In situ measurements of human cough aerosol hygroscopicity

The airborne dynamics of respiratory droplets, and the transmission routes of pathogens embedded within them, are governed primarily by the diameter of the particles. These particles are composed of the fluid which lines the respiratory tract, and is primarily mucins and salts, which will interact with the atmosphere and evaporate to reach an equilibrium diameter. Measuring organic volume fraction (OVF) of cough aerosol has proved challenging due to large variability and low material volume produced after coughing. Here, the diametric hygroscopic growth factors (GF) of the cough aerosol produced by healthy participants were measured in situ using a rotating aerosol suspension chamber and a humidification tandem differential mobility analyser. Using hygroscopicity models, it was estimated that the average OVF in the evaporated cough aerosol was 0.88 ± 0.07 and the average GF at 90% relative humidity (RH) was 1.31 ± 0.03. To reach equilibrium in dry air the droplets will reduce in diameter by a factor of approximately 2.8 with an evaporation factor of 0.36 ± 0.05. Hysteresis was observed in cough aerosol at RH = ∼35% and RH = ∼65% for efflorescence and deliquescence, respectively, and may depend on the OVF. The same behaviour and GF were observed in nebulized bovine bronchoalveolar lavage fluid.     

Mechanics of plain-woven fabrics for inflated structures

Pressurized fabric tubes, pressure-stabilized beams (known as air beams) and air-inflated structures are considered to be valuable technologies for lightweight, rapidly deployable structures. Design optimization of an inflated structure depends on a thorough understanding of woven fabric mechanics. In this paper the bending response of woven pressure-stabilized beams have been experimentally tested and analytically investigated. Additionally, the micromechanical effects of interacting tows have been studied through finite element models containing contact surfaces and nonlinear slip/stick conditions. Local unit cell models consisting of pairs of woven tows were created to characterize the effective constitutive relations. The material properties from the unit cell models were then used for the global continuum model subjected to 4-point flexure. An experimental set-up was designed and manufactured for testing of Vectran and PEN air beams. The air beam mid-span deflections were measured as functions of inflation pressure and bending load. Plots of the elastic and shear moduli with respect to the pressure and coefficient of friction have been generated. It was determined that the effective elastic and shear moduli were functions of inflation pressure, the material used and the geometry of the weave. It was shown that pneumatic or pressurized tube structures differ fundamentally from conventional metal structures.     

A novel frequency-selective metamaterial to improve helix antenna

A novel frequency-selective metamaterial with negative permittivity and permeability for improving directivity and gain of a helix antenna is presented in this paper.The proposed metamaterial is composed of two Z-shape resonators printed on opposite sides of a dielectric substrate.Two forms of multilayered cells are found to be suitable for antennas and waveguides applications.In addition,a new method of designing a metamaterial-based helix antenna is presented with high directivity and gain.A comparison on radiation properties is given between the conventional and the new metamaterial-based helix antennas.Two comparisons on radiation properties are performed:(1) the effect of proposed Z-structure on monopole,dipole,and helix antennas;(2) the effect of OE3,split-ring resonator (SRR),and proposed Z-structure unit cells on the performance of helix antennas.The results show improvement of parameters such as directivity,gain,and radiation power of the new metamaterial-based helix antenna.Therefore,the combination of Z-structure with the helix antenna shows the best performance.     

A predictive controller based on dynamic matrix control for a non-minimum phase robot manipulator

In this paper a hybrid control strategy is presented based on Dynamic Matrix Control (DMC) and feedback linearization methods for designing a predictive controller of five bar linkage manipulator as a MIMO system (two inputs and two outputs). Analyzing the internal dynamic of robot shows the open loop system is unstable and non-minimum phase, so in order to apply the predictive controller, special modifications are needed. These modifications on non-minimum phase behavior are performed using feedback linearization procedure based on state space realization. The design objective is to track a desirable set point as well as time varying trajectories as a command references with globally asymptotical stabilization. The proposed controller is applied to nonlinear fully coupled model of the typical five bar linkage manipulator with non-minimum phase behavior. Simulation results show that the proposed controller has good efficiency. The step responses of system with and without feedback linearization process illustrated that the mentioned modification for stabilizing is performed properly. After applying the proposed predictive controller, the joint angle of robot tracks the reference input while another input acts as the disturbance and vice versa.     

Analytical Modeling of Short-Channel Fully-Depleted Triple Work Function Metal Gate (TWFMG) SOI MESFET

Silicon - In this paper, a new structure: triple work function metal gate SOI MESFET, intended for integration into the deep-submicron CMOS technology, is proposed. The gate of the device consists...     

Experimental determination of gas holdup and volumetric mass transfer coefficient in a jet bubbling reactor

The hydrodynamics and mass transfer characteristics of a lab-scale jet bubbling reactor(JBR) including the gas holdup, volumetric mass transfer coefficient and specific interfacial area were assessed experimentally investigating the influence of temperature, p H and superficial gas velocity. The reactor diameter and height were 11 and 30 cm,respectively. It was equipped with a single sparger, operating at atmospheric pressure, 20 and 40℃, and two p H values of 3 and 6. The height of the liquid was 23 cm, while the superficial gas velocity changed within 0.010–0.040 m·s~(-1) range. Experiments were conducted with pure oxygen as the gas phase and saturated lime solution as the liquid phase. The liquid-side volumetric mass transfer coefficient was determined under unsteady-state oxygen absorption in a saturated lime solution. The gas holdup was calculated based on the liquid height change, while the specific interfacial area was obtained by a physical method based on the bubble size distribution(BSD) in different superficial gas velocities. The results indicated that at the same temperature but different p H, the gas holdup variation was negligible, while the liquid-side volumetric mass transfer coefficient at the p H value of 6 was higher than that at the p H = 3. At a constant p H but different temperatures, the gas holdup and the liquid-side volumetric mass transfer coefficients at 40℃ were higher than that of the same at 20℃. A reasonable and appropriate estimation of the liquid-side volumetric mass transfer coefficient(kla) in a pilot-scale JBR was provided which can be applied to the design and scale-up of JBRs.     

Designing customer-oriented catalogs in e-CRM using an effective self-adaptive genetic algorithm

Analysis of customer interactions for electronic customer relationship management (e-CRM) can be performed by way of using data mining (DM), optimization methods, or combined approaches. The microeconomic framework for data mining addresses maximizing the overall utility of an enterprise where transaction of a customer is a function of the data available on that customer. In this paper, we investigate an alternative problem formulation for the catalog segmentation problem. Moreover, a self-adaptive genetic algorithm has been developed to solve the problem. It includes clever features to avoid getting trapped in a local optimum. The results of an extensive computational study using real and synthetic data sets show the performance of the algorithm. In comparison with classical catalog segmentation algorithms, the proposed approach achieves better performance in Fitness and CPU-time.     

A memetic algorithm for minimizing the total weighted completion time on a single machine under step-deterioration

In this paper, we consider minimizing total weighted completion time criteria on a single machine. Jobs processing times are step function of its starting time and all jobs have a common due date. First, we present some new lemmas and dominance properties for this NP-hard problem, and then a memetic algorithm using these properties is developed. We compare the solutions of the memetic algorithm with optimal solutions obtained from complete enumeration. The results show that the average percentage error of the proposed algorithm from optimal solutions is about 2% and as the variance of processing time increase, the percentage errors decrease.     

Adaptive Control for State Synchronization of Nonlinear Haptic Telerobotic Systems with Asymmetric Varying Time Delays

In this paper, we introduce a new adaptive controller design scheme for nonlinear telerobotic systems with varying time delays where the delays and their variation rates are unknown. The designed controller has the ability to synchronize the state behaviors of the local and the remote robots. In this paper, asymptotic stability in the presence of varying time delays is of interest. Using the proposed controller, asymptotic stability of the bilateral telerobotic system subject to any bounded yet unknown varying delay with a bounded yet unknown rate of change can be guaranteed. Besides the varying time delay, the proposed adaptive controller has the ability to adapt to the parameter variations in the local and the remote robots’ dynamics. It is shown that position and velocity errors between the local and the remote manipulators converge to the zero asymptotically, thus ensuring teleoperation transparency. Experimental and simulation results with a pair of PHANToM haptic devices and a pair of planar manipulators under varying time delays in the communication channel demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed scheme.