Chrome-free Samarium-based Protective Coatings for Magnesium Alloys

AbstractThe microstructure of chrome-free samarium-based conversion coating on magnesium alloy was investigated and the corrosion resistance was evaluated as well. The micro-morphology, transverse section, crystal structure and composition of the coating were observed by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD), energy dispersive spectroscopy (EDS) and X- ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), respectively. The corrosion resistance was evaluated by potentiodynamic polarization curve and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS). The results reveal that the morphology of samarium conversion coating is of crack-mud structure. Tiny cracks distribute in the compact coating deposited by samarium oxides. XRD, EDS and XPS results characterize that the coating is made of amorphous and trivalent-samarium oxides. The potentiodynamic polarization curve, EIS and OCP indicate that the samarium conversion coating can improve the corrosion resistance of magnesium alloys

A Pseudo DNA Cryptography Method

The DNA cryptography is a new and very promising direction in cryptography research. DNA can be used in cryptography for storing and transmitting the information, as well as for computation. Although in its primitive stage, DNA cryptography is shown to be very effective. Currently, several DNA computing algorithms are proposed for quite some cryptography, cryptanalysis and steganography problems, and they are very powerful in these areas. However, the use of the DNA as a means of cryptography has high tech lab requirements and computational limitations, as well as the labor intensive extrapolation means so far. These make the efficient use of DNA cryptography difficult in the security world now. Therefore, more theoretical analysis should be performed before its real applications. In this project, We do not intended to utilize real DNA to perform the cryptography process; rather, We will introduce a new cryptography method based on central dogma of molecular biology. Since this method simulates some critical processes in central dogma, it is a pseudo DNA cryptography method. The theoretical analysis and experiments show this method to be efficient in computation, storage and transmission; and it is very powerful against certain attacks. Thus, this method can be of many uses in cryptography, such as an enhancement insecurity and speed to the other cryptography methods. There are also extensions and variations to this method, which have enhanced security, effectiveness and applicability.Comment: A small work that quite some people asked abou

Soliton Molecules and Multisoliton States in Ultrafast Fibre Lasers: Intrinsic Complexes in Dissipative Systems

Benefiting from ultrafast temporal resolution, broadband spectral bandwidth, as well as high peak power, passively mode-locked fibre lasers have attracted growing interest and exhibited great potential from fundamental sciences to industrial and military applications. As a nonlinear system containing complex interactions from gain, loss, nonlinearity, dispersion, etc., ultrafast fibre lasers deliver not only conventional single soliton but also soliton bunching with different types. In analogy to molecules consisting of several atoms in chemistry, soliton molecules (in other words, bound solitons) in fibre lasers are of vital importance for in-depth understanding of the nonlinear interaction mechanism and further exploration for high-capacity fibre-optic communications. In this Review, we summarize the state-of-the-art advances on soliton molecules in ultrafast fibre lasers. A variety of soliton molecules with different numbers of soliton, phase-differences and pulse separations were experimentally observed owing to the flexibility of parameters such as mode-locking techniques and dispersion control. Numerical simulations clearly unravel how different nonlinear interactions contribute to formation of soliton molecules. Analysis of the stability and the underlying physical mechanisms of bound solitons bring important insights to this field. For a complete view of nonlinear optical phenomena in fibre lasers, other dissipative states such as vibrating soliton pairs, soliton rains, rogue waves and coexisting dissipative solitons are also discussed. With development of advanced real-time detection techniques, the internal motion of different pulsing states is anticipated to be characterized, rendering fibre lasers a versatile platform for nonlinear complex dynamics and various practical applications

Biodegradable Cellulose Film Prepared from Banana Pseudo-Stem Using an Ionic Liquid for Mango Preservation

The excessive use and disposal of plastic packaging materials have drawn increasing concerns from the society because of the detrimental effect on environment and ecosystems. As the most widely used fruit packing material, polyethylene (PE) film is not suitable for long-term preservation of some tropical fruits, such as mangos, due to its inferior gas permeability. Cellulose based film can be made from renewable resources and is biodegradable and environmental-friendly, which makes it a promising alternative to PE as a packaging material. In this study, cellulose film synthesized from delignified banana stem fibers via an ionic liquid 1-Allyl-3-methylimidazolium chloride ([AMIm][Cl]) were evaluated as packing material for mangos preservation. The moisture vapor transmission rate and gas transmission rate of the synthesized cellulose film were 1,969.1 g/(m2⋅24 h) and 10,015.4 ml/(m2⋅24 h), respectively, which are significantly higher than those of commercial PE films. The high permeability is beneficial to the release of ethylene so that contribute to extend fruit ripening period. As a result, cellulose film packaging significantly decreased the disease and color indexes of mangos, while prolonged the storage and shelf life of marketable fruits. In addition, the cellulose film was decomposed in soils in 4 weeks, indicating an excellent biodegradability as compared to the PE plastic film

Synergistic effects of vaccination and virus testing on the transmission of an infectious disease

Under the background that asymptomatic virus carriers have infectivity for an infectious disease, we establish a difference equations model with vaccination and virus testing in this paper. Assuming that the vaccine is 100% effective for susceptible people but cannot stop the infectivity of asymptomatic virus carriers, we study how to combine vaccination and virus testing at the beginning of an epidemic to effectively block the spread of infectious disease in different population sizes. By considering the daily processing capacity of the vaccine and daily proportion of testing, the corresponding numerical simulation results are obtained. It is shown that when vaccine availability and virus testing capacity are insufficient, a reasonable combination of the above two measures can slow down or even block the spread of infectious disease. Single virus testing or vaccination can also block the spread of infectious disease, but this requires a lot of manpower, material and financial resources. When the daily proportion of virus testing is fixed, the ratio of the minimum daily processing capacity of vaccines used to block the spread of infectious disease to the corresponding population size is rather stable. It demonstrates that effective protective measures of the same infectious disease in countries and regions with different population sizes can be used as a reference. These results also provide a certain reference for decision makers on how to coordinate vaccines and virus testing resources to curb the spread of such an infectious disease in a certain population size

60-nm-span wavelength-tunable vortex fiber laser with intracavity plasmon metasurfaces

Wavelength-tunable vortex fiber lasers that could generate beams carrying orbital angular momentum (OAM) hold great interest in large-capacity optical communications. The wavelength tunability of conventional vortex fiber lasers is however limited by the range of 35 nm due to narrow bandwidth and/or insertion loss of mode conversion components. Optical metasurfaces apart from being compact planar components can flexibly manipulate light with high efficiency in a broad wavelength range. Here, we propose and demonstrate for the first time, to the best of our knowledge, a metasurface-assisted vortex fiber laser that can directly generate OAM beams with changeable topological charges. Due to the designed broadband gap-surface plasmon metasurface, combined with an intracavity tunable filter, the laser enables OAM beam with center wavelength continuously tunable from 1015 nm to 1075 nm, nearly twice of other vortex fiber lasers ever reported. The metasurface can be designed at will to satisfy requirements for either low pump threshold or high slope efficiency of the laser. Furthermore, the cavity-metasurface configuration can be extended to generate higher-order OAM beams or more complex structured beams in different wavelength regions, which greatly broadens the possibilities for developing low-cost and high-quality structured-beam laser sources