Control of self-assembly in micro- and nano-scale systems

Control of self-assembling systems at the micro- and nano-scale provides new opportunities for the engineering of novel materials in a bottom-up fashion. These systems have several challenges associated with control including high-dimensional and stochastic nonlinear dynamics, limited sensors for real-time measurements, limited actuation for control, and kinetic trapping of the system in undesirable configurations. Three main strategies for addressing these challenges are described, which include particle design (active self-assembly), open-loop control, and closed-loop (feedback) control. The strategies are illustrated using a variety of examples such as the design of patchy and Janus particles, the toggling of magnetic fields to induce the crystallization of paramagnetic colloids, and high-throughput crystallization of organic compounds in nanoliter droplets. An outlook of the future research directions and the necessary technological advancements for control of micro- and nano-scale self-assembly is provided.     

How to accelerate green technology diffusion? Directed technological change in the presence of coevolving absorptive capacity

The time window for effective climate change mitigation is closing. Technological change needs to be accelerated to limit global warming to a manageable level. Path dependence of technological change is one explanation for sluggish diffusion of green technologies. Firms acquire capital that differs by technology type and build up type-specific technological know-how needed to use capital efficiently. Path dependence emerges from cumulative knowledge stocks manifested in the productivity of supplied capital and firms’ capabilities. Increasing returns arise from induced innovation feedbacks and learning by doing. Relatively lower endowments with technological knowledge are a barrier to diffusion for new technologies. This paper shows how the evolution of relative stocks of technological knowledge explains different shapes of diffusion curves. Using an eco-technology extension of the macroeconomic agent-based model Eurace@unibi, it is shown how the effectiveness of different climate policies depends on the type and strength of diffusion barriers. Environmental taxes can outweigh lower productivity and subsidies perform better if lacking capabilities hinder firms to adopt a sufficiently mature technology.     

Some results on generalized residual entropy

Shannon’s entropy plays an important role in the context of information theory. Since this entropy is not applicable to a system which has survived for some units of time, the concept of residual entropy has been developed in the literature. Here we generalize the residual entropy by choosing a convex function ? with ?(1) = 0. In this paper, some orderings and aging properties have been defined in terms of the generalized residual entropy function and their properties have been studied. Quite a few results available in the literature have been generalized and some distributions (viz. uniform, exponential, Pareto, power series, finite range) have been characterized through the generalized residual entropy.     

Node-pair reliability of network systems with small distances between adjacent nodes

A new method for computing the node-pair reliability of network systems modeled by random graphs with nodes arranged in sequence is presented. It is based on a recursive algorithm using the “sliding window” technique, the window being composed of several consecutive nodes. In a single step, the connectivity probabilities for all nodes included in the window are found. Subsequently, the window is moved one node forward. This process is repeated until, in the last step, the window reaches the terminal node. The connectivity probabilities found at that point are used to compute the node-pair reliability of the network system considered. The algorithm is designed especially for graphs with small distances between adjacent nodes, where the distance between two nodes is defined as the absolute value of the difference between the nodes’ numbers. The maximal distance between any two adjacent nodes is denoted by Γ(G), where G symbolizes a random graph. If Γ(G)=2 then the method can be applied for directed as well as undirected graphs whose nodes and edges are subject to failure. This is important in view of the fact that many algorithms computing network reliability are designed for graphs with failure-prone edges and reliable nodes. If Γ(G)=3 then the method's applicability is limited to undirected graphs with reliable nodes. The main asset of the presented algorithms is their low numerical complexity—O(n), where n denotes the number of nodes.     

基于超图的产品族结构模型的研究

产品族结构模型是对系列化和组合产品各种复杂关系的综合和表达，它的合理性是产品配置设计过程的基础，超图能够表达是一般离散结构，而结构化超图表达了集合元素之间的层次关系，利用结构化超图模型来构造产品族结构模型，并给出了配置设计算法，最后用一个实例来验证方法的可行性。     

Counting maximal independent sets in directed path graphs

The problem of counting maximal independent sets is #P-complete for chordal graphs but solvable in polynomial time for its subclass of interval graphs. This work improves upon both of these results by showing that the problem remains #P-complete when restricted to directed path graphs but that a further restriction to rooted directed path graphs admits a polynomial time solution.     

Epitaxy growth and directed crystallization of high-density polyethylene in the oriented blends with isotactic polypropylene

Various lamellar orientations of high-density polyethylene (HDPE), due to competition between bulk nucleation and interfacial nucleation, have been realized in its melt drawn blends with isotactic polypropylene (iPP) upon cooling after subjected to 160 °C for 30 min. Directed crystallization, with heterogeneous nucleation in the bulk (within domains), is defined as lamellar growth along boundary of anisotropic domains and is favored in larger domains at higher temperature (slow cooling), since overgrowth of lamellae can feel the interface rather than impingement with neighbor ones as a result of scare nuclei at higher temperature. Moreover, lamellar growth caused by directed crystallization is dependent of dimension of confinement. Due to 2D confinement of cylindrical domains, lamellae can only grow along the axis of cylinder and thus b-axis orientation is formed. While in the layered domains with 1D confinement, however, lamellae grow with the normal of (110) plane along the melt drawn direction. On the other hand, epitaxial growth of HDPE chains onto iPP lamellae is related to the surface-induced crystallization and dominated by the interfacial nucleation. Only interfacial nucleation is preferred can epitaxial growth occur. Therefore, retarded crystallization, realized by either strong confinement in finer domains or rapid cooling or both, is favorable for it.     

Novel biocatalysts: Recent developments

The limited number of suitably well characterized biocatalysts continues to limit progress in the application of biological routes in the synthesis of compounds for novel pharmaceuticals, materials, or performance chemicals. In this situation, the discovery of novel biocatalysts or novel functionalities or substrates on existing ones is an important task. This work describes a range of novel biocatalysts obtained recently through one of three techniques: environmental sampling or screening, protein engineering on existing enzymes, or extension of the catalytic profile of existing catalysts.     

一种基于生成树的分类去除关联规则冗余方法

在信息及数据爆炸的时代,冗余问题已经成为数据挖掘者获得知识的重大障碍,而目前解决的方法会导致关联规则的不完整性。基于此,文中引入了有向超图表示关联规则,重定义了邻接矩阵,介绍了冗余规则分类处理思想,将冗余规则分为从属规则和重复路径规则,通过VB编程去除了从属规则冗余,以及利用生成树算法去除了重复路径规则冗余。实验结果证明,此方法创新性地结合了图论中有向超图、生成树与关联规则的知识,维护了关联规则的完整性和准确性,同时去除了全部冗余规则。     

Intelligent fault diagnosis for rolling bearings based on graph shift regularization with directed graphs

Graph shift regularization is a new and effective graph-based semi-supervised classification method, but its performance is closely related to the representation graphs. Since directed graphs can convey more information about the relationship between vertices than undirected graphs, an intelligent method called graph shift regularization with directed graphs (GSR-D) is presented for fault diagnosis of rolling bearings. For greatly improving the diagnosis performance of GSR-D, a directed and weighted k-nearest neighbor graph is first constructed by treating each sample (i.e., each vibration signal segment) as a vertex, in which the similarity between samples is measured by cosine distance instead of the commonly used Euclidean distance, and the edge weights are also defined by cosine distance instead of the commonly used heat kernel. Then, the labels of samples are considered as the graph signals indexed by the vertices of the representation graph. Finally, the states of unlabeled samples are predicted by finding a graph signal that has minimal total variation and satisfies the constraint given by labeled samples as much as possible. Experimental results indicate that GSR-D is better and more stable than the standard convolutional neural network and support vector machine in rolling bearing fault diagnosis, and GSR-D only has two tuning parameters with certain robustness.