Improved Yen-Joye's authenticated multiple-key agreement protocol

An authenticated multiple-key agreement protocol is proposed. The protocol is not only secure against the unknown-key attack but also more efficient than other protocols.     

A novel integration approach for combining the components to minimize a micro-fuel cell

This work employs porous silicon as a gas diffusion layer (GDL) in a micro-fuel cell. Pt catalyst is deposited on the surface of, and inside, the porous silicon by the physical vapor deposition (PVD) method, to improve the porous silicon conductivity. Porous silicon with Pt catalyst replaces traditional GDL, and the Pt metal that remains on the rib is used to form a micro-thermal sensor in a single lithographic process.     

The Antithrombotic Agent Pterostilbene Interferes with Integrin αIIbβ3-Mediated Inside-Out and Outside-In Signals in Human Platelets

Platelets play a crucial role in the physiology of primary hemostasis and pathological processes such as arterial thrombosis; thus, developing a therapeutic target that prevents platelet activation can reduce arterial thrombosis. Pterostilbene (PTE) has remarkable pharmacological activities, including anticancer and neuroprotection. Few studies have reported the effects of pterostilbene on platelet activation. Thus, we examined the inhibitory mechanisms of pterostilbene in human platelets and its role in vascular thrombosis prevention in mice. At low concentrations (2–8 μM), pterostilbene strongly inhibited collagen-induced platelet aggregation. Furthermore, pterostilbene markedly diminished Lyn, Fyn, and Syk phosphorylation and hydroxyl radical formation stimulated by collagen. Moreover, PTE directly hindered integrin α_IIbβ₃ activation through interfering with PAC-1 binding stimulated by collagen. In addition, pterostilbene affected integrin α_IIbβ₃-mediated outside-in signaling, such as integrin β₃, Src, and FAK phosphorylation, and reduced the number of adherent platelets and the single platelet spreading area on immobilized fibrinogen as well as thrombin-stimulated fibrin clot retraction. Furthermore, pterostilbene substantially prolonged the occlusion time of thrombotic platelet plug formation in mice. This study demonstrated that pterostilbene exhibits a strong activity against platelet activation through the inhibition of integrin α_IIbβ₃-mediated inside-out and outside-in signaling, suggesting that pterostilbene can serve as a therapeutic agent for thromboembolic disorders.     

Antibody Libraries as Tools to Discover Functional Antibodies and Receptor Pleiotropism

Most antibodies currently in use have been selected based on their binding affinity. However, nowadays, antibodies that can not only bind but can also alter the function of cell surface signaling components are increasingly sought after as therapeutic drugs. Therefore, the identification of such functional antibodies from a large antibody library is the subject of intensive research. New methods applied to combinatorial antibody libraries now allow the isolation of functional antibodies in the cellular environment. These selected agonist antibodies have provided new insights into important issues of signal transduction. Notably, when certain antibodies bind to a given receptor, the cell fate induced by them may be the same or different from that induced by natural agonists. In addition, combined with phenotypic screening, this platform allows us to discover unexpected experimental results and explore various phenomena in cell biology, such as those associated with stem cells and cancer cells.     

An investigation of laser-assisted machining of Al2O3 ceramics planing

Laser-assisted machining (LAM), an alternative method of fabricating difficult-to-machine materials, uses primarily laser power to heat the local area (without necessarily evaporating or melting any material) before the material is removed. It not only efficiently reduces the cutting force during the manufacturing process but also improves the machining characteristics and geography with regard to difficult-to-machine materials, especially structural ceramics.This study on the application of laser-assisted machining to Al₂O₃ ceramics examines the measurements of cutting force and workpiece surface temperature as well as surface integrity and tool wear. Specifically, it uses the lattice Boltzmann method (LBM) to calculate the temperature distribution inside the ceramic workpiece during the LAM process and ensure that the laser energy causes no subsurface damage. The experimental results reveal that the LAM process efficiently reduces the cutting force by 22% (feed force) and 20% (thrust force) and produces better workpiece surface quality than conventional planing.     

Parallelizing Complex Streaming Applications on Distributed Scratchpad Memory Multicore Architecture

Multicore processors can provide sufficient computing power and flexibility for complex streaming applications, such as high-definition video processing. For less hardware complexity and power consumption, the distributed scratchpad memory architecture is considered, instead of the cache memory architecture. However, the distributed design poses new challenges to programming. It is difficult to exploit all available capabilities and achieve maximal throughput, due to the combined complexity of inter-processor communication, synchronization, and workload balancing. In this study, we developed an efficient design flow for parallelizing multimedia applications on a distributed scratchpad memory multicore architecture. An application is first partitioned into streaming components and then mapped onto multicore processors. Various hardware-dependent factors and application-specific characteristics are involved in generating efficient task partitions and allocating resources appropriately. To test and verify the proposed design flow, three popular multimedia applications were implemented: a full-HD motion JPEG decoder, an object detector, and a full-HD H.264/AVC decoder. For demonstration purposes, SONY PlayStation \(^{\circledR }\) 3 was selected as the target platform. Simulation results show that, on PS3, the full-HD motion JPEG decoder with the proposed design flow can decode about 108.9 frames per second (fps) in the 1080p format. The object detection application can perform real-time object detection at 2.84 fps at \(1280 \times 960\) resolution, 11.75 fps at \(640 \times 480\) resolution, and 62.52 fps at \(320 \times 240\) resolution. The full-HD H.264/AVC decoder applications can achieve nearly 50 fps.     

Comparatively electrochemical studies at different operational temperatures for the effect of nanoclay platelets on the anticorrosion efficiency of DBSA-doped polyaniline/Na-MMT clay nanocomposite coatings

In this paper, DBSA-doped polyaniline (PANI)/Na⁺-montmorillonite (MMT) clay nanocomposite (PCN) materials have been successfully prepared with dodecylbenzenesulfonic acid (DBSA) as emulsifier and dopant for the emulsion polymerization of aniline. The as-prepared DBSA-doped samples were subsequently characterized by FTIR spectroscopy, WAXRD patterns and TEM. It should be noted that the nanocomposite coating containing 1 wt.% of clay loading was found to exhibit an observable enhanced corrosion protection on cold-rolled steel (CRS) electrode at higher operational temperature of 50 °C, which was even better than that of uncoated and electrode-coated with PANI alone at room temperature of 30 °C based on the electrochemical parameter evaluations (e.g., E_corr, R_p, I_corr, R_corr and impedance). In this work, all electrochemical measurements were performed at a double-wall jacketed cell, covered with a glass plate, through which water was circulated from a thermostat to maintain a constant operational temperature of 30, 40 and 50 ± 0.5 °C. Moreover, a series of electrochemical parameters shown in Tafel, Nyquist and Bode plots were all used to evaluate PCN coatings at three different operational temperatures in 5 wt.% aqueous NaCl electrolyte. Effect of material composition on the molecular weight and optical properties of neat PANI and PCN materials, in the form of solution, were studied by gel permeation chromatography (GPC) and UV-vis spectra, respectively. Finally, electrical conductivity at three different operational temperatures of PANI and PCN powder-pressed pellets doped with different inorganic acids such as HCl, HNO₃ and H₂SO₄ was also investigated through the measurements of standard four-point-probe technique.     

Glass transition and exclusion model in crystallization of polyether-polyester block copolymers with amide linkages

Polyether-polyester block copolymers having various polyetheramide contents were synthesized. Single glass transition intermediated in temperature between the glass transition temperatures of polyester and polyetheramide components was found for all of polyether-polyesters. The compositional variation of glass transition exhibited a similar trend to the predicted result of thermodynamic theory for compatible polymer blends. The incompatible pair of homopolyester and homopolyether was forced to be compatible after copolymerization. A modified theoretical prediction for the glass transition of copolymers based on the thermodynamic theory is proposed. Consistent results between theoretical prediction and experimental measurements were found. Unlike homopolyesters, the glass transition temperature of copolymer amorphous domains gradually decreases with crystallization time. An exclusion model for the crystallization of polyester segments in copolymers is proposed. The temperature width of the glass transition increases with crystallization time. The broadening towards the low temperature side in glass transition is interpreted as the evidence of crystallization-induced partial phase separation. Instead of forming macroscopic segregation, the excluded polyether segments resided in-between crystalline polyester lamellae and mix with amorphous polyesters to generate amorphous domains exhibiting concentration gradient along the lamellar basal surface normal. Further increasing the polyetheramide segment content brings the excluded polyetheramide segments to form domains among the crystallized polyester spherulites so as to inhibit the occurrence of spherulitic impingement.     

Managing a Very Connected World: A Report on APNOMS2015

This article presents a report on APNOMS2015, which was held August 19–21, 2015 in Busan, Korea. The theme of APNOMS2015 was “Managing a Very Connected World.”     

Impacts of employee participation and trust on e-business readiness, benefits, and satisfaction

An increasing number of firms have invested large sums in implementing electronic business (e-business). Nowadays, while the e-businesses are fostering rapid industrial growth, employees are the one who factually engage with information exchange, communication and support e-business processes. However, prior literature has paid scant attention in determining e-business value and its drivers from employee perspective. Thus, the present study attempts to investigate how user participation and trust drives e-business value in terms of e-business readiness, e-business benefits, and e-business satisfaction. For this sake, data collected from 143 employees at Taiwanese IT related firms and analyzed with partial least square (PLS) structural equation approach reveal that trust and user participation were significant precursors of employee e-business satisfaction. The results strongly support the contention that trust directly affects e-business satisfaction, and indirectly affects it through e-business readiness and e-business benefits. The research model and findings will help managers implement e-business successfully and offer valuable references for researchers interested in developing related theories.