Carbon-based TiO2-x heterostructure nanocomposites for enhanced photocatalytic degradation of dye molecules

Application of brown titanium dioxide (TiO_2-x) and its modified composite forms in the photocatalytic decomposition of organic pollutants in the environment is a promising way to provide solutions for environmental redemption. Herein, we report the synthesis of effective and stable TiO_2-x nanoparticles with g-C₃N₄, RGO, and multiwalled carbon nanotubes (CNTs) using a simple hydrothermal method. Among all the as-synthesized samples, excellent photocatalytic degradation activity was observed for RGO-TiO_2-x nanocomposite with high rate constants of 0.075 min^?1_, 0.083 min^?1 and 0.093 min^?1 for methylene blue, rhodamine-B, and rosebengal dyes under UV–Visible light irradiation, respectively. The altered bandgap (1.8 eV) and the large surface area of RGO-TiO_2-x nanocomposite impacts on both absorption of visible light and efficiency of photogenerated charge electron (e^?)/hole (h⁺) pair separation. This resulted in enhanced photocatalytic property of carbon-based TiO_2-x nanocomposites. A systematic study on the influence of different carbon nanostructures on the photocatalytic activity of brown TiO_2-x is carried out.     

Influence of Ball Burnishing Process on Equal Channel Angular Pressed Mg-Zn-Si Alloy on the Evolution of Microstructure and Corrosion Properties

Silicon - In the present study, Mg-4Zn-1Si alloy was subjected to equal channel angular pressing (ECAP) up to 4 passes at 300 °C, followed by ball burnishing using 0.3 mm...     

Field Validation of DNDC Model for Methane and Nitrous Oxide Emissions from Rice-based Production Systems of India

The DNDC (DeNitrification and DeComposition) model was tested against experimental data on CH₄ and N₂O emissions from rice fields at different geographical locations in India. There was a good agreement between the simulated and observed values of CH₄ and N₂O emissions. The difference between observed and simulated CH₄ emissions in all sites ranged from −11.6 to 62.5 kg C ha⁻¹ season⁻¹. Most discrepancies between simulated and observed seasonal fluxes were less than 20% of the field estimate of the seasonal flux. The relative deviation between observed and simulated cumulative N₂O emissions ranged from −237.8 to 28.6%. However, some discrepancies existed between observed and simulated seasonal patterns of CH₄ and N₂O emissions. The model simulated zero N₂O emissions from continuously flooded rice fields and poorly simulated CH₄ emissions from Allahabad site. For all other simulated cases, the model satisfactorily simulated the seasonal variations in greenhouse gas emission from paddy fields with different land management. The model also simulated the C and N balances in all the sites, including other gas fluxes, viz. CO₂, NO, NO₂, N₂ and NH₃ emissions. Sensitivity tests for CH₄ indicate that soil texture and pH significantly influenced the CH₄ emission. Changes in organic C content had a moderate influence on CH₄ emission on these sites. Introducing the mid-season drainage reduced CH₄ emissions significantly. Process-based biogeochemical modeling, as with DNDC, can help in identifying strategies for optimizing resource use, increasing productivity, closing yield gaps and reducing adverse environmental impacts.     

Process diagnostics using trace alignment: Opportunities, issues, and challenges

Business processes leave trails in a variety of data sources (e.g., audit trails, databases, and transaction logs). Hence, every process instance can be described by a trace, i.e., a sequence of events. Process mining techniques are able to extract knowledge from such traces and provide a welcome extension to the repertoire of business process analysis techniques. Recently, process mining techniques have been adopted in various commercial BPM systems (e.g., BPM|one, Futura Reflect, ARIS PPM, Fujitsu Interstage, Businesscape, Iontas PDF, and QPR PA). Unfortunately, traditional process discovery algorithms have problems dealing with less structured processes. The resulting models are difficult to comprehend or even misleading. Therefore, we propose a new approach based on trace alignment. The goal is to align traces in such a way that event logs can be explored easily. Trace alignment can be used to explore the process in the early stages of analysis and to answer specific questions in later stages of analysis. Hence, it complements existing process mining techniques focusing on discovery and conformance checking. The proposed techniques have been implemented as plugins in the ProM framework. We report the results of trace alignment on one synthetic and two real-life event logs, and show that trace alignment has significant promise in process diagnostic efforts.     

Natural rubber (Hevea Brasiliensis)-based quasi-solid electrolyte as a potential candidate for arresting recombination and improving performance in aqueous dye-sensitized solar cells

Journal of Materials Science: Materials in Electronics - We successfully fabricated dye sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) employing a quasi-solid state electrolyte based on pristine insulator natural...     

Heuristic techniques for accelerating hierarchical routing on road networks

The route computation module is one of the most important functional blocks in a dynamic route guidance system. Although various algorithms exist for finding the shortest path, their performance tends to deteriorate as the network size increases. We present an efficient hierarchical routing algorithm that finds a near-optimal route and evaluate it on a large city road network. Solutions provided by the hierarchical routing algorithm are compared with the optimal solutions to analyze and quantify the loss of accuracy. We propose a novel yet simple heuristic to substantially improve the performance of the hierarchical routing algorithm with acceptable loss of accuracy. A network pruning technique has been incorporated into the algorithm to reduce the search space and the correctness of the results is evaluated. The improved hierarchical routing algorithm that incorporates the heuristic techniques has been found to be over 50 times faster than a typical shortest path algorithm.     

A Linear Variable Differential Capacitive Transducer for Sensing Planar Angles

A linear variable differential capacitive transducer for the measurement of planar angles (from 0deg to 360deg) is presented in this paper. The sensor part of the transducer is made of parallel plates of standard and easy-to-fabricate shapes, and the signal-conditioning electronics are realized, employing a couple of simple relaxation oscillators. The output of the transducer is only dictated by a pair of dc reference voltages, and hence, high accuracy and linearity over the entire range (from 0deg to 360deg) are easily obtained by the use of precision dc reference voltages. Detailed analysis indicates that the sensitivity of the transducer is minimal for variations in different parameters. Experimental results obtained on a prototype transducer that has been built and tested establish the efficacy of the proposed transducer. The worst-case error of the prototype transducer is found to be less than 0.1%.     

NH4Zr2V3O12 proton conductor

NH₄Zr₂V₃O₁₂, a new proton conductor, has been synthesized by flux, melt and hydrothermal methods. The crystals were subjected to X-ray diffraction, differential thermal analysis, infrared spectroscopy and impedance measurements.