Outbreak of gastroenteritis caused by Yersinia pestis in Afghanistan.

Plague, which is most often caused by the bite of Yersinia pestis-infected fleas, is a rapidly progressing, serious disease that can be fatal without prompt antibiotic treatment. In late December 2007, an outbreak of acute gastroenteritis occurred in Nimroz Province of southern Afghanistan. Of the 83 probable cases of illness, 17 died (case fatality 20·5%). Being a case was associated with consumption or handling of camel meat (adjusted odds ratio 4·4, 95% confidence interval 2·2-8·8, P<0·001). Molecular testing of patient clinical samples and of tissue from the camel using PCR/electrospray ionization-mass spectrometry revealed DNA signatures consistent with Yersinia pestis. Confirmatory testing using real-time PCR and immunological seroconversion of one of the patients confirmed that the outbreak was caused by plague, with a rare gastrointestinal presentation. The study highlights the challenges of identifying infectious agents in low-resource settings; it is the first reported occurrence of plague in Afghanistan

Microstructural Evolutions and Mechanical Properties of Drawn Medium Carbon Steel Wire

International audienceThis study focuses on the evolution in the microstructure, texture and mechanical properties of medium carbon steel wires obtained by wire drawing at Tréfissoud Company for the manufacturing of the spring mattress. Wire drawing induces elongation of grains in the direction of drawing with the development of the fibre texture parallel to the wire axis. Kinking and bending of cementite lamellae were observed during the drawing process. The work was carried out respectively on three states, wire rod and drawn states for two different amounts (ε %=43,6 and 60 %), using the optical and SEM microscopy, electron backscatter diffraction and X-ray diffraction analysis for examination of the microstructure and texture evolution, the hardness Vickers and tensile test to follow the curing of the studied wires

Ʌ - φ generalized synchronization: application to fractional hyperchaotic systems with arbitrary dimensions and orders

This paper investigates the Ʌ − φ generalized synchronization between non-identical fractionalorder systems characterized by different dimensions and different orders. The Ʌ − φ generalized synchronization combines the inverse matrix projective synchronization with the generalized synchronization. In particular, the proposed approach enables Ʌ − φ generalized synchronization to be achieved between n-dimensional master system and m-dimensional slave system in different dimensions. The technique, which exploits nonlinear controllers, stability property of integer-order linear systems and Lyapunov stability theory, proves to be effective in achieving the Ʌ − φ generalized synchronization. Finally, the approach is applied between 4-D and 5-D fractional hyperchaotic systems with the aim to illustrate the capabilities of the novel scheme proposed herein

Study of Mechanical Properties and Precipitation Reactions in Low Copper Containing Al-Mg-Si Alloy

The scope of this work is to investigate the precipitation of two Al-Mg-Si alloys with and without Cu and excess Si by using the differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), transmission electron microscopic (TEM), Vickers hardness measurement and X-ray diffraction. The analysis of the DSC curves found that the excess Si accelerate the precipitation and the alloy contain the excess Si and small addition of copper has higher aging-hardness than that of free alloy (without excess Si and Cu) at the same heat treatment condition. The sufficient holding time for the precipitation of the β'' phase was estimated to be 6 hours for the alloy aged at 100°C and 10 hours for the alloy aged at 180°C. The low Copper containing Al-Mg-Si alloy gives rise to the forming a finer distribution of β (Mg2Si) precipitates which increases the hardness of the alloy. In order to know more about the precipitation reactions, concern the peaks on the DSC curve transmission electron microscopy observation were made on samples annealed at temperatures (250°C, 290°C and 400°C) just above the corresponding peaks of the three phases β'', β' and β respectively

Introducing a comprehensive physics-based modelling framework for tandem and other PV systems

We introduce a novel simulation tool capable of calculating the energy yield of a PV system based on its fundamental material properties and using self-consistent models. Thus, our simulation model can operate without measurements of a PV device. It combines wave and ray optics and a dedicated semiconductor simulation to model the optoelectronic PV device properties resulting in the IV-curve. The system surroundings are described via spectrally resolved ray tracing resulting in a cell resolved irradiance distribution, and via the fluid dynamics-based thermal model, in the individual cell temperatures. A lumped-element model is used to calculate the IV-curves of each solar cell for every hour of the year. These are combined factoring in the interconnection to obtain the PV module IV-curves, which connect to the inverter for calculating the AC energy yield. In our case study, we compare two types of 2 terminal perovskite/silicon tandem modules with STC PV module efficiencies of 27.7% and 28.6% with a reference c-Si module with STC PV module efficiency of 20.9%. In four different climates, we show that tandem PV modules operate at 1–1.9 °C lower yearly irradiance weighted average temperatures compared to c-Si. We find that the effect of current mismatch is significantly overestimated in pure optical studies, as they do not account for fill factor gains. The specific yields in kWh/kWp of the tandem PV systems are between −2.7% and +0.4% compared to the reference c-Si system in all four simulated climates. Thus, we find that the lab performance of the simulated tandem PV system translates from the laboratory to outdoors comparable to c-Si systems.Photovoltaic Materials and DevicesEnergy & IndustryElectrical Sustainable Energ