Application of piezoelectric actuation to regularize the chaotic response of an electrostatically actuated micro-beam

The impetus of this study is to investigate the nonlinear chaotic dynamics of a clamped–clamped micro-beam exposed to simultaneous electrostatic and piezoelectric actuation. The micro-beam is sandwiched with piezoelectric layers throughout its length. The combined DC and AC electrostatic actuation is imposed on the micro-beam through two upper and lower electrodes. The piezoelectric layers are actuated via a DC electric voltage applied in the direction of the height of the piezoelectric layers, which produces an axial force proportional to the applied DC voltage. The governing differential equation of the motion is derived using Hamiltonian principle and discretized to a nonlinear Duffing type ODE using Galerkin method. The governing ODE is numerically integrated to get the response of the system in terms of the governing parameters. The results show that the response of the system is greatly affected by the amounts of DC and AC electrostatic voltages applied to the upper and lower electrodes. The results show that the response of the system can be highly nonlinear and in some regions chaotic. Evaluating the K–S entropy of the system, based on several initial conditions given to the system, the chaotic response is distinguished from the periodic or quasiperiodic ones. The main objective is to passively control the chaotic response by applying an appropriate DC voltage to the piezoelectric layers.     

Computational analysis of exit conditions on the sound field of turbulent hot jets

A hybrid computational fluid dynamics (CFD) and computational aeroacoustics (CAA) method is used to compute the acoustic field of turbulent hot jets at a Reynolds number $Re=316,000$ and a Mach number $M=0.12$. The flow field computations are performed by highly resolved large-eddy simulations (LES), from which sound source terms are extracted to compute the acoustic field by solving the acoustic perturbation equations (APE). Two jets are considered to analyze the impact of exit conditions on the resulting jet sound field. First, a jet emanating from a fully resolved non-generic nozzle is simulated by solving the discrete conservation equations. This computation of the jet flow is denoted free-exit-flow (FEF) formulation. For the second computation, the nozzle geometry is not included in the computational domain. Time averaged exit conditions, i.e. velocity and density profiles of the first formulation, plus a jet forcing in form of vortex rings are imposed at the inlet of the second jet configuration. This formulation is denoted imposed-exit-flow (IEF) formulation. The free-exit-flow case shows up to 50% higher turbulent kinetic energy than the imposed-exit-flow case in the jet near field, which drastically impacts noise generation. The FEF and IEF configurations reveal quite a different qualitative behavior of the sound spectra, especially in the sideline direction where the entropy source term dominates sound generation. This difference occurs since the noise sources generated by density and pressure fluctuations are not perfectly modeled by the vortex ring forcing method in the IEF solution. However, the total overall sound pressure level shows the same qualitative behavior for the FEF and IEF formulations. Towards the downstream direction, the sound spectra of the FEF and IEF solutions converge.     

Transition Metal-Free Synthesis of meta-Bromo- and meta-Trifluoromethylanilines from Cyclopentanones by a Cascade Reaction

Anilines are key constituents in biologically active compounds and often obtained from transition metal-catalyzed coupling of an aryl halide with an amine. In this work, we report a transition metal-free method for the synthesis of meta-bromo- and meta-trifluoromethylanilines starting from 3-tribromomethylcyclopentanone or 3-(2-bromo-2-chloro-1,1,1-trifluoroethyl)cyclopentanone, respectively. The scope of the transformation is shown by application of primary, secondary and aromatic amines. The reaction proceeds in acceptable to high yields (20–81 %), and allows for the synthesis of anilines with substitution patterns otherwise difficult to access.     

Terminal repeller unconstrained subenergy tunneling (trust) for fast global optimization

A new method for unconstrained global function optimization, acronymedtrust, is introduced. This method formulates optimization as the solution of a deterministic dynamical system incorporating terminal repellers and a novel subenergy tunneling function. Benchmark tests comparing this method to other global optimization procedures are presented, and thetrust algorithm is shown to be substantially faster. Thetrust formulation leads to a simple stopping criterion. In addition, the structure of the equations enables an implementation of the algorithm in analog VLSI hardware, in the vein of artificial neural networks, for further substantial speed enhancement.This work was supported by the Department of Energy, Office of Basic Energy Sciences, Grant No. DE-A105-89-ER14086.     

Determination of vigabatrin in human plasma and urine by high-performance liquid chromatography with UV-Vis detection

A simple and reliable high-performance liquid chromatographic (HPLC) method with UV-Vis detection has been developed and validated for the determination of vigabatrin (VG) in human plasma and urine. The samples were pre-column derivatizated with 1,2-naphthoquinone-4-sulphonic acid sodium salt (NQS). A good chromatographic separation was achieved on a C18 column with a mobile phase consisting of acetonitrile and 10 mM orthophosphoric acid (pH 2.5) gradient elution. Tranexamic acid was used as an internal standard (I.S.). The method was linear over the concentration range of 0.8-30.0 microg/ml for both samples. The method is precise (relative standard deviation (R.S.D.) <9.13%) and accurate (relative mean error (RME) <-8.75%); analytical recoveries were 81.07% for plasma and 83.05% for urine. The assay was applied to pharmacokinetic study in a healthy volunteer after a single oral administration of 1 g of vigabatrin.     

Structure and catalytic activity of a manganese(III) tetraphenylporpholactone

A manganese(III) complex of tetraphenylporpholactone, Mn(TPPL)Cl, was synthesized and characterized, including by single-crystal X-ray diffraction; the catalytic activity of this complex for olefin epoxidation reactions is compared with that of manganese(III) tetraphenylporphyrin chloride, Mn(TPP)Cl.     

Synthesis, Structural Characterization and Chromotropism of a Ni(II) and a Co(II) Compound with Acesulfamate as a Ligand

The novel bis(acesulfamato-O)tetraaquanickel(II) and bis(acesulfamato-N)tetraaquacobalt(II) complexes have been synthesized and characterized by elemental analyses, magnetic measurements, u.v.–vis and FT-IR spectra. The thermal behavior of the complexes was also studied by simultaneous TG, DTG and DTA methods in a static air atmosphere. The crystal structure of bis(acesulfamato-O)tetraaquanickel(II) complex has been identified by single-crystal X-ray diffraction analyses. The acesulfamate ligand (acs) acts as an O-donor through the carbonyl oxygen as a monodentate ligand in the Ni(II) complex. The Ni(II) ion structure resides on a two-fold axis and is coordinated by four aqua ligands defining the basal plane, and by two monodentate acesulfamate ligands occupying the axial positions. The chromotropism of both complexes has been studied using thermal and spectral analysis. The bis(acesulfamato-N)tetraaquacobalt(II)complex is found to be very soluble in water and organic solvents and exhibits a reversible thermochromism from pink to violet depending on deaquation, which occurs in two steps, in the solid state. The bis(acesulfamato-O)tetraaquanickel(II) complex has shown two thermochromic properties one of which is a reversible and changes the color from green to yellow by an endothermic effect, whereas the other one is irreversible and changes from yellow to brown depending on deaquation, in the solid state. The bis(acesulfamato-N)tetraaquacobalt(II) complex exhibits solvatochromism in solvents with different donor number and ionochromism in the presence of various cations in solution.     

Synthesis of bis(amino alcohol)oxalamides and their usage for the preconcentration of trace metals by cloud point extraction.

C(2)-Symmetric two bis(amino alcohol)oxalamides (diamidediols) were synthesized and fully characterized. A new method was developed and successfully applied for the simultaneous preconcentration of both trace and toxic metals in water, by using C(2)-symmetric compounds. Under the optimum experimental conditions (i.e. pH = 10.0 +/- 0.2, 2.75 x 10(-3) mol L(-1) N,N'-bis[(1R)-1-ethyl-2-hydroxyethyl]ethanediamide (DAD1), 1.75 x 10(-3) mol L(-1) N,N'-bis[(1S)-1-benzyl-2-hydroxyethyl]-ethanediamide (DAD2), 0.10% w/v octylphenoxy-polyethoxyethanol (Triton X-114)), calibration graphs were linear in the range of 2.5 - 25.0 ng mL(-1) for Cu and Cd, 5.0 - 25.0 ng mL(-1) for Co and Ni. The enrichment factors were 18, 23, 18 and 20 for Cd, Cu, Co and Ni in the case of DAD1, respectively; 20, 22, 17 and 20 for Cd, Cu, Co and Ni in the case of DAD2. The limits of detection for DAD1 were found to be 0.45, 0.50, 1.25 and 0.60 ng mL(-1) for Cd, Cu, Co and Ni, respectively, and for DAD2 were found to be 0.44, 0.25, 0.60 and 1.55 ng mL(-1) for Cd, Cu, Co and Ni, respectively. The developed method was applied to the determination of Cu, Cd, Co and Ni in water samples and certified reference materials with satisfactory results.