Separating arsenic oxyanions from natural waters for oxygen isotope analysis

Diese Studie hat ein vollständiges Verfahren für die Messung der Sauerstoff-Isotope in Arsen-Oxianionen in natürlichen Wässern durch den Einsatz verschiedener Adsorbentien entwickelt. Experimente zum kinetischen Austausch von Sauerstoff zwischen AsO43- und Wasser haben gezeigt, dass sich das Gleichgewicht bei verschiedenen pH-Bedingungen und Temperaturen in sehr kurzer Zeit einstellt

Separating arsenic oxyanions from natural waters for oxygen isotope analysis

This study has developed a complete procedure for the measurement of oxygen isotopes in arsenic oxyanions in natural waters by using different adsorbents. The experimental results of kinetic exchange of oxygen between AsO43- and water show that the entire exchange procedure happens in a very short time at different pH conditions and temperatures

Modeling Emotion Influence from Images in Social Networks

Images become an important and prevalent way to express users' activities, opinions and emotions. In a social network, individual emotions may be influenced by others, in particular by close friends. We focus on understanding how users embed emotions into the images they uploaded to the social websites and how social influence plays a role in changing users' emotions. We first verify the existence of emotion influence in the image networks, and then propose a probabilistic factor graph based emotion influence model to answer the questions of "who influences whom". Employing a real network from Flickr as experimental data, we study the effectiveness of factors in the proposed model with in-depth data analysis. Our experiments also show that our model, by incorporating the emotion influence, can significantly improve the accuracy (+5%) for predicting emotions from images. Finally, a case study is used as the anecdotal evidence to further demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed model

Process Optimization and Downscaling of a Single Electron Single Dot Memory

This paper presents the process optimization of a single-electron nanoflash electron memory. Self-aligned single dot memory structures have been fabricated using a wet anisotropic oxidation of a silicon nanowire. One of the main issue was to clarify the process conditions for the dot formation. Based on the process modeling, the influence of various parameters (oxidation temperature, nanowire shape) has been investigated. The necessity of a sharp compromise between these different parameters to ensure the presence of the memory dot has been established. In order to propose an aggressive memory cell, the downscaling of the device has been carefully studied. Scaling rules show that the size of the original device could be reduced by a factor of 2. This point has been previously confirmed by the realization of single-electron memory devices

Fabrication of advanced electrochemical capacitors with higher energy density

Much effort has been put into improving the performance of the electrochemical capacitors (which can also be named as supercapacitors) due to their higher power density than that of batteries and higher energy density than that of conventional capacitors, respectively. Besides, it has been discovered that, in supercapacitors, there are about three types of electrode materials (including EDLC electrode, battery-type electrode and pseudocapacitive electrode) according to their different energy storage mechanisms and, with the combinations of different electrode materials, about three types of supercapacitors can be categorized, such as electric double layer capacitor (made of two EDLC electrode), asymmetric supercapacitor (fabricated by one pseudocapacitive electrode and one EDLC electrode or another different pseudocapacitive electrode) and hybrid supercapacitor (built by one battery-type electrode and one EDLC electrode or one pseudocapacitive electrode). In this dissertation, the energy storage mechanisms of these electrode materials are reviewed and the corresponding kinetic analysis based on cyclic voltammetry curves are discussed. Moreover, for the purpose of achieving better overall performance than that of batteries so that the supercapacitors cannot only be used in long term energy storage but also in rapid charge/discharge power supply, it is still necessary to develop supercapacitors possessing higher energy density without sacrificing their power density. Therefore, the four projects presented in this dissertation are the investigations of our group towards this ultimate goal

Social health assistance schemes: the case of Medical Financial Assistance for the rural poor in four counties of China

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Economic transition which took place in China over the last three decades, has led to a rapid marketization of the health care sector. Today inequity in health and poverty resulting from major illness has become a serious problem in rural areas of China. Medical Financial Assistance (MFA) is a health assistance scheme that helps rural poor people cope with major illness and alleviate their financial burden from major illness, which will definitely play a significant role in the process of rebuilding Chinese new rural health system. It mainly provides assistance to cover medical expenditure for inpatient services or the treatment of major illnesses, with joint funding from the central and local government. The purpose of this paper is to review the design, funding, implementation and to explore the preliminary effects of four counties' MFA in Hubei and Sichuan province of China.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>We used an analytical framework built around the main objective of any social assistance scheme. The framework contains six 'targeting' procedural 'steps' which may explain why a specific group does not receive the assistance it ought to receive. More specifically, we explored to what extent the targeting, a key component of social assistance programs, is successful, based on the qualitative and quantitative data collected from four representative counties in central and western China.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>In the study sites, the budget of MFA ranged from 0.8 million Yuan to 1.646 million Yuan in each county and the budget per eligible person ranged from 32.67 Yuan to 149.09 Yuan. The preliminary effects of MFA were quite modest because of the scarcity of funds dedicated to the scheme. The coverage rate of MFA ranged from 17.8% to 24.1% among the four counties. MFA in the four counties used several ways to ration a restricted budget and provided only limited assistance. Substantial problems remained in terms of eligibility and identification of the beneficiaries, utilization and management of funds.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>MFA needs to be improved further although it evidences the concern of the government for the poor rural people with major illness. Some ideas on how to improve MFA are put forward for future policy making.</p

Interference model of conical pick in cutting process

The load on conical pick is affected by many factors such as pick geometry and installation angle. In order to decrease the wear and vibration of pick in the cutting process by choosing proper impact angle, the interference mathematical models of straight and revolving cutting were established according to coal cutting theory. Based on this, coal cutting experiment was carried out with different impact angles β, different head face radii of pick body R and different cutting depths d to verify the mathematical model. The results indicate that the picks cutting into coal with a certain installed angle are prone to interfere with coal in the cutting progress. There is a crsitical impact angle, and it is different under different cutting conditions. The critical impact angle decreases with the head face radius of pick body R and cutting depth d. On the condition of given pick geometry and movement parameters, the cutting force of picks or cutting torque of cutting header decreases with the impact angle. When the impact angle of the pick is larger than the critical angle, the load on pick will increase prominently