Asymptotic Stability, Orbital Stability of Hopf-Bifurcating Periodic Solution of a Simple Three-Neuron Artificial Neural Network with Distributed Delay

A distributed delay model of a class of three-neuron network has been investigated. Sufficient conditions for existence of unique equilibrium, multiple equilibria and their local stability are derived. A closed interval for a parameter of the system is identified in which Hopf-bifurcating periodic solution occurs for each point of such interval. The orbital stability of such bifurcating periodic solution at the extreme points of the interval is ascertained. Lastly global bifurcation aspect of such periodic solutions is studied. The results are illustrated by numerical simulations

Stability and Hopf-Bifurcation Analysis of Delayed BAM Neural Network under Dynamic Thresholds

In this paper the dynamics of a three neuron model with self-connection and distributed delay under dynamical threshold is investigated. With the help of topological degree theory and Homotopy invariance principle existence and uniqueness of equilibrium point are established. The conditions for which the Hopf-bifurcation occurs at the equilibrium are obtained for the weak kernel of the distributed delay. The direction and stability of the bifurcating periodic solutions are determined by the normal form theory and central manifold theorem. Lastly global bifurcation aspect of such periodic solutions is studied. Some numerical simulations for justifying the theoretical analysis are also presented

Fabrication and Evaluation of Low Density Glass-Epoxy Composites for Microwave Absorption Applications

In the present work, fabrication and evaluation of low density glass – epoxy (LDGE) composites suitable for absorbing minimum 80 per cent of incident microwave energy in 8 GHz to 12 GHz (X-band) is reported. LDGE composites having different densities were fabricated using a novel method of partially replacing conventional S-glass fabric with low density glass (LDG) layers as the reinforcement materials. Flexural strength, inter laminar shear strength and impact strength of the prepared LDGE composites were evaluated and compared with conventional High density glass-epoxy (HDGE) composites to understand the changes in these properties due to replacement of S-glass fabrics with LDG layers. To convert LDGE structures to radar absorbing structures controlled quantities of milled carbon fibers were impregnated as these conducting milled carbon fibers can act as dielectric lossy materials which could absorb the incident microwave energy by interfacial polarisation. Electromagnetic properties namely loss tangent and reflection loss of carbon fiber impregnated LDGE composites were evaluated in 8 GHz -12 GHz frequency region and compared with HDGE composites. It was observed that both LDGE and HDGE composites have shown loss tangent values more than 1.1 and minimum 80 per cent absorption of incident microwave energy. Thus the results indicates that, LDGE composites can show EM properties on par with HDGE composites. Furthermore these LDGE composite could successfully withstand the low velocity impacts (4.5 m/s) with 50 J incident energy. Due to their ability to show good mechanical properties and light weight, LDGE composites can be used as a replacement for conventional HDGE composites to realise radar absorbing structures

Effect of argon ion energy on the performance of silicon nitridemultilayer permeation barriers grown by hot-wire CVD on polymers

One of the authors (S.M.) acknowledges Direction des Relations Extérieures of Ecole Polytechnique for financial support.Permeation barriers for organic electronic devices on polymer flexible substrates were realized by combining stacked silicon nitride (SiNx) single layers (50 nm thick) deposited by hot-wire chemical vapor deposition process at low-temperature (~100°C) with a specific argon plasma treatment between two successive layers. Several plasma parameters (RF power density, pressure, treatment duration) as well as the number of single layers have been explored in order to improve the quality of permeation barriers deposited on polyethylene terephthalate. In this work, maximumion energy was highlighted as the crucial parameter making it possible to minimize water vapor transmission rate (WVTR), as determined by the electrical calcium test method, all the other parameters being kept fixed. Thus fixing the plasma treatment duration at 8 min for a stack of two SiNx single layers, a minimum WVTR of 5 × 10−4 g/(m2 day), measured at room temperature, was found for a maximum ion energy of ~30 eV. This minimum WVTR value was reduced to 7 × 10−5 g/(m2 day) for a stack of five SiNx single layers. The reduction in the permeability is interpreted as due to the rearrangement of atoms at the interfaces when average transferred ion energy to target atoms exceeds threshold displacement energy.The authors are grateful to Dr. R. Cortes (PMC, Ecole Polytechnique) for XRR analysis, to Dr. P. Chapon (HORIBA Jobin Yvon) for GD-OES analysis and Dr. J. Leroy (CEA Saclay) for XPS analysis. This work was partly supported by the PICS (FrenchPortuguese) project No. 5336. One of the authors (S.M.) acknowledges Direction des Relations Extérieures of Ecole Polytechnique for financial support

Influence of low energy argon plasma treatment on the moisture barrier performance of hot wire-CVD grown SiNx multilayers

The reliability and stability are key issues for the commercial utilization of organic photovoltaic devices based on flexible polymer substrates. To increase the shelf-lifetime of these devices, transparent moisture barriers of silicon nitride (SiNx) films are deposited at low temperature by hot wire CVD (HW-CVD) process. Instead of the conventional route based on organic/inorganic hybrid structures, this work defines a new route consisting in depositing multilayer stacks of SiNx thin films, each single layer being treated by argon plasma. The plasma treatment allows creating smoother surface and surface atom rearrangement. We define a critical thickness of the single layer film and focus our attention on the effect of increasing the number of SiNx single-layers on the barrier properties. A water vapor transmission rate (WVTR) of 2 x 10-4 g/(m2 day) is reported for SiNx multilayer stack and a physical interpretation of the plasma treatment effect is given.Direction des Relations Extérieures, Ecole PolytechniquePICS (French–Portuguese No. 5336) projec

Flexible organic–inorganic hybrid layer encapsulation for organic opto-electronic devices

In this work we produce and study the flexible organic–inorganic hybrid moisture barrier layers for the protection of air sensitive organic opto-electronic devices. The inorganic amorphous silicon nitride layer (SiNx:H) and the organic PMMA [poly (methyl methacrylate)] layer are deposited alternatingly by using hot wire chemical vapor deposition (HW-CVD) and spin-coating techniques, respectively. The effect of organic–inorganic hybrid interfaces is analyzed for increasing number of interfaces. We produce highly transparent (∼80% in the visible region) hybrid structures. The morphological properties are analysed providing a good basis for understanding the variation of the water vapor transmission rate (WVTR) values. A minimum WVTR of 4.5 × 10−5g/m2day is reported at the ambient atmospheric conditions for 7 organic/inorganic interfaces. The hybrid barriers show superb mechanical flexibility which confirms their high potential for flexible applications.The authors would like to thank Dr. J.C. Vanel for help in electrical characterizations used in this study. The first author (S.M) acknowledges the financial support from Direction des Relations Extérieures, Ecole Polytechnique during his thesis

The effect of argon plasma treatment on the permeation barrier properties of silicon nitride layers

In this work we produce and study silicon nitride (SiNx) thin films deposited by Hot Wire Chemical Vapor Depo- sition (HW-CVD) to be used as encapsulation barriers for flexible organic photovoltaic cells fabricated on poly- ethylene terephthalate (PET) substrates in order to increase their shelf lifetime. We report on the results of SiNx double-layers and on the equivalent double-layer stack where an Ar-plasma surface treatment was performed on the first SiNx layer. The Ar-plasma treatment may under certain conditions influences the structure of the interface between the two subsequent layers and thus the barrier properties of the whole system. We focus our attention on the effect of plasma treatment time on the final barrier properties. We assess the encapsulation barrier properties of these layers, using the calcium degradation test where changes in the electrical conductance of encapsulated Ca sensors are monitored with time. The water vapor transmission rate (WVTR) is found to be ~3 × 10−3 g/m2·day for stacked SiNx double-layer with 8 min Ar plasma surface treatment.FCT - CNRS PICS (French–Portuguese no: 5336) projectDirection des Relations Extérieures, Ecole Polytechniqu

Differentially expressed seed aging responsive heat shock protein OsHSP18.2 implicates in seed vigor, longevity and improves germination and seedling establishment under abiotic stress

Small heat shock proteins (sHSP) are a diverse group of proteins and are highly abundant in plant species. Although majority of these sHSPs were shown to express specifically in seed, their potential function in seed physiology remains to be fully explored. Our proteomic analysis revealed that OsHSP18.2, a class II cytosolic HSP is an aging responsive protein as its abundance significantly increased after artificial aging in rice seeds. OsHSP18.2 transcript was found to markedly increase at the late maturation stage being highly abundant in dry seeds and sharply decreased after germination. Our biochemical study clearly demonstrated that OsHSP18.2 forms homooligomeric complex and is dodecameric in nature and functions as a molecular chaperon. OsHSP18.2 displayed chaperone activity as it was effective in preventing thermal inactivation of Citrate Synthase. Further, to analyze the function of this protein in seed physiology, seed specific Arabidopsis overexpression lines for OsHSP18.2 were generated. Our subsequent functional analysis clearly demonstrated that OsHSP18.2 has ability to improve seed vigor and longevity by reducing deleterious ROS accumulation in seeds. In addition, transformed Arabidopsis seeds displayed better performance in germination and cotyledon emergence under adverse conditions as well. Collectively, our work demonstrates that OsHSP18.2 is an aging responsive protein which functions as a molecular chaperon and possibly protect and stabilize the cellular proteins from irreversible damage particularly during maturation drying, desiccation and aging in seeds by restricting ROS accumulation and thereby improves seed vigor, longevity and seedling establishment

LHC and lepton flavour violation phenomenology of a left-right extension of the MSSM

We study the phenomenology of a supersymmetric left-right model, assuming minimal supergravity boundary conditions. Both left-right and (B-L) symmetries are broken at an energy scale close to, but significantly below the GUT scale. Neutrino data is explained via a seesaw mechanism. We calculate the RGEs for superpotential and soft parameters complete at 2-loop order. At low energies lepton flavour violation (LFV) and small, but potentially measurable mass splittings in the charged scalar lepton sector appear, due to the RGE running. Different from the supersymmetric 'pure seesaw' models, both, LFV and slepton mass splittings, occur not only in the left- but also in the right slepton sector. Especially, ratios of LFV slepton decays, such as Br(${\tilde\tau}_R \to \mu \chi^0_1$)/Br(${\tilde\tau}_L \to \mu \chi^0_1$) are sensitive to the ratio of (B-L) and left-right symmetry breaking scales. Also the model predicts a polarization asymmetry of the outgoing positrons in the decay $\mu^+ \to e^+ \gamma$, A ~ [0,1], which differs from the pure seesaw 'prediction' A=1$. Observation of any of these signals allows to distinguish this model from any of the three standard, pure (mSugra) seesaw setups.Comment: 43 pages, 17 figure

Unsymmetrically Functionalized 5,5″-diaryl-and 5,6,5″-triaryl-2,2′:6′,2″-terpyridines: An Efficient Synthetic Route and Photophysical Properties

An efficient approach for the synthesis of 5,5″-or 5,6,5″-aryl substituted 2,2′:6′,2″-terpyridines, bearing an anneleted cyclopentene unit in one of the side-chain pyridine rings for the improved solubility in organic solvents, via their 1,2,4-triazine analogues has been developed. By using this approach, various aromatic substituents were introduced in the 2,2′:6′,2″-terpyridine core. Depending on the nature of the aromatic substituents, the obtained terpyridines exhibited an intense emission in a range of ca. 344-394 nm in acetonitrile solutions. For the most representative compounds, pronounced bathochromic shifts in both absorption and emission spectra were observed compared with previously reported substituted terpyridines. © 2017 Published by NRC Research Press.This work was supported by the Russian Science Foundation (grant No. 15-13-10033), as well as the Council for grants of the President of the Russian Federation (to D.S. Kopchuk; grant No. MK-644.2017.3)