Graphene‐Based Composite with γ‐Fe2O3 Nanoparticle for the High‐Performance Removal of Endocrine‐Disrupting Compounds from Water

Graphene is a 2D sp²‐hybridized carbon sheet and an ideal material for the adsorption‐based separation of organic pollutants. However, such potential applications of graphene are largely limited, owing to their poor solubility and extensive aggregation properties through graphene? graphene interactions. Herein, we report the synthesis of graphene‐based composites with γ‐Fe₂O₃ nanoparticle for the high‐performance removal of endocrine‐disrupting compounds (EDC) from water. The γ‐Fe₂O₃ nanoparticles partially inhibit these graphene? graphene interactions and offer water dispersibility of the composite without compromising much of the high surface area of graphene. In their dispersed form, the graphene component offers the efficient adsorption of EDC, whilst the magnetic iron‐oxide component offers easier magnetic separation of adsorbed EDC.     

Effective Rheology of Two-Phase Flow in Three-Dimensional Porous Media: Experiment and Simulation

We present an experimental and numerical study of immiscible two-phase flow of Newtonian fluids in three-dimensional (3D) porous media to find the relationship between the volumetric flow rate (Q) and the total pressure difference (\(\Delta P\)) in the steady state. We show that in the regime where capillary forces compete with the viscous forces, the distribution of capillary barriers at the interfaces effectively creates a yield threshold (\(P_t\)), making the fluids reminiscent of a Bingham viscoplastic fluid in the porous medium. In this regime, Q depends quadratically on an excess pressure drop (\(\Delta P-P_t\)). While increasing the flow rate, there is a transition, beyond which the overall flow is Newtonian and the relationship is linear. In our experiments, we build a model porous medium using a column of glass beads transporting two fluids, deionized water and air. For the numerical study, reconstructed 3D pore networks from real core samples are considered and the transport of wetting and non-wetting fluids through the network is modeled by tracking the fluid interfaces with time. We find agreement between our numerical and experimental results. Our results match with the mean-field results reported earlier.     

Simultaneous Approximation for Generalized Baskakov-Durrmeyer-Type Operators

The present paper deals with the study of a Durrmeyer-type integral modification of certain modified Baskakov operators. Here we study simultaneous approximation properties for these operators by using the iterative combinations. We obtain an asymptotic formula and an error estimation in terms of higher order modulus of continuity for these operators.      

Linearly polarized, 3.35 W narrow-linewidth, 1150 nm fiber master oscillator power amplifier for frequency doubling to the yellow

A high-power linearly polarized Yb-doped silica fiber master oscillator power amplifier at 1150 nm is reported. It produced 3.35 W cw and 2.33 W of average power in 1 micros pulses at a 100 kHz repetition rate, both with 8 pm linewidth. This is the first report, to the best of our knowledge, of a high-power Yb-doped fiber amplifier at a wavelength longer than 1135 nm. The pulsed output was frequency doubled in a bulk periodically poled near-stoichiometric LiTaO(3) chip to generate 976 mW of average power at 575 nm with an overall system optical-to-optical efficiency of 9.8% with respect to launched pump power.     

Ultraviolet-visible-near infrared and mid-Fourier transform infrared spectroscopic studies of intermolecular interaction in cholesteryl oleyl carbonate in mesophases

Ultraviolet-visible-near infrared (UV-Vis-NIR) and Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopic studies are presented of molecular association between like molecules of cholesteryl oleyl carbonate, each containing suitable pi-donor (steroid ring C=C) and pi-acceptor (C-O single bonds united with a C=O bond to give a carbonate group) moieties. Frequency shifts and intensity enhancements of donor and acceptor oscillators appear to be governed by reduced mass, vibronic coupling constants, and a few other parameters such as relative change in force constants, etc. Donor-acceptor complex formation is characterized not only by the appearance of new bands in the mid-FTIR spectrum but also by the emergence of a new, intense electronic band centered at approximately 3700 cm(-1), the so-called charge-transfer band, in the UV-Vis-NIR spectrum. This band is strong in the smectic-A and solid phases, but progressively diminishes when temperature is raised to realize the upper end of the cholesteric phase and eventually the isotropic phase. Also, a new, small electronic band at approximately 360 nm, only seen in the entire thermal range of the cholesteric phase, is attributed to the Lifshitz-van der Waals interaction between pretransitional smectic-A domains existing in the cholesteric phase. It is argued that mesophases may owe their thermodynamic stability to both Lifshitz-van der Waals and vibronic coupling (or electron-phonon coupling in extended systems such as smectics and solids) interactions.     

Design of efficient lightweight strategies to combat DoS attack in delay tolerant network routing

Delay tolerant networks (DTNs) are characterized by delay and intermittent connectivity. Satisfactory network functioning in a DTN relies heavily on co-ordination among participating nodes. However, in practice, such co-ordination cannot be taken for granted due to possible misbehaviour by relay nodes. Routing in a DTN is, therefore, vulnerable to various attacks, which adversely affect network performance. Several strategies have been proposed in the literature to alleviate such vulnerabilities—they vary widely in terms of throughput, detection time, overhead etc. One key challenge is to arrive at a tradeoff between detection time and overhead. We observe that the existing table-based reactive strategies to combat Denial-of-service (DoS) attacks in DTN suffer from two major drawbacks: high overhead and slow detection. In this paper, we propose three secure, light-weight and time-efficient routing algorithms for detecting DoS attacks (Blackhole and Grey-hole attacks) in the Spray & Focus routing protocol. The proposed algorithms are based on use of a small fraction of privileged (trusted) nodes. The first strategy, called TN, outperforms the existing table-based strategy with 20–30 % lesser detection time, 20–25 % higher malicious node detection and negligible overhead. The other two strategies, CTN_MI and CTN_RF explore the novel idea that trusted nodes are able to utilize each others’ information/experience using their long range connectivity as and when available. Simulations performed using an enhanced ONE simulator reveals that investing in enabling connectivity among trusted nodes (as in CTN_RF) can have significant performance benefits.     

Design of a Hybrid Fiber-Optic Network Using 3-D Optical Code Sequences

We present the design of a 3-dimensional (3-D) noncoherent optical hybrid network. We also report the design of a new family of 3-D codes for fiber optic hybrid networks. We show that the hybrid network allows for shorter bit times and a higher number of users, given a set chip rate, compared to previously conceived networks. These newly designed hybrid single-pulse-per-row (HSPR) codes have very low autocorrelation side-lobes and very small cross-correlation peaks. We compare the performance of our hybrid model using our codes with the Optical Orthogonal Codes (OOCs) and Temporal/Spatial (T/S) codes and show that the new network can support a greater number of users and higher data rates than those using OOCs and T/S codes.     

Hedging Uncertainty: Approximation Algorithms for Stochastic Optimization Problems

We study two-stage, finite-scenario stochastic versions of several combinatorial optimization problems, and provide nearly tight approximation algorithms for them. Our problems range from the graph-theoretic (shortest path, vertex cover, facility location) to set-theoretic (set cover, bin packing), and contain representatives with different approximation ratios. The approximation ratio of the stochastic variant of a typical problem is found to be of the same order of magnitude as its deterministic counterpart. Furthermore, we show that common techniques for designing approximation algorithms such as LP rounding, the primal-dual method, and the greedy algorithm, can be adapted to obtain these results.