotene content of some common (cereals,pulses, vegetables,spices and condiments) and unconventional sources of plant origin

This study provides new data on the the total carotenoids and β-carotene content of commonly consumed cereals, pulses, vegetables, spices and condiments. Separation of carotenoids by HPLC showed that β-carotene is the predominant carotenoid in all the foods studied. Cereals and pulses appear to be poor sources of provitamin A precursors. Among the vegetables studied pumpkin, ridge gourd, green chillies, tomato, green peas, field beans and French beans are not only inexpensive but are better sources of β-carotene (20–120 mg/100 g). Among the spices and condiments, red chilli (1310 mg/100 g) and Smilax (2136 mg/100 g), which are regularly used in Indian recipes are good sources of provitamin A precursors. The study also identified unconventional sources like Gulmohar, Peltiforum ferruginum,Lucern and Spirulina as rich sources of β-carotene. Considering that Indian diets predominantly consist of cereals and pulses, choosing appropriate combinations of cereals and pulses will contribute significantly to overall vitamin A intakes. Together with our earlier efforts, the present study has generated a database of β-carotene contents of Indian plant foods, which could be of help in the elimination of vitamin A deficiency.