81,115 research outputs found
Understanding brønsted-acid catalyzed monomolecular reactions of Alkanes in Zeolite Pores by combining insights from experiment and theory
Acidic zeolites are effective catalysts for the cracking of large hydrocarbon molecules into lower molecular weight products required for transportation fuels. However, the ways in which the zeolite structure affects the catalytic activity at BrOnsted protons are not fully understood. One way to characterize the influence of the zeolite structure on the catalysis is to study alkane cracking and dehydrogenation at very low conversion, conditions for which the kinetics are well defined. To understand the effects of zeolite structure on the measured rate coefficient (k(app)), it is necessary to identify the equilibrium constant for adsorption into the reactant state (Kads-H+) and the intrinsic rate coefficient of the reaction (k(int)) at reaction temperatures, since k(app) is proportional to the product of Kads-H+ and k(int). We show that Kads-H+ cannot be calculated from experimental adsorption data collected near ambient temperature, but can, however, be estimated accurately from configurational-bias Monte Carlo (CBMC) simulations. Using monomolecular cracking and dehydrogenation of C-3-C-6 alkanes as an example, we review recent efforts aimed at elucidating the influence of the acid site location and the zeolite framework structure on the observed values of k(app) and its components, Kads-H+ and k(int)
Reversible watermarking scheme with image-independent embedding capacity
Permanent distortion is one of the main drawbacks of all the irreversible watermarking schemes. Attempts to recover the original signal after the signal passing the authentication process are being made starting just a few years ago. Some common problems, such as salt-and-pepper artefacts owing to intensity wraparound and low embedding capacity, can now be resolved. However, some significant problems remain unsolved. First, the embedding capacity is signal-dependent, i.e., capacity varies significantly depending on the nature of the host signal. The direct impact of this is compromised security for signals with low capacity. Some signals may be even non-embeddable. Secondly, while seriously tackled in irreversible watermarking schemes, the well-known problem of block-wise dependence, which opens a security gap for the vector quantisation attack and transplantation attack, are not addressed by researchers of the reversible schemes. This work proposes a reversible watermarking scheme with near-constant signal-independent embedding capacity and immunity to the vector quantisation attack and transplantation attack
Quantum simulation of a Fermi-Hubbard model using a semiconductor quantum dot array
Interacting fermions on a lattice can develop strong quantum correlations,
which lie at the heart of the classical intractability of many exotic phases of
matter. Seminal efforts are underway in the control of artificial quantum
systems, that can be made to emulate the underlying Fermi-Hubbard models.
Electrostatically confined conduction band electrons define interacting quantum
coherent spin and charge degrees of freedom that allow all-electrical
pure-state initialisation and readily adhere to an engineerable Fermi-Hubbard
Hamiltonian. Until now, however, the substantial electrostatic disorder
inherent to solid state has made attempts at emulating Fermi-Hubbard physics on
solid-state platforms few and far between. Here, we show that for gate-defined
quantum dots, this disorder can be suppressed in a controlled manner. Novel
insights and a newly developed semi-automated and scalable toolbox allow us to
homogeneously and independently dial in the electron filling and
nearest-neighbour tunnel coupling. Bringing these ideas and tools to fruition,
we realize the first detailed characterization of the collective Coulomb
blockade transition, which is the finite-size analogue of the
interaction-driven Mott metal-to-insulator transition. As automation and device
fabrication of semiconductor quantum dots continue to improve, the ideas
presented here show how quantum dots can be used to investigate the physics of
ever more complex many-body states
Determination of Dark Energy by the Einstein Telescope: Comparing with CMB, BAO and SNIa Observations
A design study is currently in progress for a third generation
gravitational-wave (GW) detector called Einstein Telescope (ET). An important
kind of source for ET will be the inspiral and merger of binary neutron stars
(BNS) up to . If BNS mergers are the progenitors of short-hard
-ray bursts, then some fraction of them will be seen both
electromagnetically and through GW, so that the luminosity distance and the
redshift of the source can be determined separately. An important property of
these `standard sirens' is that they are \emph{self-calibrating}: the
luminosity distance can be inferred directly from the GW signal, with no need
for a cosmic distance ladder. Thus, standard sirens will provide a powerful
independent check of the CDM model. In previous work, estimates were
made of how well ET would be able to measure a subset of the cosmological
parameters (such as the dark energy parameter ) it will have access to,
assuming that the others had been determined to great accuracy by alternative
means. Here we perform a more careful analysis by explicitly using the
potential Planck CMB data as prior information for these other parameters. We
find that ET will be able to constrain and with accuracies and , respectively. These results are compared
with projected accuracies for the JDEM Baryon Acoustic Oscillations project and
the SNAP Type Ia supernovae observations.Comment: 28 pages, 5 figures, 5 tables; Published Versio
Reconstructing a Z' Lagrangian using the LHC and low-energy data
We study the potential of the LHC and future low-energy experiments to
precisely measure the underlying model parameters of a new Z' boson. We
emphasize the complimentary information obtained from both on- and off-peak LHC
dilepton data, from the future Q-weak measurement of the weak charge of the
proton, and from a proposed measurement of parity violation in low-energy
Moller scattering. We demonstrate the importance of off-peak LHC data and
Q-weak for removing sign degeneracies between Z' couplings that occur if only
on-peak LHC data is studied. A future precision measurement of low-energy
Moller scattering can resolve a scaling degeneracy between quark and lepton
couplings that remains after analyzing LHC dilepton data, permitting an
extraction of the individual Z' couplings rather than combinations of them. We
study how precisely Z' properties can be extracted for LHC integrated
luminosities ranging from a few inverse femtobarns to super-LHC values of an
inverse attobarn. For the several example cases studied with M_Z'=1.5 TeV, we
find that coupling combinations can be determined with relative uncertainties
reaching 30% with 30 fb^-1 of integrated luminosity, while 50% is possible with
10 fb^-1. With SLHC luminosities of 1 ab^-1, we find that products of quark and
lepton couplings can be probed to 10%.Comment: 36 pages, 17 figure
Loss of histone macroH2A1 in hepatocellular carcinoma cells promotes paracrine-mediated chemoresistance and CD4+CD25+FoxP3+ regulatory T cells activation
Rationale: Loss of histone macroH2A1 induces appearance of cancer stem cells (CSCs)-like cells in hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC). How CSCs interact with the tumor microenvironment and the adaptive immune system is unclear. Methods: We screened aggressive human HCC for macroH2A1 and CD44 CSC marker expression. We also knocked down (KD) macroH2A1 in HCC cells, and performed integrated transcriptomic and secretomic analyses. Results: Human HCC showed low macroH2A1 and high CD44 expression compared to control tissues. MacroH2A1 KD CSC-like cells transferred paracrinally their chemoresistant properties to parental HCC cells. MacroH2A1 KD conditioned media transcriptionally reprogrammed parental HCC cells activated regulatory CD4+/CD25+/FoxP3+ T cells (Tregs). Conclusions: Loss of macroH2A1 in HCC cells drives cancer stem-cell propagation and evasion from immune surveillance
Effect of long-range Coulomb interaction on shot-noise suppression in ballistic transport
We present a microscopic analysis of shot-noise suppression due to long-range
Coulomb interaction in semiconductor devices under ballistic transport
conditions. An ensemble Monte Carlo simulator self-consistently coupled with a
Poisson solver is used for the calculations. A wide range of injection-rate
densities leading to different degrees of suppression is investigated. A sharp
tendency of noise suppression at increasing injection densities is found to
scale with a dimensionless Debye length related to the importance of
space-charge effects in the structure.Comment: RevTex, 4 pages, 4 figures, minor correction
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