Fatigue limit of Ti6Al4V alloy produced by Selective Laser Sintering

Abstract 3D printing is an advanced manufacturing technology for producing metal components, and titanium is a typical alloy that is used in this technique. Some limitations and peculiarity should be considered during the design of components by additive manufacturing. We adopted the most common technique to produce the samples, the selective laser sintering (SLS). In this case the remaining porosity and the surface roughness are affecting negatively the fatigue life. In this study the effects of porosity and surface roughness were studied by performing push-pull tests (R=-1) in a Rumul resonant machine to evaluate the fatigue limit in different conditions. Samples were built by SLS from Ti64 ELI biomedical grade powder. After building, all samples were thermal treated at 670°C to relax residual stresses due to the building process. At this step the microstructure was characterized, it was found to be martensitic (α'). A first lot of samples, as benchmark, was tested in this condition and in the present work are simply called "as built". Part of the samples were treated by hot isostatic pressing (HIP), by performing this process we obtained the full density, removing the pores still present in the microstructure. The HIP was performed at 920°C, so not only the density was modified by this process, but also the microstructure. The HIP worked as a thermal treatment in the α+β field and the result is that the microstructure is extremely different from the previous condition. It is a lamellar α+β microstructure. To have a significant comparison between the results part of the remaining samples was thermal treated at the same temperature and for the same holding time as for the hipped samples to obtain the same microstructure, maintaining the residual porosity typical of the SLM process. Wohler curves were determined from push-pull test to have a direct comparison of the fatigue performance between the different conditions

Clustering of reads with alignment-free measures and quality values

BACKGROUND: The data volume generated by Next-Generation Sequencing (NGS) technologies is growing at a pace that is now challenging the storage and data processing capacities of modern computer systems. In this context an important aspect is the reduction of data complexity by collapsing redundant reads in a single cluster to improve the run time, memory requirements, and quality of post-processing steps like assembly and error correction. Several alignment-free measures, based on k-mers counts, have been used to cluster reads. Quality scores produced by NGS platforms are fundamental for various analysis of NGS data like reads mapping and error detection. Moreover future-generation sequencing platforms will produce long reads but with a large number of erroneous bases (up to 15 %). RESULTS: In this scenario it will be fundamental to exploit quality value information within the alignment-free framework. To the best of our knowledge this is the first study that incorporates quality value information and k-mers counts, in the context of alignment-free measures, for the comparison of reads data. Based on this principles, in this paper we present a family of alignment-free measures called D(q)-type. A set of experiments on simulated and real reads data confirms that the new measures are superior to other classical alignment-free statistics, especially when erroneous reads are considered. Also results on de novo assembly and metagenomic reads classification show that the introduction of quality values improves over standard alignment-free measures. These statistics are implemented in a software called QCluster (http://www.dei.unipd.it/~ciompin/main/qcluster.html)

Sviluppo della moralità e costituzione della famiglia in J.-J. Rousseau. Un confronto tra il Saggio sull’origine delle lingue e il Discorso sull’origine e i fondamenti dell’ineguaglianza tra gli uomini.

A research to point out the different notion of family that Rousseau delineates in the second Discours and in the Essai sur l’origine des langues. In the first case family is something acquired, it’s the result of a revolution, of a gap, and it presupposes technical development and psychological complexity; in the second case family is something natural, it’s primitive, extremely rough, and it implies a vision of the state of nature, and of the man, that we can not identify with the vision delineated by Rousseau in his mains works

Information and motility exchange in collectives of active particles

We examine the interplay of motility and information exchange in a model of run-and-tumble active particles where the particle's motility is encoded as a bit of information that can be exchanged upon contact according to the rules of AND and OR logic gates in a circuit. Motile AND particles become non-motile upon contact with a non-motile particle. Conversely, motile OR particles remain motile upon collision with their non-motile counterparts. AND particles that have become non-motile additionally "reawaken", i.e., recover their motility, at a fixed rate $\mu$, as in the SIS (Susceptible, Infected, Susceptible) model of epidemic spreading, where an infected agent can become healthy again, but keeps no memory of the recent infection, hence it is susceptible to a renewed infection. For $\mu=0$, both AND and OR particles relax irreversibly to absorbing states of all non-motile or all motile particles, respectively. The relaxation kinetics is, however, faster for OR particles that remain active throughout the process. At finite $\mu$, the AND dynamics is controlled by the interplay between reawakening and collision rates. The system evolves to a state of all motile particles (an absorbing state in the language of absorbing phase transitions) for $\mu>\mu_c$ and to a mixed state with coexisting motile and non-motile particles (an active state in the language of absorbing phase transitions) for $\mu<\mu_c$. The final state exhibits a rich structure controlled by motility-induced aggregation. Our work can be relevant to biochemical signaling in motile bacteria, the spreading of epidemics and of social consensus, as well as light-controlled organization of active colloids

Evolution of the lattice defects and crystalline domain size in carbon nanotube metal matrix composites processed by severe plastic deformation

Nickel (Ni) and carbon nanotube (CNT)-reinforced Ni-matrix composites were processed by high-pressure torsion (HPT). The evolution of dislocation densities and crystalline domain sizes were analyzed by means of X-ray diffraction (XRD) using Whole Powder Pattern Modelling (WPPM). The composites showed an evident gradient in the microstructural refinement and in hardness with increasing applied strain. This effect was found to be more pronounced in the presence of higher amounts of CNT. In particular, a higher amount of screw dislocations was measured by WPPM after HPT. It was concluded that the strengthening of CNT-MMC processed by HPT is mainly due to work hardening and grain refinement, both mechanisms being assisted by the presence of CNT, with marginal contribution of particle strengthening.DFG, Project ID: SU911/1-

Instrumental profile of MYTHEN detector in Debye-Scherrer geometry

The main aberrations affecting data collected with 1D position sensitive detectors in Debye-Scherrer capillary geometry are examined, and analytical corrections proposed. The equations are implemented in two of the most advanced software based on the Rietveld and Whole Powder Pattern Modelling methods, respectively, for structure and microstructure analysis. Application to MYTHEN, a fast single photon counting detector developed at the Swiss Light Source, is discussed in detai

Structure and morphology of shape-controlled Pd nanocrystals

Pd nanocrystals were produced with uniform truncated-cube shape and a narrow size distribution, yielding controlled surface area fractions from low Miller index ({100}, {110}, {111}) crystalline facets. Details on the structure and morphology of the nanocrystals were obtained by combining X-ray powder diffraction line profile analysis, high-resolution transmission electron microscopy and surface electrochemistry based on Cu underpotential deposition.ML acknowledges support from the Italian government (Ministero dell’Istruzione, dell’Università e della Ricerca) through the project FIRB Futuro in Ricerca RBFR10CWDA. JMF acknowledges financial support from the MINECO (Spain) project CTQ2013-44083-P and Generalitat Valenciana project PROMETEOII/2014/013