A Study of Melt Flow Analysis of an ABS-Iron Composite in Fused Deposition Modelling Process

Fused deposition modelling (FDM) is a filament based rapid prototyping system which offers the possibility of introducing new composite material for the FDM process as long as the new material can be made in feedstock filament form. Swinburne has been undertaking extensive research in development of new composite materials involving acrylonitrile-butadiene-styrene (ABS) and other materials including metals. In order to predict the behaviour of new ABS based composite materials in the course of FDM process, it is necessary to investigate the flow of the composite material in liquefier head. No such study is available considering the geometry of the liquefier head. This paper presents 2-D and 3-D numerical analysis of melt flow behaviour of a representative ABS-iron composite through the 90-degree bent tube of the liquefier head of the fused deposition modelling process using ANSYS FLOTRAN and CFX finite element packages. Main flow parameters including temperature, velocity, and pressure drop have been investigated. Filaments of the filled ABS have been fabricated and characterized to verify the possibility of prototyping using the new material on the current FDM machine. Results provide promising information in developing the melt flow modelling of metal-plastic composites and in optimising the FDM parameters for better part quality with such composites.     

Universal Distributed Estimation Scheme for a Bandwidth Constrained Ad Hoc Sensor Network

This paper describes a distributed estimation scheme (DES) for a bandwidth constrained ad hoc sensor network.The DES is universal in the sense that operations on all sensors are identical and independent of noise distribution.The scheme requires each sensor to transmit just a 1-bit message per observation.Simulation results show that the scheme achieves much better mean-squares error (MSE) performance than the simplified isotropic universal DES and even outperforms the isotropic universal DES which requires more than twice the bandwidth of this scheme.     

A NAM Representation Method for Data Compression of Binary Images

A representation method using the non-symmetry and anti-packing model (NAM) for data compression of binary images is presented.The NAM representation algorithm is compared with the popular linear quadtree and run length encoding algorithms.Theoretical and experimental results show that the algorithm has a higher compression ratio for both lossy and lossless cases of binary images and better reconstructed quality for the lossy case.     

Dynamic Air-Route Adjustments——Model,Algorithm,and Sensitivity Analysis

Dynamic airspace management (DAM) is an important approach to extend limited air space resources by using them more efficiently and flexibly.This paper analyzes the use of the dynamic air-route adjustment (DARA) method as a core procedure in DAM systems.DARA method makes dynamic decisions on when and how to adjust the current air-route network with the minimum cost.This model differs from the air traffic flow management (ATFM) problem because it considers dynamic opening and closing of air-route segments instead of only arranging flights on a given air traffic network and it takes into account several new constraints,such as the shortest opening time constraint.The DARA problem is solved using a two-step heuristic algorithm.The sensitivities of important coefficients in the model are analyzed to determine proper values for these coefficients.The computational results based on practical data from the Beijing ATC region show that the two-step heuristic algorithm gives as good results as the CPLEX in less or equal time in most cases.     

Predictability of Plastic Parts Behaviour Made from Rapid Manufacturing

One of the most important issues to resolve in parts manufactured from rapid manufacturing (RM) technologies is to know their behavior working under real conditions. Total quality manufacturing (TQM) is only possible if mechanical properties are well known in the design stage depending on the processing parameters. This work is mainly focused on testing of several samples made with different selective laser sintering (SLS) parameters and technologies. This procedure is the starting point to establish a basis for designing for RM and the standardization of RM testing. The experiments and the analysis of variance (ANOVA) analyzed the effects of several factors on mechanical properties. The SLS technologies were 3DSystem and EOS. The results show which factor has a large effect on the variables and the interaction between them. The conclusions are very useful for developing rules for designing (designing for RM) and creating new standard rules (ISO, AISI, and DIN) for RM materials and parts testing. The ANOVA gives a better knowledge of the effects of these factors and eliminates unimportant parameters.     

Applying File Information to Block-Level Content Addressable Storage

Content addressable storage (CAS) is a promising technology for improving storage efficiency as well as access throughput.Currently,many CAS products are implemented on the block level,which results in loss of file information.Thus,some sophisticated optimizations cannot be achieved,such as accurate fileprefetching.This paper presents a file-aware block-level storage system combined with the CAS function.In contrast with some existing file-level CAS,this system is transparent to upper-level applications,including the operating system and the file system.These features are achieved by using smart-disk technologies to help the storage system to learn the file-system layout.A prototype was implemented on an open-source virtual machine (VM) with the guest operating system being Windows XP.Tests show that this combination significantly reduces the size of the VM image file and improves the storage performance by discarding unused blocks and using a simple file-level prefetching strategy.     

Simplified Design for Concurrent Statistical Zero-Knowledge Arguments

This paper shows that the protocol presented by Goyal et al.can be further simplified for a one-way function,with the simplified protocol being more practical for the decisional Diffie-Hellman assumption.Goyal et al.provided a general transformation from any honest verifier statistical zero-knowledge argument to a concurrent statistical zero-knowledge argument.Their transformation relies only on the existence of one-way functions.For the simplified transformation,the witness indistinguishable proof of kn...     

Characterization of the Antigenicity and Immunogenicity of the Escherichia Coli Produced RNase Domain of the Classical Swine Fever Virus Glycoprotein E~(rns)

Erns is a highly glycosylated envelope protein of classical swine fever virus (CSFV) with RNase activity. Erns can induce neutralizing antibodies and provide immune protection against CSFV infection. In this study, the RNase domain of the Erns was produced in Escherichia coli. Its reactivity with CSFV-positive sera and its ability to induce antibodies and to provide protective immunity were then investigated. The serological tests showed that the prokaryotically expressed RNase domain of the Erns retained i...     

Effective Factors on Forming Precision in Patternless Casting Manufacturing Technique

The patternless casting manufacturing (PCM) technique, which adopts a new concept of double scanning method, combines the principle of discreteness and deposition with resin-bonded sand technique. This paper is to evaluate the dimensional accuracy of sand mould on PCM. The two important factors-the liquid penetration rule in the space of particles and the shape and dimension of the agglomeration unit body, which influence the process parameters such as scanning speed, layer thickness, liquid flux on dimension accuracy, and surface qualities, were investigated systematically, thus the theoretical basis for these parameters was provided. Experiments on rapid manufacturing of sand mould were carried out, and the results of the free penetration and the constraint penetration well verified the relationship of the two factors and the process parameters.     

New Voronoi Diagram Algorithm of Multiply-Connected Planar Areas in the Selective Laser Melting

This paper studies the practical generation of Voronoi diagrams for multiply-connected planar areas bounded by line segments. The core of the algorithm was calculating Voronoi polygon of every Voronoi object in planar areas independently. The main approach had two steps. The first step was calculating all relevant bisectors of every Voronoi object. The second was combining obtained bisectors into completed Voronoi polygons individually. All code was implemented in Visual C++ platform. The resulting code was extensively tested in real-world data and its practical running time grew only linearly. Three statistical CPU-consumption charts had been drawn with the Voronoi diagrams computation data, and compared with other published codes for computing Voronoi diagrams. The algorithm was applied to compute offsetting of slice area consisting of large-scale line segments for the selective laser melting (SLM) trajectory scanning technology which is a kind of rapid prototyping (RP). The experimental results of offsetting for slice area based on Voronoi diagrams show that the approach is effective and simple for polygon offsetting problems. The method is helpful to those offsetting work and can provide more effective offsetting solution.