Midinfrared Surface Waves on a High Aspect Ratio Nanotrench Platform

Optical surface waves, highly localized modes bound to the surface of media, enable manipulation of light at nanoscale, thus impacting a wide range of areas in nanoscience. By applying metamaterials, artificially designed optical materials, as contacting media at the interface, we can significantly ameliorate surface wave propagation and even generate new types of waves. Here, we demonstrate that high aspect ratio (1:20) grating structures with plasmonic lamellas in deep nanoscale trenches, whose pitch is 1/10–1/35 of a wavelength, function as a versatile platform supporting both surface and guided bulk infrared waves. The surface waves exhibit a unique combination of properties: directionality, broadband existence (from 4 μm to at least 14 μm and beyond) and high localization, making them an attractive tool for effective control of light in an extended range of infrared frequencies

A novel performance measurement approach based on trust context using fuzzy T-norm and S-norm operators: The case study of energy consumption

In today's economic environment, performance and efficiency assessment is essential for organizations in order to survive and raise their market share. Energy efficient consumption is a major issue in the energy planning of each country which is a big concern of managers, hence, exploitation of a strong approach for efficiency evaluation and assessment seems necessary in the energy section. In this study, a novel performance assessment model is proposed based on the concept of trust, using two popular fuzzy operators called T-norm and S-norm. The developed model is applied for a real case study of energy consumption efficiency assessment for 36 countries. An adaptive network based fuzzy inference system (ANFIS) is used to measure the efficiencies. Also, to predict efficiency rates of the future time periods, a regression model is applied as a time series model. The obtained results indicate the superiority and applicability of the proposed methodology. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study that proposes a novel performance measurement approach based on trust context by using fuzzy T-norm and S-norm operators