Sharif Digital Repository

In this paper, nano/microstructured-conducting polypyrrole has been prepared on Cu/Au interdigital electrode surfaces by using constant potential amperometry technique. The Fe(II) ions were used as catalyst and X = ClO4 -, pTs-, Cl-, TCA-, DS-, DBS- was implemented as anion dopants. The morphologies of the films were investigated by field emission scanning electron microscope. A remarkable dependence was observed between the type of anion dopant and the morphology of polypyrrole (PPy). The sensing behavior of the PPy-X sensor has been studied toward acetone, methanol, ethanol, 1-propanol, 2-propanol, nitromethane, propylamine, pyridine, and gas mixtures of aliphatic alcohols. The responses... 

Gas pressure reduction stations are essential in energy distribution networks because even a minor failure of these systems causes disruptive consumer problems. This study aims to introduce and implement a new knowledge-based platform that uses the synthesized expert's opinions to improve gas pressure control facilities. Given the record of failure of gas transmission system components and the data's uncertain nature, a new fuzzy expert system is developed that takes advantage of the object-oriented programming paradigm to analyze failure modes and conditions. The artificial intelligent model is designed in C# programming language, and a user-friendly interface is developed for ease of... 

Developing a uniform polymer-based composite filament is a critical factor for a successful 3D printing process. In this regard, a novel technique for the fabrication of PLA-graphite filament with the potential to be applied to other PLA-based composite filaments was proposed and compared to the solvent casting method. This modified mixing technique involves partial dissolution of the PLA pellets surface by dichloromethane (DCM), which creates a sticky surface for the strong adhesion of reinforcement powders. The manufactured composite filament by this method exhibited excellent structural features, while the solvent casting method yielded a heterogeneous filament with a non-uniform diameter... 

In this paper, we develop a phase inverting technique to improve the received power of an antenna array, with an emphasis on the simplicity of the receiver hardware and reducing the power consumption. The goal is to propose a simple array architecture to develop intelligent algorithms to enhance the received power of the array. A test set-up with 8-element switched array antenna at 28 GHz has been developed to implement the proposed algorithms. The measured results reveal that in a high scattering environment, the phase inverting technique provides about 13 dB enhancement in the received power compared to a fixed array. This significant enhancement plays a major role in establishing a robust... 

In this article, a design methodology is presented to realize integrated class-F high-power amplifiers (HPAs). A harmonic-control network (HCN) is proposed to present short- and open-circuit impedances to each transistor employed in the output stage of the HPA at 2f_0 and 3f_0 frequencies. The HCN absorbs the parasitic capacitance of the transistor and lends itself to be absorbed in the matching and power combiner networks, reducing the die area of the HPA. A proof-of-concept 9.7-10.3-GHz class-F HPA was designed and implemented in a 0.25-μm GaAs pHEMT technology with VDD of 6 V. The designed HPA consists of two amplifying stages, and its output stage includes 16 transistors in parallel to... 

In this article, a design methodology is presented to realize integrated class-F high-power amplifiers (HPAs). A harmonic-control network (HCN) is proposed to present short- and open-circuit impedances to each transistor employed in the output stage of the HPA at {2}f {0} and {3}f {0} frequencies. The HCN absorbs the parasitic capacitance of the transistor and lends itself to be absorbed in the matching and power combiner networks, reducing the die area of the HPA. A proof-of-concept 9.7-10.3-GHz class-F HPA was designed and implemented in a 0.25- μ ext{m} GaAs pHEMT technology with V {DD} of 6 V. The designed HPA consists of two amplifying stages, and its output stage includes 16... 

In this article, a design methodology is presented to realize integrated class-F high-power amplifiers (HPAs). A harmonic-control network (HCN) is proposed to present short- and open-circuit impedances to each transistor employed in the output stage of the HPA at {2}f {0} and {3}f {0} frequencies. The HCN absorbs the parasitic capacitance of the transistor and lends itself to be absorbed in the matching and power combiner networks, reducing the die area of the HPA. A proof-of-concept 9.7-10.3-GHz class-F HPA was designed and implemented in a 0.25- μ ext{m} GaAs pHEMT technology with V {DD} of 6 V. The designed HPA consists of two amplifying stages, and its output stage includes 16... 

Polylactic acid (PLA) scaffolds produced by the fused deposition modeling (FDM) method have biocompatibility, close Young's modulus to that of bone, and the ability to make complex shapes. However, PLA has some drawbacks like brittleness, inappropriate mechanical strength and hydrophobicity, and a low degradation rate. In this study, polyethylene glycol (PEG) (5 and 10 wt%) by solving method and titanium (Ti) particles (5 wt%) by two different methods were mixed with PLA to address the mentioned problems. Extruded filaments were investigated by X-ray diffraction (XRD), differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), and fourier transform infrared (FTIR). Surface morphology of the produced filaments... 

The inertial microfluidic technique, as a powerful new tool for accurate cell/particle separation based on the hydrodynamic phenomenon, has drawn considerable interest in recent years. Despite numerous microfluidic techniques of particle separation, there are few articles in the literature on separation techniques addressing external outlet geometry to increase the throughput efficiency and purity. In this work, we report on a spiral inertial microfluidic device with high efficiency (>98%). Herein, we demonstrate how changing the outlet geometry can improve the particle separation throughput. We present a complete separation of 4 and 6 μm from 10 μm particles potentially applicable to... 

Silk fibroin (SF) has been broadly applied in wound dressing fabrication because of its proper features for wound healing. In this work, we developed a carboxymethyl cellulose (CMC)/gelatin blend film with different concentrations of glycerol, and modified the optimized film with an SF layer through electrospinning process. Tensile strength and cell viability evaluation of blend films demonstrated that the glycerol content of 3% could be suitable as the substrate layer for the two-layer wound dressing. The morphology of the blend film and electrospun nanofibers was obtained from scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR). It concluded that... 

A typical process in many industrial applications is rising bubble dynamic in viscous liquids like two-phase reactors. Examining the physical behavior of bubbles may improve the understanding of systems regarding design and operation. This study focused on the splitting of bubbles resulting from their impact on solid obstacles. Fragmentation of the bubbles appears in many applications such as lab on a chip in small scale or slug bubbly flow moving upward in a tube in large scales. Using a new index-function model in Lattice Boltzmann technique proposed by “He”, we simulated the deformation and motion of a bubble in different regimes, through which, we accurately captured a sharp interface... 

A novel magnetic nanocarrier with long spacer length and high colloidal stability has been prepared for effective delivery of doxorubicin (DOX). First, poly(amidoamine) (PAMAM) dendrimer was grown up onto the surface of superparamagnetic iron oxide nanoparticles to increase the loading amount of amine groups. Then, terminal amine groups were functionalized by polyethylene glycol dimethylester to increase the spacer length. Then anticancer drug DOX was covalently attached onto the system by hydrazone bond to forms a pH-sensitive nanocarrier. This system is designed to combine the advantage of magnetic targeting, high drug loading capacity, and controlled release  

Emerging tools that ease sharing information in online social networks (OSNs) can cause various privacy issues for users. Access control is the main security mechanism in OSNs which is used to tackle such issues. In this paper, a prioritized ontology based access control model for protecting users' information in OSNs is proposed. In the proposed model, description logic (DL) is used for modeling social networks and MKNF+ rules are used for specification of users' access control policies. Using MKNF+, we can have nonmonotonic inference (i.e., closed-world reasoning) in the access control procedure. Conflict among access rules defined by a user in an OSN, is another problem, which is resolved... 

Electrophoretic technique was used to deposit micro- and nano-sized aluminum nitride coatings on stainless steel surfaces by using a well-dispersed stable suspension produced by addition of AlN powder plus a small amount of iodine to ethanol. Parabolic regime governed the deposition. Electrophoretic deposition for 240 s at 100 V resulted in formation of a uniformly dense film on the top, but a porous inhomogeneous layer at the bottom. This was attributed to fast deposition of coarse particles and/or agglomerates at large electric fields. After drying, micro-sized particles led to a uniform crack-free interface while nano-particles resulted in fragmented non-cohesive layers. Weight loss... 

Implementation of new materials in automotive body-in-white requires through knowledge of their metallurgical response to welding process thermal cycle. This two-part paper aims at understanding the physical and mechanical metallurgy of stainless steels, as interesting candidates for automotive application, during resistance spot welding. The second part addresses the phase transformations in the heat affected zone of three types of stainless steels including austenitic, ferritic and duplex steels. Failure modes and mechanical properties of stainless steel resistance spot welds are discussed. The peak load and energy absorption of stainless steel resistance spot welds are compared with... 

This paper addresses the microstructure and mechanical performance of dissimilar resistance spot welds between AISI 430 ferritic stainless steel and drawing quality special killed (DQSK) low-carbon steel. The mechanical properties of the welds are described by peak load, failure energy, and failure mode during the tensile-shear test. Phase transformations in the fusion zone (FZ) and heat-affected zone (HAZ) are analyzed. The main metallurgical features of the weldment are the formation of a dual-phase, ferrite-martensite microstructure in the FZ, grain growth and martensite formation in the HAZ of the ferritic stainless steel side, and martensitic and eutectoid transformations in the HAZ of... 

Cloud computing as a new technology can provide significant advantages in electronic banking services. Adoption of this technology in e-banking services requires consideration of several factors. The main objective of this study is to identify and rank the effective factors on adoption of cloud computing in e-banking. The factors were identified from literature review in four dimension based on TOE and HOT-fit models (technological, human, environmental and organisational factors). As a result of this study, 16 factors were identified in four dimensions. Using fuzzy group decision-making model and pairwise comparison between factors (by a survey of 63 experts, academics and practical persons... 

Mechanical alloying and sintering were used to fabricate nanostructured Ti6Al4V scaffolds of highly controllable pore geometry and fully interconnected porous network. Elemental powders were milled for different periods of time (10, 20, 30, 40 and 60 h), mixed with 40-60 vol.-% of 200-400 μm cuboidal NaCl, compacted at 500-600 MPa and sintered according to single or double stage heat treatment regimes at 790 and 950°C under vacuum. After sintering, the samples were soaked in distilled water to washout the NaCl. Foamy microstructures were obtained showing well shaped biopores and fragmentary embedded micropores. The shape of initial NaCl was copied into the biopores which had highly... 

Boosting is a general method for improving the accuracy of any given learning algorithm. In this paper, we have proposed the boosting method for face recognition (FR) that improves the linear discriminant analysis (LDA)-based technique. The improvement is achieved by incorporating the regularized LDA (R-LDA) technique into the boosting framework. R-LDA is based on a new regularized Fisher's discriminant criterion, which is particularly robust against the small sample size problem compared to the traditional one used in LDA. The AdaBoost technique is utilized within this framework to generalize a set of simple FR subproblems and their corresponding LDA solutions and combines the results from... 

Low salinity waterflooding (LSWF) is a process in which by lowering the ionic strength and/or manipulation of the composition of the injection water, the long term equilibrium in oil/brine/rock system is disturbed to reach a new state of equilibrium through which the oil production will be enhanced due to fluid/fluid and/or rock/fluid interactions. In spite of recent advances in the simulation of the LSWF at core scale and beyond, there are very few works that have modelled and simulated this process at the pore scale specially using direct numerical simulation (DNS). As a result the effects of wettability alteration and/or Interfacial Tension (IFT) change on the distribution of the phases...