Aquaculture technology transfer to smallholder farmers in Malawi, Southern Africa

Details are given of activities conducted in Zomba, Malawi, in order to demonstrate new aquaculture technologies and encourage their use by smallholder fish farmers. The following technologies were introduced: napier grass as a pond output; use of a reed fence for harvesting fish; developing a high-quality compost as a pond input; vegetable-pond integration; chicken-pond integration; smoking kiln; pond stirring; and rice-fish integration. The reactions of the farmers to these technologies and their testing by the farmers are outlined briefly.

Validation of a lattice Boltzmann model for gas-solid reactions with experiments

A lattice Boltzmann method is used to model gas-solid reactions where the composition of both the gas and solid phase changes with time, while the boundary between phases remains fixed. The flow of the bulk gas phase is treated using a multiple relaxation time MRT D3Q19 model; the dilute reactant is treated as a passive scalar using a single relaxation time BGK D3Q7 model with distinct inter- and intraparticle diffusivities. A first-order reaction is incorporated by modifying the method of Sullivan et al. [13] to include the conversion of a solid reactant. The detailed computational model is able to capture the multiscale physics encountered in reactor systems. Specifically, the model reproduced steady state analytical solutions for the reaction of a porous catalyst sphere (pore scale) and empirical solutions for mass transfer to the surface of a sphere at Re=10 (particle scale). Excellent quantitative agreement between the model and experiments for the transient reduction of a single, porous sphere of Fe 2O 3 to Fe 3O 4 in CO at 1023K and 10 5Pa is demonstrated. Model solutions for the reduction of a packed bed of Fe 2O 3 (reactor scale) at identical conditions approached those of experiments after 25 s, but required prohibitively long processor times. The presented lattice Boltzmann model resolved successfully mass transport at the pore, particle and reactor scales and highlights the relevance of LB methods for modelling convection, diffusion and reaction physics. © 2012 Elsevier Inc.

Revealing lithium-silicide phase transformations in nano-structured silicon-based lithium ion batteries via in situ NMR spectroscopy.

Nano-structured silicon anodes are attractive alternatives to graphitic carbons in rechargeable Li-ion batteries, owing to their extremely high capacities. Despite their advantages, numerous issues remain to be addressed, the most basic being to understand the complex kinetics and thermodynamics that control the reactions and structural rearrangements. Elucidating this necessitates real-time in situ metrologies, which are highly challenging, if the whole electrode structure is studied at an atomistic level for multiple cycles under realistic cycling conditions. Here we report that Si nanowires grown on a conducting carbon-fibre support provide a robust model battery system that can be studied by (7)Li in situ NMR spectroscopy. The method allows the (de)alloying reactions of the amorphous silicides to be followed in the 2nd cycle and beyond. In combination with density-functional theory calculations, the results provide insight into the amorphous and amorphous-to-crystalline lithium-silicide transformations, particularly those at low voltages, which are highly relevant to practical cycling strategies.

Mechanism on exciton-mediated energy transfer in erbium-doped silicon

Exciton-mediated energy transfer model in Er-doped silicon was presented. The emission intensity is related to optically active Er concentration, lifetime of excited Er3+ ion and spontaneous emission. The thermal quenching of the Er luminescence in Si is caused by thermal ionization of Er-bound exciton complex and nonradiative energy back-transfer processes, which correspond to the activation energy of 6.6 and 47.4 meV, respectively. Er doping in silicon introduces donor states, a large enhancement in the electrical activation of Er (up to two orders of magnitude) is obtained by co-implanting Er with O. It appears that the donor states are the gateway to the optically active Er. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.

Transient flow patterns and bubble slug lengths in parallel microchannels with oxygen gas bubbles produced by catalytic chemical reactions

Transient flow patterns and bubble slug lengths were investigated with oxygen gas (O-2) bubbles produced by catalytic chemical reactions using a high speed camera bonded with a microscope. The microreactor consists of an inlet liquid plenum, nine parallel rectangular microchannels followed by a micronozzle, using the MEMS fabrication technique. The etched surface was deposited by the thin platinum film, which is acted as the catalyst. Experiments were performed with the inlet mass concentration of the hydrogen peroxide from 50% to 90% and the pressure drop across the silicon chip from 2.5 to 20.0 kPa. The silicon chip is directly exposed in the environment thus the heat released via the catalytic chemical reactions is dissipated into the environment and the experiment was performed at the room temperature level. It is found that the two-phase flow with the catalytic chemical reactions display the cyclic behavior. A full cycle consists of a short fresh liquid refilling stage, a liquid decomposition stage followed by the bubble slug flow stage. At the beginning of the bubble slug flow stage, the liquid slug number reaches maximum, while at the end of the bubble slug flow stage the liquid slugs are quickly flushed out of the microchannels. Two or three large bubbles are observed in the inlet liquid plenum, affecting the two-phase distributions in microchannels. The bubble slug lengths, cycle periods as well as the mass flow rates are analyzed with different mass concentrations of hydrogen peroxide and pressure drops. The bubble slug length is helpful for the selection of the future microreactor length ensuring the complete hydrogen peroxide decomposition. Future studies on the temperature effect on the transient two-phase flow with chemical reactions are recommended.

Mechanism on exciton-mediated energy transfer in erbium-doped silicon

Exciton-mediated energy transfer model in Er-doped silicon was presented. The emission intensity is related to optically active Er concentration, lifetime of excited Er3+ ion and spontaneous emission. The thermal quenching of the Er luminescence in Si is caused by thermal ionization of Er-bound exciton complex and nonradiative energy back-transfer processes, which correspond to the activation energy of 6.6 and 47.4 meV, respectively. Er doping in silicon introduces donor states, a large enhancement in the electrical activation of Er (up to two orders of magnitude) is obtained by co-implanting Er with O. It appears that the donor states are the gateway to the optically active Er. (C) 2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.

High-efficiency transfer and expression of AdCMV-p53 in human cervix adenocarcinoma cells induced by subclinical-dose carbon beam radiation

Purpose The aim of this study is to evaluate the eVect of carbon-beam irradiation on adenovirus-mediated p53 transfer in human cervix adenocarcinoma.Materials and methods The HeLa cells pre-exposed to carbon-beam or -ray, were infected with replication-deficient adenovirus recombinant vectors, containing human wild-type p53 (AdCMV-p53) and green Xuorescent protein (GFP) (AdCMV–GFP), respectively. The GFP transfer and p53 expression were detected by Xow cytometric analysis.Results The GFP transfer frequency in C-beam with AdCMV-GFP groups was 38–50% more than that inγ-ray with AdCMV–GFP groups. The percentage of p53 positive cells in the C-beam with AdCMV–p53 groups was 34–55.6% more than that in γ-ray with AdCMV-p53 groups (p < 0.05), suggesting that subclinical-dose C-beam irradiation could signiWcantly promote exogenous p53 transfer and p53 expression, and extend the duration of p53 expression in the HeLa cells. The expression of p21 increased with p53 expression in HeLa cells. The survival fractions for the 0.5–1.0 Gy C-beam with AdCMV-p53 groups were 38–43% less than those for the isodose γ-ray with AdCMV-p53 groups, and 31–40% less than those for the C-beam only groups (p <0.05).Conclusions The subclinical-dose C-beam irradiation could signiWcantly promote the transfer and expression of exogenous p53, extend the duration of p53 expression, and enhance the suppression of p53 on cervix adenocarcinoma cells.

Production mechanism of superheavy nuclei in massive fusion reactions

Within the concept of the dinuclear system (DNS), a dynamical model is proposed for describing the formation of superheavy nuclei in complete fusion reactions by incorporating the coupling of the relative motion to the nucleon transfer process. The capture of two heavy colliding nuclei, the formation of the compound nucleus and the de-excitation process are calculated by using an empirical coupled channel model, solving a set of microscopically derived master equations numerically and applying statistical theory, respectively.Fusion-fission reactions and evaporation residue excitation functions of synthesizing superheavy nuclei (SHN)are investigated systematically and compared them with available experimental data. The possible factors that affecting the production cross sections of SHN are discussed in this workshop.

Experimental study on heavy ion single event effects in SOI SRAMs

Silicon-on-insulator (SOI) technologies have been developed for radiation-hardened military and space applications. The use of SOI has been motivated by the full dielectric isolation of individual transistors, which prevents latch-up. The sensitive region for charge collection in SOI technologies is much smaller than for bulk-silicon devices potentially making SOI devices much harder to single event upset (SEU). In this study, 64 kB SOI SRAMs were exposed to different heavy ions, such as Cu, Br, I, Kr. Experimental results show that the heavy ion SEU threshold linear energy transfer (LET) in the 64 kB SOI SRAMs is about 71.8 MeV cm(2)/mg. Accorded to the experimental results, the single event upset rate (SEUR) in space orbits were calculated and they are at the order of 10(-13) upset/(day bit).

Pion Production in Heavy-Ion Collisions in the 1 A GeV Region

Within the framework of the improved isospin dependent quantum molecular dynamics (ImIQMD) model, pion emission in heavy-ion collisions in the region 1 A GeV is investigated systematically, in which the pion is considered to be mainly produced by the decay of resonances Delta(1232) and N*(1440). The in-medium dependence and Coulomb effects of pion production are included in the calculation. Total pion multiplicity and pi(-)/pi(+) yields are calculated for the reaction Au-197+(197) Au in central collisions for selected Skyrme parameters SkP, SLy6, Ska, SIII and compared with the measured data of the FOPI collaboration.

Collective Transverse Flow in Intermediate Energy Heavy-Ion Collisions

Within the hadronic transport model IBUU04, we study the density-dependent symmetry energy by using the neutron-proton differential flow from the Sn-132+Sn-124 reactions at beam energies of 200, 400, 600 and 800MeV per nucleon. The strong effect of the symmetry energy is shown at the incident beam energy of 400 MeV/A. The small medium-effect of the neutron-proton differential flow is also found. We also study the neutron-proton differential flows with impact parameters of 3, 5, 7 fm. It is found that in semi-central collisions the sensitivity of the neutron-proton differential flow to the symmetry energy is larger.

Electron transfer in fast atomic collisions in the presence of an x-ray laser

We consider electron capture in fast collisions between a proton and hydrogen in the presence of an intense x-ray laser whose angular frequency omega is close to v(2)/2, where v is the collision velocity. We show that in such a case laser-induced capture becomes possible and that the latter proceeds via both induced photon emission and photon absorption channels and can, in principle, compete with kinematic and radiative electron capture.