Benchtop micromolding of polystyrene by soft lithography

Polystyrene (PS), a standard material for cell culture consumable labware, was molded into microstructures with high fidelity of replication by an elastomeric polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) mold. The process was a simple, benchtop method based on soft lithography using readily available materials. The key to successful replica molding by this simple procedure relies on the use of a solvent, for example, gamma-butyrolactone, which dissolves PS without swelling the PDMS mold. PS solution was added to the PDMS mold, and evaporation of the solvent was accomplished by baking the mold on a hotplate. Microstructures with feature sizes as small as 3 μm and aspect ratios as large as 7 were readily molded. Prototypes of microfluidic chips made from PS were prepared by thermal bonding of a microchannel molded in PS with a flat PS substrate. The PS microfluidic chip displayed much lower adsorption and absorption of hydrophobic molecules (e.g. rhodamine B) compared to a comparable chip created from PDMS. The molded PS surface exhibited stable surface properties after plasma oxidation as assessed by contact angle measurement. The molded, oxidized PS surface remained an excellent surface for cell culture based on cell adhesion and proliferation. To demonstrate the application of this process for cell biology research, PS was micromolded into two different microarray formats, microwells and microposts, for segregation and tracking of non-adherent and adherent cells, respectively. The micromolded PS possessed properties that were ideal for biological and bioanalytical needs, thus making it an alternative material to PDMS and suitable for building lab-on-a-chip devices by soft lithography methods.     

Minimum intelligent neural device: A tool for social simulation

A simple but effective neural network algorithm illustrates common principles of this new class of computational tools. Designed for use in a range of simulation studies, this minimum intelligent neural device is capable of learning which of a complex set of stimuli to avoid, and large numbers of these devices can be assembled in programs to explore the development of prejudice and of various interaction strategies. Neural nets are error‐reduction algorithms with the potential to perform a wide range of useful tasks, including modeling theories of the social consequences of human error.     

Automorphic Equivalence within Gapped Phases of Quantum Lattice Systems

Gapped ground states of quantum spin systems have been referred to in the physics literature as being ‘in the same phase’ if there exists a family of Hamiltonians H(s), with finite range interactions depending continuously on \({s\in [0,1]}\), such that for each s, H(s) has a non-vanishing gap above its ground state and with the two initial states being the ground states of H(0) and H(1), respectively. In this work, we give precise conditions under which any two gapped ground states of a given quantum spin system that ’belong to the same phase’ are automorphically equivalent and show that this equivalence can be implemented as a flow generated by an s-dependent interaction which decays faster than any power law (in fact, almost exponentially). The flow is constructed using Hastings’ ‘quasi-adiabatic evolution’ technique, of which we give a proof extended to infinite-dimensional Hilbert spaces. In addition, we derive a general result about the locality properties of the effect of perturbations of the dynamics for quantum systems with a quasi-local structure and prove that the flow, which we call the spectral flow, connecting the gapped ground states in the same phase, satisfies a Lieb-Robinson bound. As a result, we obtain that, in the thermodynamic limit, the spectral flow converges to a co-cycle of automorphisms of the algebra of quasi-local observables of the infinite spin system. This proves that the ground state phase structure is preserved along the curve of models H(s), 0 ≤ s ≤ 1.     

Quantum Harmonic Oscillator Systems with Disorder

We study many-body properties of quantum harmonic oscillator lattices with disorder. A sufficient condition for dynamical localization, expressed as a zero-velocity Lieb-Robinson bound, is formulated in terms of the decay of the eigenfunction correlators for an effective one-particle Hamiltonian. We show how state-of-the-art techniques for proving Anderson localization can be used to prove that these properties hold in a number of standard models. We also derive bounds on the static and dynamic correlation functions at both zero and positive temperature in terms of one-particle eigenfunction correlators. In particular, we show that static correlations decay exponentially fast if the corresponding effective one-particle Hamiltonian exhibits localization at low energies, regardless of whether there is a gap in the spectrum above the ground state or not. Our results apply to finite as well as to infinite oscillator systems. The eigenfunction correlators that appear are more general than those previously studied in the literature. In particular, we must allow for functions of the Hamiltonian that have a singularity at the bottom of the spectrum. We prove exponential bounds for such correlators for some of the standard models.     

Q-switched thulium-doped photonic crystal fiber laser

We report a novel, Tm-doped photonic crystal fiber (PCF) actively Q-switched oscillator that provides ~8.9 kW peak power with 435 μJ, 49 ns pulses at 10 kHz repetition rate at 2 μm wavelength. This fiber has a mode-field area >1000 μm2, the largest of any flexible PCF providing diffraction-limited beam quality to the best of our knowledge. As an application, the oscillator is used as pump to generate >350 nm broadening in ~50 m of SMF-28 fiber.     

Fuzzy stability analysis of regenerative chatter in milling

During machining, unstable self-excited vibrations known as regenerative chatter can occur, causing excessive tool wear or failure, and a poor surface finish on the machined workpiece. Consequently it is desirable to predict, and hence avoid the onset of this instability. Regenerative chatter is a function of empirical cutting coefficients, and the structural dynamics of the machine-tool system. There can be significant uncertainties in the underlying parameters, so the predicted stability limits do not necessarily agree with those found in practice. In the present study, fuzzy arithmetic techniques are applied to the chatter stability problem. It is first shown that techniques based upon interval arithmetic are not suitable for this problem due to the issue of recursiveness. An implementation of fuzzy arithmetic is then developed based upon the work of Hanss and Klimke. The arithmetic is then applied to two techniques for predicting milling chatter stability: the classical approach of Altintas, and the time-finite element method of Mann. It is shown that for some cases careful programming can reduce the computational effort to acceptable levels. The problem of milling chatter uncertainty is then considered within the framework of Ben-Haim's information-gap theory. It is shown that the presented approach can be used to solve process design problems with robustness to the uncertain parameters. The fuzzy stability bounds are then compared to previously published data, to investigate how uncertainty propagation techniques can offer more insight into the accuracy of chatter predictions.     

泥沙输运模拟综述——现状及其发展趋势

随着流体力学中数值方法的飞速发展,计算模型已经成为研究流体运动,泥沙输运和不同环境(诸如河流,湖泊及沿海地区)中相应污染物归趋过程等方面非常有吸引力的工具,在过去的30多年里,发展了许多计算水动力学/泥沙输运模型.文章追溯当前具有代表性的(一维、二维、三维)模型的发展历程,描述他们各自的特点,优势及局限,力图作为对模型方面感兴趣读者的第一指南,同时也为大家讨论模型的局限性,未来的发展趋势和研究需求方面搭建一个平台.给出了模型的表达,时空特性,水动力学和沉积物的耦合方式,处理非恒定流,推移质和悬移质,泥沙交换过程,泥沙类型(粘性或非粘性)及非均匀泥沙输运的能力.总结了不同模型的应用实例,读者可以运用这些例子作为研究模型设置,模型率定及模型验证的参考.给出了选择泥沙输运模型应遵循的原则,模型输入及率定方面存在的问题及改进的途径.探讨了现有水动力学/泥沙输运模型在处理复杂湍流,泥沙携带,流动与输沙耦合,非均匀泥沙,离散和扩散系数,河岸来沙处理等方面的局限性及改进的方向.最后,对基于多相流思想的泥沙输运模型及其它一些交叉性问题作了评述与展望.     

Experimental investigation of the onsets of gas and liquid entrainment from a small branch mounted on an inclined wall

The phenomena of the onsets of liquid entrainment and gas entrainment were investigated experimentally for the case of a flat plane with a circular outlet branch of diameter d (=6.35 mm) at the plane centre. This flat plane was situated in a large tank containing a stratified mixture of air and water under pressure (317 kPa for most experiments and 520 kPa for a few experiments) and at room temperature. The plane was inclined through various angles (θ) in increments of 30°, from the outlet branch orientation being vertically upward through the horizontal to vertically downward. For both onsets the vertical distance between the centre of the outlet branch and the undisturbed gas–liquid interface (h) was measured for various angles of inclination and Froude numbers. Both onsets were observed visually through a large viewing part of the test section. It was found that for both onsets there is a range of inclination angles where the onset h depended on θ and a range where the onset h essentially did not depend on θ. The data were correlated in terms of onset h/d, Froude number, and θ where there was dependence of onset h on the angle of inclination.