Bending analysis of a functionally graded rotating disk based on the first order shear deformation theory

The theoretical formulation for bending analysis of functionally graded (FG) rotating disks based on first order shear deformation theory (FSDT) is presented. The material properties of the disk are assumed to be graded in the radial direction by a power law distribution of volume fractions of the constituents. New set of equilibrium equations with small deflections are developed. A semi-analytical solution for displacement field is given under three types of boundary conditions applied for solid and annular disks. Results are verified with known results reported in the literature. Also, mechanical responses are compared between homogeneous and FG disks. It is found that the stress couple resultants in a FG solid disk are less than the stress resultants in full-ceramic and full-metal disk. It is observed that the vertical displacements for FG mounted disk with free condition at the outer surface do not occur between the vertical displacements of the full-metal and full-ceramic disk. More specifically, the vertical displacement in a FG mounted disk with free condition at the outer surface can even be greater than vertical displacement in a full-metal disk. It can be concluded from this work that the gradation of the constitutive components is a significant parameter that can influence the mechanical responses of FG disks.     

A block cipher with dynamic S-boxes based on tent map

In this paper, a block encryption scheme based on dynamic substitution boxes (S-boxes) is proposed. Firstly, the difference trait of the tent map is analyzed. Then, a method for generating S-boxes based on iterating the tent map is presented. The plaintexts are divided into blocks and encrypted with different S-boxes. The cipher blocks are obtained by 32 rounds of substitution and left cyclic shift. To improve the security of the cryptosystem, a cipher feedback is used to change the state value of the tent map, which makes the S-boxes relate to the plaintext and enhances the confusion and diffusion properties of the cryptosystem. Since dynamic S-boxes are used in the encryption, the cryptosystem does not suffer from the problem of fixed structure block ciphers. Theoretical and experimental results indicate that the cryptosystem has high security and is suitable for secure communications.     

ToF-SIMS investigation of octadecylphosphonic acid monolayers on a mica substrate

In this paper, time-of-flight secondary ion mass spectrometry (ToF-SIMS) under static conditions was used to investigate self-assembled monolayers (SAMs) of octadecylphosphonic acid (OPA) formed on freshly cleaved muscovite mica substrates. The coverage of OPA on mica ranged from 20 to 100%, with a film thickness of 1.7+/-0.2 nm, which was determined by atomic force microscopy (AFM) imaging. The relative intensity of the specific secondary ion species associated with the OPA and with the exposed mica substrate exhibited good correlation with surface coverage. An excellent correlation was also observed (R2=0.98) between the relative SIMS [OPA-H]- intensity and the surface carbon concentration (OPA C 1s, in atomic %) from XPS at the prescribed surface coverage. The observation of positive and negative OPA molecular attachment of secondary ions involving the substrate species is discussed in terms of the chemical affinity of the OPA phosphonate headgroup for the cleaved mica surface as well as the sampling depth. In addition, the OPA molecular attachment species formed with the potassium ions on the cleaved mica substrate dominated the positive secondary ion mass spectrum in the high-mass range. A temperature-dependent, ToF-SIMS study employing in situ heating of a 100% coverage OPA monolayer revealed that the molecules begin to diffuse above approximately 80 degrees C, resulting in a decrease in the relative secondary ion yield of the OPA-specific secondary ions. This observation is hypothesized to be due to a decrease in the effective coverage of the substrate by the OPA molecules, which in turn could be due to the formation of multilayers upon heating in an effort to minimize the energy of the system. The interesting behavior of the novel OPA dimer species as a function of temperature is also reported. It was observed that the relative intensity of OPA and the mica-specific secondary ion peak intensities to that of Si (mica substrate) provides an effective means to estimate the change in coverage at elevated temperatures.     

Nanostructure PtRu/MWNTs as anode catalysts prepared in a vacuum for direct methanol oxidation

Platinum and ruthenium nanoparticles that are uniformly dispersed on multiwalled carbon nanotubes (MWNTs) were synthesized by vacuum pyrolysis using Pt(acac)2 and Ru(acac)3 as the metal precursors. The resulting nanocomposites were characterized by transmission electron microscopy and X-ray diffraction. The Pt, Pt45Ru55, and Ru nanoparticles had mean diameters of 3.0 +/- 0.6, 2.7 +/- 0.6, and 2.5 +/- 0.4 nm and the same mole number as their metal precursors at 500 degrees C. The electrocatalytic activity of the Pt/MWNTs and PtRu/MWNTs was investigated at room temperature by cyclic voltammetry and chronoamperometry. All of the electrochemical results showed that the PtRu/MWNTs exhibited a high level of catalytic activity for methanol oxidation as a result of the large surface area of the supporting carbon nanotubes and the wide dispersion of the Pt and Ru nanoparticles. Compared with the Pt/MWNTs, the onset potential for methanol oxidation of the PtRu/MWNTs was significantly lower, and the ratio of the forward anodic peak current to the reverse anodic peak current during methanol oxidation was somewhat higher. The Pt45Ru55/MWNTs displayed the best electrocatalytic activity of all of the carbon-nanotube-supported Pt and PtRu catalysts.     

Use of a ruthenium-containing conjugated polymer as a photosensitizer in photovoltaic devices fabricated by a layer-by-layer deposition process

Multilayer polymer films composed of a ruthenium terpyridine complex containing poly(p-phenylenevinylene) (Ru-PPV) and sulfonated polyaniline (SPAN) were prepared by a layer-by-layer electrostatic self-assembly deposition. The deposition process was carried out from SPAN solution in water and Ru-PPV in dimethylformamide (DMF). Optical-quality multilayer thin films were obtained. The film growth process was monitored by quartz crystal microbalance, and the surface morphology of the films was studied by atomic force microscopy. It was found that the properties of the multilayer films were dependent on deposition conditions such as the pH of the SPAN solution, the presence of salt in the polymer solutions, and the post-film-forming thermal annealing process. Cross-section transmission electron microscopic images suggested that there was no stratified structure formed in the multilayer films. Photovoltaic cells were fabricated by sandwiching the multilayer films between indium-tin-oxide and aluminum electrodes. The device performances were examined by illumination with AM 1.5 simulated solar light. The power conversion efficiencies of these devices were on the order of 10(-3)%. The maximum incident photon-to-electron conversion efficiency (IPCE) of the devices was found to be approximately 2% at 510 nm, which is consistent with the absorption maximum of the ruthenium complex. This indicates that the photosensitization process is due to the electronic excitation of the ruthenium complex.     

Sub part-per-million mass accuracy by using stepwise-external calibration in fourier transform ion cyclotron resonance mass spectrometry

A new external calibration procedure for FT-ICR mass spectrometry is presented, stepwise-external calibration. This method is demonstrated for MALDI analysis of peptide mixtures, but is applicable to any ionization method. For this procedure, the masses of analyte peaks are first accurately measured at a low trapping potential (0.63 V) using external calibration. These accurately determined (< 1 ppm accuracy) analyte peaks are used as internal calibrant points for a second mass spectrum that is acquired for the same sample at a higher trapping potential (1.0 V). The second mass spectrum has a approximately 10-fold improvement in detection dynamic range compared with the first spectrum acquired at a low trapping potential. A calibration equation that accounts for local and global space charge is shown to provide mass accuracy with external calibration that is nearly identical to that of internal calibration, without the drawbacks of experimental complexity or reduction of abundance dynamic range. For the 609 mass peaks measured using stepwise-external calibration method, the root-mean-square error is 0.9 ppm. The errors appear to have a Gaussian distribution; 99.3% of the mass errors are shown to lie within three times the sample standard deviation (2.6 ppm) of their true value.     

Combining low and high mass ion accumulation for enhancing shotgun proteome analysis by accurate mass measurement

A simple procedure is described that increases sensitivity and dynamic range for the analysis of a proteome batch digest by FT-ICR mass spectrometry. Ions at the low and high mass ranges are preferentially collected using two different sets of tuning conditions. By combing data collected using tuning conditions that favor low mass (m/z < 2000) and high mass (m/z > 2000) ions, 277 proteins are identified for a whole cell lysate of Methanococcus maripaludis in a single HPLC-MALDI FT-ICR mass spectrometry experiment, a 70% improvement compared with previous analyses using a wide mass range acquisition. This procedure improves the detection of low abundance ions and thereby increases the range of proteins that are observed. Because the observed mass range is effectively narrower for each spectrum, mass calibration is more accurate than for the standard method that provides a wide range of masses. The trap plate potential on the analyzer cell may be set to a higher value than used for wide mass range measurements, increasing the ion capacity of the analyzer cell and extending the dynamic range, while still maintaining mass accuracy.     

Integration of genomic data for pharmacology and toxicology using Internet resources

Genome based technologies such as sequencing and gene expression profiling using microarrays are creating massive amounts of data. Results from these studies have provided unique insights into targets, biochemical pathways, and biological systems affected by drug or xenobiotic chemical treatments. Moreover, these genomic technologies offer the potential to identify biomarkers for pharmacological development or toxicological prediction. Nonetheless, microarray studies involving a single compound produce useful although limited data. To gain further power from these individual studies, the ability to combine datasets through integration schemes has become imperative. In the current study, we describe and analyze currently available Internet resources designed to address this problem. Many functionalities, such as ability to cross reference orthologous genes across species or to combine same technology platform data, are present in these resources. Nonetheless, these resources are limited in the number of technology platforms they can support. While the ability to integrate all currently existing gene expression datasets remains enigmatic, the current tools provide a partial solution that may still yield unique insights into the affects of exogenous molecules at the level of gene expression.     

What makes the cylinder-shaped N72 cage stable?

Recent theoretical studies have suggested that the stabilizing factors for large nitrogen cages tend to favor more five-membered rings, more three-membered rings, and cylindrical structures with large numbers of layers. One of the major issues in this study of the all-nitrogen molecule is the determination of what brings about the stabilizing factors. Herein, the cylinder-shaped molecule of N72 (D3d) has been studied in detail. The geometry and energies are examined at B3LYP/cc-pVDZ, and single-point energy calculations at MP2/cc-pVDZ are carried out for the purposes of determining relative thermodynamic stability. Natural bond order (NBO) analysis and atoms in molecules (AIM) analysis are applied to investigate the bonding properties of the cage molecule. The major result of this study is the identification of intramolecular interactions, whether it is at B3LYP/cc-pVDZ or at MP2/cc-pVDZ, as the dominant stabilizing factor for the large all-nitrogen cage. The length of the cylinder-shaped molecule is about 2.2 nm. N72 (D3d) might be one novel nanomaterial which is environment friendly, and as a beeline nanotube or a beeline "nano-bar", it is expected to impact a wide range of applications.     

Grignard reagents in ionic liquids

Grignard reagents were generated from magnesium and organic iodides in the ionic liquid n-butylpyridinium tetrafluoroborate, [bpy][BF4], and they showed different reactivity from classical Grignard reagents in organic solvents.