Experimental Study of an Adding Interferometer at Millimeter Waves

In order to study an original detection architecture for future cosmology experiments based on wide band adding interferometry, we have tested a single baseline bench instrument based on commercial components. The instrument has been characterized in the laboratory with a wide band power detection setup. A method which allows us to reconstruct the complete transfer function of the interferometer has been developed and validated with measurements. This scheme is useful to propagate the spurious effects of each component till the output of the detector.     

Bipolar resistive switching in p-type Co3O4 nanosheets prepared by electrochemical deposition

Metal oxide nanosheets have potential applications in novel nanoelectronics as nanocrystal building blocks. In this work, the devices with a structure of Au/p-type Co₃O₄ nanosheets/indium tin oxide/glass having bipolar resistive switching characteristics were successfully fabricated. The experimental results demonstrate that the device have stable high/low resistance ratio that is greater than 25, endurance performance more than 200 cycles, and data retention more than 10,000 s. Such a superior performance of the as-fabricated device could be explained by the bulk film and Co₃O₄/indium tin oxide glass substrate interface effect.     

FPGA Based Implementation and Comparison of Beamformers for CDMA2000

For the integration of smart antennas into third generation code division multiple access (CDMA) base stations, it still remains as a challenging task to implement smart antenna algorithms on programmable processors. In this paper, we study implementations of some CDMA compatible beamforming algorithms, namely least mean square (LMS), constant modulus (CM), and space code correlator (SCC) algorithms, using Xilinx??s Virtex family FPGAs. This study exhibits feasibility of implementing even simple, practical, and computationally small algorithms based on today??s most powerful FPGA technologies. 16 and 32 bits floating point implementations of the algorithms are investigated using both Virtex II and Virtex IV FPGAs. CDMA2000 reverse link baseband signal format is used in the signal modeling. Randomly changing fading and Direction-of-arrivals (DOAs) of multipaths are considered as a channel condition. The implementation results in terms of beamforming accuracy, FPGA resource utilization, weight vector computation time, and DOA estimation error are presented. Beamformer weight vectors using LMS and CM can be computed within less than 20 ??s on Virtex II FPGA and 10 ??s on Virtex IV FPGA, and using SCC it can be achieved within less than 22 ??s on Virtex IV FPGA. These results show that FPGAs provide approximately 500 times faster speed in implementations than our previous work with DSPs.     

Improvement of Mechanical Properties of Unsaturated Polyesters by Acrylonitrile

Propylene glycol- and diethylene glycol-based unsaturated polyesters were prepared and hardened by using styrene and acrylonitrile monomer mixtures. The addition of 12% acrylonitrile to a propylene glycol-based polyester containing 40% styrene increased the hardness from 12 BHN to 26 BHN. The addition of 20% acrylonitrile increased the impact strength of the same polyester from 14 J/m width to 39 J/m width. The diethylene glycol-based polyester containing 40% styrene and 40% acrylonitrile achieved a hardness of 23 BHN and an impact strength of 59 J/m width.     

Technical note an evaluation of water corrosivity of the river tigris at Baghdad

A series of experiments was carried out on different samples of tap water abstracted from the Baghdad water supply network in order to observe the effect of water on supply pipes, either scale forming or corrosive. This experimental investigation on the corrosive effect of the city of Baghdad tap water showed that the water can be classified as corrosive according to the Ryznar index, while the Langelier index showed that the water has the ability to form scale on the pipes. However, personal field observation indicated that the water is corrosive to the pipes and to the network appurtenance. Other findings are reported herein.     

Introducing two landscape components from Turkey: Irim and Kesik

A very particular set of landscape components, namely the irim and the kesik, found in the peri-urban rural area called Karabaglar, are considered. This area is in the contiguous land of the city of Mugla, in southwestern Turkey, and is administered by its municipality. It has a rural character, yet also includes summerhouses for the inhabitants of the city. Physical resemblance of the irim and the kesik to the hedgerow suggests similar functions, but a closer look reveals that they have a wider range of features and aspects. Functioning not only as a marker of agricultural land sub-divisions, they also play an important role in the hydrology of the area. While their specific traditional features can be used in designed landscapes, the intention here is, first, to introduce the irim, the kesik and the very special setting offered by Karabaglar, which are now under the pressure of urban encroachment. A comparison with the hedgerow is nevertheless useful in order to better understand related aspects and features.     

Determination of pistachio drying behaviour and conditions in a solar drying system

The main object of this study is to determine the drying behaviour and conditions of shelled and unshelled pistachio samples using both solar assisted and open sun drying. For each drying experiment, 100 g each of unshelled and shelled pistachio were used. The least‐squares method was applied to find the drying curve equation of pistachio. During the experiments, shelf temperatures, weight loss of pistachio, moisture content of air, and distribution of solar radiation were measured; and presented depending on the drying time. Also, the mass shrinkage ratios of shelled and unshelled pistachio samples were determined, and the experimental uncertainty ratio was calculated as 15–16.5 per cent based on the experimental results. It was deduced that the shelled and unshelled pistachio samples in the solar assisted forced convection dryer were perfectly dried at temperatures of 50±10°C in the time period of 6 h. Whereas, the samples in the open sun drying were not sufficiently dried at temperatures of 28±4°C in the same time period. Hence, it is suggested that the pistachio samples with approximately 29.0 per cent of moisture are dried in the solar assisted convection dryer at 50±10°C of temperature in the time period of approximately 6 h in order to protect from the negative climatic and environmental effects. However, it is not desirable to dry the pistachio samples in the open sun because of greater drying time, dirt, dust and harmful insects. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Experimental Comparison of the Effects of Nanometric and Micrometric Particulates on the Tensile Properties and Fracture Behavior of Al Composites at Room and Elevated Temperatures

This article studies the influence of nanometric (n-SiC_p) and micrometric-scale SiC particulates (μ-SiC_p) on the tensile properties of the Al 7075 alloy. The unreinforced Al and its composites were synthesized using the powder metallurgy (P/M) route and were tested uniaxially in tension at both room and elevated temperatures. Aging behavior was studied to observe any effect of the reinforcement on the aging kinetics and hardness of the composites. X-ray diffraction was performed to determine the crystal structures of the raw materials and any reaction phase formed in the composites. The n-SiC_p were not dispersed uniformly in the Al matrix and clustered mainly at the grain boundaries. The stiffness of the composites increased and the ductility decreased with an increase in the volume fraction of the n-SiC_p. The n-SiC_p proved to be a better reinforcement than the traditional μ-SiC_p in terms of imparting higher ductility to the composite. Fractography and microscopy using optical, scanning electron, and transmission electron microscopes were performed for failure and microstructural analysis of all the materials. At room temperature, the fracture altered from ductile in the unreinforced Al to brittle in the composites. At an elevated temperature, the fracture mechanism transformed from brittle to ductile rupture in the composites.