Discharge characteristics of lead dioxide electrode prepared with cementation lead oxide

Lead acid batteries have had restricted applications because of relatively low energy density below 50Wh/kg. Many efforts have achieved lighter battery components such as separators, connections and containers etc. Thus, the most important problem of the lead acid battery is to improve the low capacity of the active material in the positive electrode. The purpose of this study is to improve the utilization of the active material in the lead dioxide electrode for the lead acid battery through the production of lead oxide with better physicochemical characteristics through cementation. A cementation reaction was performed in 1.0wt.%HCl solution using pure magnesium plate as the reductant. We investigated the utilization of the active material and discharge characteristics of the positive electrode with a current density ranging from 3.4 to 108.8mAcm⁻². As a result, the active material utilization was about 72% at 3.48 mAcm⁻² and increased with decreasing current density. The discharge characteristics according to current density are especially very good at high current density     

Investigation of the grain coarsening behavior of some Aluminum alloys

Grain coarsening tests were carried out on Al-4.5 pct Cu and Al-4.5 pct Si alloys. The effects of three variables, melt composition, pour temperature, and mold temperature, were determined. It was found that the macrostructure generally coarsened with increased pour and mold temperatures. Coarsening was extreme in the unrefined alloys but was retarded by the active grain refiners like titanium and columbium. The effect of boron was spectacular in suppressing coarsening tendencies. The results of the investigation support the carbide theory of nucleation as opposed to the peritectic theory.     

Microstructure evolution during batch annealing

Design of industrial annealing cycles requires recrystallization and grain growth studies, which are typically carried out under isothermal laboratory condition. The kinetics coefficients of these phase transformations are obtained from such studies, which are subsequently used in designing the industrial nonisothermal cycles using the additivity principles. However, the strong heating rate effects on the grain growth kinetics necessitate such kinetics studies using industrial thermal profiles. In the present work, the hot and cold spot cycles of an industrial batch annealing cycle for AIK grade steel have been simulated in a programmable laboratory furnace. Subsequently, the effect of annealing temperature, soaking time, and heating rate on the microstructural features, such as grain size distribution, grain shape anisotropy, and grain orientation, have been investigated through extensive quantitative microscopy. The implications of these results on the design of industrial batch annealing cycles have been discussed.     

Effects of solid solution alloying on creep deformation of aluminum

The effects of solid solution alloying on the creep-rupture properties, deformation characteristics, ductility, and fracture of pure aluminum were studied by means of creep-rupture tests on polished specimens of three alloys each of Al-Cu (0.24, 0.79, and 2.05 pct Cu), Al-Zn (4.93, 9.89, and 19.78 pct Zn), and Al-Mg (0.94, 1.92, and 5.10 pct Mg) at 500°, 700°, and 900°F.     

Microstructure and creep behavior in AE42 magnesium die-casting alloy

The micro structural analysis of die-cast AE42 reveals a correlation between micro structure and creep strength. A lamellar-phase Al₁₁RE₃, which dominates the interdendritic microstructure of the alloy, partly decomposes above 150‡C into Al₂RE and Al (forming Mg₁₇Al₁₂). The increased solubility of aluminum in magnesium at higher temperatures may also promote the decomposition of Al₁₁RE₃. The creep strength decreases sharply with these phase changes. A mechanism for the decrease in creep strength of AE42 is proposed whereby the reduced presence of lamellar Al1₁₁RE₃ and/or the presence of Mg₁₇Al₁₂ contribute to the observed poor creep strength at higher temperatures.     

Chromium distribution between liquid iron and molten basic slags

An equilibrium study was made of the distribution of chromium and oxygen between liquid iron, containing less than 1 pct Cr, and simple slags of the CaO(MgO)-SiO₂-FeO-Cr₂O₃ type in the temperature range 1526° to 1734°C The effects of slag oxidation, temperature, and basicity were observed.     

The preparation of tantalum powder using a MR-EMR combination process

In the conventional metallothermic reduction (MR) process used to obtain tantalum powder in batch-type operation, it is difficult to control the morphology and location of the tantalum deposits. In contrast, an electronically mediated reaction (EMR) process is capable of overcoming this difficulty. It has the advantage of being a continuous process, but has the disadvantage of a poor reduction yield. A process known as the MR-EMR combination process is able to overcome the shortcomings of the MR and EMR processes. In this study, an MR-EMR combination process is applied to the production of tantalum powder via sodium reduction of K₂TaF₇. In the MR-EMR combination process, the total charge passed through an external circuit and the average particle size (FSSS) increase as the reduction temperature increases. In addition, the proportion of fine particles (−325 mesh) decreases as the reduction temperature increasess. The tantalum yield improved from 65 to 74% as the reduction temperature increased. Taking into account the charge, impurities, morphology, particle size and yield, a reduction temperature of 1123 K was found to be optimum for the MR-EMR combination process.     

Beyond multi-adjoint logic programming

In ‘multi-adjoint logic programming’, MALP in brief, each fuzzy logic program is associated with its own ‘multi-adjoint lattice’ for modelling truth degrees beyond the simpler case of true and false, where a large set of fuzzy connectives can be defined. On this wide repertoire, it is crucial to connect each implication symbol with a proper conjunction thus conforming constructs of the form (←_i, &_i) called ‘adjoint pairs’, whose use directly affects both declarative and operational semantics of the MALP framework. In this work, we firstly show how the strong dependence of adjoint pairs can be largely weakened for an interesting ‘sub-class’ of MALP programs. Then, we reason in a similar way till conceiving a ‘super-class’ of fuzzy logic programs beyond MALP, which definitively drops out the need for using adjoint pairs, since the new semantics behaviour relies on much more relaxed lattices than multi-adjoint ones.     

Extended Reflexive Ontologies for the Generation of Clinical Recommendations

Decision recommendations are a set of alternative options for clinical decisions (e.g., diagnosis, prognosis, treatment selection, follow-up, and prevention) that are provided to decision makers by knowledge-based Clinical Decision Support Systems (k-CDSS) as aids. We propose to follow a “reasoning over domain” approach for the generation of decision recommendations by gathering and inferring conclusions from production rules. In order to rationalize our approach, we present a specification that will sustain the logic models supported in the knowledge bases we use for persistence. We introduce first the underlying knowledge model and then the necessary extensions that will convey toward the solution of the reported needs. The starting point of our approach is the proposition of Reflexive Ontologies (RO). Here, we go a step further, proposing an extension of RO that includes the handling and reasoning that production rules provide. Our approach speeds up the recommendation generation process.