Preparation of a ZrO2–Al2O3 nanocomposite by high-pressure sintering of spray-pyrolyzed powders

ZrO2–Al2O3 powders were synthesized by spray pyrolysis. These powders were sintered at 1 GPa in the temperature range of 700–1100 °C. The microstructural evolution and densification are reported in this paper. The application of 1 Gpa pressure lowers the crystallization temperature from ∼850 to <700 °C. Similarly, the transformation temperature under 1 GPa pressure for γ → α–Al2O3 reduces from ∼1100 to 700–800 °C range, and that for t → m ZrO2 reduces from ∼1050 to 700–800 °C range. It was possible to obtain highly dense nanocrystalline ZrO2–Al2O3 composite at temperatures as low as 700 °C. The effect of high pressure on nucleation and transformation of phases is discussed.

On the dynamic contact angle in simulation of impinging droplets with sharp interface methods

Effects of dynamic contact angle models on the flow dynamics of an impinging droplet in sharp interface simulations are presented in this article. In the considered finite element scheme, the free surface is tracked using the arbitrary Lagrangian-Eulerian approach. The contact angle is incorporated into the model by replacing the curvature with the Laplace-Beltrami operator and integration by parts. Further, the Navier-slip with friction boundary condition is used to avoid stress singularities at the contact line. Our study demonstrates that the contact angle models have almost no influence on the flow dynamics of the non-wetting droplets. In computations of the wetting and partially wetting droplets, different contact angle models induce different flow dynamics, especially during recoiling. It is shown that a large value for the slip number has to be used in computations of the wetting and partially wetting droplets in order to reduce the effects of the contact angle models. Among all models, the equilibrium model is simple and easy to implement. Further, the equilibrium model also incorporates the contact angle hysteresis. Thus, the equilibrium contact angle model is preferred in sharp interface numerical schemes.

Treatment efficacy of algae-based sewage treatment plants

Lagoons have been traditionally used in India for decentralized treatment of domestic sewage. These are cost effective as they depend mainly on natural processes without any external energy inputs. This study focuses on the treatment efficiency of algae-based sewage treatment plant (STP) of 67.65 million liters per day (MLD) capacity considering the characteristics of domestic wastewater (sewage) and functioning of the treatment plant, while attempting to understand the role of algae in the treatment. STP performance was assessed by diurnal as well as periodic investigations of key water quality parameters and algal biota. STP with a residence time of 14.3 days perform moderately, which is evident from the removal of total chemical oxygen demand (COD) (60 %), filterable COD (50 %), total biochemical oxygen demand (BOD) (82 %), and filterable BOD (70 %) as sewage travels from the inlet to the outlet. Furthermore, nitrogen content showed sharp variations with total Kjeldahl nitrogen (TKN) removal of 36 %; ammonium N (NH4-N) removal efficiency of 18 %, nitrate (NO3-N) removal efficiency of 22 %, and nitrite (NO2-N) removal efficiency of 57.8 %. The predominant algae are euglenoides (in facultative lagoons) and chlorophycean members (maturation ponds). The drastic decrease of particulates and suspended matter highlights heterotrophy of euglenoides in removing particulates.

Design and Evaluation of a Robust Optical Beam-Interruption-Based Vehicle Classifier System

This paper presents the design and development of a novel optical vehicle classifier system, which is based on interruption of laser beams, that is suitable for use in places with poor transportation infrastructure. The system can estimate the speed, axle count, wheelbase, tire diameter, and the lane of motion of a vehicle. The design of the system eliminates the need for careful optical alignment, whereas the proposed estimation strategies render the estimates insensitive to angular mounting errors and to unevenness of the road. Strategies to estimate vehicular parameters are described along with the optimization of the geometry of the system to minimize estimation errors due to quantization. The system is subsequently fabricated, and the proposed features of the system are experimentally demonstrated. The relative errors in the estimation of velocity and tire diameter are shown to be within 0.5% and to change by less than 17% for angular mounting errors up to 30 degrees. In the field, the classifier demonstrates accuracy better than 97.5% and 94%, respectively, in the estimation of the wheelbase and lane of motion and can classify vehicles with an average accuracy of over 89.5%.

The translation initiation factor DAP5 promotes IRES-driven translation of p53 mRNA

Translational regulation of the p53 mRNA can determine the ratio between p53 and its N-terminal truncated isoforms and therefore has a significant role in determining p53-regulated signaling pathways. Although its importance in cell fate decisions has been demonstrated repeatedly, little is known about the regulatory mechanisms that determine this ratio. Two internal ribosome entry sites (IRESs) residing within the 5'UTR and the coding sequence of p53 mRNA drive the translation of full-length p53 and Delta 40p53 isoform, respectively. Here, we report that DAP5, a translation initiation factor shown to positively regulate the translation of various IRES containing mRNAs, promotes IRES-driven translation of p53 mRNA. Upon DAP5 depletion, p53 and Delta 40p53 protein levels were decreased, with a greater effect on the N-terminal truncated isoform. Functional analysis using bicistronic vectors driving the expression of a reporter gene from each of these two IRESs indicated that DAP5 preferentially promotes translation from the second IRES residing in the coding sequence. Furthermore, p53 mRNA expressed from a plasmid carrying this second IRES was selectively shifted to lighter polysomes upon DAP5 knockdown. Consequently, Delta 40p53 protein levels and the subsequent transcriptional activation of the 14-3-3 sigma gene, a known target of Delta 40p53, were strongly reduced. In addition, we show here that DAP5 interacts with p53 IRES elements in in vitro and in vivo binding studies, proving for the first time that DAP5 directly binds a target mRNA. Thus, through its ability to regulate IRES-dependent translation of the p53 mRNA, DAP5 may control the ratio between different p53 isoforms encoded by a single mRNA.

Combinatorial Exploration of the Structural Landscape of Acid-Pyridine Cocrystals

The structural landscape of acid-pyridine cocrystals is explored by adopting a combinatorial matrix method with 4-substituted benzoic acids and 4-substituted pyridines. The choice of the system restricts the primary synthon to the robust acid-pyridine entity. This methodology accordingly provides hints toward the formation of secondary synthons. The pK(a) rule is validated in the landscape by taking all components of the matrix together and exploring it as a whole. Along with the global features, the exploration of landscapes reveals some local features. Apart from the identification of secondary synthons, it also sheds light on the propensity of hydration in cocrystals, synthon competition, and certain topological similarities. The method described here combines two approaches, namely, database analysis and high throughput crystallography, to extract more information with minimal extra experimental effort.

Quantum-Confined ZnO Nanoshell Photoanodes for Mesoscopic Solar Cells

We present a photoanode for dye-sensitized solar cell (DSC) based on ZnO nanoshell deposited by atomic layer deposition at 150 degrees C on a mesoporous insulating template. An ultrathin layer of ZnO between. 3 and 6 nm, which exhibits quantum confinement effect, is found to be sufficient to transport the photogenerated electrons to the external contacts and exhibits near-unity collection efficiency. A 6 nm ZnO nanoshell on a 2.5 mu m mesoporous nanoparticle Al2O3 template yields photovoltaic power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 4.2% in liquid DSC. Perovskite absorber (CH3NH3PbI3) based solid state solar cells made with similar ZnO nanostructures lead to a high PCE of 7%.

Effect of the Flow Rule on the Bearing Capacity of Strip Foundations on Sand by the Upper-Bound Limit Analysis and Slip Lines

The influence of the flow rule on the bearing capacity of strip foundations placed on sand was investigated using a new kinematic approach of upper-bound limit analysis. The method of stress characteristics was first used to find the mechanism of the failure and to compute the stress field by using the Mohr-Coulomb yield criterion. Once the failure mechanism had been established, the kinematics of the plastic deformation was established, based on the requirements of the upper-bound limit theorem. Both associated and nonassociated plastic flows were considered, and the bearing capacity was obtained by equating the rate of external plastic work to the rate of the internal energy dissipation for both smooth and rough base foundations. The results obtained from the analysis were compared with those available from the literature. (C) 2014 American Society of Civil Engineers.

Experimental investigation of forming limit, void coalescence and crystallographic textures of aluminum alloy 8011 sheet annealed at various temperatures

In this work, a combined forming and fracture limit diagram, fractured void coalescence and texture analysis have been experimentally evaluated for the commercially available aluminum alloy Al 8011 sheet annealed at different temperatures viz. 200 degrees C, 250 degrees C, 300 degrees C and 350 degrees C. The sheets were examined at different annealing temperatures on microstructure, tensile properties, formability and void coalescence. The fractured surfaces of the formed samples were examined using scanning electron microscope (SEM) and these images were correlated with fracture behavior and formability of sheet metals. Formability of Al 8011 was studied and examined at various annealing temperatures using their bulk X-ray crystallographic textures and ODF plots. Forming limit diagrams, void coalescence parameters and crystallographic textures were correlated with normal anisotropy of the sheet metals annealed at different temperatures. (C) 2013 Politechnika Wroclawska. Published by Elsevier Urban & Partner Sp. z o.o. All rights reserved.

Non-existence of tight neighborly triangulated manifolds with beta(1)=2

All triangulated d-manifolds satisfy the inequality ((f0-d-1)(2)) >= ((d+2)(2))beta(1) for d >= 3. A triangulated d-manifold is called tight neighborly if it attains equality in this bound. For each d >= 3, a (2d + 3)-vertex tight neighborly triangulation of the Sd-1-bundle over S-1 with beta(1) = 1 was constructed by Kuhnel in 1986. In this paper, it is shown that there does not exist a tight neighborly triangulated manifold with beta(1) = 2. In other words, there is no tight neighborly triangulation of (Sd-1 x S-1)(#2) or (Sd-1 (sic) S-1)(#2) for d >= 3. A short proof of the uniqueness of K hnel's complexes for d >= 4 under the assumption beta(1) not equal 0 is also presented.

Improving speech transcription for Mandarin-english translation

This paper describes the development of the CU-HTK Mandarin Speech-To-Text (STT) system and assesses its performance as part of a transcription-translation pipeline which converts broadcast Mandarin audio into English text. Recent improvements to the STT system are described and these give Character Error Rate (CER) gains of 14.3% absolute for a Broadcast Conversation (BC) task and 5.1% absolute for a Broadcast News (BN) task. The output of these STT systems is then post-processed, so that it consists of sentence-like segments, and translated into English text using a Statistical Machine Translation (SMT) system. The performance of the transcription-translation pipeline is evaluated using the Translation Edit Rate (TER) and BLEU metrics. It is shown that improving both the STT system and the post-STT segmentations can lower the TER scores by up to 5.3% absolute and increase the BLEU scores by up to 2.7% absolute. © 2007 IEEE.

Factores que inciden en el nivel de pobreza de las familias campesinas en las comunidades de la montañita uno y la montañita dos, Municipio de Tisma, Masaya

Este estudio se realizó en las comunidades de La Montañita 1 y La Montañita 2 del Municipio de Tisma, Departamento de Masaya, en el año 2002. Se aplicaron 30 encuestas por comunidad. Las comunidades de “La Montañita 1” y “La Montañita 2” del Municipio de Tisma, Departamento de Masaya tienen una población mayoritariamente analfabeta, un factor que incide negativamente en elevar el nivel de vida de las familias campesinas y se constituye en una dificultad para emprender acciones de desarrollo y erradicación de la pobreza a corto plazo. Un segmento las poblaciones de estas comunidades tienen nivel académico de primaria incompleta, siendo potencialmente analfabetos; y otro porcentaje (13.2% y 27.1% Montañita 1 y 2 respectivamente) nunca han recibido ningún tipo de formación. La capacitación de estas comunidades ha sido insignificante, debido a que el 89.1% no ha recibido ningún tipo de capacitación y solamente el 10.9% dice haber recibido. De las personas que han recibido capacitación, el 4% lo ha hecho solamente una vez, esto nos indica que en estas comunidades los proyectos no han priorizado la capacitación como estrategia de desarrollo y mejoramiento del nivel de vida. Es importante mencionar que el 47.7% dice que nadie ha llegado a capacitar y el 16.7% piensa que no tiene tiempo disponible para participar en este tipo de actividades. Otro factor importante a considerar en el mejoramiento del nivel de vida de las comunidades rurales es la organización comunitaria, en las poblaciones estudiadas se logro observar que el 85.7% no pertenecía a ningún tipo de organización y el 14.3% no tuvo vínculos con alguna organización. Además, el 85.5% dice no haber ningún tipo de beneficio.

直墙前破波波浪力──对修正过的Gota方法的探讨

对被重新修正后的Goat在墙波压力计算方法进行了分析，主要是对其无因次波浪力随基床肩宽和相对波高的变化进行分析，结果发现，Goat法计算的无因次波浪力随基床肩宽的变化，有一最不利肩宽，此不利肩宽与相对波高无关；在同一水深条件下，Goat法计算的无因次波浪力随相对波高的增大而增大。此两点与试验数据不符。

高超声速小钝锥尾流化学非平衡辐射研究

本文主要目的是研究化学非平衡对高超声速小钝锥尾流辐射的影响。计算结果表明：激发发射辐射比化学发光辐射重要，红外辐射比可见光辐射重要。结果还表明：由化学非平衡瞬时辐射模型计算求得的ＮＯ５．３μ的辐射能比由局部平衡辐射模型求得的辐射能大３０～７０％。由此可知，小钝锥尾流的化学非平衡辐射模型对辐射的影响是不能忽略的。

Prevalencia de anestro post parto en el ganado bovino de doble propósito en el municipio de Camoapa, departamento de Boaco

El presente estudio se realizó con el objetivo de Determinar la prevalencia de Anestro post parto en el ganado bovino de doble propósito en el Municipio de Camoapa Departamento de Boaco. El municipio de Camoapa está ubicado en la parte sudeste del departamento, su extensión territorial es de 1,478 Km2 siendo el de mayor extensión territorial del departamento de Boaco, limita al norte con el departamento de Matagalpa y el municipio de Boaco, al sur con Chontales, al este con la RAAS y al oeste con el municipio de San Lorenzo, la zona donde se encuentra ubicado corresponde a una parte ondulada y baja que se extiende descendiendo hacia la llanura aluvial del Caribe, con predominancia de una cultura productiva ganadera y donde la tenencia de la tierra está orientada hacia haciendas de ganadería extensiva. El tamaño requerido de la muestra de este trabajo fue de 84 vacas en periodo posparto en total de toda la zona en estudio, extrayéndose muestra representativas de las distintas zonas del Municipio. De las 84 vacas en posparto analizadas por los registros a los 60 días, se encontró que el 85.7% de las vacas estudiadas presentaron anestro posparto, un 14.3% presentaron su estro normal entre los 57 - 60 días posparto. De 72 animales que presentaron anestro 13 que representan un 18% entraron en celo después en un lapso de tiempo entre 61- 150 días y 59 que representan un 82% se mantuvieron en anestro durante el periodo del estudio, la principal causa es la hipofunción ovárica presente en 62 vacas que representa un 86%, seguido de cuerpo lúteo persistente que representan 7 vacas con un 9.7% y los quistes ováricos 3 animales con un 4.3%. El intervalo parto primer celo (IPPC) comprende entre 57 -150 días en et 29.7% de las vacas en estudio.