Miracle-dz/UniFAR-FTUs huggingface dataset:
A Novel Nonlinear Device Based on a Reflective Fiber Optic LP01↔LP02 Mode Converter: Dispersion Bistability

A novel nonlinear device for optical bistability based on a reflective fiber grating through the mode coupling between the LP 01 and counter propagating LP 02 modes (i. e., the reflective LP 01 ↔ LP 02 mode converter) is proposed and investigated. Both the transmissive and reflective properties of this nonlinear device are analysed, which show that the output-versus-input relation exhibits the optical bistability. The dispersion effect of optical bistability, i. e. the bistability in respect to the input wavelength, is also investigated. Our results show that when the input wavelength shifts to the shorter wavelength compared with the Bragg wavelength of DFB structure, the threshold of the switching power for the optical bistability can be reduced. When the input wavelength shifts to the longer wavelength, the bistable hysteresis loop is widened and the bistability is strengthened but this is at the expense of increasing the threshold of switching power on. In addition, we also demonstrate that both the threshold powers of switching on and off for a nonlinearly reflective LP 01 ↔ LP 02 mode converter are much lower than those of a conventional nonlinear fiber Bragg grating reflector.
Dominant Ego States in Transactional Analysis in the Context of Managers’ Stress Coping Strategies

: Purpose: The article aims to grasp the relations between the ego states constituting the personality of a human being (manager) and his/her ways of reacting to stressful situations. Knowledge in this area is fascinating from a cognitive point of view and gives excellent opportunities associated with the optimisation of human resources management in the practice of managing enterprises. Design/Methodology/Approach: Two research tools were used in the studies presented in this paper, the CISS Questionnaire and the Ego State Scale of Kälin. The CISS Test enables measuring stress coping styles on three scales, task-oriented coping, emotion-oriented coping, avoidance-oriented coping (SSU). The Ego State Scale refers to the functional model and its authors distinguish the following states, Controlling Parent, Nurturing Parent, Adult, Free Child and Adapted Child. Findings: The paper presents results of studies the purpose of which was to capture the relation between the ego states, comprising an individual’s identity, and the mode in which the individual reacts to stressful situations. The knowledge gathered about the correlation between the individual ego states and styles of coping with stress was subjected to a multi-aspect analysis and interpretation, whereas its results offer a good insight into the mechanisms and causes of such relations. Practical Implications: Knowledge about the mutual determinants between the ego states and the preferred styles of coping with stress also offers extensive possibilities of taking practical development steps, aimed at increasing the efficiency of individuals becoming liberated from the adverse impact of stress-inducing stimuli. Originality/Value: The received results have great cognitive and practical significance. They confirm a very close relation between personality and modes in which people handle stress and explain which type of personality features correlate with individual stress coping styles. Increasing interest in Transactional Analysis follows from the fact that it is a theory that delivers a series of practical indications, possible for implementation whilst taking correcting or development actions.
Damage indication in smart structures using modal effective electromechanical coupling coefficients

This work explores the use, in structural health monitoring, of the so-called modal effective electromechanical coupling coefficient (EMCC) as a damage indicator for structures with failures such as cracks. For this purpose, a discrete layered finite element (FE) model for smart beams is proposed and applied to short-circuit (SC) and open-circuit (OC) modal analyses of healthy and damaged (cracked) cantilever beams with symmetrically surface-bonded piezoelectric patches. Focus is made here on enhancing the electrical behavior modeling by introducing a quadratic bubble function in the electric potential through-the-thickness approximation. Therefore, the corresponding higher-order potential (HOP) degree of freedom is condensed at the ply level, leading to a passive stiffening effect (SE) similar to the so-called higher-order induced potential (HIP); then the physical equipotential (EP) electrode effect, often neglected in the piezoelectric FE literature, is here implemented after the electrodes’ FE assembly. After its validation against available analytical and experimental results, the proposed piezoelectric FE is used for parametric analyses of SC-based and OC-based EMCC change factors (ECFs) and frequency change factors (FCFs) in terms of the crack depth and position ratios. It was found that the EP effect was more influential on the ECF than the SE. However, for the FCFs, the EP effect was influential only when it is defined from the OC frequencies. Finally, the ECFs were found to be higher than the FCFs, in particular for higher modes.
p‐Coumaric acid alleviates cisplatin‐induced ovarian toxicity in rats

The therapeutic value of cisplatin (CDDP) as an anticancer drug is limited by its ovo‐otoxicity. The effect of natural phenolic acids in the prevention of many diseases related to oxidative stress has been reported. Here, the ability of p‐coumaric (pCA) acid, a member of phenolic acids, to protect rat ovary tissue against CDDP‐induced oxidative stress was investigated.
Design of a compact ultra-wide-band monopole antenna with band rejection characteristics

This study presents a design of two compact monopole antennas with band-notched characteristics for ultra-wide-band application. The compact antennas are etched on an FR4 substrate with the size of 14 × 16 × 1 mm3, consists of a tree-shaped radiation patch with modified ground structure, providing a wide usable fractional bandwidth of more than 170% (2.8–19.2 GHz). To reject certain-frequency bands, two completely different approaches are proposed. First a shorted T-shaped quarter-wavelength resonator is used to omit undesired frequency band of 5.1–5.9 GHz. In the second approach, two L-shaped slots are inserted in the patch to act as a filter structure for worldwide interoperability for microwave access (3.4–3.6 GHz) and wireless local area network (5–5.6 GHz) applications. The band-notched can be controlled by adjusting the length of the rectangle slots. The effects of dimensional parameters on the antenna performance have been investigated through a parametric study. Furthermore, current density distribution on the antenna is also computed to gain a better insight of its behaviour. The antennas are investigated numerically and experimentally for their impedance matching properties, frequency notched characteristics and radiation performances.
Parangon uses LOM technology to cut product development times

Examines the benefits that a small French engineering design company is experiencing after investing in a Laminated Object Manufacturing [LOM] rapid prototyping machine. It constructs models from layers of paper which are cut to shape by a CO2 laser and glued together by a heated roller. The LOM machines works directly from design data developed by a CAD/CAM system. Gives advantages and disadvantages of the system and looks at possible future developments for the LOM machine, including the handling of new materials such as plastic films.
Basic research on power limb using variable stiffness mechanism

The number of aged people is increasing rapidly and this problem will be more serious in Japan. For this reason, there will be many disabled people who have difficulty in walking in the near future. As one area of engineering support for them, a new control method and mechanism for a power limb are proposed in this paper. The main function of the power limb is to support and transport the human body, and so far, electric motors have been used as actuators. However, a general control method for the power limb has not been established. Furthermore, there is an important problem that the mechanism using only motors costs a large amount of energy during walking. In this paper, past research for artificial legs including power limbs and their problems are reviewed, and a new method for the control of a power limb is proposed. First, to realize effective walking, a novel method for determination of walking parameters is identified. Next, a new design method using variable stiffness to suppress the energy consumption at the knee joint is described. The simulation results show the effectiveness of the proposed method.
DISPLACEMENT-BASED SEISMIC ASSESSMENT OF REINFORCED CONCRETE BUILDINGS

Seismic assessment of existing reinforced concrete frame and shear wall buildings is discussed. Building on an earlier preliminary assessment procedure incorporating aspects of capacity design into a systems approach for assessment, suggestions are made towards a displacement-based, rather than forced-based, approach to determining available seismic capacity. Based on results from recent experimental programs, procedures are proposed for assessing member strength including column and beam-column joint shear-strength, that result in less conservative estimates of performance than would result from application of existing code rules.
Synchrone Programmierung - Grundlagen (Teil 1) (Synchronous Programming - Foundations (Part 1))

Dieser Artikel ist der erste Teil einer dreiteiligen Serie, die in die synchrone Programmierung einführt. Der erste Teil diskutiert die grundlegenden Konzepte an Hand der Programmiersprache Esterel. Der zweite Teil stellt weitere synchrone Programmiersprachen vor, und der dritte entwickelt beispielhaft eine Anwendung.
Analysis of propagation characteristics and field images for printed transmission lines on anisotropic substrates using a 2-D-FDTD method

In this paper, we apply an efficient two-dimensional (2-D) finite-difference time-domain (FDTD) algorithm to an analysis of uniform transmission fines printed on various anisotropic substrates. By investigating the transverse resonant properties of the structures, we obtain their propagation characteristics, as well as the field images at specified frequencies. To eliminate the Gibbs phenomenon generated by a sudden time-stepping termination, we employ the Blackman-Harris window (BHW) function to truncate and modulate the entire time-domain fields, which leads to a significant time saving compared to the conventional time-stepping termination.
Implementing and Testing $d$ – $q$ WPT-Based Digital Protection for Microgrid Systems

This paper presents the implementation and performance evaluation of a new digital protection for microgrid systems, The proposed digital protection is based on utilizing the wavelet packet transform (WPT) for extracting the first-level high-frequency subband contents present in the $d$ – $q$ -axis current components. The utilized WPT is realized by a half-band digital high-pass filter, whose coefficients are determined by the Daubechies $db4$ wavelet basis functions. The $d$ – $q$ WPT-based digital protection is implemented for offline and experimental performance evaluation. Offline tests are conducted using data collected from a simulation model of a microgrid located in Fermeuse, NL, Canada. The experimental tests are conducted on a laboratory microgrid system that is constructed as a scaled version of the Fermeuse microgrid. Several transient disturbances occurring in different parts of the test microgrid systems are investigated both offline and in experimentation. Performance results demonstrate significant abilities of the $d$ – $q$ WPT-based digital protection for fast, accurate, and reliable detection, classification, and response to different transient disturbances. In all tested faults, the developed digital protection is able to generate a trip signal in less than a quarter cycle based on the 60-Hz system operating frequency.
An Overview of Fog Computing and Edge Computing Security and Privacy Issues

With the advancement of different technologies such as 5G networks and IoT the use of different cloud computing technologies became essential. Cloud computing allowed intensive data processing and warehousing solution. Two different new cloud technologies that inherit some of the traditional cloud computing paradigm are fog computing and edge computing that is aims to simplify some of the complexity of cloud computing and leverage the computing capabilities within the local network in order to preform computation tasks rather than carrying it to the cloud. This makes this technology fits with the properties of IoT systems. However, using such technology introduces several new security and privacy challenges that could be huge obstacle against implementing these technologies. In this paper, we survey some of the main security and privacy challenges that faces fog and edge computing illustrating how these security issues could affect the work and implementation of edge and fog computing. Moreover, we present several countermeasures to mitigate the effect of these security issues.
Electronics at Nanoscale: Fundamental and Practical Challenges, and Emerging Directions

In electronics, i.e. when using charge transport and change of electromagnetic fields in devices and systems, non-linearity, collective effects, and a hierarchy of design across length and time scales is central to efficient information processing through manipulation and transmission of bits. Silicon-based electronics brings together a systematic interdependent framework that connects software and hardware to reproducibility, speed, power, noise margin, reliability, signal restoration and communication, low defect count, and an ability to do predictive design across the scales. In the limits of nanometer scale, the dominant practical constraints arise from power dissipation in ever smaller volumes and of efficient signal interconnectivity commensurate with the large density of devices. These limitations are tied to the physical basis in charge transport and changes of fields, and equally apply to other materials – hard, soft or molecular. At the largest scale, the limitations arise from partitioning and hierarchical apportionment for system performance, ease of design and manufacturing. Power management, behavioral encapsulation, fault tolerance, congestion avoidance, timing, placement, routing, electromagnetic cross-talk, etc. all need to be addressed from the perspective of centimeter scale. We take a hierarchical view of the underlying fundamental and practical challenges of the conventional and unconventional approaches using the analytic framework appropriate to the length scale to distinguish between fact and fantasy, and to point to practical emerging directions with a system-scale perspective.
Self-Healing Ability of Smart Coating for Anticorrosion of Reinforcing Steel

Self-healing materials offer tremendous potential for providing long-lived structural materials. In this study, isophorone diisocyanate (IPDI) microcapsules as self-healing materials were synthesized via in situ polymerization. Thermogravimetric analysis characterized the thermal ability of IPDI, microcapsules and microcapsule shells. The morphology of microcapsules and microcapsule shells were characterized by FE-SEM. Scanning micro-reference electrode technique demonstrated that epoxy resin coatings with IPDI microcapsules on the surface of reinforcing steel Q235 could cure the scratched crevice by immersion in 0.01 M NaCl solution after the coating was scratched. The self-healing epoxy resin coating could protect Q235 from corrosion.
Study on IPv6 Capabilities of Mobile Devices

With the rapid development of Internet, the current Internet Protocol IPv4 cannot meet the new requirements. Compared with IPv4, IPv6 has more advantages. Fruitful results have been borne in aspects of IPv6 protocol study and network construction in China. On the other hand, application and popularization of IPv6 is far from sufficient. In recent years, mobile devices have popularized very rapidly. More and more people use mobile devices, including smartphones and tablets, to surf online everywhere. If such a gigantic amount of mobile devices can access network with IPv6, it will be very important for application of IPv6. In this paper, we first analyze the market of mobile devices to determine the devices to be tested. Then we introduce how to construct test environment and test cases. After that, we illustrate the test procedure. Then we summarize how the mainstream mobile devices support IPv6. At the end of this paper, we look forward the future work.
DEFINING A REALISTIC BALANCED SCORECARD - A BUILDING PROCESS TECHNIQUE

This paper examines the connection between structural equation modeling and Balanced Scorecard in a Swiss non-profit organization. Using financial and non- financial data taken directly from the establishment, the paper puts forward a rational construction and analysis of Balanced Scorecard by choosing the right indicators for the right strategic perspectives. This choice is made by implementing a series of Partial Least Squares in the proposed model. In addition, the method determines the cause-and-effect chain defined by Kaplan and Norton as: the measures of organizational learning and growth will impact the measures of internal business processes which in turn will affect the measures of the customer perspective which, finally, will shape the financial measures. It will be observed that the Kaplan and Norton model of Balanced Scorecard is different from the findings in this paper, a case somehow too general to cope with today's complex market environment. Subsequent to this, the study suggests a general approach to build step-by-step a realistic Balanced Scorecard rooted in the actual company's strategy. Finally, the proposed approach will be applied and evidenced in a detailed real case of a Swiss non-profit organization. (Abstract)
A KA BAND MMIC SUPER REGENERATIVE DETECTOR

In this paper for the fvst time a K,, band MMIC oscillator has been designed to enable it to function as a super regenerative detector. This provides a highly sensitive detector from a single PHEMT device operating at 34 GHz. It has been possible to detect a.m. signal levels at -61 dBm for 12dB SINAD, giving a 34 dB improvement over a conventional self oscillating detector using the same MMIC oscillator. Importantly, it has been found that unlike classical super regenerative detectors operating at UHF, the point of maximum detector sensitivity is not equal to the free running oscillation frequency due to the dynamic frequency pushing effects of the oscillator. This gives rise to applications in the area of low cost short range telemetry and sensor applications at KA band.
Fuzzy Friction Controllers For Semi-active Seismic Isolation Systems

Some studies have shown that a conventional seismic isolation system may suffer from an excessive isolator displacement when subjected to a near-fault earthquake that usually has a long-period velocity pulse waveform. In order to alleviate this problem, a semi-active isolation system (SAIS) with a variable friction damper (VFD) controlled by proposed fuzzy controllers is investigated in this study. By varying the clamping force in the VFD damper, the slip force of the damper applied on the isolation system can be regulated on-line. Moreover, in order to determine the clamping force, four types of simple fuzzy controllers are developed based on the concept of antilock braking systems used in automobiles, and their isolation performances are simulated and compared. In addition, in order to assure a fair comparison, four types of earthquakes, namely far-field, weak near-fault, strong near-fault, extreme near-fault earthquakes, representing a wide variety of ground motions are considered as the ground excitations in the simulation. The numerical result shows that among the four fuzzy controllers proposed, the one that takes the ground velocity as an input variable has the best overall performance. As compared to the uncontrolled passive isolation system, the SAIS system with this controller greatly reduces the structural acceleration and base displacement responses simultaneously in a strong or extreme near-fault earthquake, whereas the controller results in a roughly equal level of acceleration response and a much less base displacement in a far-field or weak near-fault earthquake.
Comparison of Two Concepts for Modeling of Lightning Strike into Overhead Line

The paper presents a comparison of results of determining the lightning current flow in the shield wires of a high voltage line, using the model of lightning in the form of a lumped current generator and the antenna model, which takes the electromagnetic coupling into account. The usability of these two models is discussed. Słowa kluczowe: piorun, prąd, przebieg, widmo.
Design specifications for wet-bulb aspirator apparatus

Aspirated psychrometers are commonly used for the measurement of the wet-bulb temperature of a moist air stream. By knowing the wet-bulb temperature, dry-bulb temperature, and pressure, it is possible to determine the thermodynamic state of a moist air stream. ASHRAE Standards 41.6-1994 (ANSI/ASHRAE 2006) and 41.1 (ANSI/ASHRAE 1991) provide detailed design guidelines and considerations required to construct an aspirated psychrometer capable of measuring the wet-bulb temperature to within ±0.10°C (±0.18°F). This article documents the results of ASHRAE research project RP-1460 (2010), which had the objective of establishing design guidelines and considerations required to construct an aspirated psychrometer capable of measuring the wet-bulb temperature to within ±0.05°C (±0.09°F). First, an analytical model is presented and used to optimize an aspirated psychrometer and to predict the error in the measurement of the wet-bulb temperature over a range of conditions. Next, the details of an experimental apparatus are presented. The apparatus is used to verify the results of the analytical model and to establish the accuracy of the optimized psychrometer. Finally, conclusions are drawn as to the practicality of measuring the wet-bulb temperature to within ±0.05°C (±0.09°F).
A 62-GHz monolithic InP-based HBT VCO

A monolithic V-band VCO using InP-based HBT technology has been designed, fabricated, and tested. This VCO delivers a peak output power of 4 dBm at a center frequency of 62.4 GHz with a tuning range of 300 MHz. The measured phase noise shows -78 dBc/Hz at 100 kHz offset and -104 dBc/Hz at 1 MHz offset. To our knowledge, this is the highest frequency fundamental-mode oscillator ever reported using bipolar transistors. >
Refined power quality indices

Major power quality indices such as total harmonic distortion, power factor, K-factor and others are presented, analysed and discussed. The limitations, deficiency and difficulty of practical application of these FFT-based indices in quantifying the quality of three-phase power systems are manifested. Modified versions of each index that avoid its unwanted drawbacks are suggested utilising the potential of wavelet multiresolution signal decomposition. A load nonlinearity indicator is proposed as a novel power quality index. Advantages of the new indices are highlighted.