Evaluation of process parameters of ultrasonic treatment of bacterial suspensions in a pilot scale water disinfection system

In this study, several process parameters that may contribute to the efficiency of ultrasound disinfection are examined on a pilot scale water disinfection system that mimics realistic circumstances as encountered in an industrial environment. The main parameters of sonication are: (i) power; (ii) duration of treatment; (iii) volume of the treated sample. The specific energy (E_s) is an indicator of the intensity of the ultrasound treatment because it incorporates the transferred power, the duration of sonication and the treated volume. In this study, the importance of this parameter for the disinfection efficiency was assessed through changes in volume of treated water, water flow rate and electrical power of the ultrasonic reactor. In addition, the influences of the initial bacterial concentration on the disinfection efficiency were examined. The disinfection efficiency of the ultrasonic technique was scored on a homogenous and on a mixed bacterial culture suspended in water with two different types of ultrasonic reactors (Telsonic and Bandelin). This study demonstrates that specific energy, treatment time of water with ultrasound and number of passages through the ultrasonic reactor are crucial influential parameters of ultrasonic disinfection of contaminated water in a pilot scale water disinfection system. The promising results obtained in this study on a pilot scale water disinfection system indicate the possible application of ultrasound technology to reduce bacterial contamination in recirculating process water to an acceptable low level. However, the energy demand of the ultrasound equipment is rather high and therefore it may be advantageous to apply ultrasound in combination with another treatment.     

On computing rational Gauss-Chebyshev quadrature formulas

We provide an algorithm to compute the nodes and weights for Gauss-Chebyshev quadrature formulas integrating exactly in spaces of rational functions with arbitrary real poles outside . Contrary to existing rational quadrature formulas, the computational effort is very low, even for extremely high degrees, and under certain conditions on the poles it can be shown that the complexity is of order . This method is based on the derivation of explicit expressions for Chebyshev orthogonal rational functions, which are (thus far) the only examples of explicitly known orthogonal rational functions on with arbitrary real poles outside this interval.

     

Selectivity and sensitivity of a reagentless electrochemical DNA sensor studied by square wave voltammetry and fluorescence

Poly(5-hydroxy-1,4-naphthoquinone-co-5-hydroxy-3-thioacetic acid-1,4-naphthoquinone)-modified electrode is used for the direct electrochemical detection of oligonucleotide hybridization. The polymer film presents well-defined electroactivity in the cathodic potential domain (between 0 and -0.8 V/SCE), due to the quinone group embedded into the polymer structure. The detection can be performed simply by square wave voltammetry. This sensor is a "signal-on" device and works with different oligonucleotide lengths, from 10 to 30 bases. Quantitative results from fluorescence are consistent with electrochemical data. It is confirmed that the signal increase in square wave voltammetry is unambiguously due to hybridization. The biosensor presents a detection limit of target of ca. 25 nM and is highly selective as it can discriminate single mismatch base.     

A curved no-slip boundary condition for the lattice Boltzmann method

We present a generalization of the no-slip boundary condition by Lätt et al. [J. Lätt, B. Chopard, O. Malaspinas, M. Deville, A. Michler, Straight velocity boundaries in the lattice Boltzmann method, Physical Review E 77 (5) (2008) 056703] from straight to curved geometries for the lattice Boltzmann Bhatnager–Gross–Krook method (LBGK). The boundary condition is based on a reconstruction of the populations from the density, velocity and rate of strain. For curved boundaries, the reconstruction reduces the question of accuracy to a technical issue of interpolation. We present a method of interpolation allowing a very accurate representation of the curved boundary. The resulting boundary condition is verified for three different test cases: Taylor–Couette flow in-between rotating cylinders, laminar flow around a cylinder and flow past an impulsively started cylinder, demonstrating its second order accuracy and low error constant. The present boundary is stable for relaxation frequencies close to two.     

Arbitrage and utility maximization in market models with an insider

We study arbitrage opportunities, market viability and utility maximization in market models with an insider. Assuming that an economic agent possesses an additional information in the form of an \(\mathscr {F}_T\)-measurable discrete random variable G, we give criteria for the no unbounded profits with bounded risk property to hold, characterize optimal arbitrage strategies, and prove duality results for the utility maximization problem faced by the insider. Examples of markets satisfying NUPBR yet admitting arbitrage opportunities are provided. For the case when G is a continuous random variable, we consider the notion of no asymptotic arbitrage of the first kind (NAA1) and give an explicit construction for unbounded profits if NAA1 fails.     

Complete characterisation of the customer delay in a queueing system with batch arrivals and batch service

Whereas the buffer content of batch-service queueing systems has been studied extensively, the customer delay has only occasionally been studied. The few papers concerning the customer delay share the common feature that only the moments are calculated explicitly. In addition, none of these surveys consider models including the combination of batch arrivals and a server operating under the full-batch service policy (the server waits to initiate service until he can serve at full capacity). In this paper, we aim for a complete characterisation—i.e., moments and tail probabilities - of the customer delay in a discrete-time queueing system with batch arrivals and a batch server adopting the full-batch service policy. In addition, we demonstrate that the distribution of the number of customer arrivals in an arbitrary slot has a significant impact on the moments and the tail probabilities of the customer delay.     

Delay analysis of two batch-service queueing models with batch arrivals: Geo X /Geo c /1

In this paper, we compute the probability generating functions (PGF’s) of the customer delay for two batch-service queueing models with batch arrivals. In the first model, the available server starts a new service whenever the system is not empty (without waiting to fill the capacity), while the server waits until he can serve at full capacity in the second model. Moments can then be obtained from these PGF’s, through which we study and compare both systems. We pay special attention to the influence of the distribution of the arrival batch sizes. The main observation is that the difference between the two policies depends highly on this distribution. Another conclusion is that the results are considerably different as compared to Bernoulli (single) arrivals, which are frequently considered in the literature. This demonstrates the necessity of modeling the arrivals as batches.