Super-Strong Hydrogel Composites Reinforced with PBO Nanofibers for Cartilage Replacement

Cartilage replacement materials exhibiting a set of demanding properties such as high water content, high mechanical stiffness, low friction, and excellent biocompatibility are quite difficult to achieve. Here, poly(p-phenylene-2,6-benzobisoxazole) (PBO) nanofibers are combined with polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) to form a super-strong structure with a performance that surpasses the vast majority of previously existing hydrogels. PVA–PBO composites with water contents in the 59–76% range exhibit tensile and compressive moduli reaching 20.3 and 4.5 MPa, respectively, and a coefficient of friction below 0.08. Further, they are biocompatible and support the viability of chondrocytes for 1 week, with significant improvements in cell adhesion, proliferation, and differentiation compared to PVA. The new composites can be safely sterilized by steam heat or gamma radiation without compromising their integrity and overall performance. In addition, they show potential to be used as local delivery platforms for anti-inflammatory drugs. These attractive features make PVA–PBO composites highly competitive engineered materials with remarkable potential for use in the design of load-bearing tissues. Complementary work has also revealed that these composites will be interesting alternatives in other industrial fields where high thermal and mechanical resistance are essential requirements, or which can take advantage of the pH responsiveness functionality.     

Optimal replacement and allocation of multi‐state elements in k‐within‐m‐from‐r/n sliding window systems

This paper proposes a new model that generalizes the linear sliding window system to the case of multiple failures. The considered k ‐within‐ m ‐from‐ r / n sliding window system consists of n linearly ordered multi‐state elements and fails if at least k groups out of m consecutive groups of r consecutive multi‐state elements have cumulative performance lower than the demand W . A reliability evaluation algorithm is suggested for the proposed system. In order to increase the system availability, maintenance actions can be performed, and the elements can be optimally allocated. A joint element allocation and maintenance optimization model is formulated with the objective of minimizing the total maintenance cost subjected to the pre‐specified system availability requirement. Basic procedures of genetic algorithms are adapted to solve the optimization problem. Numerical experiments are presented to illustrate the applications. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

M-ZSM-12型分子筛的合成与鉴定

在碱性介质中,以甲基三乙基溴化铵为模板剂,采用水热晶化法合成了M-ZSM-12型(M=B,Ga,Ge)分子筛,考察了影响合成的因素。通过x射线衍射、扫描电镜、IR、XPS、²⁹Si高分辨固体核磁共振谱和TG-DTA等方法证明了M对ZSM-12型分子筛骨架的同晶取代。     

FeCo2(CO)9(μ3-S)簇合物羰基取代衍生物的合成与表征

Mono-、 di- and tri-substituted derivatives of FeCo₂(CO)₉(μ₃-S) with P(OR)₃ were synthesized. They have the following formular, FeCo₂(CO)_9-n(μ₃-S)［P(OR)₃］_n ［n=1, R=CH₂CH₂CH₃(a); n=1,2,3, R=CH₂CH₂CH₂CH₃(b); n=1,2,R=CH(CH₃)(CH₂)₂CH₃(c)］. The six new compounds were characterized by elemental analysis, IR, ¹H NMR and MS spectra and their molecular structures were deduced.     

置换反应制备双金属纳米催化剂

双金属纳米颗粒具有比单金属纳米颗粒更加优异的催化、光学及电学等性能,常见的双金属纳米颗粒制备方法有共还原法、连续还原法、电沉积法、微乳液法及置换反应法等.其中,置换反应是一种重要的双金属纳米颗粒制备方法,具有反应条件温和、无需其他还原剂、所制备的纳米颗粒粒径分布均匀、结构可调可控等特点.采用该方法制备的合金结构、核壳结构以及空心结构的双金属纳米颗粒均表现出优异的催化性能,本文综述了近年来置换反应制备不同结构双金属纳米颗粒的研究现状,并且提出了置换反应制备双金属纳米颗粒研究中存在的问题和今后可能的发展方向.     

刚柔组合桩复合地基加固设计与应用

利用柔性桩减少刚性桩与土之间的刚度差,使之与土结合良好,达到提高复合地基承载力特征值和柔性桩软土地基加固的置换率、减少刚性桩复合地基变形及降低软地基处理造价等目的.将水泥土柔性短桩中心用沉管桩的工法施工低强度（C10）砼桩——＂刚柔组合桩＂的复合地基,处理宁波北仑某仓库的软土地基,经检测、计算验证和经济型比较,表明刚柔组合桩复合地基法可应用于软土地基工程,且能降低造价.     

基于效用的机会网络缓存替换策略

机会网络具有节点流动性较大、数据时延长、资源有限等特点,如何合理和高效地使用节点提供的缓存资源、增加节点间的协作来减少机会网络时延、节省带宽、防止拥塞是一个关键问题.通过对机会网络缓存策略研究,提出了基于效用的概率缓存替换策略,该策略分别计算数据的流行度和最短机会路径的权重,得出节点的效用值,通过比较效用值确定了节点要缓存的数据.实验结果表明提高了节点获取资源的成功率并减少了协作缓存资源请求的平均响应时间.     

Synthesis of silver nanoparticles by sonogalvanic replacement on aluminium powder in sodium polyacrylate solutions

The process of the formation of silver nanoparticles (AgNPs) via the method of galvanic replacement (GR) of Ag⁺ with aluminum powder in sodium polyacrylate (NaPA) solutions in the ultrasonic (US) field has been studied. It was observed, that the yellow colloidal solutions of stabilized AgNPs with the absorption maximum at ∼ 410 nm were obtained under the application of US power by 20 W and frequency by 20 kHz in the wide range of AgNO₃ and NaPA concentrations (0.1 – 0.5 mM and 0.5 – 5.0 g/L respectively) at 25 ⁰C. It was shown, that the GR process under US field occurs without of the significant induction period. Using the UV–vis spectroscopy the kinetics of AgNPs formation has been studied and it was observed the first order kinetics with respect to Ag⁺ ions both for the nucleation and growth processes. It was found that observable rate constants of nucleation are close for the all experimental conditions but the observable rate constants of growth decreased with increasing of initial concentration of AgNO₃. Based on the obtained kinetic data it was proposed a mechanism of the formation of AgNPs consisted of the following two main stages: 1) the nucleation with the formation of primary nanoclusters (AgNCs) on aluminum surface followed by their ablation from the surface of the sacrificial metal by ultrasound into bulk of solution; 2) the transformation of AgNCs in AgNPs via growth from the Al surface and / or agglomeration of AgNCs. Using TEM it was found that the size of obtained AgNPs does not exceed of 25 nm and slightly depends on the initial concentrations of precursors. High antimicrobial activity of obtained colloidal solutions against gram-negative and gram-positive bacteria as well as against fungi was observed.     

Synthesis and Characterization of Pd@MxCu1−x (M=Au,Pd, and Pt) Nanocages with Porous Walls and a Yolk–Shell Structure through Galvanic Replacement Reactions

This paper describes the synthesis of Pd@M_xCu_1?x (M=Au, Pd, and Pt) nanocages with a yolk–shell structure through galvanic replacement reactions that involve Pd@Cu core–shell nanocubes as sacrificial templates and ethylene glycol as the solvent. Compared with the most commonly used templates based on Ag, Cu offers a much lower reduction potential (0.34 versus 0.80 V), making the galvanic reaction more easily to conduct, even at room temperature. Our structural and compositional characterizations indicated that the products were hollow inside, and each one of them contained porous M–Cu alloy walls and a Pd cube in the interior. For the Pd@Au_xCu_1?x yolk–shell nanocages, they displayed broad extinction peaks extending from the visible to the near‐IR region. Our mechanistic study revealed that the dissolution of the Cu shell preferred to start from the slightly truncated corners and then progressed toward the interior, because the Cu {100} side faces were protected by a surface capping layer of hexadecylamine. This galvanic approach can also be extended to generating other hollow metal nanostructures by using different combinations of Cu nanostructures and salt precursors.     

A preventive maintenance policy for a continuously monitored system with correlated wear indicators

A continuously monitored system is considered, that gradually and stochastically deteriorates according to a bivariate non-decreasing Lévy process. The system is considered as failed as soon as its bivariate deterioration level enters a failure zone, assumed to be an upper set. A preventive maintenance policy is proposed, which involves a delayed replacement, triggered by the reaching of some preventive zone for the system deterioration level. The preventive maintenance policy is assessed through a cost function on an infinite horizon time. The cost function is provided in full form, and tools are provided for its numerical computation. The influence of different parameters on the cost function is studied, both from a theoretical and/or numerical point of view.