Application of Replacement Theory in Determination of Pavement Design Life

This paper presents a methodology to determine the economic life of pavement based replacement theory/decision. The replacement theory is generally used for the determination of the replacement period of machines, bulbs, vehicles, equipment, buildings, T.V. parts… etc. This theory has been used to determine the economic life pavement for a road project and a bridge project with a real case study. The economic life has been found out. The economic life of flexible pavement has been found to be 15 years for national highways. This theory can be also applied to determine the economic life of new developed items/useful materials for highway projects

Determination of Optimal Block Designs With Pre-assigned Variance For Elementary Contrasts

A method for obtaining optimal designs from the class of variance balanced and connected designs was developed for comparing treatment effects with a pre-assigned variance. The properties of the C-matrix of a block design are employed in developing this method. Some new results concerning the design parameters and the non-zero characteristic root of the C-matrix are also presented

Cloud-native databases : an application perspective

As cloud computing technologies evolve to better support hosted software applications, software development businesses are faced with a multitude of options to migrate to the cloud. A key concern is the management of data. Research on cloud-native applications has guided the construction of highly elastically scalable and resilient stateless applications, while there is no corresponding concept for cloud-native databases yet. In particular, it is not clear what the trade-offs between using self-managed database services as part of the application and provider-managed database services are. We contribute an overview about the available options, a testbed to compare the options in a systematic way, and an analysis of selected benchmark results produced during the cloud migration of a commercial document management application

Effectiveness of Solvent Vapor Annealing over Thermal Annealing on the Photovoltaic Performance of Non-Fullerene Acceptor Based BHJ Solar Cells

We explore two small molecules containing arms of dicyano-n-hexylrhodanine and diathiafulvalene wings terminated with benzothiadiazole linker, denoted as BAF-4CN and BAF-2HDT, respectively, as small molecule non-fullerene acceptors (SMNFAs) in organic solar cells. The proposed materials are mixed with a low band gap polymer donor PTB7-Th having broad absorption in the range of 400–750 nm to form solution-processed bulk heterojunctions (BHJs). The photoluminescence (PL) measurements show that both donor and acceptor can quench each other’s PL effectively, implying that not only electrons are transferred from PTB7-Th → SMNFAs but also holes are transferred from SMNFAs → PTB7-Th for efficient photocurrent generation. Furthermore, solvent vapor annealing (SVA) processing is shown to yield a more balanced hole and electron mobility and thus suppresses the trap-assisted recombination significantly. With this dual charge transfer enabled via fine-tuning of end-groups and SVA treatment, power conversion efficiency of approximately 10% is achieved, demonstrating the feasibility of the proposed approach

Molecular association of glucose-6- phosphate isomerase and pyruvate kinase M2 with glyceraldehyde-3-phosphate dehydrogenase in cancer cells

Background: For a long time cancer cells are known for increased uptake of glucose and its metabolization through glycolysis. Glyceraldehyde-3-phosphate dehydrogenase (GAPDH) is a key regulatory enzyme of this pathway and can produce ATP through oxidative level of phosphorylation. Previously, we reported that GAPDH purified from a variety of malignant tissues, but not from normal tissues, was strongly inactivated by a normal metabolite, methylglyoxal (MG).Molecular mechanism behind MG mediated GAPDH inhibition in cancer cells is not well understood. Methods: GAPDH was purified from Ehrlich ascites carcinoma (EAC) cells based on its enzymatic activity. GAPDH associated proteins in EAC cells and 3-methylcholanthrene (3MC) induced mouse tumor tissue were detected by mass spectrometry analysis and immunoprecipitation (IP) experiment, respectively. Interacting domains of GAPDH and its associated proteins were assessed by in silico molecular docking analysis. Mechanism of MG mediated GAPDH inactivation in cancer cells was evaluated by measuring enzyme activity, Circular dichroism (CD) spectroscopy, IP and mass spectrometry analyses. Result: Here, we report that GAPDH is associated with glucose-6-phosphate isomerase (GPI) and pyruvate kinase M2 (PKM2) in Ehrlich ascites carcinoma (EAC) cells and also in 3-methylcholanthrene (3MC) induced mouse tumor tissue. Molecular docking analyses suggest C-terminal domain preference for the interaction between GAPDH and GPI. However, both C and N termini of PKM2 might be interacting with the C terminal domain of GAPDH. Expression of both PKM2 and GPI is increased in 3MC induced tumor compared with the normal tissue. In presence of 1 mM MG,association of GAPDH with PKM2 or GPI is not perturbed, but the enzymatic activity of GAPDH is reduced to 26.8 ± 5 % in 3MC induced tumor and 57.8 ± 2.3 % in EAC cells. Treatment of MG to purified GAPDH complex leads to glycation at R399 residue of PKM2 only, and changes the secondary structure of the protein complex. Conclusion: PKM2 may regulate the enzymatic activity of GAPDH. Increased enzymatic activity of GAPDH in tumor cells may be attributed to its association with PKM2 and GPI. Association of GAPDH with PKM2 and GPI could be a signature for cancer cells. Glycation at R399 of PKM2 and changes in the secondary structure of GAPDH complex could be one of the mechanisms by which GAPDH activity is inhibited in tumor cells by MG

Ultralight vector dark matter search using data from the KAGRA O3GK run

Among the various candidates for dark matter (DM), ultralight vector DM can be probed by laser interferometric gravitational wave detectors through the measurement of oscillating length changes in the arm cavities. In this context, KAGRA has a unique feature due to differing compositions of its mirrors, enhancing the signal of vector DM in the length change in the auxiliary channels. Here we present the result of a search for U(1)B−L gauge boson DM using the KAGRA data from auxiliary length channels during the first joint observation run together with GEO600. By applying our search pipeline, which takes into account the stochastic nature of ultralight DM, upper bounds on the coupling strength between the U(1)B−L gauge boson and ordinary matter are obtained for a range of DM masses. While our constraints are less stringent than those derived from previous experiments, this study demonstrates the applicability of our method to the lower-mass vector DM search, which is made difficult in this measurement by the short observation time compared to the auto-correlation time scale of DM

Identifying Postural Instability in Children with Cerebral Palsy Using a Predictive Model: A Longitudinal Multicenter Study

Insufficient postural control and trunk instability are serious concerns in children with cerebral palsy (CP). We implemented a predictive model to identify factors associated with postural impairments such as spastic or hypotonic truncal tone (TT) in children with CP. We conducted a longitudinal, double-blinded, multicenter, descriptive study of 102 teenagers with CP with cognitive impairment and severe motor disorders with and without truncal tone impairments treated in two specialized hospitals (60 inpatients and 42 outpatients; 60 males, mean age 16.5 ± 1.2 years, range 12 to 18 yrs). Clinical and functional data were collected between 2006 and 2021. TT-PredictMed, a multiple logistic regression prediction model, was developed to identify factors associated with hypotonic or spastic TT following the guidelines of “Transparent Reporting of a multivariable prediction model for Individual Prognosis or Diagnosis”. Predictors of hypotonic TT were hip dysplasia (p = 0.01), type of etiology (postnatal > perinatal > prenatal causes; p = 0.05), male gender, and poor manual (p = 0.01) and gross motor function (p = 0.05). Predictors of spastic TT were neuromuscular scoliosis (p = 0.03), type of etiology (prenatal > perinatal > postnatal causes; p diplegia > hemiplegia; p = 0.05), presence of dystonia (p = 0.001), and epilepsy (refractory > controlled, p = 0.009). The predictive model’s average accuracy, sensitivity, and specificity reached 82%. The model’s accuracy aligns with recent studies on applying machine learning models in the clinical field

Creep Behavior of As-Cast Mg-10 wt.%Sn and Mg-10 wt.%Sn-3 wt.%Al-1 wt.%Zn Alloys: A Comparative Study

The present investigation highlights the creep deformation and rupture behavior of indigenously produced as-cast Mg-10 wt.%Sn-3 wt.%Al-1 wt.%Zn (TAZ1031) and Mg-10 wt.%Sn (T10) alloys. Conventional creep tests were conducted at 423 K (150 degrees C) in the stress range of 30-45 MPa and at 45 MPa in the temperature range of 423-453 K (150-180 degrees C) for both the alloys. The nature of creep curves was found to be identical for both the alloys with short primary and secondary creep regime, followed by extended tertiary creep region. The creep resistance of the TAZ1031 alloy was better than the T10 alloy. The former exhibited reduced minimum creep rate and enhanced creep rupture life under identical creep test conditions with respect to the latter. The change of minimum creep rate (epsilon(min)) followed a power-law relationship with a change in applied stress (sigma) for both the alloys with a significant change in stress exponent (n) value. Activation energy for creep deformation of TAZ1031 alloy (similar to 117 kJ/mol) was found to be higher than T10 alloy (similar to 105 kJ/mol). Fine secondary Mg2Sn precipitates within the alpha-Mg matrix and primary Mg2Sn, Mg17Al12 and MgZn2 precipitates along the grain boundaries improved the creep properties of TAZ1031 alloy. On the contrary, the threshold stress required for creep deformation was found to be significantly low in TAZ1031 alloy due to the presence of Mg17Al12. Both creep damage analysis and dimpled fracture surfaces revealed necking dominated creep deformation for the alloys. SEM studies revealed the absence of creep cavities along grain/dendritic boundaries for the investigated alloys, which substantiated the formation of dimpled fracture surfaces during creep deformation

Modeling and Measurements of Intermixing Time in a Water Model of a Four Strand Steelmaking Tundish System

Abstract Intermixing of two different grades of steel in a 17 tonne, 4 strand bloom casting has been investigated in a *0.3 scale, geometrically and dynamically similar, isothermal water model tundish system. In this, intermixing phenomena were studied by simulating mixing of flowing water in the tundish, having different dissolved tracer (electrolyte) concentrations. Electrical conductivity measurement technique was employed to monitor concentration of dissolved electrolyte near the strands as a function of time and thereby determine intermixing time. For each experimental condition, three measurements were made and based on such an average intermixing timewas estimated. Reproducibility was found to be always within±15 %. Influence of key operating variables such as, inflow rate fromladle, net outflow rate from tundish, residual liquid volume left over from the previous grade etc. on the duration over which intermixing occurs (referred to as in the text as the intermixing time) was investigated. It was found that any increase in residual volume as well as inflow rate tends to prolong intermixing time.In contrast, influence of outflow rate was quite the opposite. Furthermore, while variation of intermixing time amon