Upper Critical Solution Temperature-Type Responsive Cyclodextrins with Characteristic Inclusion Abilities

Water-soluble and thermoresponsive macrocycles with stable inclusion toward guests are highly valuable to construct stimuli-responsive supramolecular materials for versatile applications. Here, we develop such macrocycles – ureido-substituted cyclodextrins (CDs) which exhibit unprecedented upper critical solution temperature (UCST) behavior in aqueous media. These novel CD derivatives showed good solubility in water at elevated temperature, but collapsed from water to form large coacervates upon cooling to low temperature. Their cloud points are greatly dependent on concentration and can be mediated through oxidation and chelation with silver ions. Significantly, the amphiphilicity of these CD derivatives is supportive to host-guest binding, which affords them inclusion abilities to guest dyes. The inclusion complexation remained nearly intact during thermally induced phase transitions, which is in contrast to the switchable inclusion behavior of lower critical solution temperature (LCST)-type CDs. Moreover, ureido-substituted CDs were exploited to co-encapsulate a pair of guest dyes whose fluorescence resonance energy transfer process can be switched by the UCST phase transition. We therefore believe these novel thermoresponsive CDs may form a new strategy for developing smart macrocycles and allow for exploring smart supramolecular materials.     

再谈Minc-Sathre不等式的上下界

用调和平均值、均值不等式之间的关系及对数平均不等式,对Minc-Sathre不等式的上下界进行改进,使结论更精确.     

A note on a priori error estimates for augmented mixed methods

In this note we describe a strategy that improves the a priori error bounds for augmented mixed methods under appropriate hypotheses. This means that we can derive a priori error estimates for each one of the involved unknowns. Usually, the standard a priori error estimate is for the total error. Finally, a numerical example is included, that illustrates the theoretical results proven in this paper.     

Boundary problems for fractional differential equations

In this paper, the existence of solutions of fractional differential equations with nonlinear boundary conditions is investigated. The monotone iterative method combined with lower and upper solutions is applied. Fractional differential inequalities are also discussed. Two examples are added to illustrate the results.     

On solitary wave solutions to the nonlinear Schrödinger equations with two parameters

In this paper, we discuss the existence and multiplicity of positive solitary wave solutions for nonlinear Schrödinger equations with two parameters. The proof is based on the method of upper and lower solutions and the fixed point index.     

Comparison of scale factor estimators for ultrasonic temperature monitoring: Application to structural health monitoring

In Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) of materials, estimating the effects of environmental and operational conditions such as temperature is important. Indeed, temperature changes induce modifications of the mechanical properties of the material and therefore cause a dilation of the acoustic signals characterized by a scale factor. This paper described four scale factor estimators able to monitor changes in temperature: The short-time cross-correlation (STXC) method, the stretching method (STRE), the Minimum Variance Based Estimator method (MVBE) and the Scale Transform Based Estimator method (STBE). The first two methods have already been assessed in the literature while the latter two have been specifically developed for this study. First, closed-form for the Cramer-Rao bound on the estimates of the scale factor, from a simplified deterministic signal, are derived and simplified expressions are given. Then, a statistical evaluation of the quality of estimates is conducted through Monte-Carlo simulations using synthetic signals, based on a model taking into account the influence of temperature. A raw estimate of the computational complexity of signal processing methods also completes this evaluation phase. Finally, the experimental validation of estimation methods is conducted on an aluminum plate subjected to temperatures variations in a controlled thermal environment. The temperature estimates are then faced with an analytical model describing the material behavior.     

Generalized matching theorems for closed coverings of convex sets

In this paper we use fixed point and coincidence theorems due to Park [8] to give matching theorems concerning closed coverings of nonempty convex sets in a real topological vector space. Our new results extend previously given ones due to Ky Fan [2], [3], Shih [10], Shih and Tan [11], and Park [7].