Membrane sorption property effects on transmembrane permeation

A theoretical study was carried out into membrane transport phenomena.Formulae for calculating the membrane transport resistance and transmembrane mass flux were given,variations in membrane resistance and moisture flux with the membrane sorption constant(C)under various humidity conditions were analyzed,and the value of C corresponding to the minimum membrane resistance or the maximum moisture flux was obtained.The results show that the membrane resistance and moisture flux relate not only to C but also to the relative humidities on both sides of the membrane.As C increases,membrane resistance initially decreases but then increases,i.e.,a minimum occurs,while the moisture flux first decreases and then increases,i.e.,a maximum occurs.The membrane resistance and moisture flux reach their extrema at the same value of C,which is determined by the relative humidities on both sides of the membrane.To reduce the membrane resistance,the value of C should be chosen based on the humidity conditions.     

Superfluid density of two-dimensional weakly interacting boson system at zero temperature

We compute the superfluid density of a two-dimensional boson system with weak two-body repulsive interactions at zero temperature using one-loop perturbation theory in the weak coupling region. The boson fields are taken to be in continuum form in real space, and the interactions are approximated by a δ function of the distance between the bosons. We find that the one-loop fluctuations slightly decrease the superfluid density of a classical level. The superfluid density is approximated by the condensate density multiplied by the mass of the boson particle.     

Upwind finite volume element methods for one-dimensional semiconductor device

A fully discrete implicit Euler upwind finite volume element method is derived and studied for one-dimensional semiconductor device. Upwind scheme is introduced to deal with the convection-dominated diffusion equations in the semiconductor model. With different time steps for the electrostatic potential and the other unknown quantities, the computational procedure of the method is obtained. The local mass conservation laws are preserved under the framework of the upwind finite volume element schemes. A first-order accuracy in the L ²-norm is proved. Numerical experiments are given to validate the usefulness and efficiency of the method.     

Sufficient Reason and Reason Enough

I offer an analysis of the Principle of Sufficient Reason and its relevancy for the scientific endeavour. I submit that the world is not, and cannot be, rational—only some brained beings are. The Principle of Sufficient Reason is not a necessary truth nor a physical law. It is just a guiding metanomological hypothesis justified a posteriori by its success in helping us to unveil the mechanisms that operate in Nature.     

Semi-global stabilization via homogeneous output feedback for a class of nonlinear time-delay systems

The semi-global stabilization problem for a class of nonlinear systems with state time-delay is addressed in this paper. By using Lyapunov-Krasovskii functional method and homogeneous domination approach, a homogeneous observer and an output feedback controller with a scaling gain are designed. Then the scaling gain is adjusted such that the closed-loop system is semi-global asymptotically stable. A numerical example is presented to illustrate the effectiveness of the obtained results in this paper.     

Attentional negativity bias moderated by positive mood arousal

Automatically allocation of more attention to negative stimuli is called emotional negativity bias. An event-related potentials (ERPs) experiment investigated whether or not this bias was altered by positive mood arousal. The results suggested that the attention bias towards negative stimuli was attenuated when positive information was accessible.     

Teeming stream protection using an argon shroud during casting of steel ingots

Two kinds of argon shroud protection devices with two different basic structures were designed and investigated. Industrial experiments and numerical simulations were used to examine the protection effect, and the mechanism of air entrapment during the casting of steel ingots was analyzed. The influence of the structure of the argon shroud protection device on the protection effect was investigated. An argon shroud protection device mounted to the nozzle holder on the bottom of the ladle does not provide a good protection effect because air can easily flow into the teeming system and cause reoxidation of molten steel during teeming. By contrast, an argon shroud protection device seated on the top of the central trumpet provides an excellent protection effect, where air has little chance of flowing into the teeming system during casting. The feasibilities of the argon shroud protection devices are discussed.     

Research on catalysis of sodium-metallochlorophylls in Ni/MH battery

The effects of sodium-metallochlorophylls including sodium-iron chlorophyllin, sodium-copper chlorophyllin and sodium-magnesium chlorophyllin on performance of Ni/MH battery were investigated. The results show that sodium-iron chlorophyllin can effectively activate the gases produced during charge in Ni/MH battery, therefore reducing the reduction potential of oxygen and the oxidation potential of hydrogen, and the increased speed of inner pressure of battery is decreased significantly. With the aid of DMol3 software, the activation process of oxygen and hydrogen by sodiummetallochlorophylls was simulated and analyzed. It was found that the catalysis behavior is in agreement with the experimental results, and the activation process also gets a reasonable explanation from the calculated results.     

BDRouter:拐弯数密度驱动的总体布线算法

拐弯优化是布线阶段考虑的重要问题之一。该文提出了一种考虑拐弯优化的总体布线算法BDRouter来同时考虑减少布线拐弯数和拐弯密度。这有助于在布线阶段减少通孔并给必要的通孔增加可能的冗余通孔位置,以此来增强可制造性、可靠性和提高成品率。实验测试表明:该文算法与已有典型算法相比,在线长不增加或增加不超过10%的前提下,能够减少约50%的拐弯数,并降低约20%的拐弯数标准差。     

Competing Definitions of Information Versus Entropy in Physics

As was mentioned by Nicolas Lori in his (Found Sci, 2010) commentary, the definition of Information in Physics is something about which not all authors agreed. According to physicists like me Information decreases when Entropy increases (so entropy would be a negative measure of information), while many physicists, seemingly the majority of them, are convinced of the contrary (even in the camp of Quantum Information Theoreticians). In this reply I reproduce, and make more precise, some of my arguments, that appeared here and there in my (2010) paper, in order to clarify the presentation of my personal point of view on the subject.