Reduced graphene oxide wrapped Cu2O supported on C3N4: An efficient visible light responsive semiconductor photocatalyst

Herein, Cu 2O spheres were prepared and encapsulated with reduced graphene oxide (rGO). The Cu 2O–rGO–C3N4 composite covered the whole solar spectrum with significant absorption intensity. rGO wrapped Cu 2O loading caused a red shift in the absorption with respect to considering the absorption of bare C3N4. The photoluminescence study confirms that rGO exploited as an electron transport layer at the interface of Cu 2O and C3N4 heterojunction. Utmost, ∼2 fold synergistic effect was achieved with Cu 2O–rGO–C3N4 for the photocatalytic reduction of 4-nitrophenol to 4-aminophenol in comparison with Cu 2O–rGO and C3N4. The Cu 2O–rGO–C3N4 photocatalyst was reused for four times without loss in its activity.

Research Update: Photoelectrochemical water splitting and photocatalytic hydrogen production using ferrites (MFe2O4) under visible light irradiation

The utilization of solar light for the photoelectrochemical and photocatalytic production of molecular hydrogen from water is a scientific and technical challenge. Semiconductors with suitable properties to promote solar-driven water splitting are a desideratum. A hitherto rarely investigated group of semiconductors are ferrites with the empirical formula MFe2O4 and related compounds. This contribution summarizes the published results of the experimental investigations on the photoelectrochemical and photocatalytic properties of these compounds. It will be shown that the potential of this group of compounds in regard to the production of solar hydrogen has not been fully explored yet.

Gerhart Hauptmann liest Leopardi

Gerhart Hauptmann beschäftigte sich über einen längeren Zeitraum mit dem italienischen Dichter Giacomo Leopardi. Anhand von Tagebuchnotizen und Lesespuren in zwei deutschprachigen Leopardi-Ausgaben der nachgelassenen Bibliothek Hauptmanns rekonstruiert der Aufsatz Hauptmanns Leopardi-Rezeption (vor allem im Zeitraum 1929 und 1938), die mehr der Selbstbespiegelung im Lesen als kritischer oder produktiver Auseinandersetzung dient. Ein weiterer Abschnitt betrachtet Hauptmanns Interesse an Leopardis Biographie, das u.a. die Lesespuren im Vorwort zur Auswahl-Ausgabe von Leopardis Werken durch Ludwig Wolde bezeugen, aber auch die Anteilnahme an der biographischen Leopardi-Skizze in Herbert Eulenbergs populärem Büchlein 'Schattenbilder und Lichtbilder' (1926).

"Last-Mile" preparation for a potential disaster - Interdisciplinary approach towards tsunami early warning and an evacuation information system for the coastal city of Padang, Indonesia

Extreme natural events, like e.g. tsunamis or earthquakes, regularly lead to catastrophes with dramatic consequences. In recent years natural disasters caused hundreds of thousands of deaths, destruction of infrastructure, disruption of economic activity and loss of billions of dollars worth of property and thus revealed considerable deficits hindering their effective management: Needs for stakeholders, decision-makers as well as for persons concerned include systematic risk identification and evaluation, a way to assess countermeasures, awareness raising and decision support systems to be employed before, during and after crisis situations. The overall goal of this study focuses on interdisciplinary integration of various scientific disciplines to contribute to a tsunami early warning information system. In comparison to most studies our focus is on high-end geometric and thematic analysis to meet the requirements of smallscale, heterogeneous and complex coastal urban systems. Data, methods and results from engineering, remote sensing and social sciences are interlinked and provide comprehensive information for disaster risk assessment, management and reduction. In detail, we combine inundation modeling, urban morphology analysis, population assessment, socioeconomic analysis of the population and evacuation modeling. The interdisciplinary results eventually lead to recommendations for mitigation strategies in the fields of spatial planning or coping capacity. © Author(s) 2009.

[(3-Chlorobenzamido)methyl]triethylammonium chloride

We report the synthesis of [(3-chlorobenzamido)methyl]triethylammonium chloride in a reaction of N-(chloromethyl)-3-chlorobenzamide and triethylamine in dry acetone. The structure of the newly synthesized compound was characterized with1H-NMR,13C-NMR, FTIR and Mass spectroscopy. © 2015 by the authors; licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.

[3 + 2]-Cycloadditions of nitrile ylides after photoactivion of vinyl azides under flow conditions

The photodenitrogenation of vinyl azides to 2H-azirines by using a photoflow reactor is reported and compared with thermal formation of 2H-azirines. Photochemically, the ring of the 2H-azirines was opened to yield the nitrile ylides, which underwent a [3 + 2]-cycloaddition with 1,3-dipolarophiles. When diisopropyl azodicarboxylate serves as the dipolarophile, 1,3,4-triazoles become directly accessible starting from the corresponding vinyl azide. © 2013 Cludius-Brandt et al.

A rolling-gliding wear simulator for the investigation of tribological material pairings for application in total knee arthroplasty

Background: Material wear testing is an important technique in the development and evaluation of materials for use in implant for total knee arthroplasty. Since a knee joint induces a complex rolling-gliding movement, standardised material wear testing devices such as Pin-on-Disc or Ring-on-Disc testers are suitable to only a limited extent because they generate pure gliding motion only.Methods: A rolling-gliding wear simulator was thus designed, constructed and implemented, which simulates and reproduces the rolling-gliding movement and loading of the knee joint on specimens of simplified geometry. The technical concept was to run a base-plate, representing the tibia plateau, against a pivoted cylindrical counter-body, representing one femur condyle under an axial load. A rolling movement occurs as a result of the friction and pure gliding is induced by limiting the rotation of the cylindrical counter-body. The set up also enables simplified specimens handling and removal for gravimetrical wear measurements. Long-term wear tests and gravimetrical wear measurements were carried out on the well known material pairings: cobalt chrome-polyethylene, ceramic-polyethylene and ceramic-ceramic, over three million motion cycles to allow material comparisons to be made.Results: The observed differences in wear rates between cobalt-chrome on polyethylene and ceramic on polyethylene pairings were similar to the differences of published data for existing material-pairings. Test results on ceramic-ceramic pairings of different frontal-plane geometry and surface roughness displayed low wear rates and no fracture failures.Conclusions: The presented set up is able to simulate the rolling-gliding movement of the knee joint, is easy to use, and requires a minimum of user intervention or monitoring. It is suitable for long-term testing, and therefore a useful tool for the investigation of new and promising materials which are of interest for application in knee joint replacement implants. © 2010 Richter et al; licensee BioMed Central Ltd.

A space-time hybrid hourly rainfall model for derived flood frequency analysis

For derived flood frequency analysis based on hydrological modelling long continuous precipitation time series with high temporal resolution are needed. Often, the observation network with recording rainfall gauges is poor, especially regarding the limited length of the available rainfall time series. Stochastic precipitation synthesis is a good alternative either to extend or to regionalise rainfall series to provide adequate input for long-term rainfall-runoff modelling with subsequent estimation of design floods. Here, a new two step procedure for stochastic synthesis of continuous hourly space-time rainfall is proposed and tested for the extension of short observed precipitation time series. First, a single-site alternating renewal model is presented to simulate independent hourly precipitation time series for several locations. The alternating renewal model describes wet spell durations, dry spell durations and wet spell intensities using univariate frequency distributions separately for two seasons. The dependence between wet spell intensity and duration is accounted for by 2-copulas. For disaggregation of the wet spells into hourly intensities a predefined profile is used. In the second step a multi-site resampling procedure is applied on the synthetic point rainfall event series to reproduce the spatial dependence structure of rainfall. Resampling is carried out successively on all synthetic event series using simulated annealing with an objective function considering three bivariate spatial rainfall characteristics. In a case study synthetic precipitation is generated for some locations with short observation records in two mesoscale catchments of the Bode river basin located in northern Germany. The synthetic rainfall data are then applied for derived flood frequency analysis using the hydrological model HEC-HMS. The results show good performance in reproducing average and extreme rainfall characteristics as well as in reproducing observed flood frequencies. The presented model has the potential to be used for ungauged locations through regionalisation of the model parameters.

A systematic review of the cost-effectiveness of targeted therapies for metastatic non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC)

Background: Non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) imposes a substantial burden on patients, health care systems and society due to increasing incidence and poor survival rates. In recent years, advances in the treatment of metastatic NSCLC have resulted from the introduction of targeted therapies. However, the application of these new agents increases treatment costs considerably. The objective of this article is to review the economic evidence of targeted therapies in metastatic NSCLC. Methods: A systematic literature review was conducted to identify cost-effectiveness (CE) as well as cost-utility studies. Medline, Embase, SciSearch, Cochrane, and 9 other databases were searched from 2000 through April 2013 (including update) for full-text publications. The quality of the studies was assessed via the validated Quality of Health Economic Studies (QHES) instrument. Results: Nineteen studies (including update) involving the MoAb bevacizumab and the Tyrosine-kinase inhibitors erlotinib and gefitinib met all inclusion criteria. The majority of studies analyzed the CE of first-line maintenance and second-line treatment with erlotinib. Five studies dealt with bevacizumab in first-line regimes. Gefitinib and pharmacogenomic profiling were each covered by only two studies. Furthermore, the available evidence was of only fair quality. Conclusion: First-line maintenance treatment with erlotinib compared to Best Supportive Care (BSC) can be considered cost-effective. In comparison to docetaxel, erlotinib is likely to be cost-effective in subsequent treatment regimens as well. The insights for bevacizumab are miscellaneous. There are findings that gefitinib is cost-effective in first- and second-line treatment, however, based on only two studies. The role of pharmacogenomic testing needs to be evaluated. Therefore, future research should improve the available evidence and consider pharmacogenomic profiling as specified by the European Medicines Agency. Upcoming agents like crizotinib and afatinib need to be analyzed as well. © Lange et al.

A test method for analysing disturbed ethernet data streams

Ethernet connections, which are widely used in many computer networks, can suffer from electromagnetic interference. Typically, a degradation of the data transmission rate can be perceived as electromagnetic disturbances lead to corruption of data frames on the network media. In this paper a software-based measuring method is presented, which allows a direct assessment of the effects on the link layer. The results can directly be linked to the physical interaction without the influence of software related effects on higher protocol layers. This gives a simple tool for a quantitative analysis of the disturbance of an Ethernet connection based on time domain data. An example is shown, how the data can be used for further investigation of mechanisms and detection of intentional electromagnetic attacks. © 2015 Author(s).

Accidental SUSY: Enhanced bulk supersymmetry from brane back-reaction

We compute how bulk loops renormalize both bulk and brane effective interactions for codimension-two branes in 6D gauged chiral supergravity, as functions of the brane tension and brane-localized flux. We do so by explicitly integrating out hyper- and gauge-multiplets in 6D gauged chiral supergravity compactified to 4D on a flux-stabilized 2D rugby-ball geometry, specializing the results of a companion paper, arXiv:1210.3753 , to the supersymmetric case. While the brane back-reaction generically breaks supersymmetry, we show that the bulk supersymmetry can be preserved if the amount of brane- localized flux is related in a specific BPS-like way to the brane tension, and verify that the loop corrections to the brane curvature vanish in this special case. In these systems it is the brane-bulk couplings that fix the size of the extra dimensions, and we show that in some circumstances the bulk geometry dynamically adjusts to ensure the supersymmetric BPS-like condition is automatically satisfied. We investigate the robustness of this residual supersymmetry to loops of non-supersymmetric matter on the branes, and show that supersymmetry- breaking effects can enter only through effective brane-bulk interactions involving at least two derivatives. We comment on the relevance of this calculation to proposed applications of codimension-two 6D models to solutions of the hierarchy and cosmological constant problems. © 2013 SISSA.

Advanced parametrical modelling of 24 GHz radar sensor IC packaging components

This paper deals with the development of an advanced parametrical modelling concept for packaging components of a 24 GHz radar sensor IC used in automotive driver assistance systems. For fast and efficient design of packages for system-in-package modules (SiP), a simplified model for the description of parasitic electromagnetic effects within the package is desirable, as 3-D field computation becomes inefficient due to the high density of conductive elements of the various signal paths in the package. By using lumped element models for the characterization of the conductive components, a fast indication of the design's signal-quality can be gained, but so far does not offer enough flexibility to cover the whole range of geometric arrangements of signal paths in a contemporary package. This work pursues to meet the challenge of developing a flexible and fast package modelling concept by defining parametric lumped-element models for all basic signal path components, e.g. bond wires, vias, strip lines, bumps and balls. © Author(s) 2011. CC Attribution 3.0 License.

AFLP-based genetic mapping of the " bud-flowering" trait in heather (Calluna vulgaris)

Background: Calluna vulgaris is one of the most important landscaping plants produced in Germany. Its enormous economic success is due to the prolonged flower attractiveness of mutants in flower morphology, the so-called bud-bloomers. In this study, we present the first genetic linkage map of C. vulgaris in which we mapped a locus of the economically highly desired trait " flower type" .Results: The map was constructed in JoinMap 4.1. using 535 AFLP markers from a single mapping population. A large fraction (40%) of markers showed distorted segregation. To test the effect of segregation distortion on linkage estimation, these markers were sorted regarding their segregation ratio and added in groups to the data set. The plausibility of group formation was evaluated by comparison of the " two-way pseudo-testcross" and the " integrated" mapping approach. Furthermore, regression mapping was compared to the multipoint-likelihood algorithm. The majority of maps constructed by different combinations of these methods consisted of eight linkage groups corresponding to the chromosome number of C. vulgaris.Conclusions: All maps confirmed the independent inheritance of the most important horticultural traits " flower type" , " flower colour" , and " leaf colour". An AFLP marker for the most important breeding target " flower type" was identified. The presented genetic map of C. vulgaris can now serve as a basis for further molecular marker selection and map-based cloning of the candidate gene encoding the unique flower architecture of C. vulgaris bud-bloomers. © 2013 Behrend et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd.

An identification procedure of multi-input Wiener models for the distortion analysis of nonlinear circuits

In this contribution, a system identification procedure of a two-input Wiener model suitable for the analysis of the disturbance behavior of integrated nonlinear circuits is presented. The identified block model is comprised of two linear dynamic and one static nonlinear block, which are determined using an parameterized approach. In order to characterize the linear blocks, an correlation analysis using a white noise input in combination with a model reduction scheme is adopted. After having characterized the linear blocks, from the output spectrum under single tone excitation at each input a linear set of equations will be set up, whose solution gives the coefficients of the nonlinear block. By this data based black box approach, the distortion behavior of a nonlinear circuit under the influence of an interfering signal at an arbitrary input port can be determined. Such an interfering signal can be, for example, an electromagnetic interference signal which conductively couples into the port of consideration. © 2011 Author(s).

An investigation of online acoustic information for elite rowers in on-water training conditions

Presenting acoustic information has become increasingly interesting for technique training and control in various sports. In elite rowing, acoustic feedback is a new and promising application to optimize the boat's forward motion. This paper describes the potential of acoustic information which represents the movement-relevant information on the boat's forward motion for rowing and its implementation as online acoustic feedback during on-water training sessions. The first significant results were encouraging and support the intention to implement the acoustic information regularly into training processes for elite athletes. © Faculty of Education. University of Alicante.