Convolutional neural network with joint stepwise character/word modeling based system for scene text recognition

Multimedia Tools and Applications - Text recognition in the wild is a challenging task in the field of computer vision and machine learning. Existing optical character recognition engines cannot...     

Spray-Coating of Superhydrophobic Coatings for Advanced Applications

Superhydrophobic coatings are widely applicable, e.g., as self-cleaning surfaces or water–oil separation membranes, yet their wider usage is impeded due to costs of fabrication, size, or substrate limitation. Spray-coating is a versatile coating procedures and might offer a good solution for the fabrication of these superhydrophobic coatings, due to the fact that coatings can be fabricated on various materials in a simple, fast, and inexpensive manner. Most procedures rely on hybrid coatings of hydrophobized nanoparticles and a polymeric matrix, which have several drawbacks including the easy loss of nanoparticles and difficult waste handling. Here, the fabrication of the superhydrophobic material, called Fluoropor, for the first time, by spray-coating on various substrates including metals, tissues, concrete, and glass is presented. It is fabricated by spray-coating a mixture of a highly fluorinated monomer blended with porogens followed by photopolymerization. The superhydrophobicity of the material relies on the porous structure on the micro-/nanoscale across the bulk material and does not require any nanoparticles. Excellent self-cleaning ability of these coatings, resistance against thermal and abrasive impact, and their application as oil–water separation membranes are shown. This versatile applicability is highly promising for real-world application as self-cleaning coatings or oil–water separating membranes.     

Characterization of aromatic compounds and biological activities of essential oils from Tunisian aromatic plants

The aromatic compounds and biological activities of essential oils from six Tunisian aromatic plants including Artemisia herba-alba, Rosmarinus officinalis, Thymus capitatus, Mentha piperita, Ocimum basilicum and Artemisia absinthium were investigated. Hydro-distillation was used to extract essential oil from these plants. The identification of compounds from essential oils was performed using GC–MS analysis. Camphor (28.47%) was the major compound of A. absinthium essential oil. High contents of verbenone (20.99%) and camphor (19.72%) were found in R. officinalis. In the case of T. capitatus, carvacrol (81.09%), gamma terpinene (6.61%) and caryophyllene (4.87%) were identified as the major compounds. While eugenol (24.69%), linalool (18.00%) were characteristic compounds of O. basilicum essential oil, camphor (39.10%) and farnesol (14.25%) together with bornyl acetate (12.31%) were the main constituents of A. absinthium. These oils were also subjected to a screening for their antioxidant activity and essential oil from A. absinthium showed a greater antioxidant activity (IC₅₀?=?0.0063 mg/mL) compared to the standard Vitamin E (IC₅₀?=?0.019 mg/mL). The antibacterial activities of the oils against seven pathogenic strains, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, Bacillus cereus, Salmonella, Klebsiella pneumoniae, Escherichia coli, Staphylococcus aureus, Enterococcus faecalis and Micrococcus luteus, were tested. The highest and broadest activity was shown by M. piperita; however, Ocimum basilicum was inactive against all strains. Essential oils were also evaluated for antidiabetic and anti-acetylcholinesterase activities. The IC₅₀ values of A. herba-alba and O. basilicum against α-amylase were respectively 17.76 and 16.32 µg/mL suggesting a powerful anti-diabetic effect comparable to that of acarbose (IC₅₀?=?14.88 µg/mL). R. officinalis, M. piperita and A. absinthium exhibited an interesting acetylcholinesterase inhibition with IC₅₀ equal to 22, 24 and 58 µg/mL respectively.     

An associative accelerator for large databases

The RAPID-1 (relational access processor for intelligent data), an associative accelerator that recognizes tuples and logical formulas, is presented. It evaluates logical formulas instantiated by the current tuple, or record, and operates on whole relations or on hashing buckets. RAPID- 1 uses a reduced instruction set and hardwired control and executes all comparisons in a bit-parallel mode. It speeds up the database by a significant factor and will adapt to future generations of microprocessors. The principal design issues, data structures, instruction set, architecture, environments and performance are discussed     

Crystal structure,thermal behaviour,vibrational spectroscopy and optical properties of new compounds K$$_{}$$Ca(HAsO$$_{4}$$4)$$_{}\cdot $$·H$$_{}$$O with kröhnkite-type chain

The new kröhnkite compound called potassium calcium-bis-hydrogen arsenate dihydrate K\(_{2}\)Ca(HAsO\(_{4})_{2}\cdot \)2H\(_{2}\)O was obtained by hydrothermal method and characterized by X-ray diffraction, infrared spectroscopy, Raman scattering, thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) and differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) analysis and optical (photoluminescence and absorption) properties. It crystallizes in the triclinic space group P\(\bar{1}\) and unit cell parameters \(a = 5.971(3)\) Å, \(b =6.634(3)\) Å, \(c = 7.856(4)\) Å, \(\alpha =104.532(9)\) \(^{\circ }\), \(\beta = 105.464(9)\) \(^{\circ }\) and \(\gamma = 109.698(9)\) \(^{\circ }\). The structure of K\(_{2}\)Ca(HAsO\(_{4})_{2}\cdot \)2H\(_{2}\)O built up from this infinite, (Ca(HAsO\(_{4})_{2}\)(H\(_{2}\)O)\(_{2})^{2+}\), was oriented along an axis resulting from the association of CaO\(_{6}\) octahedra alternating with each two HAsO\(_{4}\) tetrahedra by sharing corners. Each potassium atom links two adjacent chains by three oxygen atoms of HAsO\(_{4}\) tetrahedra. TGA and DSC have shown the absence of phase transition. The existence of vibrational modes corresponding to the kröhnkite is identified by the IR and Raman spectroscopies in the frequency ranges of 400–4000 and 20–4000 cm\(^{-1}\), respectively. The photoluminescence measurement show one peak at 507 nm, which is attributed to band–band (free electron–hole transitions) and (bound electron–hole transitions) emissions within the AsO\(_{4}\) inorganic part.     

Three-Dimensional Network Polymeric Structure of (2-Amino-5 Ammoniopyridinium)[CuCl4]: Crystal Supramolecularity and Magnetic Properties

A single crystal structure determination of the complex (C₅H₉N₃)CuCl₄ [henceforth I] has been carried out. It crystallizes in the orthorhombic space group Cmca, with the cell parameters a=6.7053(5) Å, b=22.4171(19) Å, c=13.4173(9) Å, V=2016.8(3) Å³, and Z=8. In the complex, the anion is comprised of infinite zigzag chains of monochloro-bridged $\mathrm{CuCl}_{4}^{2-}$ units ?–CuCl₃–μ–Cl–CuCl₃–μ–Cl–CuCl₃–? surrounded by the pyridinium-ammonium cations. The Cu ions are five-coordinate to chloride ions in a distorted square-pyramidal geometry with the zigzag chains formed by corner-sharing polyhedra. The Cu ion is located 0.151 Å above the basal plane. In the crystal, there are four intermolecular hydrogen bonding interactions, linking the CuCl chains to the cations to form a 2D-network. The resulting 2D-networks are further linked by aryl?aryl (π?π) interactions within the cationic chains leading to a 3D-network. Variable temperature magnetic susceptibility data were fit to a one-dimensional S=1/2 antiferromagnetic chain model yielding C=0.44(1) emu-K/mol-Oe and J=?37(1) K.     

NUMERICAL STUDY OF A HEATED PULSED AXISYMMETRIC JET IN LAMINAR MODE

In this work, we have studied numerically the influence of a pulsation on the flow generated by an axisymmetric immerged jet in a laminar mode. A finite-difference method is used to solve the dimensionless equations governing the flow. The simulation enabled us to determine the space-time evolution of the flow variables, such as the velocity components, temperatures, length of the potential core, and both the dynamic and thermal half-thicknesses. The results obtained are the outcome of various factors such as the pulsation amplitude, the frequency which affects the Strouhal number value, and the Reynolds and the Grashof numbers. All of them show that a pulsed jet reaches an asymptotic mode identical to that of the steady one. On the other hand, the pulsation considerably accelerates the expansion of the jet and clearly improves the entrainment at the nozzle exit for distances of some diameters. The results reached in this work are validated with those obtained for a steady jet in its various aspects.     

Application of a continuously stirred tank bioreactor (CSTR) for bioremediation of hydrocarbon-rich industrial wastewater effluents

A continuously stirred tank bioreactor (CSTR) was used to optimize feasible and reliable bioprocess system in order to treat hydrocarbon-rich industrial wastewaters. A successful bioremediation was developed by an efficient acclimatized microbial consortium. After an experimental period of 225 days, the process was shown to be highly efficient in decontaminating the wastewater. The performance of the bioaugmented reactor was demonstrated by the reduction of COD rates up to 95%. The residual total petroleum hydrocarbon (TPH) decreased from 320 mg TPH l(-1) to 8 mg TPH l(-1). Analysis using gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) identified 26 hydrocarbons. The use of the mixed cultures demonstrated high degradation performance for hydrocarbons range n-alkanes (C10-C35). Six microbial isolates from the CSTR were characterized and species identification was confirmed by sequencing the 16S rRNA genes. The partial 16S rRNA gene sequences demonstrated that 5 strains were closely related to Aeromonas punctata (Aeromonas caviae), Bacillus cereus, Ochrobactrum intermedium, Stenotrophomonas maltophilia and Rhodococcus sp. The 6th isolate was affiliated to genera Achromobacter. Besides, the treated wastewater could be considered as non toxic according to the phytotoxicity test since the germination index of Lepidium sativum ranged between 57 and 95%. The treatment provided satisfactory results and presents a feasible technology for the treatment of hydrocarbon-rich wastewater from petrochemical industries and petroleum refineries.     

Electrical properties of magnesium sodium hydrogen monophosphate: MgNa3H(PO4)2

Magnesium sodium hydrogen monophosphate, Na₃MgH(PO₄)₂, crystallizes in the triclinic cell . The crystal morphology is related to the synthesis temperature and the evaporation rate. Samples were characterized through X-ray diffraction and chemical analysis, examined by IR and Raman vibrational spectroscopy and impedance and modulus spectroscopy techniques. The conductivity relaxation parameters associated with some H^· conduction have been determined from an analysis of the M^″/M_max^″ spectrum measured in a wide temperature range. Transport properties in this material appear to be due to an H^· ion hopping mechanism.