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Effective and robust electrocatalysts are mainly based on innovative materials and unique structures. Herein, we designed a flakelike cobalt phosphide-based catalyst supporting on NiCo2O4 nanorods array, which in-situ grew on the nickel foam (NF) current collector, referring as N–Co2P/NiCo2O4/NF electrode. By optimizing the microstructure and electronic structure through 3D hierarchy fabrication and nitrogen doping, the catalyst features with abundant electrochemical surface area, favorable surface wettability, excellent electron transport, as well as tailored d band center. Consequently, the as-prepared N–Co2P/NiCo2O4/NF electrode exhibits an impressive HER activity with a low overpotentials of 58 mV at 10 mA cm−2, a Tafel slop of 75 mV dec−1, as well as superior durability in alkaline medium. This work may provide a new pathway to effectively improve the hydrogen evolution performance of transition metal phosphides and to develop promising electrodes for practical electrocatalysis.

In the multi-access edge computing (MEC) environment, app vendors’ data can be cached on edge servers to ensure low-latency data retrieval. Massive users can simultaneously access edge servers with high data rates through flexible allocations of transmit power. The ability to manage networking resources offers unique opportunities to app vendors but also raises unprecedented challenges. To ensure fast data retrieval for users in the MEC environment, edge data caching must take into account the allocations of data, users, and transmit power jointly. We make the first attempt to study the Data, User, and Power Allocation (DUPA $^3$ 3 ) problem, aiming to serve the most users and maximize their overall data rate. First, we formulate the DUPA $^3$ 3 problem and prove its $\mathcal {NP}$ NP -completeness. Then, we model the DUPA $^3$ 3 problem as a potential DUPA $^3$ 3 game admitting at least one Nash equilibrium and propose a two-phase game-theoretic decentralized algorithm named DUPA $^3$ 3 Game to achieve the Nash equilibrium as the solution to the DUPA $^3$ 3 problem. To evaluate DUPA $^3$ 3 Game, we analyze its theoretical performance and conduct extensive experiments to demonstrate its effectiveness and efficiency.

Edge computing (EC) can overcome several limitations of cloud computing. In the EC environment, a service provider can deploy its application instances on edge servers to serve users with low latency. Given a limited budget K for deploying applications in a particular geographical area, some approaches have been proposed to achieves various optimization objectives, e.g., to maximize the servers' coverage, to minimize the average network latency, etc. However, the robustness of the services collectively delivered by the service provider's applications deployed on the edge servers has not been considered at all. This is a critical issue, especially in the highly distributed, dynamic and volatile EC environment. We make the first attempt to tackle this challenge. Specifically, we formulate this Robustness-oriented Edge Application Deployment(READ) problem as a constrained optimization problem and prove its NP-hardness. Then, we provide an integer programming based approach READ-O for solving it precisely, and an approximation algorithm READ-A for efficiently finding near-optimal solutions to large-scale problems. READ-A's approximation ratio is not worse than K/2, which is constant regardless of the total number of edge servers. Evaluation of the widely-used real-world dataset against five representative approaches demonstrates that our approaches can solve the READ problem effectively and efficiently.

Electrochemical water splitting is one of the most sustainable approaches for generating hydrogen. Because of the inherent constraints associated with the architecture and materials, the conventional alkaline water electrolyzer and the emerging proton exchange membrane electrolyzer are suffering from low efficiency and high materials/operation costs, respectively. Herein, we design a membrane-free flow electrolyzer, featuring a sandwich-like architecture and a cyclic operation mode, for decoupled overall water splitting. Comprised of two physically-separated compartments with flowing H2-rich catholyte and O2-rich anolyte, the cell delivers H2 with a purity >99.1%. Its low internal ohmic resistance, highly active yet affordable bifunctional catalysts and efficient mass transport enable the water splitting at current density of 750 mA cm−2 biased at 2.1 V. The eletrolyzer works equally well both in deionized water and in regular tap water. This work demonstrates the opportunity of combining the advantages of different electrolyzer concepts for water splitting via cell architecture and materials design, opening pathways for sustainable hydrogen generation., Seawater electrolysis is promising for grid-scale H2 production without freshwater reliance, but high energy costs and detrimental Cl chemistry reduce its practical potential. Here, authors developed an energy-saving hybrid seawater electrolyzer for chlorine-free H2 production and N2H4 degradation.

Folding of RNA can produce elaborate tertiary structures, corresponding to their diverse roles in the regulation of biological activities. Direct observation of RNA structures at high resolution in their native form however remains a challenge. The large vestibule and the narrow constriction of a Mycobacterium smegmatis porin A (MspA) suggests a sensing mode called nanopore trapping/translocation, which clearly distinguishes between microRNA, small interfering RNA (siRNA), transfer RNA (tRNA) and 5 S ribosomal RNA (rRNA). To further profit from the acquired event characteristics, a custom machine learning algorithm is developed. Events from measurements with a mixture of RNA analytes can be automatically classified, reporting a general accuracy of ~93.4%. tRNAs, which possess a unique tertiary structure, report a highly distinguishable sensing feature, different from all other RNA types tested in this study. With this strategy, tRNAs from different sources are measured and a high structural conservation across different species is observed in single molecule., Nanopores have been used for direct observation of RNA structure in native environments but have limited RNA differentiation capabilities. Here, the authors report on the use of Mycobacterium smegmatis porin A nanopores for the trapping and translocation identification of microRNA, siRNA, tRNA and ribosomal RNA.

Grounding natural language in images, such as localizing "the black dog on the left of the tree", is one of the core problems in artificial intelligence, as it needs to comprehend the fine-grained and compositional language space. However, existing solutions rely on the association between the holistic language features and visual features, while neglect the nature of compositional reasoning implied in the language. In this paper, we propose a natural language grounding model that can automatically compose a binary tree structure for parsing the language and then perform visual reasoning along the tree in a bottom-up fashion. We call our model RVG-TREE: Recursive Grounding Tree, which is inspired by the intuition that any language expression can be recursively decomposed into two constituent parts, and the grounding confidence score can be recursively accumulated by calculating their grounding scores returned by sub-trees. RVG-TREE can be trained end-to-end by using the Straight-Through Gumbel-Softmax estimator that allows the gradients from the continuous score functions passing through the discrete tree construction. Experiments on several benchmarks show that our model achieves the state-of-the-art performance with more explainable reasoning., Comment: Accepted to IEEE Transactions on Pattern Analysis and Machine Intelligence (T-PAMI)

The underlying structural origin of magnetic properties is still elusive in Fe-based amorphous alloys. In this study, distinctive soft magnetic properties were developed in Fe76Si9B10P5 amorphous ribbons through systematic design of annealing process. Combining with synchrotron radiation, high-resolution transmission electron microscopy and first principle ab initio molecular dynamic simulation, it is found that the atomic structural evolution both in short range order and medium range order is responsible for the magnetic softness at proper annealing temperature. In short range, formation of separated and densely coordinated Fe-metalloid clusters is instigated to adapt energy minimization, resulting in strengthening of ferromagnetic exchange interaction locally. In medium range, a homogeneous exchange-coupling from the uniformly strong and weak ferromagnetic regions is generated, which significantly weakens magnetic heterogeneity and leads to the excellent magnetic softness. Our findings may provide an effective/promising pathway to modulate the magnetic properties for Fe-based amorphous alloys, and give a comprehensive and quantitative understanding of the structure-properties relationship in amorphous materials.

Bone regeneration is a crucial part in the treatment of periodontal tissue regeneration, in which new attempts come out along with the development of nanomaterials. Herein, the effect of cerium oxide nanoparticles (CeO2 NPs) on the cell behavior and function of human periodontal ligament stem cells (hPDLSCs) was investigated. Results of CCK-8 and cell cycle tests demonstrated that CeO2 NPs not only had good biocompatibility, but also promoted cell proliferation. Furthermore, the levels of alkaline phosphatase activity, mineralized nodule formation and expressions of osteogenic genes and proteins demonstrated CeO2 NPs could promote osteogenesis differentiation of hPDLSCs. Then we chose electrospinning to fabricate fibrous membranes containing CeO2 NPs. We showed that the composite membranes improved mechanical properties as well as realized release of CeO2 NPs. We then applied the composite membranes to in vivo study in rat cranial defect models. Micro-CT and histopathological evaluations revealed that nanofibrous membranes with CeO2 NPs further accelerated new bone formation. Those exciting results demonstrated that CeO2 NPs and porous membrane contributed to osteogenic ability, and CeO2 NPs contained electrospun membrane may be a promising candidate material for periodontal bone regeneration., Graphical abstract Schematic illustration of the in vitro and in vivo study of CeO2 NPs' effects on accelerating bone regeneration.Image 1, Highlights • CeO2 nanoparticles are induced in the therapy of periodontal regeneration as a bio-activator. • CeO2 nanoparticles have potential promotion on osteogenic differentiation of periodontal stem cells. • Fibrous membrane containing CeO2 nanoparticles was fabricated by electrospinning with biodegradable materials. • Incorporation CeO2 nanoparticles with PCL/gelatin enhance bone regeneration in rat critical bone defect.

Deep learning-aided optical orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (O-OFDM) is proposed for intensity modulated direct detection transmissions, which is termed as O-OFDMNet. In particular, O-OFDMNet employs deep neural networks (DNNs) for converting a complex-valued signal into a non-negative signal in the time-domain at the transmitter and vice versa at the receiver. The associated frequency-domain signal processing remains the same as in conventional radio frequency (RF) OFDM. As a result, our scheme achieves the same spectral efficiency as the RF scheme, which has never been attained by the existing O-OFDM schemes, because they have relied on the Hermitian symmetry of the spectral-domain signal to guarantee that the time-domain signal becomes real-valued. We show that O-OFDMNet can be viewed as an autoencoder architecture, which can be trained in an end-to-end manner in order to simultaneously improve both the bit error ratio (BER) and the peak-to-average power ratio (PAPR) for transmission over both additive white Gaussian noise and frequency-selective channels. Furthermore, we intrinsically integrate a soft-decision aided channel decoder with our O-OFDMNet and investigate its coded performance relying on both convolutional and polar codes. The simulation results show that our scheme improves both the uncoded and coded BER as well as a reducing the PAPR compared to the benchmarks at the cost of a moderate additional DNN complexity. Furthermore, our scheme is capable of approaching the throughput of RF-OFDM, which is notably higher than that of conventional O-OFDM. Finally, our complexity analysis shows that O-OFDMNet is suitable for real-time operation.

Surface modification of different functional molecules onto NaREF4 (RE = rare earth) upconversion nanoparticles (UCNPs) impart their multiple functionalities. Functional molecules can be loaded onto NaREF4 UCNPs through the formation of coordination bonds between the surface-exposed RE3+ ions and the appropriate chemical groups of functional molecules. The density of surface RE3+ ions directly determines the loading efficiency of NaREF4 UCNPs. However, NaREF4 is a binary cation system, rendering the surface-distributed Na+ and RE3+ ions remains a mystery. Here, we develop an effective strategy to significantly enhance the density of surface RE3+ ions, thus maximizing the loading capacity of NaREF4 UCNPs. This strategy is based on a heterovalent cation exchange (HCE) reaction in the surface region in which Na+ ions are replaced by RE3+ ions. The density of surface ligands enhances from 3.6 to 8.8 molecules/nm2 after reaction, suggesting that the loading efficiency increases by approximately 150%. Benefiting from the improved loading capacity, we demonstrate such surface-RE-rich nanoparticles have the ability to offer higher colloidal stability and more desirable photodynamic therapy (PDT) efficacy. This work not only advances our understanding of cation exchange reactions in RE-based nanoparticles, but also provides significant value for considerable applications such as sensing, bioimaging, and therapy.

Dislocation plays a crucial role in controlling the strength and plasticity of bulk materials. However, determining the densities of geometrically necessary dislocations (GNDs) and statistically stored dislocations (SSDs) is one of the classical problems in material research for several decades. Here, we proposed a new approach based on indentation size effect (ISE) and strengthening theories. This approach was performed on a laser powder bed fused (L-PBF) Hastelloy X (HX), and the results were verified by the Hough-based EBSD and modified Williamson–Hall (m-WH) methods. Furthermore, to better understand the new approach and essential mechanisms, an in-depth investigation of the microstructure was conducted. The distribution of dislocations shows a clear grain orientation-dependent: low density in large preferentially orientated grains while high density in fine orientated grains. The increment of strengthening in L-PBF HX is attributed to a huge amount of edge-GNDs. Planar slip is the main operative deformation mechanism during indentation tests, and the slip step patterns depend mostly on grain orientations and stacking fault energy. This study provides quantitative results of GND and SSD density for L-PBF HX, which constructs a firm basis for future quantitative work on other metals with different crystal structures. Funding agencies: The Swedish Governmental Agency for Innovation Systems (Vinnova Grant No. 2016-05175) and the Center for Additive Manufacturing-metal (CAM2). Siemens Energy is acknowledged for providing the samples.

The bio-nanotechnological fabrication of high-surface-area carbons has attracted widespread interest in supercapacitor applications by using readily-available natural products as raw materials or bio-templates, and is expected to refine on pore accessibility for compact energy storage. Here, a renovated design strategy of semi-biomass interpenetrating polymer network (IPN) derived carbon is demonstrated through physically knitting the biomacromolecule (sodium alginate, SA) polymeric chains into the highly crosslinked resorcinol-formaldehyde (RF) network and subsequent thermochemical conversion. Molecule-level interlacing forces in such IPN efficiently relieve the RF skeleton shrinkage when producing carbon, while the other SA network addresses the macrophase separation issue to sacrifice as an in-knitted porogen and a morphology-directing agent. As a result, porous carbon globules are equipped with moss-like surfaces and interconnected pore architecture for high accessible electrode surface (1013 m2/g), and efficient electrochemical responses are reached with the specific capacitance of 312 F/g at 1 A/g. Taking the advantage of 9 mol/kg NaClO4 complex-solvent electrolyte, the voltage window is extended to 2.4 V, endowing the two-electrode device with the high energy delivery of 32.3 Wh/kg at 240 W/kg.

Natural spinal tissues have unique dynamic properties and it is crucial to investigate the full dynamic response of spinal implants and related biomedical materials to ensure compatibility with the host tissue. Silicon nitride is a promising bioceramic for spinal implants. In this study, the mechanical properties and dynamic response of silicon nitride were comprehensively evaluated using novel and efficient testing methods, at both the material and structural level. The correlation between mechanical properties and porosity was investigated and the results showed that Young's modulus and compressive strength decreased non-linearly as porosity increased. Both the compressive strength (100.35±3.39MPa) and fracture toughness (1.06±0.06MPa⋅m1/2) of the porous silicon nitride samples (~70% porosity) can be considered sufficient for load bearing purposes as a substitute for trabecular bone. Moreover, the results from a drop tower test showed that the average ultimate strength of the scaffolds under an impact loading was significantly lower than the strength under quasi-static compression. Nevertheless, this value is still comparable to that of trabecular bone. Regarding damping capacity, the results of free damped vibration tests of cantilever beams showed that a silicon nitride beam has a higher damping ratio (0.17%±0.01%) than a zirconia beam (0.13%±0.01%), which indicates that ceramics with similar Young's moduli can have different energy dissipating capacities. However, both dense and porous silicon nitride showed a low energy dissipation, substantially lower than natural spinal tissues. Overall, dense silicon nitride possesses a high stiffness, and altering the porosity of silicon nitride is one option to tailor its mechanical properties towards those of trabecular bone, however, more effort is required to increase its damping capacity, if this is a desired trait., Ceramics International, 47 (23), ISSN:0272-8842, ISSN:1873-3956

The application of Si as the anode materials for lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) is still severely hindered by the rapid capacity decay due to the structural damage caused by large volume change (>300%) during cycling. Herein, a three-dimensional (3D) aerogel anode of Si@carbon@graphene (SCG) is rationally constructed via a polydopamine-assisted strategy. Polydopamine is coated on Si nanoparticles to serve as an interface linker to initiate the assembly of Si and graphene oxide, which plays a crucial role in the successful fabrication of SCG aerogels. After annealing the polydopamine is converted into N-doped carbon (N-carbon) coatings to protect Si materials. The dual protection from N-carbon and graphene aerogels synergistically improves the structural stability and electronic conductivity of Si, thereby leading to the significantly improved lithium storage properties. Electrochemical tests show that the SCG with optimized graphene content delivers a high capacity (712 mAh/g at 100 mA/g) and robust cycling stability (402 mAh/g at 1 A/g after 1500 cycles). Furthermore, the full cell using SCG aerogels as anode exhibits a reversible capacity of 187.6 mAh/g after 80 cycles at 0.1 A/g. This work provides a plausible strategy for developing Si anode in LIBs.

Peri-implantitis are a major problem causing implant failure these days. Accordingly, anti-infection during the early stage and subsequent promotion of osseointegration are two main key factors to solve this issue. Micro-arc oxidation (MAO) treatment is a way to form an oxidation film on the surface of metallic materials. The method shows good osteogenic properties but weak antibacterial effect. Therefore, we developed combined strategies to combat severe peri-implantitis, which included the use of a novel compound, PD, comprising dendrimers poly(amidoamine) (PAMAM) loading dimethylaminododecyl methacrylate (DMADDM) as well as MAO treatment. Here, we explored the chemical properties of the novel compound PD, and proved that this compound was successfully synthesized, with the loading efficiency and encapsulation efficiency of 23.91% and 31.42%, respectively. We further report the two-stage double benefits capability of PD + MAO: (1) in the first stage, PD + MAO could decrease the adherence and development of biofilms by releasing DMADDM in the highly infected first stage after implant surgery both in vitro and in vivo; (2) in the second stage, PD + MAO indicated mighty anti-infection and osteoconductive characteristics in a rat model of peri-implantitis in vivo. This study first reports the two-staged, double benefits of PD + MAO, and demonstrates its potential in clinical applications for inhibiting peri-implantitis, especially in patients with severe infection risk., Graphical abstract Image 1, Highlights • PAMAM-DMADDM shows toxicity reduction and osteoconductive properties in vitro. • Micro-arc oxidation treatment shows osteoconductive but weak antibacterial effect. • PAMAM-DMADDM + Micro-arc oxidation treatment shows multifunctional properties.

Spacecraft formation maneuvering will inevitably induce flexible vibration from flexible appendages of spacecraft such as solar array appendages or antennae, which leads to complex disturbances with unknown fundamental frequencies. To achieve high performance of spacecraft formation flying, a novel adaptive iterative learning disturbance observer based on adaptive notch filter is designed to estimate and compensate unknown multi-frequency disturbances. Different from existing results on iterative learning disturbance observer, the newly proposed observer can estimate effectively both low-frequency disturbances and high-frequency periodic disturbances. Based on the proposed observer, an output feedback pose tracking law is derived by combining the proposed velocity observer and a feedback controller in dual quaternions description. The stability of the closed-loop system is approved based on the Lyapunov framework. Finally, the effectiveness and accuracy of the proposed observer and controller are demonstrated successfully by numerical simulations.

Metal halide perovskites, as a new generation of semiconductor materials, have been widely applied in various optoelectronic devices, especially in the field of perovskite light-emitting diodes (PeLEDs). The external quantum efficiencies (EQEs) of green, red, and near-infrared PeLEDs have exceeded 20% for the last few years, which are comparable to those of the state-of-the-art organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) and quantum-dot light-emitting diodes (QLEDs). However, the performances of blue PeLEDs lag far behind those of their counterparts, presumably due to the low quantum yields of blue perovskite films, the instability of the emission spectra, and the difficulties in charge injection for the devices under operation conditions. In this review, the structures and physical properties of blue emissive perovskite materials and the preparation methods of the corresponding perovskite films are firstly addressed. Then, the recent advances and strategies to improve the efficiency of blue PeLEDs are outlined, and the main challenges faced with the blue PeLEDs are also discussed. Finally, an outlook on blue LEDs based on perovskite materials is proposed.

In the field of civil engineering, the meteorological data available usually do not have the detailed information of the wind near a certain site. However, the detailed information of the wind field during typhoon is important for the wind-resistant design of civil structures. Furthermore, the resolution of the meteorological data available by the civil engineers is too coarse to be applicable. Therefore it is meaningful to obtain the detailed information of the wind fields based on the meteorological data provided by the meteorological department. Therefore, in the present study, a one-way coupling method between WRF and CFD is adopted and a method to keep the mass conservation during the simulation in CFD is proposed. It is found that using the proposed one-way coupling method, the predicted wind speed is closer to the measurement. And the curvature of the wind streamline during typhoon is successfully reproduced.

The forward osmosis (FO) membrane exhibits great performance degradation when contacting with chlorine solutions. The damage of chlorine to membrane material will seriously reduce the lifetime of the membrane and increase the cost of membrane treatment technology. Here, we prepared chlorine-stable membranes by a covalent modification method with cyclohexylamine. The cyclohexylamine observably changed the surface morphology, the roughness (arithmetic average) of the membrane decreased from 22 to 17.2 nm. The addition of cyclohexylamine produced a denser sacrificial layer of short chain polyamide, which made modified membranes possess significantly better chlorine resistance with slightly declined water flux. The water flux of the optimal modified membrane was 10.78 Lm−2 h−1, only 13% less than that of the pristine membrane. Importantly, after 20,000 ppm·h chlorine exposure, the membrane with 1.5 wt% cyclohexylamine had a salt rejection of 77.2% and showed 26.0% lower water flux than pristine TFC (thin film composite) membrane in FO mode. Notably, the grafting membranes could maintain a high performance under acidic chlorination conditions. The membrane with best performance had a salt rejection of 81.6%, exhibiting 24.4% higher salt rejection than pristine membrane with 20,000 ppm·h chlorine exposure at a pH of 4. The cyclohexylamine endowed the FO membrane with better chlorine resistance, making it attractive for the development of chlorine-resistant membrane for environmental and desalination processes. HIGHLIGHTS The addition of cyclohexylamine produced a chlorine-resistant sacrificial layer.; The 1.0 wt% addition of cyclohexylamine did not significantly decrease the water flux of the forward osmosis membrane.; Under acidic conditions, cyclohexylamine could still significantly improve the chlorine resistance of forward osmosis membranes.

Representative driving cycles and specific vehicle types play an important role in analyzing energy consumption to provide valuable references for manufacturers and government inspections. In this study, a parallel plug-in hybrid electric vehicle with different driven configurations is employed to analyze energy consumption under a typical driving cycle. Specifically, a typical driving cycle of Tianjin is constructed by integrating the clustering and Markov chain algorithms. Considering the various layouts of energy systems in plug-in hybrid electric vehicles, three different driven configurations (P2, P3, P4) of the parallel plug-in hybrid electric vehicle are established. Finally, the energy consumptions of the different configurations are analyzed under the proposed typical driving cycle and the compared China Automotive Test Cycle. Results of two driving cycles demonstrate that the fuel consumption of the P3 configuration is lower than that of the P2 and P4 configurations, respectively, while the purely electric driving range of the P3 configuration is longer than the other two configurations, respectively. These results provide a basis for the formulation of China’s new light vehicle emission standards and reduce exhaust emission by making the vehicles more economically suitable for the road conditions in Tianjin.

A condition-controlled strategy for selectively synthesis of 2-acylbenzothiazoles and bibenzo[b][1,4]thiazines from aryl methyl ketones and disulfanediyldianilines was realized using I2/DMSO or I2/MeCN systems, respectively. The desired products were synthesized in only 15 min with moderate to excellent yields (50%-90%) under microwave-assisted, metal-free conditions. The strategy provides a great advantage for selective synthetic applications in the efficient synthesis of benzothiazoles and bibenzothiazines heterocycle compounds.

Hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) disproportionation, iron precipitation, and narrow pH range are the drawbacks of traditional Fenton process. To surmount these barriers, we proposed a ferric ion (Fe3+)-ascorbic acid (AA) complex catalyzed calcium peroxide (CaO2) Fenton-like system to remove organic dyes in water. This collaborative Fe3+/AA/CaO2 system presented an obvious improvement in the methyl orange (MO) decolorization, and also effectively eliminated other dyes. Response surface method was employed to optimize the running parameters for this coupling process. Under the optimized arguments (2.76 mmol/L Fe3+, 0.68 mmol/L AA, and 4 mmol/L CaO2), the MO removal achieved 98.90% after 15 min at pH 6.50, which was close to the computed outcome of 99.30%. Furthermore, this Fenton-like system could perform well in a wide range of pH (3–11), and enhance the H2O2 decomposition and Fe ions recycle. The scavenger experiment result indicated that hydroxyl radical, superoxide anion free radical, and singlet oxygen were acted on the dye elimination. Moreover, electron spin resonance analysis corroborated that the existences of these active species in the Fe3+/AA/CaO2 system. This study could advance the development of Fenton-like technique in organic effluent disposal.

The precision fabrication of ceramic moulds for the mass-production of micro/meso-structural arrays places a tremendous challenge to the manufacturing industry. This work aims to reveal the physics behind the processes so as to address this technological challenge. A new method for texturing the diamond grinding wheel surface with a micro-abrasive waterjet is proposed for highly efficient form-grinding of ceramic moulds into the required micro/meso-structural surfaces. It shows that this technology provides some unique advantages in improving the sharpness and geometrical accuracy of the grinding wheels. The mechanisms about material removal and texture formation in grinding wheel truing are investigated to enable the precise control of micro/meso-structure generation on the grinding wheel. A theoretical model is established to study the effect of grinding wheel surface micro/meso-textures and grain trajectory on the quality of the ground mould surface and reveal the reflection mechanism of the ground marks on the mould surface. Furthermore, an integrated rough-fine grinding strategy is proposed which is shown to significantly increase the grinding efficiency by 15–24 times. It is found that ductile domain grinding of ceramic moulds to achieve the required contour profile of 6.7 μm PV accuracy and a surface roughness Ra of less than 40 nm can be achieved.

Decomposition-based multiobjective evolutionary algorithms (MOEAs) are a class of popular methods for solving the multiobjective optimization problems (MOPs), and have been widely studied in numerical experiments and successfully applied in practice. However, we know little about these algorithms from the theoretical aspect. In this paper, we present running time analysis of a simple MOEA with mutation and crossover based on the MOEA/D framework (MOEA/D-C) on five pseudo-Boolean functions. Our rigorous theoretical analysis shows that by properly setting the number of subproblems, the upper bounds of expected running time of MOEA/D-C obtaining a set of solutions to cover the Pareto fronts (PFs) of these problems are apparently lower than those of the one with mutation-only (MOEA/D-M). Moreover, to effectively obtain a set of solutions to cover the PFs of these problem, MOEA/D-C only needs to decompose these MOPs into several subproblems with a set of simple weight vectors while MOEA/D-M needs to find $\Omega (n)$ optimally decomposed weight vectors. This result suggests that the use of crossover in decomposition-based MOEA can simplify the setting of weight vectors for different problems and make the algorithm more efficient. This paper provides some insights into the working principles of MOEA/D and explains why some existing decomposition-based MOEAs work well in computational experiments.

Herein, coralloid core-shell structure NiS/Ni3S4@PPy@MoS2 nanowires were elaborately designed and successfully synthesized through a three-step route to obtain exceptional microwave absorption (MA) properties. Ni nanowires were first fabricated, and then used as the substrate to be coated with a layer of PPy. Ni chalcogenides were obtained by using Ni nanowire as sacrificial templates while growing MoS2 nanorods by hydrothermal method. Both the one-dimensional (1D) core-shell structure and the coralloid surface generated by MoS2 nanorods were beneficial for the attenuation of microwaves. After investigating the electromagnetic properties of different loading content absorbers (30 wt.%, 40 wt.% and 50 wt.%), it is found that the 50 wt.% loading absorber has the optimal MA performance. The minimum reflection loss (RLmin) value can reach −51.29 dB at 10.1 GHz with a thickness of 2.29 mm, and the corresponding effective absorption bandwidth (EAB, RL

This paper investigates the issue of cluster synchronization (CS) for the coupled neural networks (CNNs) with time-varying delays via the delay-dependent distributed impulsive control. A new Halanay-like inequality, where delayed impulses are taken into consideration, is proposed. Based on the Lyapunov theory and the new differential inequality, sufficient conditions of CS for delayed CNNs with fixed and switching coupling topology are obtained, respectively. Moreover, delay-dependent distributed impulsive controllers with fixed or switching topology are designed thereby. Finally, we present a numerical example of CNNs with fixed or switching coupling to verify the effectiveness of our results, respectively.

Among the various anodes, Li3VO4 is a potential intercalation kind anode used in lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) that exhibits safer discharge voltage and higher capacity than graphite, a lower voltage plateau than Li4Ti5O12, and smaller volume difference in the Li+ intercalation/deintercalation process than metals and alloys. However, the comparatively low electronic conductivity, low initial coulombic efficiency (ICE) and serious capacity decay make the Li3VO4 anode unviable when it comes to practical implementation. Therefore, this paper reviews the research progress of Li3VO4 in recent years, mainly including the strategies of developing different synthesis methods to construct unique morphology, through coating, compositing or elemental doping to increase the ICE, electronic conductivity and the cycle constancy. Moreover, the application of Li3VO4 anode materials in other energy storage systems is summarized. Lastly, the development prospect and challenge of Li3VO4 anodes are discussed.

The seismic performance and design method of fabricated concrete bridge piers limit their applications in complex and harsh environments. In this study, a continuous bridge pier in an 8-degree seismic fortification intensity area was considered as a prototype. Two 1/3-scale models were designed and manufactured. The specimens were connected via a grouted sleeve connections (SFP) and a grouted sleeve prestressing tendon composite connections (SSFP), respectively. Moreover, a cast-in-place 1/3-scale model (reinforcement concrete pier, RCP) was designed as a comparison specimen. Quasi-static experiments were performed on these three specimens. The seismic performance of the specimens was analysed according to the failure phenomena, bearing capacity, displacement ductility, stiffness, energy-dissipation capacity, and residual deformation. On these basis, a bearing-capacity estimation method for SFP (including SSFP) was developed and validated. The results indicated that the damage to the SFP and SSFP mainly accumulated along the top and bottom of the sleeves. The plastic hinge area of the SFP and SSFP moved up or down. Thus, the damage to the SFP and SSFP was concentrated at the joints. Cracks first occurred at the seam of the two fabricated specimens when the loading drift was relatively small. Then, the concrete at the loading edge of the joints was crushed. Furthermore, the longitudinal bars yielded and broke. Finally, the specimens failed. Compared with the RCP, the SFP and the SSFP had larger yield and ultimate displacements. The bearing capacities of the RCP and the SFP were similar. However, the bearing capacity of the SSFP was significantly higher. The bearing capacities of the SFP and SSFP did not decrease significantly before the specimens failed. Compared with the RCP, the SFP had a lower initial stiffness, a lower stiffness degradation rate, similar displacement ductility, smaller residual displacement, and less cumulative energy dissipation. The SSFP was better than the SFP with regard to the displacement ductility, initial stiffness, and cumulative energy dissipation. Thus, the SFP and SSFP can satisfy the seismic requirements of high-intensity areas. The proposed bearing-capacity estimation method can be used for the seismic design and evaluation of SFPs and SSFPs.

This paper presents a trilevel risk-averse strategy to configure the grid-scale energy storage systems (ESS) in active distribution network. Unlike the traditional planning framework, which presumes that ESS and renewable energy sources (RES) are cooperatively planned, we consider a practical situation that the siting choice of individual RES owners could be conflict with systems operation target of hosting capacity improvement. To address this challenge, a trilevel ESS planning formulation with “min-max” risk constraint is developed. Also, a scenario-based stochastic program model is incorporated in the lower level problem to handle the random fluctuation of RES outputs. As the resulting risk-constrained trilevel formulation is computationally difficult, we develop a customized column-and-constraint generation algorithm with finite convergence. Numerical studies on 33-bus test system and a real-world 56-bus distribution network indicate that the proposed methodology can effectively enhance the robustness of look-ahead ESS configuration against those non-cooperative and uncertain integration choices for renewable energy construction. Moreover, our customized algorithm demonstrates a superior solution capacity and scalability to support the efficient decisions for risk-averse storage planning.

SiC is a promising functional ceramic material with many great properties. High concentrated SiC slurry with excellent rheology and stability is required in some processes of ceramic forming. In this work, the dispersion of SiC powders was obviously improved by ternary modifiers: γ-(2,3-epoxypropoxy) propytrimethoxysilane (KH560), sodium humate and sodium dodecyl sulfate (SDS). Modified SiC slurry showed the lowest viscosity of 0.168 Pa s at a solid content of 50 vol%. The maximum absolute value of zeta potential of SiC increased from 47.3 to 61.6 mV by modification. Sedimentation experiments showed that a highly stable suspension of modified SiC was obtained at pH 10. SiC green body with high density of 2.643 g/cm3 was prepared with modified powders by slip casting. X-ray photoelectron spectra (XPS) and thermogravimetry (TG) measurements indicated the adsorption of modifiers on SiC surface. Therefore, modified SiC powders could stably disperse in aqueous media due to the increase of electrosteric repulsion between particles. The novel strategy used in this study could further improve the dispersion of SiC powders.

Confocal microscopy is high precision and widely used method for topography measurement. The surface height information is obtained by peak extraction of the axial response signal (ARS) which axial tomography of the surface is required. Therefore, when scanning large-diameter surfaces with a confocal coordinate measuring system (CCMS), the relative horizontal scanning trajectory (RHST) between the confocal sensor and surface is repeated and time-consuming step motion, which greatly increases the measurement time. To improve the scanning measurement efficiency of CCMS, we propose a new location tracking scanning (LTS) method based on multi-focus. In the LTS method, the RHST is a continuous linear motion during the process of axial tomography, and the horizontal motional surface is located and tracked through a series of focuses to restore the ARS. A generatrix profile of a spherical surface is measured to verify the effectiveness of the proposed method, and the results show that the scanning measurement time can be reduced by more than 90% without loss of accuracy of the profile measurement.

In the general 2-satellite formation near Earth, the deputy satellite moves around the chief one, resulting that the relative baseline exhibits the periodical variations in the form of trigonometric functions. In such case, only the certain positions can be employed for interferometric imaging, and the high requirements of Earth observation and remote sensing can be barely satisfied. Therefore, a new tethered satellite-sail system, termed satellite-sail transverse formation, is proposed in this study. The chief satellite is in a sun-synchronous orbit and is connected to one deputy solar sail in a non-Keplerian displaced orbit. Given the continuous solar radiation pressure, the sail can move with the satellite side by side synchronously such that the relative baseline is always perpendicular to the subastral point tracks of the satellites. Our investigation mainly focuses on the relative dynamics and control of the proposed system during the deployment process that is divided into two stages: pop-up and steady release. Subsequently, the deployment dynamics are established considering the chief and deputy satellites as mass points connected by a rigid rod. To ensure a successful deployment, a sliding mode controller with a saturation function is adopted where the control force is provided by the solar radiation pressure and tether tension. The results show that the proposed deployment strategy is successful, and the transverse formation is eventually realized under the smooth rotation of the solar sail.

Metallic nanoparticle (NP)/ceramic composite cermets present desirable broadband absorption of the solar spectrum and thus are the preferred material scheme for constructing cermet-based solar absorbers. However, the effects of fine nanoparticle structural features on the light-matter interactions in nanocermet layers and corresponding cermet-based solar absorbers are still not well clear until now. Herein, we report a systematical investigation on the effects of W (tungsten) nanoparticle sizes, its concentrations and configurations in an alumina matrix on the optical responses of W Al2O3 nanocermet layers and a solar absorber with double-cermet layers. It is found that to possess admirable light absorption features at high temperatures, it is better to maintain the fine particle size of less than 10 nm, isolated states and suitable separations between them for W Al2O3 nanocermets. Thus, the dominated intrinsic absorption of W NPs, their plasmonic excitation and coupling effects among each other all contribute significantly to the broadband optical performance of the cermet layers and the whole absorber. More importantly, this study demonstrates a valuable criterion for maintaining optical performances of nanocermet layers and cermet-based solar absorbers under heating and thus their thermal robustness.

The binary-sized pebble mixed beds at the maximum packing efficiency state were numerical simulated by the DEM simulation to investigate the effect of fixed wall and pebble size ratios. The evolution of the distribution of packing fraction and porosity, radial distribution function and contact force were given and analyzed with emphasis on the effects of the fixed wall and pebble size ratio. The results showed that the fixed wall will result in a reduction of average packing fraction and an obvious wall effect in local porosity distribution. With the increase of the pebble size ratio, the volume fraction of the wall affected regions gradually decrease. The variation of the local packing fraction of the binary-sized pebble bed is mainly determined by the partial packing fraction of large pebbles and the partial packing fraction of small pebbles, respectively, in the regions close to the fixed wall. Furthermore, the fixed wall has little effect on the radial distribution function and contact force. However, the pebble size ratios have great influence on the radial distribution function and the contact force in binary-sized pebble bed at the maximum packing efficiency state. With the increase of the pebble size ratio, the radial distribution functions of the whole pebble beds are consistent with that of small pebbles, and approach to that of the mono-sized pebble bed. In addition, with the increase of the pebble size ratio, a higher contact force can be obtained in pebble beds.

Zinc metal has aroused increasing interest as anode material of Zn-based batteries for their energy storage application. However, the uneven Zn stripping/plating processes induce severe dendrite growth, leading to low Coulombic efficiency and safety hazards. Herein, a surface-tuned two-dimensional (2D) MXene Ti3C2Tx scaffold as a robust skeleton is developed to facilitate the uniform Zn stripping/plating. The Ti3C2Tx with high electrical conductivity and unique structure provides fast ionic-transport paths, promising even Zn2+ stripping/plating processes. With suppressed Zn dendrite growth and uniform nucleation, the proposed 2D Ti3C2Tx scaffold for Zn metal anode delivers a low voltage hysteresis of 63 mV and long lifespan over 280 h. This surface-tuned engineering strategy demonstrates the potential application of Zn anode with MXene skeleton for next-generation Zn-based batteries.

The Fischer-Tropsch (FT) synthesis, as an alternative route to produce high-quality liquid fuels and chemicals, has received considerable attention in recent years. In this work, a nano-sized capsule catalyst (ZrO2@FeCu) with ZrO2 as a core and FeCu bimetallic oxide as a shell was fabricated by urea hydrolysis method. For comparison, FeCu@ZrO2 capsule catalyst was synthesized by the sequential precipitation method. FeCu + ZrO2 reference catalyst was obtained by physically mixing of FeCu and ZrO2 samples. Besides, these catalysts with potassium (K) modification were realized by wetness impregnation method, and the catalysts are denoted as ZrO2@FeCu-K, FeCu@ZrO2-K, and FeCu + ZrO2-K, respectively. The structure-function relationship of the obtained catalysts was systematically clarified by means of a series of characterization techniques, such as BET, XRD, H2-TPR, CO-TPD, XPS, SEM and EDS mapping. Among these catalysts after reduction, ZrO2@FeCu-K exhibited the most excellent catalytic performance with 97 % CO conversion and 49 % α-olefins selectivity by promoted CO adsorption.

Generative adversarial network (GAN) has shown profound power in machine learning. It inspires many researchers from other fields to create powerful tools for various tasks, including quantum state preparation, quantum circuit translation, and so on. It is known as classical techniques cannot efficiently simulate the quantum system, and the existing works haven’t investigated the quantum version of maximum mean discrepancy as the metric in learning models and applied it to quantum data. In this paper, we propose a metric named quantum maximum mean discrepancy (qMMD), which can be used to measure the distance between quantum data in Hilbert space. Based on the qMMD, we then design a quantum generative adversarial model, named qMMD-GAN, under the hybrid quantum–classical methods. We also provide the construction of qMMD-GAN that can be easily implemented on a quantum device. We demonstrate the power of our qMMD-GAN by applying it to a crucial real-world application that is generating an unknown quantum state. Our numerical experiments show that qMMD-GAN has a competitive performance compared to existing results. We believe that the hybrid-based models will not only be applied to physics research but provide a new direction for improving classical data processing tasks.

Existing methods that use document-level information for event detection ignore the dependencies between sentences and also have shortcomings in modeling the dependencies among words. In this paper, we propose a novel Hierarchical Graph Enhanced Event Detection (HGEED) framework to make full use of syntax and document information for the task of event detection. First, a sentence graph is used to model word-to-word dependencies, enriching the local information of words by incorporating syntactic features. Then, a document graph is built to model sentence-to-sentence dependencies, obtaining global semantic representations for word-level prediction. The experiment results on the widely used ACE 2005 and TAC KBP 2015 corpora show that our model can capture local and global information with dependencies and achieve significant improvements as compared to all baselines.

Automatic segmentation of lung lesions from COVID-19 computed tomography (CT) images can help to establish a quantitative model for diagnosis and treatment. For this reason, this article provides a new segmentation method to meet the needs of CT images processing under COVID-19 epidemic. The main steps are as follows: First, the proposed region of interest extraction implements patch mechanism strategy to satisfy the applicability of 3-D network and remove irrelevant background. Second, 3-D network is established to extract spatial features, where 3-D attention model promotes network to enhance target area. Then, to improve the convergence of network, a combination loss function is introduced to lead gradient optimization and training direction. Finally, data augmentation and conditional random field are applied to realize data resampling and binary segmentation. This method was assessed with some comparative experiment. By comparison, the proposed method reached the highest performance. Therefore, it has potential clinical applications.

Nanoscale materials possess distinct physical and chemical attributes including size-dependent properties, quantum confinement, high surface-to-volume ratio, and superior catalytic activity. These unique qualities enable sensors with high sensitivity, robustness, and fast time response. As the emergence of the Internet of Things (IoT) demands increased production of sensors, it also provides an impetus for concentrated nanomaterial-based sensor research. Meanwhile, additive manufacturing (AM) of nanomaterial-based sensors is critical to bridge the gap between one-off, lab-scale fabrication and cost-effective, industrial-scale production with high reproducibility. By applying the design flexibility and cost savings of AM techniques, a new generation of nanomaterial-based sensing platforms can be integrated with IoT devices in the consumer space. Furthermore, emergent research in human–machine interfaces, food safety, and point-of-care diagnostics will be expedited by the development of sensors that can be printed with irregular form factors. In this Review, the relative strengths and weaknesses of printed sensor systems based on zero-, one-, and two-dimensional nanomaterials are discussed. In addition, sensors enabled by printable soft nanomaterials, heterostructures, and nanocomposites are surveyed due to their synergistic advantages for wearable healthcare monitoring and soft robotics. Finally, a roadmap for the next decade of research on this topic is provided.

Permanent magnet machines have been used in the high‐speed drive applications due to their high‐efficiency, high‐power‐density, and wide‐speed range characteristics. However, control of such high‐speed permanent magnet machines machine is always challenging and proper flux‐weakening controller design is essential to achieve high performance of these machines. In this paper, an improved feedforward flux‐weakening control scheme for interior permanent magnet synchronous machine (IPMSM) drives are proposed. The proposed method identifies optimal d‐axis and q‐axis currents under different operation regions using maximum‐torque‐per‐ampere curve, voltage limit, and current limit curves with a fast Newton–Raphson algorithm. To ensure the optimal performance of the control mechanism, effects of inductance variations due to the magnetic saturation are considered and an innovative high‐frequency staircase voltage injection method is used to identify the q‐axis inductance. The experimental results show that compared with other existing flux‐weakening methods, the proposed technique can improve the DC‐link voltage utilisation without the need to tune any controller gains and can fully utilise maximum available torque with desirable transient performance.

Given the superior thermal stability and electromagnetic features, continuous Si–B–(C)–N ceramic fibers have displayed great potential to fulfill the increasing demand for the high-temperature structural and functional materials. Manufacture of such ceramic fibers depends heavily upon the design of processable polymer precursors. Herein, a class of polyborosilazanes (PBSZs) with high spinnability were created through a facile one-pot synthesis. The trade-off between spinnability and ceramic yield of PBSZs was overcome by using heptamethyldisilazane and hexamethyldisilazane as the co-condensing agents to polymerize silicon and boron chloride monomers. The optimal PBSZs can fabricate continuous Si–B–C–N fibers with homogeneous diameter of 7.9 ± 0.5 μm and high ceramic yield of 80 wt%. Experimental characterization and quantum chemical computation revealed the mechanistic pictures of the impact of pendant groups on the polycondensation, melt spinning, and pyrolyzing process. These insights improve our understanding of spinnable pre-ceramic polymers for exploiting high-performance nitride ceramic fibers.

To improve anaerobic digestion (AD) efficiency of rice straw, solid alkaline CaO and the liquid fraction of digestate (LFD) were used as pretreatment agents of rice straw. The results showed that AD performance of rice straw with CaO − LFD pretreatment was optimal in different pretreatment methods of the CaO + LFD, CaO − LFD, LFD + CaO, CaO, and LFD. The maximum methane yield (314 ml⋅(g VS)−1) and the highest VFAs concentration (14851 mg⋅L−1 on day 3) of the CaO − LFD pretreatment group were 81% and 118% higher than that of the control group, respectively. Under the action of solid alkaline CaO, the bacteria of Clostridium, Atopostipes, Sphaerochaeta, Tissierella, Thiopseudomonas, Rikenellaceae, and Sedimentibacter could build up co-cultures with the archaeal of Methanosaeta, Methanobacterium, and Methanosarcina performing direct interspecies electron transfer (DIET) and improving AD performance of rice straw. Therefore, the combined pretreatment using CaO and LFD could not only pretreat rice straw but also stimulate co-cultures of microorganism to establish DIET enhancing AD efficiency.

Perovskite quantum dots (PQDs) have been devised as an efficient narrow half-width phosphor and received extensive attention due to their high photoluminescence quantum yield (PLQY), adjustable emission colour and high colour purity. However, the low stability of perovskite quantum dots seriously affects its performance and application. Here, we have proposed a simple ligand-assisted precipitation method to encapsulate PQDs in zirconium silicate (ZrSi). Owing to the special stacked structure and high specific surface area of ZrSi, the composite material exhibits extremely high humidity stability and thermal stability compared to pure PQDs. Both ZrSi/CH3NH3PbBr3 PQDs and ZrSi/CsPbBr3 PQDs prepared by ZrSi packaging exhibit excellent luminescence properties, and the three-colour phosphor composite prepared by changing the halogen ratio has a very high colour gamut. In addition, ZrSi/CH3NH3PbBr3 PQDs and ZrSi/CsPbBr3 PQDs assembled white light-emitting diodes (LEDs) also have very excellent optical properties. This work provides a new method for the synthesis of high-stability perovskite quantum dots for white LED and display materials by using stacked structure materials.

The development of Fe-coordination polymer-based nanoparticles, with safe and high anti-tumor effects, for the treatment of tumor is facing challenges such as limited resources and poor targeting. In this study, we prepared Fe-polyhydroxy coordination polymer nanoparticles (TA-Fe@MNPs), based on tartaric acid (TA)–Fe(III) coordination polymer as the new photothermal agent, mannose (M) as the target, and bovine serum albumin (BSA) and polyethyleneimine (PEI) as the carrier materials, and investigated them for targeting the multifunctional therapy of tumors. The TA-Fe@MNPs synthesized via a simple coordination of Fe3+ with TA, bovine serum albumin, and polyethyleneimine under ambient conditions exhibited an appropriate size (~125 nm), electrically neutral surfaces, good biocompatibility, and low normal cell toxicity. The TA-Fe@MNPs are the first to exhibit a remarkable photothermal performance. They also showed a pH-sensitive Fenton-like response that was further enhanced via glutathione response. Interestingly, after a single injection, the TA-Fe@MNPs could be retained at the tumor site for 36 h with an effective photothermal dose, which was attributed to the reduced protein adsorption and slow elimination in tumor cells with the aid of M modification and carrier materials, while that for the TA-Fe@NPs did so for only 2 h. Tumor ablation was demonstrated by in vivo photothermal and chemokinetic therapy using TA-Fe@MNPs, and their safety was evident from the weight changes and blood parameters. These results indicated that the TA-Fe@MNPs, as new photothermal and CDT agents, have the potential to be used in clinical tumor therapy nanoplatforms.

Ti3C2TX MXene has been proven to be a material of high application potential in the field of electromagnetic (EM) protection. Considering the density, MXene/polymer films (MPFs) are fabricated by employing the simple tape casting process and exhibit excellent electromagnetic shielding performance with respect to the MXene content. However, the absorption properties of as-fabricated MPFs are not satisfactory due to the impedance mismatch. Herein, a multilayer impedance gradient absorber with MPFs arranged in order has been successfully designed and prepared. The developed absorber possesses excellent EM wave absorption properties owing to the well-matched impedance and adjustment of permittivity. Moreover, the effect of the thickness of MPFs on the EM wave absorbing properties has been investigated by theoretical calculations and experimental measurements. The HFSS calculation reveals that the effective absorption bandwidth is capable to cover the whole X-band (8.2–12.4 GHz) with only a micro-adjustment of the thickness, with the minimum reflection coefficient (RCmin) reaching up to −26.10 dB. In addition, the synergistic effect of the multiple loss mechanisms has been discussed in detail. This study not only proposes the effective design of a novel multilayer impedance gradient absorber, but also provides new fundamental basis for combining the simulation technology and material design.

Modifying traditional photocatalysts has always been the focus of scientists’ efforts. Using piezoelectric potential to assist photocatalysis can improve catalytic efficiency. The catalytic performance of BaTiO3 was further enhanced by surface modification of silver nanoparticles deposited by a simple photoreduction method. The synergism among piezo-, photo-catalysis and the LSPR effect greatly enhanced the catalytic efficiency (more than 240%). The involved free radicals generated in the catalytic system and the cycle stability of the catalysts were examined. Based on the experimental results, an enhanced synergistic catalytic mechanism of BaTiO3 modified with Ag was proposed. The strategy presented here provides ideas for realizing the development of high-efficient catalysts for practical applications.

Carbon coated silicon nanoparticle is regarded as a promising anode material for the next generation of lithium ion batteries, while the development of a cost-effective and environmental-friendly preparation method is still difficult and hinders the practical implementation. In this research, a controllable and byproduct-free synthesis method is proposed for the preparation of silicon nanoparticles with amorphous hydrogenated carbon coating. The current apparatus is operated based on the application of induction thermal plasma. Plasma properties are tunable by adjusting the ratio of tangential and radial gas flow rates (T/R), which compose the plasma sheath gas. Obtained results reveal the plasma shape is shrunk with higher T/R values, which will lead to a steeper temperature gradient and lower temperature distributions in reaction chamber. Consequently, the compositions and properties of synthesized particles can be modified with T/R values. The formation of SiC, which was an intractable issue before, can be vanished at higher tangential gas flow rates in current research and the capacity of silicon anode for batteries will be improved in predict. This research is significant for a deep understanding of plasma synthesis processing and design of batteries with excellent performance.

To investigate the load transfer mechanism of open and closed Pre-stressed High-strength Concrete (PHC) piles jacked into layered soil, a full-scale in-situ test was conducted. In this test, the axial stress experienced by one open and two closed PHC pipe piles during jacking into layered soil was monitored using Fiber Bragg Grating (FBG) sensors mounted on pile shaft. The test results showed that (1) The jacking force on pile depended on the soil mechanical properties at the end of pile; (2) The variation of axial force on pile reflected that the compaction effect of soil for closed pile was larger than that for open pile; (3) At the beginning of penetration depth, the variation of shaft and end resistances on the open pile were different from those on the closed piles; (4) The variation of average shaft resistance relied on the mechanical properties of soil at the side of pile.

This study evaluated the differences in the physicochemical, digestion and microstructure of soy protein gels acidified with Lactobacillus casei (L. casei), glucono-δ-lactone (GDL) and citric acid. The maximum acidification rate was as follows: citric acid > GDL > L. casei. The gelation points of L. casei-induced gel (LC gel) and GDL-induced gel (GDL gel) occurred at 74 min and 55 min; however, gelation point of citric acid-induced gel (CA gel) was not detected because acidification was too fast. LC gel showed the high gel hardness (20.40 ± 2.23 g) and water holding capacity (84.58 ± 0.59%). At the end of intestinal digestion, the average particle size of the LC gel was the largest, but there was no significant difference between GDL gel and CA gel. The microstructure of the GDL gel was found to be the densest. Acidification rate was the “key step” of acid-induced gels, while both the proteolytic and exopolysaccharide (EPS) production capacity were involved in LC gel.