Low-cost and two-cycle hardware structures of PRINCE lightweight block cipher

In this paper, low-cost and two-cycle hardware structures of the PRINCE lightweight block cipher are presented. In the first structure, we proposed an area-constrained structure, and in the second structure, a high-speed implementation of the PRINCE cipher is presented. The substitution box (S-box) and the inverse of S-box (S-box⁻¹) blocks are the most complex blocks in the PRINCE cipher. These blocks are designed by an efficient structure with low critical path delay. In the low-cost structure, the S-boxes and S-boxes⁻¹ are shared between the round computations and the intermediate step of PRINCE cipher. Therefore, the proposed architecture is implemented based on the lowest number of computation resources. The two-cycle implementation of PRINCE cipher is designed by a processing element (PE), which is a general and reconfigurable element. This structure has a regular form with the minimum number of the control signal. Implementation results of the proposed structures in 180-nm CMOS technology and Virtex-4 and Virtex-6 FPGA families are achieved. The proposed structures, based on the results, have better critical path delay and throughput compared with other's related works.     

New approach to unsupported ReS2 nanorod catalyst for upgrading of heavy crude oil using methane as hydrogen source

Highly active ReS₂ nanocatalysts were prepared by CVD method and characterized by XRD, BET -BJH, Raman spectroscopy, XPS, TPR, NH₃-TPD, SEM, and HRTEM techniques. Catalytic activities were used in upgrading heavy crude oil using methane as hydrogen source. The results showed a significant increase in API and decrease in sulfur and nitrogen content of crude oil. RSM technique was used to investigate the interactive effects of temperature (200–400 °C), pressure (20–40 bar) and dosage of nanocatalyst (0.5–2 wt. %) on the performance of HDS reaction. The results represent that the maximum predicted HDS activity (74.375%) was estimated under the optimal conditions (400 °C, 20 bars, and 2 wt % of nanocatalyst). Also, the effect of reaction temperature, pressure and dosage of ReS₂ nanorods catalyst on HDN of heavy crude oil was investigated and highest efficiency in the HDN process (93%) occurred at 400 °C and 40 bar using 2 wt % ReS₂.     

Structural and electronic properties of CuInSe2

Structural investigation on monocrystalline CuInSe₂ samples has been made. From the single crystal results, the space group of CuInSe₂ was confirmed to be Iˉ42d and the crystal solidification direction was investigated. Compositional uniformity of the ingots was established by EPMA and it was found that the indium concentration was greater than that for copper. Systematic annealing experiments were carried out in vacuum at different temperatures (as low as 160° C) and for different times. Large variation in resistivity was observed after the annealing treatment. P-type samples were found to convert to n-type after the heat-treatments.     

A New Image Analysis Based Method for Measuring Electrospun Nanofiber Diameter

In this paper, a new image analysis based method for electrospun nanofiber diameter measurement has been presented. The method was tested by a simulated image with known characteristics and a real web. Mean (M) and standard deviation (STD) of fiber diameter obtained using this method for the simulated image were 15.02 and 4.80 pixels respectively, compared to the true values of 15.35 and 4.47 pixels. For the real web, applying the method resulted in M and STD of 324 and 50.4 nm which are extremely close to the values of 319 and 42 nm obtained using manual method. The results show that this approach is successful in making fast, accurate automated measurements of electrospun fiber diameters.     

Extending the Kernighan/Lin Heuristic for Hardware and Software Functional Partitioning

The Kernighan/Lin graph partitioning heuristic, also known as min-cut or group migration, has been extended over several decades very successfully for circuit partitioning. Those extensions customized the heuristic and its associated data structure to rapidly compute the minimum-cut metric central to circuit partitioning; as such, those extensions are not directly applicable to other problems. In this paper, we extend the heuristic for functional partitioning, which in turn can solve the much investigated codesign problem of partitioning a system's coarse-grained functions among hardware and software components. The key extension customizes the heuristic and data structure to rapidly compute execution-time and communication metrics, crucial to hardware and software partitioning, and leads to near-linear time-complexity and excellent resulting quality. Another extension uses a new criteria for terminating the heuristic, eliminating time-consuming and unnecessary fine-tuning of a partition. Our experiments demonstrate extremely fast execution times (just a few seconds) with results matched only by the slower simulated annealing heuristic, meaning that the extended Kernighan/Lin heuristic will likely prove hard to beat for hardware and software functional partitioning.     

Mlcrolasers based on silica microspheres

Light can be confined efficiently in the high-Q, small-volume whispering-gallery-modes observed in silica microspheres. By coupling these microspheres to eroded optical fibers and fiber tips, direct mapping of the whispering-gallery modes has been achieved and the mode numbers have been assessed. The properties of these modes have allowed us to obtain laser action with very low thresholds in Nd-doped silica microspheres. Further projects in the field of non-linear optics and cavity quantum electrodynamics are described.     

A complete VARMA modelling methodology based on scalar components

Abstract. This article proposes an extension to scalar component methodology for the identification and estimation of VARMA models. The complete methodology determines the exact positions of all free parameters in any VARMA model with a predetermined embedded scalar component structure. This leads to an exactly identified system of equations that is estimated using full information maximum likelihood.     

A differential transformer-based force sensor utilizing a magnetic fluid core

Microsystem Technologies - A force sensor utilizing a transformer concept with a ferrofluid core was developed. A ferrofluid reservoir was machined out of Teflon and the open top of the reservoir...     

Classification and trend analysis of UML books (1997–2009)

Technical books of each subject area denote the level of maturity and knowledge demand in that area. According to the Google Books database, about 208 Unified Modeling Language (UML) books have been published from its inception in 1997 until 2009. While various book reviews are frequently published in various sources (e.g., IEEE Software Bookshelf), there are no studies to classify UML books into meaningful categories. Such a classification can help researchers in the area to identify trends and also reveal the level of activity in each sub-area of UML. The statistical survey reported in this article intends to be a first step in classification and trend analysis of the UML books published from 1997 to 2009. The study also sheds light on the quantity of books published in different focus areas (e.g., UML’s core concepts, patterns, tool support, Object Constraint Language and Model-Driven Architecture) and also on different application domains (e.g., database modeling, web applications, and real-time systems). The trends of book publications in each sub-area of UML are also used to track the level of maturity, to identify possible Hype cycles and also to measure knowledge demand in each area.