Magnetic field-assisted photochemical machining (MFAPCM) of SS316L

In this paper, a new technique of photochemical machining (PCM) process has been described. The objective of this study is to investigate the effect of applying a magnetic field on the PCM of AISI 316?L stainless steel. The experiments were planned and conducted using a Full Factorial Design (FFD) approach. The control parameters selected were magnetic field, temperature, concentration and time. The analysis of the results shows significant improvement in the etch rate due to the application of a magnetic field. The highest etch rate was achieved at a concentration of 700?g/l, at the temperature of 60°C in a static magnetic field. The improvement of the etch rate is 2.5 times with the application of magnetic field as compared to the conventional PCM process.     

Investigation on effect of grain orientation in photochemical machining of Monel 400

In this study, microchannels with widths of 60, 100, 150, 200, and 250?µm were fabricated on the surface of Monel 400 alloy, and the effect of the rolling direction on the surface finish and etching depth was investigated. The obtained results revealed that the quality of the microchannel surface finish was better along the rolling direction than across the rolling direction, owing to the grain boundary orientations along the (001) plane. In addition, the etching depth increased along the rolling direction due to the presence of residual stress and plastic strain, which ultimately improved the microchannel quality.     

A Generative Computer-Aided Process Planning System for Prismatic Components

This paper deals with design and development of a generative computer-aided process planning (CAPP) system for prismatic components and named PSG-CAPP. The proposed CAPP system has been divided into three modules. The first module is concerned with feature extraction. The second and third modules deal with planning the set-up, machine selection, cutting tool selection, cutting parameter selection, and generation of process plan sheet. The whole CAPP system is developed using Visual Basic 6.0 as front end and Oracle 7.3 as back end. The SolidWorks98 plus has been used for modelling, and feature extraction has been implemented using a program written in Visual Basic 6.0. The speciality of the developed CAPP system is that it is linked with the CAD module and it extracts the majority of features automatically prior to process planning. The developed CAPP system has been tested with aerospace components. The main feature of the proposed CAPP system is its ability to handle a variety of prismatic components and generate process plans for them. A case study has been included to highlight the potential of the CAPP system. ID="A1"Correspondance and offprint requests to: Professor P. V. Mohanram, Department of Mechanical Engineering, PSG College of Technology, Peelamedu, Coimbatore 641004, India. E-mail: msadaiah@yahoo.com     

Detection of breast masses in mammograms by density slicing and texture flow-field analysis.

We propose a method for the detection of masses in mammographic images that employs Gaussian smoothing and sub-sampling operations as preprocessing steps. The mass portions are segmented by establishing intensity links from the central portions of masses into the surrounding areas. We introduce methods for analyzing oriented flow-like textural information in mammograms. Features based on flow orientation in adaptive ribbons of pixels across the margins of masses are proposed to classify the regions detected as true mass regions or false-positives (FPs). The methods yielded a mass versus normal tissue classification accuracy represented as an area (Az) of 0.87 under the receiver operating characteristics (ROCs) curve with a dataset of 56 images including 30 benign disease, 13 malignant disease, and 13 normal cases selected from the mini Mammographic Image Analysis Society database. A sensitivity of 81% was achieved at 2.2 FPs/image. Malignant tumor versus normal tissue classification resulted in a higher Az value of 0.9 under the ROC curve using only the 13 malignant and 13 normal cases with a sensitivity of 85% at 2.45 FPs/image. The mass detection algorithm could detect all the 13 malignant tumors successfully, but achieved a success rate of only 63% (19/30) in detecting the benign masses. The mass regions that were successfully segmented were further classified as benign or malignant disease by computing five texture features based on gray-level co-occurrence matrices (GCMs) and using the features in a logistic regression method. The features were computed using adaptive ribbons of pixels across the boundaries of the masses. Benign versus malignant classification using the GCM-based texture features resulted in Az = 0.79 with 19 benign and 13 malignant cases.     

Performance of alumina-based ceramic inserts in high-speed machining of nimonic 80A

The study of machining forces and cutting tool wear during the machining is important for designing and selection of machining system and improving the productivity. This study reports the machinability of Nimonic 80A superalloy with alumina-based ceramic inserts. The objective is to analyze the reason for higher cutting forces generated during machining and tool wear mechanism on machining parameters. The cutting forces and tool wear are found to be mainly influenced by the cutting speed. The main causes of tool failure while machining Nimonic 80A are adhesion and abrasion. The role of tool wear is more dominant on the surface finish at lower cutting speed. Also, with an increase in cutting speed, thermally activated wear quietly increases at tool surfaces. The mechanistic approach is used to model the main cutting force. Developed cutting force model agrees well with experimental cutting force values.     

Remote research methods for Human–AI–Robot Teaming

This study focuses on methodological adaptations and considerations for remote research on Human–AI–Robot Teaming (HART) amidst the COVID-19 pandemic. Themes and effective remote research methods were explored. Central issues in remote research were identified, such as challenges in attending to participants' experiences, coordinating experimenter teams remotely, and protecting privacy and confidentiality. Instances of experimental design overcoming these challenges were identified in methods for recruitment and onboarding, training, team task scenarios, and measurement. Three case studies are presented in which interactive in-person testbeds for HART were rapidly redesigned to function remotely. Although COVID-19 may have temporarily constrained experimental design, future HART studies may adopt remote research methods to expand the research toolkit.     

Experimental investigation of surface topography in photochemical machining of Inconel 718

Surface topography is one of the important aspects of micro-components manufacturing. Photochemical machining (PCM) is the most commonly used method in the low-cost micro-manufacturing process. The present investigation focused on the study of the effect of process parameters on the surface topography in PCM of Inconel 718 of two different grain sizes using ferric chloride (FeCl₃). For this work, the input parameters considered are concentration, time and temperature of the etchant. The temperature of the etchant was found to be the most dominant parameter in the PCM of Inconel 718. Moreover, in this study, the effect of grain size of samples on surface roughness was considered. The average increase in surface roughness is 1.227 times due to variation in grain size from 59?µm to 42?µm.     

Photochemical machining of a novel cardiovascular stent

This paper describes the design, analysis, and fabrication of a cardiovascular stent on a SS316L using 3D photochemical machining (PCM). Finite element simulation has been performed to investigate the mechanical behavior of the designed stent. The buckling, stress, and displacement of the stent are computed and analysed. Efforts are made in the replacement of a conventional tedious photo-tool masking process with a more efficient and rapid process of micro-image printing on a 3D seamless tube. The experimentations are performed by using ultrasonic enhanced photochemical machining. The analysis of results show a significant improvement in the etch rate due to ultrasonic vibration. It is observed that the etch rate is approximately 2.7 times higher than the conventional PCM process. Furthermore, it is also observed that the maximum etch rate is achieved at a temperature of 353?K and a concentration of 700?g/l in ultrasonic vibrations. The results show the cost effectiveness and usefulness of the new technique for mass production.     

Gradient and texture analysis for the classification of mammographic masses

Computer-aided classification of benign and malignant masses on mammograms is attempted in this study by computing gradient-based and texture-based features. Features computed based on gray-level co-occurrence matrices (GCMs) are used to evaluate the effectiveness of textural information possessed by mass regions in comparison with the textural information present in mass margins. A method involving polygonal modeling of boundaries is proposed for the extraction of a ribbon of pixels across mass margins. Two gradient-based features are developed to estimate the sharpness of mass boundaries in the ribbons of pixels extracted from their margins. A total of 54 images (28 benign and 26 malignant) containing 39 images from the Mammographic Image Analysis Society (MIAS) database and 15 images from a local database are analyzed. The best benign versus malignant classification of 82.1%, with an area (Az) of 0.85 under the receiver operating characteristics (ROC) curve, was obtained with the images from the MIAS database by using GCM-based texture features computed from mass margins. The classification method used is based on posterior probabilities computed from Mahalanobis distances. The corresponding accuracy using jack-knife classification was observed to be 74.4%, with Az = 0.67. Gradient-based features achieved Az = 0.6 on the MIAS database and Az = 0.76 on the combined database. The corresponding values obtained using jack-knife classification were observed to be 0.52 and 0.73 for the MIAS and combined databases, respectively.     

Asymmetric Desymmetrization of the Diallyl Acetals of Alkynals by the Enantioselective Pauson–Khand‐Type Reaction Catalysts

Asymmetric desymmetrization of the diallyl acetals of alkynal ( 1 ) by an enantioselective Pauson–Khand‐type reaction catalyst was studied. The corresponding 5‐oxabicyclo[3.3.0]octenones ( 2 ) were obtained as a mixture of diastereomers ( 2a and 2b ), which were hydrolyzed to afford a single enantiomer ( 3 ), in high yields (up to 88%) as well as excellent enantioselectivities (up to 97%).