Refinement of primary Si in hypereutectic Al-Si alloys by intensive melt shearing

Hypereutectic Al-Si based alloys are gaining popularity for applications where a combination of light weight and high wear resistance is required. The high wear resistance arising from the hard primary Si particles comes at the price of extremely poor machine tool life. To minimize machining problems while exploiting outstanding wear resistance, the primary Si particles must be controlled to a uniform small size and uniform spatial distribution. The current industrial means of refining primary Si chemically by the addition of phosphorous suffers from a number of problems. In the present paper an alternative, physical means of refining primary Si by intensive shearing of the melt prior to casting is investigated. Al-15wt%Si alloy has been solidified under varying casting conditions (cooling rate) and the resulting microstructures have been studied using microscopy and quantitative image analysis. Primary Si particles were finer, more compact in shape and more numerous with increasing cooling rate. Intensive melt shearing led to greater refinement and more enhanced nucleation of primary Si than was achieved by adding phosphorous. The mechanism of enhanced nucleation is discussed.EPSRC (grant EP/H026177/1)

L(d,2,1)-Labeling of Star and Sun Graphs

For positive integer d, L(d,2,1)-labeling of a graph G is a function f from V(G) to the positive integers, f: V(G) {1, 2,…} such that |f(u) – f(v)| ≥ d if the distance between any 2 vertices u and v is 1 (D(u,v) =1), |f(u) – f(v)| ≥ 2 if D(u,v) = 2, and |f(u) – f(v)| ≥ 1 if D(u,v) = 3. The L(d,2,1)-labeling number kd(G) of a graph G is the smallest positive integer kd such that G has an L(d,2,1)-labeling with kd as the maximum label. This paper presents a general kd-value of stars K1,n and kd-value of sun graphs Sn for d = 3. Keywords: L(d,2,1)-Labeling, distance, L(d,2,1)-Labeling number, sun graphs, stars

The Price of Anarchy in Transportation Networks: Efficiency and Optimality Control

Uncoordinated individuals in human society pursuing their personally optimal strategies do not always achieve the social optimum, the most beneficial state to the society as a whole. Instead, strategies form Nash equilibria which are often socially suboptimal. Society, therefore, has to pay a price of anarchy for the lack of coordination among its members. Here we assess this price of anarchy by analyzing the travel times in road networks of several major cities. Our simulation shows that uncoordinated drivers possibly waste a considerable amount of their travel time. Counterintuitively,simply blocking certain streets can partially improve the traffic conditions. We analyze various complex networks and discuss the possibility of similar paradoxes in physics.Comment: major revisions with multicommodity; Phys. Rev. Lett., accepte

Biorefinery process for protein extraction from oriental mustard (Brassica juncea (L.) Czern.) using ethanol stillage

Large volumes of treated process water are required for protein extraction. Evaporation of this water contributes greatly to the energy consumed in enriching protein products. Thin stillage remaining from ethanol production is available in large volumes and may be suitable for extracting protein rich materials. In this work protein was extracted from ground defatted oriental mustard (Brassica juncea (L.) Czern.) meal using thin stillage. Protein extraction efficiency was studied at pHs between 7.6 and 10.4 and salt concentrations between 3.4 × 10-2 and 1.2 M. The optimum extraction efficiency was pH 10.0 and 1.0 M NaCl. Napin and cruciferin were the most prevalent proteins in the isolate. The isolate exhibited high in vitro digestibility (74.9 ± 0.80%) and lysine content (5.2 ± 0.2 g/100 g of protein). No differences in the efficiency of extraction, SDS-PAGE profile, digestibility, lysine availability, or amino acid composition were observed between protein extracted with thin stillage and that extracted with NaCl solution. The use of thin stillage, in lieu of water, for protein extraction would decrease the energy requirements and waste disposal costs of the protein isolation and biofuel production processes

Criterion for transformation of transverse domain wall to vortex or antivortex wall in soft magnetic thin-film nanostripes

We report on the criterion for the dynamic transformation of the internal structure of moving domain walls (DWs) in soft magnetic thin-film nanostripes above the Walker threshold field, Hw. In order for the process of transformation from transverse wall (TW) to vortex wall (VW) or antivortex wall (AVW) occurs, the edge-soliton core of the TW-type DW should grow sufficiently to the full width at half maximum of the out-of-plane magnetizations of the core area of the stabilized vortex (or antivortex) by moving inward along the transverse (width) direction. Upon completion of the nucleation of the vortex (antivortex) core, the VW (AVW) is stabilized, and then its core accompanies the gyrotropic motion in a potential well (hill) of a given nanostripe. Field strengths exceeding the Hw, which is the onset field of DW velocity breakdown, are not sufficient but necessary conditions for dynamic DW transformation

Preroughening, Diffusion, and Growth of An FCC(111) Surface

Preroughening of close-packed fcc(111) surfaces, found in rare gas solids, is an interesting, but poorly characterized phase transition. We introduce a restricted solid-on-solid model, named FCSOS, which describes it. Using mostly Monte Carlo, we study both statics, including critical behavior and scattering properties, and dynamics, including surface diffusion and growth. In antiphase scattering, it is shown that preroughening will generally show up at most as a dip. Surface growth is predicted to be continuous at preroughening, where surface self-diffusion should also drop. The physical mechanism leading to preroughening on rare gas surfaces is analysed, and identified in the step-step elastic repulsion.Comment: Revtex + uuencoded figures, to appear in Physical Review Letter

Motion management within two respiratory-gating windows: feasibility study of dual quasi-breath-hold technique in gated medical procedures.

A dual quasi-breath-hold (DQBH) technique is proposed for respiratory motion management (a hybrid technique combining breathing-guidance with breath-hold task in the middle). The aim of this study is to test a hypothesis that the DQBH biofeedback system improves both the capability of motion management and delivery efficiency. Fifteen healthy human subjects were recruited for two respiratory motion measurements (free breathing and DQBH biofeedback breathing for 15 min). In this study, the DQBH biofeedback system utilized the abdominal position obtained using an real-time position management (RPM) system (Varian Medical Systems, Palo Alto, USA) to audio-visually guide a human subject for 4 s breath-hold at EOI and 90% EOE (EOE90%) to improve delivery efficiency. We investigated the residual respiratory motion and the delivery efficiency (duty-cycle) of abdominal displacement within the gating window. The improvement of the abdominal motion reproducibility was evaluated in terms of cycle-to-cycle displacement variability, respiratory period and baseline drift. The DQBH biofeedback system improved the abdominal motion management capability compared to that with free breathing. With a phase based gating (mean ± std: 55  ±  5%), the averaged root mean square error (RMSE) of the abdominal displacement in the dual-gating windows decreased from 2.26 mm of free breathing to 1.16 mm of DQBH biofeedback (p-value = 0.007). The averaged RMSE of abdominal displacement over the entire respiratory cycles reduced from 2.23 mm of free breathing to 1.39 mm of DQBH biofeedback breathing in the dual-gating windows (p-value = 0.028). The averaged baseline drift dropped from 0.9 mm min(-1) with free breathing to 0.09 mm min(-1) with DQBH biofeedback (p-value = 0.048). The averaged duty-cycle with an 1 mm width of displacement bound increased from 15% of free breathing to 26% of DQBH biofeedback (p-value = 0.003). The study demonstrated that the DQBH biofeedback system has the potential to significantly reduce the residual respiratory motion with the improved duty cycle during the respiratory gating procedure