A high performing meta-heuristic for training support vector regression in performance forecasting of supply chain

The prevalence of the use of third-party logistics (3PL) providers is noticeable. The complexity of the relationships pertinent to 3PL is greater than that of any traditional logistics supplier relationships. Moreover, they can be considered as truly strategic alliances. The use of the mentioned relationships to increase the flexibility of the organization to address the rapid changes occurring in market conditions has become popular while these relationships concentrate on the core competencies as well as the development of long-term growth strategies. A good number of studies have examined the selection of service providers. With respect to the selection of the service providers, the most recent studies approved the better performance of neural networks in comparison with the conventional methods to provide a solution for the real-world engineering problems, one of the sociopolitically inspired optimization strategies named imperialist competitive algorithm (ICA) is used. In order to select the 3PL, integration of the support vector regression (SVR) and self-adaptive ICA (SAICA) has offered a novel model, in which SAICA is utilized to adjust the parameters of the SVR. The suggested model is applied for cosmetics production. Moreover, the comparison of the suggested model and back-propagation neural networks, pure SVR, and ICA–SVR is presented. Higher estimation accuracy is achieved as the results of the proposed model reveal, which leads to the effective prediction.     

Study on Soybean Oil Plant Wastewater Treatment Using the Electro‐Fenton Technique

Due to its low viscosity, soybean oil is commonly used as edible oil. Its production is accompanied by a large amount of wastewater containing hazardous materials like phenolic compounds. In this study, the electro‐Fenton process with response surface methodology was applied for oil removal from wastewater of soybean oil plants. Five independent variables, including reaction time, pH, current density, molar ratio of H₂O₂ to Fe²⁺, and volume fraction of H₂O₂ to wastewater, were investigated for their effects on oil removal. The significant independent variables were optimized by the Box‐Behnken design. The optimum conditions were statistically obtained, and the results were confirmed by experiment. 92.66 % oil removal were experimentally found for the optimum conditions.     

Modeling and analysis of MEMS disk resonators

Microsystem Technologies - In this work a very accurate process for modeling a microdisk resonator is presented and the dynamic behavior of the resonator is investigated. Using the minimization of...     

Design and Analysis of a Performance-Optimized CMOS UWB Distributed LNA

In this paper, the systematic design and analysis of a CMOS performance-optimized distributed low-noise amplifier (DLNA) comprising bandwidth-enhanced cascode cells will be presented. Each cascode cell employs an inductor between the common-source and common-gate devices to enhance the bandwidth, while reducing the high-frequency input-referred noise. The noise analysis and optimization of the DLNA accurately accounts for the impact of thermal noise of line terminations and all device noise sources of each CMOS cascode cell including flicker noise, correlated gate-induced noise and channel thermal noise on the overall noise figure. A three-stage performance-optimized wideband DLNA has been designed and fabricated in a 0.18-mum SiGe process, where only MOS transistors were utilized. Measurements of the test chip show a flat noise figure of 2.9 dB, a forward gain of 8 dB, and input and output return losses below -12 dB and -10 dB, respectively, across the 7.5 GHz UWB band. The circuit exhibits an average IIP3 of -3.55 dBm. The 872 mum times 872 mum DLNA chip consumes 12 mA of current from a 1.8-V DC voltage.     

Integrated circuit transmission-line transformer power combiner for millimetre-wave applications

A new approach for power combining several low-voltage CMOS amplifiers using a new on-chip transmission line transformer structure is presented. The power combiner utilises the interconnection of short sections of integrated differential lines and has an efficiency independent of the transformation ratio. Full-wave electromagnetic simulation confirms the operation and low insertion loss of the transformer     

Empirical equations for electrical conductivity and density of Zn,Cd and Mn sulphate solutions in the range of electrowinning and electrorefining electrolytes

Electrical conductivities and densities of acidic zinc, cadmium and manganese sulphate solutions were measured. Empirical equations have been derived to represent the measured values with high accuracy. Electrical conductivity of solutions has been shown to be expressed as a logarithmic function of temperature, a second order polynomial function of sulphuric acid concentration and a linear function of metal ion concentration. It can be deduced that the density of solution can be described as a linear function of metal ion concentration, temperature and sulphuric acid concentration. These equations could be used to improve the electrowinning or electrorefining process conditions.     

Effects and Mechanism of Combinational Chemical Agents on Solution‐Derived K0.5Na0.5NbO3 Piezoelectric Thin Films

Sodium potassium niobate (KNN) piezoelectric ceramic thin films were prepared by a chemical solution deposition method, in which the introduction of appropriately combinational organic stabilizing agents, including monoethanolamine (MEA), diethanolamine (DEA), and ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid (EDTA), dramatically suppressed the volatile loss of the alkali ions, improved the crystallinity, and promoted crystal orientation of the perovskite phase in the resulting KNN thin films. Theoretical analyses including ab initio calculation based on molecular model indicated that stronger binding structure could form comprising the alkali ions and the combinational EDTA‐(DEA‐MEA) chemical agents than the cases of using individual binding agents separately. Outstandingly large effective piezoelectric strain coefficient d₃₃ under the substrate clamping condition was achieved. The theoretical and experimental results provide the insight on the underlying interaction mechanism between the multiple stabilizing chemical agents and metal ions, and the guidance for establishing the methodology for producing high quality oxide thin films from chemical solutions with dedicatedly designed combinational stabilizing agents.