Perceived production complexity – understanding more than parts of a system

To successfully manage today’s complex production systems it is essential to study operators’ perception of the system. The paper presents perceived production complexity assessed at seven manufacturing companies with the CompleXity Index (CXI) method. While other methods have measured product variants, layout, work content, tools and information items, CXI combines them into three areas. These three complexity areas (Station design, Work variance and Disturbance handling) help to create an understanding of the complex system by visualising how they contribute to complexity, and show the need to support the operators’ ability to handle the varying work.     

Adolescent self-control and music and movie piracy

Recent studies have applied Grottfredson and Hirschi’s General Theory of Crime to investigate whether college students’ inclinations toward internet software piracy is related to low self-control and opportunity (i.e., computer ownership). Given the widespread use of the internet to illegally obtain copies of music and movies, it is important to understand the factors in this form of piracy as well. This study applied the self-control perspective to examine the attitudes of high school students toward the internet piracy of music and movies. Attitudes toward the internet piracy of music and movies were related to self-control, biological sex, internet experience, affiliation with deviant peers, and grade level in this study of high school students. This information is important because studies of internet piracy had not yet confirmed the presence and predictability of internet piracy in high school students. This study also suggests that piracy prevention efforts may be most appropriately focused on high school age individuals and directed toward increasing self-control.     

Proteomic studies in animal models of diabetes

The aim of this review is to provide an overview of proteomic studies in animal models of diabetes and to give some insight into the different methods available today in the rapidly developing field of proteomics. A summary of 31 papers published between 1997 and 2007 is presented. For instance, proteomics has been used to study the development of both type 1 and type 2 diabetes, diabetic complications in tissues like heart, kidney and retina and changes after treatment with anti-diabetic drugs like peroxisome proliferator-activated receptors agonists. Together, these studies give a good overview of a number of experimental approaches. Proteomics holds the promise of providing major contributions to the field of diabetes research. However, to achieve this, a number of issues need to be resolved. Appropriate data representation to facilitate data comparison, exchange, and verification is required, as well as improved statistical assessment of proteomic experiments. In addition, it is important to follow up the results with functional studies to be able to make biologically relevant conclusions. The potential of proteomics to dissect complex human disorders is now beginning to be realized. In the future, this will result in new important information concerning diabetes.     

Simulation of shale gas transport and production with complex fractures using embedded discrete fracture model

The goal of this study is to develop a new model to simulate gas and water transport in shale nanopores and complex fractures. A new gas diffusivity equation was first derived to consider multiple important physical mechanisms such as gas desorption, gas slippage and diffusion, and non‐Darcy flow. For complex fractures, a state‐of‐the‐art embedded discrete fracture model (EDFM) was implemented. Numerical model is verified against a commercial reservoir simulator for shale gas simulation with multiple planar fractures. After that, a series of simulation studies was performed to investigate the impacts of complex gas transport mechanisms and various fracture geometries on well performance. The critical parameters controlling well performance are identified. The simulation results reveal that modeling of gas production from complex fractures as well as modeling important gas transport mechanisms in shale gas reservoirs is extremely significant. © 2018 American Institute of Chemical Engineers AIChE J, 64: 2251–2264, 2018     

Phase Equilibria and Thermodynamics in the Al2O3–SiO2 System—Modeling of Mullite and Liquid

The Al₂O₃–SiO₂ system has been reassessed using a solution model for mullite extending from sillimanite to a hypothetical state of alumina. The property of sillimanite, to be used to describe one of the end-members, was extracted from an analysis of the T – P phase diagram for Al₂SiO₅ polymorphs. It was possible to represent the information on the range of stability of mullite, including some showing that mullite extends to higher SiO₂ contents than represented by the composition of 3:2 mullite. An attempt was made to model the liquid with the ionic two-sublattice model using a new species AlO₂⁻¹. The pressure dependence of Al₂SiO₅ polymorphs was optimized by a new model recently implemented in Thermo-Calc.     

千鹅冲铜钼矿床地球物理特征及找矿模型

大别山北麓千鹅冲铜钼矿是斑岩型矿床,矿体、控矿构造、岩浆岩、赋矿地层以及周围地质体之间存在某种物理性能差异,具有明显的地球物理异常特征。对此,在对矿床地球物理特征分析的基础上,建立了该区域的地球物理找矿模型,以期为正在进行中的大别山地区多金属成矿带的找矿工作提供参考。     

Effect of the Sapphire-Nitridation Level and Nucleation-Layer Enrichment with Aluminum on the Structural Properties of AlN Layers

The effect of atomic aluminum deposited onto sapphire substrates with different nitridation levels on the quality of AlN layers grown by ammonia molecular-beam epitaxy is investigated. The nitridation of sapphire with the formation of ~1 monolayer of AlN is shown to ensure the growth of layers with a smoother surface and better crystal quality than in the case of the formation of a nitrided AlN layer with a thickness of ~2 monolayers. It is demonstrated that the change in the duration of exposure of nitrided substrates to the atomic aluminum flux does not significantly affect the parameters of subsequent AlN layers.     

What Are Quantum States?

We present three strong arguments against the ontic interpretation of quantum states. We then show that the appropriate alternative is not an epistemic interpretation, but viewing quantum states as representing the available knowledge about the potentialities of a quantum system from the perspective a of a particular point in space. Unlike ordinary knowledge, which requires a knower, available knowledge can be assumed to be present regardless of a knower. The relationship between “perspectives on potentialities” and “the potentialities themselves” is clarified.