Overmoulding of electronics for end of life recovery

With the increasing use of electronic control systems in automotive applications, the environments in which they are required to operate are becoming evermore demanding. For improved functionality and to reduce the number of interconnections it is desirable to place the electronic control units (ECUs) as close as possible to the sensors and actuators they interact with, and they can increasingly be found mounted on engine, transmission and chassis components. The electronics are therefore exposed to high/low temperatures, high humidity, vibration and corrosive fluids. In order to protect the electronics and maintain reliability in safety critical areas, great lengths are taken to mount the devices in ways that will prevent the ingress of moisture, cushion shocks and dissipate heat. Potting of electrical devices with thermosetting polymers has been a commonplace method to install a protective layer over the circuit assemblies, which are often mounted in separate boxes within the vehicle. However, with the drive to reduce vehicle weight and increase recyclability, there has been much interest in the use of overmoulding with thermoplastic polymers, not only to provide protection, but to enable the electronics to be mounted into a structural component of the vehicle thereby saving space and weight and eliminating a level of packaging. While this has been shown to be a practical way forward in terms of reliability, the recyclability of the thermoplastic polymer is compromised by the intermixed electronics that are hard to separate economically

After trust (JOURNAL SPECIAL ISSUE)

1. “Trust” has long been seen as critical to the success and durability of trading networks, and conceptualised as a positive moral sentiment that is embedded in shared kinship, ethnicity or friendship, or in shared frameworks of morality. Other recent studies of business communities suggest that the ability to work in settings characterised by pervasive mistrust is a key factor in the development of commercial acumen and determining success. This Special Issue argues that the focus on trust and mistrust, and the underlying concern with ethics and morality, obscure equally critical aspects that inform the durability of trading networks. It offers ethnographic accounts of different inter-Asian trading networks active in the city of Yiwu. One of China’s most dynamic and diverse ‘international trade cities’, Yiwu is home to the largest wholesale market of small commodities in the world, and attracts traders and merchants from across the planet; over 12,000 foreign traders are also resident in the city. The collected articles analyse the durability of these networks in relation to broader geopolitical processes and contexts, arguing that success often depends on the ability to negotiate geopolitical shifts and the faultlines of political identity. The articles trace traders’ efforts to create institutions that allow them to withstand geopolitical transformations. They also document the ability of trading networks to operate flexibly across different social fields, showing that resilience often depends on the ability to navigate and profit from shifting relations between economic, political and familial domains. 2. This article consists of an analysis of ethnographic material on Afghan trading networks involved in both the export of commodities from China to a variety of settings across Eurasia and the movement of ‘refugees’ from Afghanistan to Europe. Much recent work on trading networks has deployed the concept of trust to understand the functioning of such social formations. By contrast, in this article I assess the durability of Afghan networks in three ways. First, recognition of how they are polycentric and multi-nodal. Second, how they are successful in transforming their collective aims and projects in changing shifting political and economic circumstances. Third, how they are made up of individuals able to switch their statuses and activities within trading networks over time. Furthermore, I argue that a focus on the precise ways in which traders entrust capital, people and commodities to one another, reveals the extent to which social and commercial relationships inside trading networks are frequently impermanent and pregnant with concerns about mistrust and contingency. Recognition of this suggests that scholars should focus on practices of entrustment rather than abstract notions of trust in their analyses of trading networks per se, as well as seek to understand the ways in which these practices enable actors to handle and address questions of contingency

Foreword

Foreword to Vol. 41 No. 2 (2023): Special Issue: Minority Migration from Muslim Asia. Guest Editor: Vera Skvirskaja.Paul Anderson: Associate Professor of Middle Eastern Studies, University of CambridgeMagnus Marsden:Professor of Social Anthropology and Director of the Sussex Asia Centre, University of SussexVera Skvirskaja: Associate Professor, Department of Cross-Cultural and Regional Studies, University of Copenhagen</p

Changes in (002) Bragg peak position in a track (highlighted in <b>Fig. 1</b>) through each tooth slice (artificial demineralization, artificial remineralization, healthy control and natural caries) from enamel surface to EDJ.

<p>Changes in (002) Bragg peak position in a track (highlighted in <a href="http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0108879#pone-0108879-g001" target="_blank"><b>Fig. 1</b></a>) through each tooth slice (artificial demineralization, artificial remineralization, healthy control and natural caries) from enamel surface to EDJ.</p

Scanning microradiography area scans showing the relative mineral density distribution of a) artificially demineralized lesion, b) artificially remineralized enamel, c) natural caries lesion, d) healthy enamel.

<p>The scale bar and colour intensity bar are representative for all images.</p

Digital photographs of enamel samples a) artificially demineralized, b) artificially remineralized and c) naturally carious and d) healthy enamel, outlining regions of interest (box) selected for SMR measurement.

<p>The line within the box represents the track measured by SXRD.</p

Treatment regimen for tooth samples.

<p>Treatment regimen for tooth samples.</p

Intensity versus azimuthal angle taken from a typical (002) Bragg reflection of an enamel diffraction pattern.

<p>Pronounced peaks highlight a high degree of texture in this sample. Both peaks have been fitted to a Gaussian plus baseline (red and green lines respectively).</p

SEM images of enamel from the surface of a) artificially demineralized b) artificially remineralized c) naturally carious (surface) and d) healthy region.

<p>The inset to d) shows the bulk of the carious region ∼150 µm from the surface.</p

Application of ¹H-NMR Metabolomic Profiling for Reef-Building Corals

<div><p>In light of global reef decline new methods to accurately, cheaply, and quickly evaluate coral metabolic states are needed to assess reef health. Metabolomic profiling can describe the response of individuals to disturbance (i.e., shifts in environmental conditions) across biological models and is a powerful approach for characterizing and comparing coral metabolism. For the first time, we assess the utility of a proton-nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy (¹H-NMR)-based metabolomics approach in characterizing coral metabolite profiles by 1) investigating technical, intra-, and inter-sample variation, 2) evaluating the ability to recover targeted metabolite spikes, and 3) assessing the potential for this method to differentiate among coral species. Our results indicate ¹H-NMR profiling of <i>Porites compressa</i> corals is highly reproducible and exhibits low levels of variability within and among colonies. The spiking experiments validate the sensitivity of our methods and showcase the capacity of orthogonal partial least squares discriminate analysis (OPLS-DA) to distinguish between profiles spiked with varying metabolite concentrations (0 mM, 0.1 mM, and 10 mM). Finally, ¹H-NMR metabolomics coupled with OPLS-DA, revealed species-specific patterns in metabolite profiles among four reef-building corals (<i>Pocillopora damicornis, Porites lobata, Montipora aequituberculata,</i> and <i>Seriatopora hystrix</i>). Collectively, these data indicate that ¹H-NMR metabolomic techniques can profile reef-building coral metabolomes and have the potential to provide an integrated picture of the coral phenotype in response to environmental change.</p></div