A comparison of different failure assessment methodologies applied to the NESC-1 test

Predictions for a 75x205mm surface semi-elliptic defect in the NESC-1 spinning cylinder test have been made using BS PD 6493:1991, the R6 procedure, non-linear cracked body finite element analysis techniques and the local approach to fracture. All the techniques agree in predicting ductile tearing near the inner surface of the cylinder followed by cleavage initiation. However they differ in the amount of ductile tearing, and the exact location and time of any cleavage event. The amount of ductile tearing decreases with increasing sophistication in the analysis, due to the drop in peak crack driving force and more explicit consideration of constraint effects. The local approach predicts a high probability of cleavage in both HAZ and base material after 190s, while the other predictions suggest that cleavage is unlikely in the HAZ due to constraint loss, but likely in the underlying base material. The timing of this event varies from ∼150s for R6 predictions to ∼250-300s using non-linear cracked body analysis.

功能菌剂的混合发酵研究

随着化工行业的发展，大量有毒有害难降解有机物随工业废水的排放进入环境，这些物质能够在环境中长期存在、积累和扩散，通过食物链对动植物的生存及人类的健康造成不良影响。本文以苯酚、对氯硝基苯、氯苯和十六烷为模拟污染物，以前期研制的功能菌剂为对象，经过紫外线线诱变筛选出优于出发菌株的功能菌，对诱变后功能菌的理化性能进行了研究，对菌种进行了鉴定，在此基础上，就其相互之间的微生态关系进行研究，为混合发酵提供理论基础，并就其最佳发酵条件及发酵参数进行了研究，最后对发酵产品的性能进行了检测。目前，国内外有关功能菌剂的研究还存在多方面的不足，主要包括：①由于多菌种混合发酵过程较为复杂，各菌之间存在复杂的相互作用，影响因素较多，关于菌种之间的相互关系研究得很少，环境功能菌剂的发酵方法大多采用单独发酵后混合的方式。单独发酵对原材料、设备和能源的利用率较低，对于多菌种制剂发酵，在设备、能源和原材料的方面造成的浪费更大，将会大幅增加菌剂的生产成本，影响多菌种功能菌剂的发展；②功能菌剂生产过程的质量控制方面研究得较少；③功能菌剂产品的稳定性、抗冲击性能研究得较少，对环境微生物制剂的研究主要集中在菌种选育和培养条件优化方面。 通过本论文研究，得到以下主要结论。 （1）在紫外线诱变处理中，用紫外线对发生一定程度退化的出发菌株进行诱变处理后，六株具有高效降解性能的菌株被筛选出来，诱变筛选出的菌株形态和ERIC-PCR指纹图谱与出发菌株相比发生了明显改变；而且诱变后的菌株对目标难降解底物的降解能力均得到改善，其中，FPN、FCB、F14、FEm对目标底物的降解率提高了20%以上；诱变后菌株经过7次连续传代接种后，对目标难降解底物的降解率无显著变化，具有一定的遗传稳定性。并对诱变后的功能菌进行了初步的鉴定，这6株菌都分别是芽孢杆菌。 （2）对诱变后的功能菌相互之间的微生态关系进行了研究，通过抑菌实验、生长量以及基质消耗量的比较，确定它们之间的生长关系是无害共栖关系，可以进行混合发酵。 （3）对该功能菌剂进行发酵培养条件研究，结果表明发酵培养基的最佳成分（g/L）：葡萄糖 31.0g/L、玉米粉10.0g/L、磷酸氢二钾1.0g/L、硫酸铵1.1g/L、硫酸镁0.55g/L。通过研究不同的培养条件对菌体生长和降解性能的影响，确定了最佳培养条件：培养基初始pH7.5；最适温度32℃；培养基装液量125mL（250 mL三角瓶），以及培养时间对降解性能的影响，培养20 h的产物对降解最为有利。通过研究添加不同目标污染物对菌体生长和降解性能的影响，确定了添加目标污染物的最佳量以及最佳时间：苯酚投加量：1.125 g/L，对氯硝基苯投加量：0.1 g/L；最佳投加时间为发酵培养开始后4 h。 （4）以摇瓶分批发酵最优条件为基础，对FPN、F10、FCB、FNa、F14 和 FEm进行了摇瓶分批发酵试验。以摇瓶分批发酵试验数据为依据，对功能菌剂分批发酵动力学进行了研究，建立了菌体生长和基质消耗的动力学模型，拟合模型能较好的反映功能菌剂分批发酵过程。 （5）功能菌剂和活性污泥协同作用，可以提高系统的生物降解能力，功能菌剂投加量为2%，新鲜活性污泥3500 mg/L，降解24 h条件下，功能菌剂和活性污泥的协同作用对COD的去除率和对照组相比，最多的提高了36.8%。功能菌剂和活性污泥协同作用以及活性污泥的单独作用，其生物降解过程均符合一级反应动力学过程，功能菌剂和活性污泥协同作用的生物降解动力学方程为：，相关系数97%。采用SBR运行方式，引入功能菌剂的SBR系统明显能够改善和提高生物降解的效率。与仅有活性污泥的系统相比，系统对COD的平均去除率可以提高27.1%，同时，系统的耐负荷冲击以及耐毒害冲击的性能比仅有活性污泥的SBR系统强，特别是负荷冲击对引入功能菌剂的SBR系统影响很小。仅有活性污泥的SBR系统经过负荷冲击和毒害冲击之后，不能恢复到冲击之前的水平，而且系统有效作用时间的周期比引入功能菌剂的SBR系统相比大大缩短，而引入功能菌剂的SBR系统处理效果较为稳定，恢复能力很强。 Along with the development of industries, many recalcitrant organic chemicals have been discharged into natural environments together with wastewaters and can exist in waters, soil and sediments for a long time without degradation. These haz-ardous substances, their byporducts and metabolizabilities can be highly toxic, mu-tagenic and carcinogenic, thereby threatening animals, plants and human health through food chain. Consequently the removal of these compounds is of significant interest in the area of wastewater treatment. In this dissertation, the phenol, hydro-quinone, chlorobenzene and hexadecane treated as the model pollutants, the func-tional microorganism agent was used as the starting strains, they treated with ultra-violet light, and then the mutant strains with high degradation ability were screened out and identified primarily, the relationship between these stains were studied, the medium composition and fermentation conditions were optimized, the degradation ability of the fermented production was tested. The literature survey indicates that the study of the microorganism agent is far from complete and more information is re-quired on following problems. 1, Because of the complexity of relationship in mixed fermentation and the complicated factors, the study is hardly to process.2, There is a lack of information on the quality control of the producing process .3, And there is a lack of information on the stability about the microorganism agent. In this dissertation, the main results of the present study could be summarized as follows: (1)The degenerate starting strains were treated with the ultraviolet light, and six mutant strains with high biodegradation ability were screened out by using the me-dium with selective pressure of model pollutants. The mutant strains had great changes in colonialmorphology and ERIC-PCR fingerprinting. And the mutant strains got obvious advantages over the starting strains in degradation ability and over 20% improvement of removal rates was achieved for FPN、FCB、F14 and FEm. The de-gradation ability of the mutant strains was stable after seven generations. After that, the mutant strains were primarily identified as bacillus respectively. (2) The relationship between these mutant strains was studied. By the compari-son of antibiosis effect, biomass and consumption of substrate, the relationships were neutralism and they could be mixed fermented. (3) The optimized cultivation conditions were as follows: glucose 31.0 g/L, corn power 10 g/L, K2HPO4 1.0 g/L, (NH4)2SO4 1.1 g/L, MgSO4 0.55 g/L, initial pH7.5, temperature 32℃, working volume 125 mL/250 mL, and cultivation time 20h (con-sidering the time effect on degradation ability), adding pollutants phenol (1.125 g/L) and hydroquinone (0.1 g/L) into the broth at 4 h after cultivation. (4) Based on the above optimum condition, the batch fermentation was per-formed with strains FPN, F10, FCB, FNa, F14 and FEm in shake flask. The batch fermentation kinetics was studied based on the experimental data. Two kinetic models were constructed which could reflect the regularity of growth and substrate consump-tion in the process of batch fermentation. (5) The co-operation of functional microorganism agent and activated sludge could raise biodegradation of system by adding some microorganism agent and 3500 mg/L fresh activated sludge. Bioaugumentation by the addition of high effective deg-radation culture enhanced the treatment effect of SBR system and the COD removal rate was increased by 20%-36.8%. Its biodegradation matched first-order dynamical reaction equation, and the reaction equation was ln0.2327.391ct=−+. The micro-organism agent had the effect of optimization to activated sludge micro-ecosystem. The SBR system adding 2% microorganism agent, the average COD removal rate of that was increased by 27.1% and stronger anti-shock ability to load and toxicant were achieved (compared with SBR system just adding activated sludge). Especially the load-shock has barely effect to the SBR system adding microorganism agent. After the load and toxicant shock, the SBR system just adding activated sludge couldn’t come back to original level and the activated sludge micro-ecosystem was frustrated. The applying of microorganism agent increased biological activity and system’s re-sistance ability to load shock and toxicant shock.

Best practices for competency development and assessment in higher education

The main objective of this article is to present the results of a study aimed at determining, classifying and evaluating practices of interest for general competency development and assessment in undergraduate programmes. The study encompassed the following phases: (1) focus group in order to establish a starting point regarding competency development and assessment, counting on the opinion of some of the best-rated teachers belonging to the participating universities; (2) collection of best practices; (3) design and validation of a scale for the assessment of best practices; and (4) scale administration (evaluation of good practices) and data analysis.

Instruccion y Reglas de la Congregacion de San Luis Gonzaga

Signaturas: A-Q8/4.

Luz transmitida y dispersada por materiales para coberturas de invernaderos

p.177-180

Aspectos comparativos en la extensión del modelo de Van Hiele al concepto de aproximación local

En el contexto del modelo de Van Hiele, se ha llevado a cabo un estudio comparativo de dos colecciones de descriptores para el mismo concepto: El de aproximación local en su manifestación de la recta tangente a la gráfica de una curva en un punto. A partir de las visualizaciones que se obtienen de los mecanismos llamados "haz de secantes" y del "zoom", se concluye que, en efecto, el nivel de razonamiento es independiente de la forma de abordar el concepto, de ese mecanismo particular usado para acercarse al mismo.

Determinants of aflatoxin exposure in young children from Benin and Togo, West Africa: the critical role of weaning

Background Dietary exposure to high levels of the fungal toxin, aflatoxin, occurs in West Africa, where long-term crop storage facilitates fungal growth.

Methods We conducted a cross-sectional study in Benin and Togo to investigate aflatoxin exposure in children around the time of weaning and correlated these data with food consumption, socioeconomic status, agro-ecological zone of residence, and anthropometric measures. Blood samples from 479 children (age 9 months to 5 years) from 16 villages in four agro-ecological zones were assayed for aflatoxin-albumin adducts (AF-alb) as a measure of recent past (2-3 months) exposure.

Results Aflatoxin-albumin adducts were detected in 475/479 (99%) children (geometric mean 32.8 pg/mg, 95% CI: 25.3-42.5). Adduct levels varied markedly across agro-ecological zones with mean levels being approximately four times higher in the central than in the northern region. The AF-alb level increased with age up to 3 years, and within the 1-3 year age group was significantly (P=0.0001) related to weaning status; weaned children had approximately twofold higher mean AF-alb adduct levels (38 pg AF-lysine equivalents per mg of albumin [pg/mg]) than those receiving a mixture of breast milk and solid foods after adjustment for age, sex, agro-ecological zone, and socioeconomic status. A higher frequency of maize consumption, but not groundnut consumption, by the child in the preceding week was correlated with higher AF-alb adduct level. We previously reported that the prevalence of stunted growth (height for age Z-score HAZ) and being underweight (weight for age Z-score WAZ) were 33% and 29% respectively by World Health Organziation criteria. Children in these two categories had 30-40% higher mean AF-alb levels than the remainder of the children and strong dose- response relationships were observed between AF-alb levels and the extent of stunting and being underweight.

Conclusions Exposure to this common toxic contaminant of West African food increases markedly following weaning and exposure early in life is associated with reduced growth. These observations reinforce the need for aflatoxin exposure intervention strategies within high-risk countries, possibly targeted specifically at foods used in the post-weaning period.

In vitro mesenchymal stem cell responses on laser-welded NiTi alloy

The biocompatibility of NiTi after laser welding was studied by examining the in vitro (mesenchymal stem cell) MSC responses at different sets of time varying from early (4 to 12 h) to intermediate phases (1 and 4 days) of cell culture. The effects of physical (surface roughness and topography) and chemical (surface Ti/Ni ratio) changes as a consequence of laser welding in different regions (WZ, HAZ, and BM) on the cell morphology and cell coverage were studied. The results in this research indicated that the morphology of MSCs was affected primarily by the topographical factors in the WZ: the well-defined and directional dendritic pattern and the presence of deeper grooves. The morphology of MSCs was not significantly modulated by surface roughness. Despite the possible initial Ni release in the medium during the cell culture, no toxic effect seemed to cause to MSCs as evidenced by the success of adhesion and spreading of the cells onto different regions in the laser weldment. The good biocompatibility of the NiTi laser weldment has been firstly reported in this study.

Susceptibility to stress corrosion cracking of NiTi laser weldment in Hanks’ solution

In this study, the susceptibility to stress corrosion cracking (SCC) of laser-welded NiTi wires in Hanks’ solution at 37.5 °C was studied by the slow strain-rate test (SSRT) at open-circuit potential and at different applied anodic potentials. The weldment shows high susceptibility to SCC when the applied potential is near to the pitting potential of the heat-affected zone (HAZ). The pits formed in the HAZ become sites of crack initiation when stress is applied, and cracks propagate in an intergranular mode under the combined effect of corrosion and stress. In contrast, the base-metal is immune to SCC under similar conditions. The increase in susceptibility to SCC in the weldment could be attributed to the poor corrosion resistance in the coarse-grained HAZ.

Parameter study on laser welding of nitinol wire by Taguchi method

A L27 Taguchi experiment was done to investigate the effect of laser power, welding time, laser mode (CW and two pulsed modes), focus position, and their possible interactions on the weld-bead aspect ratio of laser-welded NiTi wires by using a 100W fibre laser. The optimized parameter setting to produce the full penetrated weldment with minimum welding defects is successfully determined in the Taguchi experiment. The laser mode is found to be the most important parameter that directly controls the weld-bead aspect ratio. The focus position is the secondly important parameter for the laser welding of NiTi wires. Strong interaction between the power and focus position is found in the Taguchi experiment. The optimized weldment produced by the Taguchi experiment is mainly of columnar dendritic structure in the weld zone (WZ) with the size of 1-3µm, while the HAZ exhibits equiaxed grain structure with the size of 5-10µm. The Vickers micro-hardness test indicted that the WZ and HAZ in the weldment are softened to certain extends after fibre laser welding.

Parameter Optimization on Laser Welding of NiTi Wires by Taguchi Method

In this research, a preliminary study was done to find out the initial parameter window to obtain the full-penetrated NiTi weldment. A L27 Taguchi experiment was then carried out to statistically study the effects of the welding parameters and their possible interactions on the weld bead aspect ratio (or penetration over fuse-zone width ratio), and to determine the optimized parameter settings to produce the full-penetrated weldment with desirable aspect ratio. From the statistical results in the Taguchi experiment, the laser mode was found to be the most important factor that substantially affects the aspect ratio. Strong interaction between the power and focus position was found in the Taguchi experiment. The optimized weldment was mainly of columnar dendritic structure in the weld zone (WZ), while the HAZ exhibited equiaxed grain structure. The XRD and DSC results showed that the WZ remained the B2 austenite structure without any precipitates, but with a significant decrease of phase transformation temperatures. The results in the micro-hardness and tensile tests indicated that the mechanical properties of NiTi were decreased to a certain extent after fibre laser welding.

Effect of laser treatment on the attachment and viability of mesenchymal stem cell responses on shape memory NiTi alloy

The objectives of this study were to investigate the effect of laser-induced surface features on the morphology, attachment and viability of mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) at different periods of time, and to evaluate the biocompatibility of different zones: laser-melted zone (MZ), heat-affected zone (HAZ) and base metal (BM) in laser-treated NiTi alloy. The surface morphology and composition were studied by scanning electron microscope (SEM) and X-ray photoemission spectroscopy (XPS), respectively. The cell morphology was examined by SEM while the cell counting and viability measurements were done by haemocytometer and 3-(4,5-dimethylthiazol-2-yl)-2,5-diphenyltetrazolium bromide (MTT) colorimetric assay. The results indicated that the laser-induced surface features, such as surface roughening, presence of anisotropic dendritic pattern and complete surface Ni oxidation were beneficial to improve the biocompatibility of NiTi as evidenced by the highest cell attachment (4 days of culture) and viability (7 days of culture) found in the MZ. The biocompatibility of the MZ was the best, followed by the BM with the HAZ being the worst. The defective and porous oxide layer as well as the coarse grained structure might attribute to the inferior cell attachment (4 days of culture) and viability (7 days of culture) on the HAZ compared with the BM which has similar surface morphology.

Effect of Post-weld Heat-treatment on the Stress Corrosion Cracking Behaviour of Laser-welded Shape Memory NiTi Wires in Hanks’ Solution

In this study, the stress-corrosion cracking (SCC) behaviour of laser-welded NiTi wires before and after post-weld heat-treatment (PWHT) was investigated. The samples were subjected to slow strain rate testing (SSRT) under tensile loading in Hanks’ solution at 37.5 °C (or 310.5 K) at a constant anodic potential (200 mVSCE). The current density of the samples during the SSRT was captured by a potentiostat, and used as an indicator to determine the susceptibility to SCC. Fractography was analyzed using scanning-electron microscopy (SEM). The experimental results showed that the laser-welded sample after PWHT was immune to the SCC as evidenced by the stable current density throughout the SSRT. This is attributed to the precipitation of fine and coherent nano-sized Ni4Ti3 precipitates in the welded regions (weld zone, WZ and heat-affected zone, HAZ) after PWHT, resulting in (i) enrichment of TiO2 content in the passive film and (ii) higher resistance against the local plastic deformation in the welded regions.

Curso: Memorias del psicoanálisis.Construcción y desconstrucción narrativa del sujeto

A partir del miércoles 20 de agosto de 2008 desarrollaremos nuestro octavo seminario consecutivo, dedicado, como los anteriores, al tema de la memoria en una perspectiva que aspira a integrar los desarrollos clásicos y contemporáneos en el psicoanálisis, las neurociencias, la filosofía, la historia y la teoría y práctica de la literatura. El seminario 2006-2 (¡Haz memoria!) trabajó en torno a los recuerdos de infancia, el seminario 2007-1 (Ficciones de la memoria) tuvo como tema el encriptamiento de la memoria y ciertas novelas supuestamente fundadas en el recuerdo, el seminario 2007-2 giró alrededor de la oposición entre Memoria del uno y memoria del otro. El seminario 2008-1 estuvo centrado en una de las Modalidades de la memoria: la nostalgia. El Seminario 2008-2 trató de la segunda modalidad: El traumatismo. Como suele suceder, no alcanzamos a desarrollar todo cuanto nos propusimos y aspectos importantes quedaron para el semestre siguiente. En esa medida, el Seminario 2009-1 tratará de tocar los temas inacabados y continuar hacia nuevos aspectos de nuestra problemática.

Curso: Memorias de la muerte

A partir del miércoles 11 de febrero de 2009 desarrollaremos el noveno seminario consecutivo, dedicado, como los anteriores, al tema de la memoria en una perspectiva que aspira a integrar los desarrollos clásicos y contemporáneos en el psicoanálisis, las neurociencias, la filosofía, la historia y la teoría y práctica de la literatura. El seminario 2006-2 (¡HAZ MEMORIA!) trabajó en torno a los recuerdos de infancia, el seminario 2007-1 (FICCIONES DE LA MEMORIA) tuvo como tema el encriptamiento de la memoria y ciertas novelas supuestamente fundadas en el recuerdo, el seminario 2007-2 giró alrededor de la oposición entre MEMORIA DEL UNO Y MEMORIA DEL OTRO. El seminario 2008-1 estuvo centrado en una de las modalidades de la memoria: LA NOSTALGIA. El seminario 2008-2 trató de la segunda modalidad: El traumatismo. El seminario 2009-1 tuvo un tema radicalmente diferente: Las memorias del psicoanálisis. Construcción y desconstrucción narrativas del sujeto del inconsciente. Para el seminario 2009-2 tenemos un título extraño, paradójico: Memorias de la muerte.