Relationship between load/unload response ratio and damage variable and its application

The physics-based parameter: load/unload response ratio (LURR) was proposed to measure the proximity of a strong earthquake, which achieved good results in earthquake prediction. As LURR can be used to describe the damage degree of the focal media qualitatively, there must be a relationship between LURR and damage variable (D) which describes damaged materials quantitatively in damage mechanics. Hence, based on damage mechanics and LURR theory, taking Weibull distribution as the probability distribution function, the relationship between LURR and D is set up and analyzed. This relationship directs LURR applied in damage analysis of materials quantitatively from being qualitative earlier, which not only provides the LURR method with a more solid basis in physics, but may also give a new approach to the damage evaluation of big scale structures and prediction of engineering catastrophic failure. Copyright (c) 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

Comparison of aggregation behaviors between branched and linear block polyethers: MesoDyn simulation study

The comparison of aggregation behaviors between the branched block polyether T1107 (polyether A) and linear polyether (EO)(60)(PO)(40)(EO)(60) (polyether B) in aqueous solution are investigated by the MesoDyn simulation. Polyether A forms micelles at lower concentration and has a smaller aggregation number than B. Both the polyethers show the time-dependent micellar growth behaviors. The spherical micelles appear and then change to rod-like micelles with time evolution in the 10 vol% solution of polyether A. The micellar cluster appears and changes to pseudo-spherical micelles with time evolution in the 20 vol% solution of polyether A. However, the spherical micelles appear and change to micellar cluster with time evolution in the 20 vol% polyether B solution. The shear can induce the micellar transition of both block polyethers. When the shear rate is 1x10(5) s(-1), the shear can induce the sphere-to-rod transition of both polyethers at the concentration of 10 and 20 vol%. When the shear rate is lower than 1x10(5) s(-1), the huge micelles and micellar clusters can be formed in the 10 and 20 vol% polyether A systems under the shear, while the huge micelles are formed and then disaggregated with the time evolution in the 20 vol% polyether B system.

Emittance estimation by an ion optical element with variable focusing strength and a viewing target

The emittance of an extracted ion beam can be estimated to first order by a series of three linear independent profile measurements. This estimation is restricted to the evaluation of an upper limit of the emittance value for a homogeneous, nonfilamented beam. The beam is assumed to be round, respectively elliptical, without any structure of the intensity distribution, no space charge has been assumed for the drifting beam, and the optics is assumed to be linear. Instead of using three different drift sections, a linear focusing element with three different focusing strengths can be used. Plotting the beam radius as function of focusing strength, three independent solutions can be used to calculate the Twiss parameters alpha, beta, and gamma and furthermore the emittance epsilon. Here we describe the measurements which have been performed with the SECRAL ion source at Institute of Modern Physics Lanzhou.

Supervised Gaussian Process Latent Variable Model for Dimensionality Reduction

The Gaussian process latent variable model (GP-LVM) has been identified to be an effective probabilistic approach for dimensionality reduction because it can obtain a low-dimensional manifold of a data set in an unsupervised fashion. Consequently, the GP-LVM is insufficient for supervised learning tasks (e. g., classification and regression) because it ignores the class label information for dimensionality reduction. In this paper, a supervised GP-LVM is developed for supervised learning tasks, and the maximum a posteriori algorithm is introduced to estimate positions of all samples in the latent variable space. We present experimental evidences suggesting that the supervised GP-LVM is able to use the class label information effectively, and thus, it outperforms the GP-LVM and the discriminative extension of the GP-LVM consistently. The comparison with some supervised classification methods, such as Gaussian process classification and support vector machines, is also given to illustrate the advantage of the proposed method.

A simple and sensitive colorimetric pH meter based on DNA conformational switch and gold nanoparticle aggregation

A simple and rapid colorimetric pH meter has been developed based on the conformational switch of i-motif DNA and non-crosslinking AuNP aggregation, the average accuracy of the nano-meter was found to be +/- 0.04 pH unit across the physiological operating range.

Rapid label-free detection of metal-induced Alzheimer's amyloid beta peptide aggregation by electrochemical method

Amyloid beta peptide plays a critical role in the pathogenesis of Alzheimer's disease (AD). Metal ions are highly enriched in cerebral amyloid deposits in AD and are proposed to be able to mediate A beta conformation. Therefore, a rapid, low-cost, and sensitive detection of metal-induced A beta aggregation and their relation to AD is clearly needed for the clinical diagnosis and treatment. In this report, we study metal-induced A beta aggregation by a rapid, label-free electrochemical method and monitor both the aggregation kinetics and the morphology in the absence or presence of Zn (II) and Cu (II).

Aggregation-based growth of silver nanowires at room temperature

We describe an aggregation-based growth mechanism for formation of silver nanowires at room temperature. It is found that the pH of solution and the concentration of L-cysteine capping molecules have an important effect on the formation and growth of nanowires. Characterization by atomic force microscopy (AFM) and UV-vis spectroscopy recorded as time clearly shows that the silver nanowires are grown at the expense of nanoparticles.

Nucleic Acid-Induced Aggregation and Pyrene Excimer Formation

Nucleic acid was found to induce the aggregation of the positively charged pyrene probe (compound 1); as a result, strong pyrene excimer emission was observed. The intensity of the excimer emission was dependent on the concentration of the pyrene probe and the oligonucleotide length, sequence, and concentration. These results suggest a new strategy for label-free nucleic acid-based biosensing applications.

Tight intermolecular packing through supramolecular interactions in crystals of cyano substituted oligo(para-phenylene vinylene): a key factor for aggregation-induced emission

Strong supramolecular interactions, which induced tight packing and rigid molecules in crystals of cyano substituent oligo(para-phenylene vinylene) (CN-DPDSB), are the key factor for the high luminescence efficiency of its crystals; opposite to its isolated molecules in solution which have very low luminescence efficiency.

Study of controllable aggregation morphology of ABA amphiphilic triblock copolymer in dilute solution by changing the solvent property

We have studied, both experimentally and theoretically, the aggregation morphology of the ABA amphiphilic triblock copolymer in dilute solution by changing the solvent property. Experimental results showed that the micellar morphology changed from spheres to rods and then to vesicles by changing the common solvent from N-N-dimethylformamide (DMF) to dioxane and then to tetrahydrofuran (THF). These controllable aggregates were also obtained by Monte Carlo simulation. The simulative results showed that the solvent property is a key factor that determines the copolymer aggregation morphology. The morphology changed from spheres to rods and then to vesicles by increasing the solvent solubility, corresponding to the change of stretched of the copolymer chains in the micellar cores. This result is in good agreement with the experimental one. Moreover, the simulative results revealed that the end-to-end distant of the ABA triblock copolymer in the vesicle was larger than that in the spheres and rods, indicating that the copolymer chains were more stretched in vesicles than in the spheres and rods. Furthermore, we gave the distribution of the fraction of the chain number with the end-to-end distance. The results indicated that the amount of folded chains is almost the same as that of stretched chains in the vesicle. Although most chains were folded, stretched chains could be found in the rod and sphere micelles.

Monte Carlo simulation of the aggregation of rod-flexible triblock copolymers in a thin film

The aggregation of rod-flexible ABA and BAB triblock (A was rod block and repulsive with block B) copolymers in a thin film was studied as a function of varying the rigidity (eta) and the length of the rod block by Monte Carlo simulation. The rigidity of block A was defined as eta = R-c/R-max in this study. R-c, was the end-to-end distance below which the conformation of the block was not allowed, whereas R-max, was the longest end-to-end distance that the block could be. If eta = 0 the block was flexible, whereas if eta = 1 the block was a straight rod. The simulation results showed that the ABA triblock copolymer film were likely to form lamella structure with increasing the rigidity (eta) of block A. The lamellas were parallel each other and perpendicular to the film surface. However, the aggregation of BAB triblock copolymers tended to change from lamella to cylinder structure with increasing the rigidity (eta) of block A. Typical lamella and cylinder co-exist structure was obtained at eta = 0.504 for the BAB copolymer film. On the other hand, the simulation results indicated that the film changed from disorder to order, then to disorder structure with increasing the relative length of B block for both ABA and BAB copolymer films.