25,346 research outputs found
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The effect of water absorption on the dielectric properties of epoxy nanocomposites
In this research, the influence of water absorption on the dielectric properties of epoxy resin and epoxy micro-composites and nano-composites filled with silica has been studied. Nanocomposites were found to absorb significantly more water than unfilled epoxy. However, the microcomposite absorbed less water than unfilled epoxy: corresponding to reduced proportion of the epoxy in this composite. The glass transition temperatures of all the samples were measured by both differential scanning calorimetry and dielectric spectroscopy. The Tg decreased as the water absorption increased and, in all cases, corresponded to a drop of approximately 20K as the humidity was increased from 0% to 100%. This implied that for all the samples, the amount of water in the resin component of the composites was almost identical. It was concluded that the extra water found in the nanocomposites was located around the surface of the nanoparticles. This was confirmed by measuring the water uptake, and the swelling and density change, as a function of humidity as water was absorbed. The water shell model, originally proposed by Lewis and developed by Tanaka, has been further developed to explain low frequency dielectric spectroscopy results in which percolation of charge carriers through overlapping water shells was shown to occur. This has been discussed in terms of a percolation model. At 100% relative humidity, water is believed to surround the nanoparticles to a depth of approximately 5 monolayers. A second layer of water is proposed that is dispersed by sufficiently concentrated to be conductive; this may extend for approximately 25 nm. If all the water had existed in a single layer surrounding a nanoparticle, this layer would have been approximately 3 to 4 nm thick at 100%. This "characteristic thickness" of water surrounding a given size of nanoparticle appeared to be independent of the concentration of nanoparticles but approximately proportional to water uptake. Filler particles that have surfaces that are functionalized to be hydrophobic considerably reduce the amount of water absorbed in nanocomposites under the same conditions of humidity. Comments are made on the possible effect on electrical aging
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A "water shell" model for the dielectric properties of hydrated silica-filled epoxy nano-composites
The electrical properties of epoxy resin have been studied as a function of hydration. The epoxy was studied in an un-filled state, filled with 40 ”m SiO2 particles, and filled with 50 nm SiO2 particles. The relative humidity was controlled by saturated salt solutions at ambient temperatures from 298-353 K. Measurements were made using dielectric spectroscopy over the frequency range 10-3-105 Hz. The hydration isotherm (i.e. the mass uptake of water) was established by measuring the mass as a function of relative humidity (RH). It was found that the nanocomposites absorb up to 60% more water than the unfilled and micro-filled epoxies. Dielectric spectroscopy shows different conduction and quasi-DC behaviours at very low frequencies (<10-2 Hz) with activation energies dependent on the hydration and temperature. These observations have led to the development of a âwater shellâ model to explain this phenomenon
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Influence of absorbed water on the dielectric properties and glass-transition temperature of silica-filled epoxy nanocomposites
Work on dielectric spectroscopy of epoxy resin filled with nano-SiO2 at different relative humidities and temperatures is reported. Above the glass-transition temperature (Tg), dc-like imperfect charge transport (QDC or LFD) dominates the low frequency dielectric spectrum. Another mid-frequency relaxation process was found in the non-dried composites. Water also induces glass-transition temperature decreases, which can be measured both by dielectric spectroscopy and DSC. Both theory and experiment demonstrated that a higher water content could exist in nanocomposites than unfilled epoxy suggesting a bigger free volume when nanostructured. In our system, the hydrophilic surface of silica is likely to cause water to surround and lead to delamination of the epoxy from SiO2. This is a potential mechanical and dielectric weakness in the nanocomposites, which may lead to an ageing phenomenon. Hydrophobic surface group may reduce the water adsorption in nanocomposites
Isospin breaking and - mixing in the reaction
We make a theoretical study of the and
reactions with an aim to determine the
isospin violation and the mixing of the and resonances.
We make use of the chiral unitary approach where these two resonances appear as
composite states of two mesons, dynamically generated by the meson-meson
interaction provided by chiral Lagrangians. We obtain a very narrow shape for
the production in agreement with a BES experiment. As to the amount
of isospin violation, or and mixing, assuming constant
vertices for the primary and
production, we find results which
are much smaller than found in the recent experimental BES paper, but
consistent with results found in two other related BES experiments. We have
tried to understand this anomaly by assuming an I=1 mixture in the
wave function, but this leads to a much bigger width of the mass
distribution than observed experimentally. The problem is solved by using the
primary production driven by followed by , which induces an extra singularity in the loop functions needed to
produce the and resonances. Improving upon earlier work
along the same lines, and using the chiral unitary approach, we can now predict
absolute values for the ratio which are in fair agreement with experiment. We also show that the same
results hold if we had the resonance or a mixture of these two
states, as seems to be the case in the BES experiment
Linear optical implementation of a single mode quantum filter and generation of multi-photon polarization entangled state
We propose a scheme to implement a single-mode quantum filter, which
selectively eliminates the one-photon state in a quantum state
. The vacuum state and the two photon state are
transmitted without any change. This scheme requires single-photon sources,
linear optical elements and photon detectors. Furthermore we demonstrate, how
this filter can be used to realize a two-qubit projective measurement and to
generate multi-photon polarization entangled states.Comment: revision submitted to PR
Developing Sustainable Relationships through Public Private People Partnership (4P) Projects
Conference Theme: Global Challenges in Construction IndustryPublic Private Partnership (PPP) are sometimes used to procure public infrastructure, if deemed useful in mobilising private finance and expertise for generating innovations and enhanced âvalueâ. However, when delivering desired âvalueâ to specific end-users, we should not neglect âoverall valueâ for the sustainable development of the parent community/society. To address such holistic issues in suitable broader-based projects, wider-ranging âPublic Private People Partnershipâ (4P) arrangements are proposed to invite and integrate contributions from societal stakeholders through relevant bodies, e.g. social enterprises, NGOs, academia and professional institutions. Selecting and integrating such stakeholders in a properly structured 4P procurement and operational framework can help formulate more widely acceptable and sustainable designs and mobilise more resources for procurement, construction, maintenance and operation of built assets. This will also help to address grass roots aspirations and concerns earlier, rather than try to resolve conflicts later. However, a major barrier to involving more stakeholders in already complex projects arises in managing their inputs, and relationships, while optimising outputs. Based on literature review and structured interviews, this paper presents pros and cons of using 4P in selected scenarios such as post-disaster reconstruction. Initial findings confirm that a 4P approach requires superior relationship management. This paper also draws on another study that highlighted the often neglected importance of relationship management in âtraditionalâ PPP projects. Combining these findings, a case is made for improving relationship management by mobilising the additional P (âpeopleâ) to appropriate extents in selected PPP projects, so as to identify, prioritise and harmonise diverse stakeholder objectives and target optimal âoverall valueâ with sustainable relationships aimed at common goals.published_or_final_versio
Fast and robust road sign detection in driver assistance systems
© 2018, Springer Science+Business Media, LLC, part of Springer Nature. Road sign detection plays a critical role in automatic driver assistance systems. Road signs possess a number of unique visual qualities in images due to their specific colors and symmetric shapes. In this paper, road signs are detected by a two-level hierarchical framework that considers both color and shape of the signs. To address the problem of low image contrast, we propose a new color visual saliency segmentation algorithm, which uses the ratios of enhanced and normalized color values to capture color information. To improve computation efficiency and reduce false alarm rate, we modify the fast radial symmetry transform (RST) algorithm, and propose to use an edge pairwise voting scheme to group feature points based on their underlying symmetry in the candidate regions. Experimental results on several benchmarking datasets demonstrate the superiority of our method over the state-of-the-arts on both efficiency and robustness
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