Strategic bidding in an accumulating priority queue: equilibrium analysis

This paper considers the pricing decisions of substitutable products which are produced by duopolistic manufacturers respectively and then sold by one common retailer to the consumers. Both the manufacturing cost and the customer demand for each product are characterized as fuzzy variables. Six expected value models are developed to explore the effects of the duopolistic manufacturers’ three pricing strategies (i.e. Bertrand competition, Stackelberg competition, cooperation) and vertical competition between the manufacturers and the retailer on the optimal pricing decisions and channel profit-split of a two echelon supply chain, and the corresponding analytical solutions are derived. Finally, a numerical example is given to illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed models, and to gain additional managerial insights.     

Phase transitions in ultraoriented polyethylene fibers under moderate pressures: A synchrotron X-ray study

The effect of pressure on phase transformations of ultradrawn ultra-high-molecular-weight polyethylene (UHMWPE) fibers was examined by in situ X-ray diffraction measurements with synchrotron radiation. The mesomorphic hexagonal phase was metastable even at a relatively low pressure of about 100 bar. The effect of pressure on the melting transitions was larger than in chain-folded structures. The existence and metastability of the hexagonal phase is the basis of compaction technology of UHMWPE fibers in composite materials. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Polym Sci Part B: Polym Phys 42: 53–59, 2004     

Stopping paramagnetic supersonic beams: the advantage of a co-moving magnetic trap decelerator

The long standing goal of chemical physics is finding a convenient method to create slow and cold beams intense enough to observe chemical reactions in the temperature range of a few Kelvin. We present an extensive numerical analysis of our moving magnetic trap decelerator showing that a 3D confinement throughout the deceleration process enables deceleration of almost all paramagnetic particles within the original supersonic expansion to stopping velocities. We show that the phase space region containing the decelerating species is larger by two orders of magnitude as compared to other available deceleration methods.     

Tailoring the trajectory of cell rolling with cytotactic surfaces

Cell separation technology is a key tool for biological studies and medical diagnostics that relies primarily on chemical labeling to identify particular phenotypes. An emergent method of sorting cells based on differential rolling on chemically patterned substrates holds potential benefits over existing technologies, but the underlying mechanisms being exploited are not well characterized. In order to better understand cell rolling on complex surfaces, a microfluidic device with chemically patterned stripes of the cell adhesion molecule P-selectin was designed. The behavior of HL-60 cells rolling under flow was analyzed using a high-resolution visual tracking system. This behavior was then correlated to a number of established predictive models. The combination of computational modeling and widely available fabrication techniques described herein represents a crucial step toward the successful development of continuous, label-free methods of cell separation based on rolling adhesion.