Capas finas de ZrO2 para mejorar la resistencia química de los vidriados mates de calcio

La resistencia al ataque químico de vidriados cerámicos susceptibles al mismo, concretamente formulados a partir de una frita mate de calcio, se ha mejorado depositando en la superficie una capa delgada de óxido de circonio. Un sol de circonio estabilizado es el precursor de la capa, el cual se deposita mediante aerografía sobre el vidriado cocido y con un tratamiento térmico suave (Tmax ≈ 400 ºC), es transformado en ZrO2 y anclado a la superficie. Los ensayos de resistencia química demuestran que el vidriado protegido no sufre un ataque apreciable visualmente por parte del ácido clorhídrico concentrado, condiciones en las que el mismo vidriado sin el recubrimiento resulta gravemente dañado. El precursor utilizado genera una capa de óxido de circonio que protege el vidriado subyacente, de modo que el ataque químico por parte del ácido clorhídrico queda confinado al entorno de las grietas y discontinuidades de la capa depositadaPeer reviewe

A Multi-signal Variant for the GPU-based Parallelization of Growing Self-Organizing Networks

Among the many possible approaches for the parallelization of self-organizing networks, and in particular of growing self-organizing networks, perhaps the most common one is producing an optimized, parallel implementation of the standard sequential algorithms reported in the literature. In this paper we explore an alternative approach, based on a new algorithm variant specifically designed to match the features of the large-scale, fine-grained parallelism of GPUs, in which multiple input signals are processed at once. Comparative tests have been performed, using both parallel and sequential implementations of the new algorithm variant, in particular for a growing self-organizing network that reconstructs surfaces from point clouds. The experimental results show that this approach allows harnessing in a more effective way the intrinsic parallelism that the self-organizing networks algorithms seem intuitively to suggest, obtaining better performances even with networks of smaller size.Comment: 17 page

Efecto del tipo y cantidad de alúmina como dopante sobre la densificación y las propiedades eléctricas de electrodos cerámicos de óxido de zinc

[EN] Aluminum-doped zinc oxide (AZO) electrodes can be a good alternative to replace the expensive electrodes (Ti, ITO, FTO, etc.), which are used in the electrooxidation process to remove refractory and emergent contaminants from industrial wastewaters. AZO electrodes have been prepared by the traditional ceramic method using ZnO as the main raw material and different precursors of Al2O3 as dopant sources. Densification, microstructure and electric resistivity of AZO electrodes are a function of precursor's nature and sintering thermal treatment. The higher the number of precursor's particles and the smaller their size, the sintering temperature needed to attain high densifications and low resistivities shifted to higher values. Micrometric and colloidal alumina were the precursors which allowed to equilibrate an affordable sintering temperature interval (1200-1300 degrees C) with acceptable densification and resistivity values (around 95% and 5 x 10(-3) Omega cm, respectively). However, colloidal alumina made it possible to obtain slightly lower values of resistivity at the cost of having a narrower working interval.[ES] En este trabajo de investigación se presentan electrodos cerámicos de óxido de zinc dopado con aluminio (AZO) como alternativa a los actuales electrodos de titanio (ITO, FTO. . .) utilizados en el proceso de electrooxidación de aguas residuales para la eliminación de contaminantes refractarios y emergentes. Estos electrodos AZO han sido preparados mediante el método tradicional cerámico, utilizando ZnO como materia prima principal y diferentes precursores de Al2O3 como dopantes. La densificación, la microestructura y la resistividad eléctrica de estos electrodos son propiedades que están directamente relacionadas con la naturaleza del precursor y con eltratamiento térmico utilizado para su sinterización. Cuanto mayor es el número de partículas del precursor y menor es su tamano, ¿ la temperatura de sinterización necesaria para lograr altas densificaciones y bajas resistividades cambia a valores más altos. Fueron la alúmina micrométrica y la coloidal los dopantes que ofrecieron un buen equilibrio entre temperatura de sinterización (1.200¿1.300 ¿C) y densificación-resistividad (95% y 5·10¿3 cm, respectivamente). Concretamente en el caso de la alúmina coloidal, se pudieron optimizar estos resultados estrechando el intervalo de temperatura de trabajo.The authors thanks to"Ministerio de Economia y Competitividad" and "Fondo Europeo de Desarrollo Regional" the support to this research [Plan Nacional de I+D, project Ref. CTQ2015-65202-C2-2-R (MINECO/FEDER)].Sánchez-Rivera, M.; Orts, M.; Pérez-Herranz, V.; Mestre, S. (2021). Effect of type and amount of alumina as dopant over the densification and the electrical properties of zinc oxide ceramic electrodes. Boletín de la Sociedad Española de Cerámica y Vidrio. 60(1):53-61. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bsecv.2020.01.003536160

3D reconstruction of medical images from slices automatically landmarked with growing neural models

In this study, we utilise a novel approach to segment out the ventricular system in a series of high resolution T1-weighted MR images. We present a brain ventricles fast reconstruction method. The method is based on the processing of brain sections and establishing a fixed number of landmarks onto those sections to reconstruct the ventricles 3D surface. Automated landmark extraction is accomplished through the use of the self-organising network, the growing neural gas (GNG), which is able to topographically map the low dimensionality of the network to the high dimensionality of the contour manifold without requiring a priori knowledge of the input space structure. Moreover, our GNG landmark method is tolerant to noise and eliminates outliers. Our method accelerates the classical surface reconstruction and filtering processes. The proposed method offers higher accuracy compared to methods with similar efficiency as Voxel Grid

Real time motion estimation using a neural architecture implemented on GPUs

This work describes a neural network based architecture that represents and estimates object motion in videos. This architecture addresses multiple computer vision tasks such as image segmentation, object representation or characterization, motion analysis and tracking. The use of a neural network architecture allows for the simultaneous estimation of global and local motion and the representation of deformable objects. This architecture also avoids the problem of finding corresponding features while tracking moving objects. Due to the parallel nature of neural networks, the architecture has been implemented on GPUs that allows the system to meet a set of requirements such as: time constraints management, robustness, high processing speed and re-configurability. Experiments are presented that demonstrate the validity of our architecture to solve problems of mobile agents tracking and motion analysis

Structural and Morphological Characterization of Micro and Nanofibers Produced by Electrospinning and Solution Blow Spinning: A Comparative Study

Nonwoven mats of poly(lactic acid) (PLA), poly(ethylene oxide) (PEO), and poly(ε-caprolactone) (PCL) were prepared at a nano- and submicron scale by solution blow spinning (SBS) and electrospinning in order to compare crystalline structure and morphology developed by both processes during fiber formation. Polymer solutions were characterized by rheometry and tensiometry. Spun fibers were characterized by several analytical steps. SEM analyses showed that both solution blow spun and electrospun fibers had similar morphology. Absence of residual solvents and characteristic infrared bands in the solution blow spun fibers for PLA, PCL, and PEO was confirmed by FTIR studies. XRD diffraction patterns for solution blow spun and electrospun mats revealed some differences related to distinct mechanisms of fiber formation developed by each process. Significant differences in thermal behavior by DSC were observed between cast films of PLA, PCL, and PEO and their corresponding spun nanofibers. Furthermore, the average contact angles for spun PLA and PCL were higher than for electrospun mats, whereas it was slightly lower for PEO. When comparing electrospun and solution blow spun fibers, it was possible to verify that fiber morphology and physical properties depended both on the spinning technique and type of polymer