Sharif Digital Repository

A duplex surface treatment on DIN 1.2210 steel has been developed involving nitriding and followed by chromium thermo-reactive deposition (TRD) techniques. The TRD process was performed in molten salt bath at 550, 625 and 700°C for 1-14h. The process formed a thickness up to 9.5μm of chromium carbonitride coatings on a hardened diffusion zone. Characterization of the coatings by means of scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and X-ray diffraction analysis (XRD) indicates that the compact and dense coatings mainly consist of Cr(C,N) and Cr2(C,N) phase. All the growth processes of the chromium carbonitride obtained by TRD technique followed a parabolic kinetics. Activation energy (Q) for the... 

The article was originally published with the splitting of the corresponding author name into two author names. The original article has been corrected. © The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature B.V. 2022  

The authors consider the problem of finding a minimum cost multicast sub-graph based on network coding, where delay values associated with each link, limited buffer-size of the intermediate nodes and link capacity variations over time are taken into account. The authors consider static multicast (where membership of the multicast group remains constant for the duration of the connection) in lossless wireline networks. For such networks, first the continuous-time (asynchronous packet transmissions) model is formulated. Subsequently, the discrete-time model for the synchronous packet transmissions scenario is derived. Then, by using an auxiliary time-expanded network, a decentralised algorithm... 

In the present study, bainite fraction results of continuous cooling of high strength low alloy steels have been modeled by artificial neural networks. The artificial neural network models were constructed by 16 input parameters including chemical compositions (C, Mn, Nb, Mo, Ti, N, Cu, P, S, Si, Al, V), Nb in solution, austenitizing temperature, initial austenite grain size and cooling rate over the temperature range of the occurrence of phase transformations. The value for the output layer was the bainite fraction. According to the input parameters in feed-forward back-propagation algorithm, the constructed networks were trained, validated and tested. To make a decision on the completion... 

In this research paper, the authors present a comprehensive overview of three key elements of Metaverse-as-a-service (MaaS) platforms: privacy and security, edge computing, and blockchain technology. The study begins by examining security concerns for wireless access to the Metaverse. It then delves into privacy and security issues within the Metaverse from data-centric, learning-centric, and human-centric perspectives. The authors propose novel and less-explored methods to aid mobile network operators and Metaverse service providers in creating secure and private MaaS platforms across various layers of the Metaverse, from access to social interactions. The article also explores the... 

A SEnsor Network with Mobile Agents (SENMA) is an architecture proposed for large scale sensor networks in which the access point moves above the network and gathers information from a limited number of nodes. However, the performance of such system is limited by estimation errors and packet errors due to collision. In this paper, we first derive the equations of distortion in a general scenario and use this model to obtain four best node positions in order to achieve min-max estimation error in a square. In addition, an opportunistic MAC is proposed that considers both collision effects and estimation error based on Channel State Information (CSI). As the simulation results show the... 

This paper introduces adaptive consensus, a spatio-temporal adaptive method to improve convergence behavior of the current consensus fusion schemes. This is achieved by introducing a time adaptive weighting method for updating each sensor data in each iteration. Adaptive consensus method will improve node convergence rate, average convergence rate and the variance of error over the network. A mathematical formulation of the method according to the adaptive filter theory as well as derivation of the time adaptive weights and convergence conditions are presented. The analytical results are verified by simulation as well. ©2006 IEEE  

Efficient combination of multiple input multiple output (MIMO) and passive coherent location (PCL) ideas is expected to improve performance of localisation schemes. While using multiple antennas at transmit and receive sides provides spatial diversity, it is possible to obtain similar performance by using multiple transmitters, already transmitting standard signals (such as digital TV) in the environment (also known as illuminators of opportunity). However, in this case, it is not always possible to ensure that signals of different transmitters are orthogonal to each other. In such cases, resolving signals of multiple transmitters reflected from multiple objects is not a trivial problem. One... 

Passive localization using MIMO techniques has attracted much attention recently. In such schemes, using multiple antennas at transmitter and receiver sides provides spatial diversity without need for identifiable transmitters. On the other hand, one of the problems facing such approach arises when transmitters of a single frequency network (SFN) are used as non-cooperative transmitters and resolving the signals of multiple transmitters reflected from multiple targets is not trivial at receiver side. Therefore, in order to obtain the diversity gain of MIMO localization schemes, it is necessary to develop a technique to assign each echo arriving at the receiver to a given transmitter. In this... 

Recently, it has been shown that applying MIMO technology, i.e. using multiple antennas at the transmit side and multiple antennas at the receive side, improves the performance of object detection and localization. In such scenarios, the spatial diversity specifically helps overcome the fading of the cross section of the object, leading to reduced probability of missed detection. Such a phenomenon is, in fact, the dual of probability of bit error reduction in communication systems due to diversity gain. Despite the importance of such performance enhancement, this subject has not been sufficiently investigated in the PCL (Passive Coherent Location) schemes, where the transmitters (or... 

As the DVB-T (Digital Video Broadcasting-Terrestrial)'s use is outspreading, one of its interesting emerging applications is to use DVB-T stations as non-cooperative transmitters in order to detect and localize targets. An important and favorable characteristic of DVB-T for this application is its being working in a Single Frequency Network (SFN), so that multiple transmitters can be used simultaneously to detect the targets. In addition, using multiple antennas at the receiver side leads to the well known configuration known as MIMO. However, one of the obstacles, arisen in such configurations, is the receive antennas' placement in proper positions so that the detection performance is... 

In this paper, we study the problem of leader selection in the presence of selfish nodes in mobile ad-hoc networks (MANETs). In order to encourage selfish nodes to assume the leadership role, some form of incentive mechanism is required. We present an incentive-based leader selection mechanism in which incentives are incorporated in the form of credit transfer to the leader, which motivates nodes to compete with each other for assuming the leadership role. The competition among nodes is modeled as a series of one-on-one incomplete information, alternating offers bargaining games. Furthermore, we propose an efficient algorithm in order to reduce the communication overhead imposed on the... 

Estimating the position of a mobile set is of great importance in new mobile services. However, in most cases, the accuracy should be less than 100 meters. This accuracy is hard to reach especially in urban areas. The main problem is that there are a lot of obstacles like buildings between the BTS and the mobile set. Thus the time measured between BTS and the mobile set is somehow greater than the time it takes the wave to travel directly between two points. This paper introduces an optimized solution for TDOA as one of the most efficient ways for finding the location of a mobile phone. Considering the standards and limitations of both GSM and UMTS, the Authors present a solution for... 

In this paper, we propose and study a context-aware leader selection algorithm within the concept of mobile clouds. We deploy a dedicated Cooperative Control Server (CCS) to assist and manage the process of leader selection more efficiently. The proposed algorithm collects data regarding instantaneous conditions of Mobile Terminals (MTs) and their radio environment; and then computes and assigns a rank to each MT. The ranks calculated based on a combination of different context-related parameters and corresponding weighting factors, allow selecting the leader. Furthermore, the energy efficiency and stability of the selected leaders is investigated for different parameter values through... 

Introduction: B lymphocyte-induced maturation protein 1 (BLIMP1) encoded by the positive regulatory domain 1 gene (PRDM1), is a key regulator in T cell differentiation in mouse models. BLIMP1-deficiency results in a lower effector phenotype and a higher memory phenotype. Methods: In this study, we aimed to determine the role of transcription factor BLIMP1 in human T cell differentiation. Specifically, we investigated the role of BLIMP1 in memory differentiation and exhaustion of human T cells. We used CRISPR interference (CRISPRi) to knock-down BLIMP1 and investigated the differential expressions of T cell memory and exhaustion markers in BLIMP1-deficient T cells in comparison with... 

Methods of human semen assessment are quite wide ranging. In this paper, we use background subtraction methods in order to detect progressive sperms whose quality of movement strongly influence fertility. Robust Principal Component Analysis (RPCA) is a powerful algorithm which has been used recently for background subtraction purposes. Sperm tracking problem can also be defined as a background subtraction problem. In RPCA algorithm, data is represented by a low rank plus sparse matrix. In our approach, the foreground data is recovered through such matrix decomposition. We compare the RPCA approach with four other background subtraction methods in order to check accuracy of algorithm as a... 

In this paper, we use delay-amplify-and-forward relays in the uplink direction of a coordinated multi-point network based on orthogonal frequency division multiplexing. The key novelty is that we assume delay from users to different base stations (BSs), in general, may exceed cyclic prefix (CP) length as might be the case in large cells and cannot be completely compensated by traditional timing advance strategies. Consequently, interchannel interference and intersymbol interference may arise under such assumptions. We first optimize the adjustable delays added at users, relays and BS nodes in order to reduce the effective delay spread at the receive sites, then we optimize relays' weights... 

In future wireless networks, network functions virtualization lays the foundations for establishing a new dynamic resource management framework to efficiently utilize network resources. In this paper, a network service can be viewed as a chain of virtual network functions (VNFs), called a service function chain (SFC), served via placement, admission control (AC), and embedding into network infrastructure, based on the resource management objectives and the state of network. To fully exploit such a potential and reach higher network performance, resource management stages should be jointly performed. To this end, two main challenges are: how to present a system model that formulates the... 

We consider a cellular wireless system including several interfering multi-user multi-antenna uplink channels, where the base station of each cell has to locally recover the messages of its corresponding users. We use a linear Wyner model, where each base station experiences interference only from the users in the two neighboring cells. Each base station is connected to the two nearby base stations through a backhaul link. The objective is to achieve the maximum degrees of freedom per cell, with minimum aggregated load in the backhaul. We propose a successive cooperative alignment scheme, in which each base station forms backhaul messages by combining the previous received backhaul messages... 

We consider a K-user Interference Channel where each transmitter is interested in conveying a message to its corresponding receiver. In addition, we assume a fully connected noiseless backhaul network through which receivers can collaborate and help each other recover their desired messages. In this paper, we fully characterize the trade-off between the rate in wireless link (per user) in terms of degrees of freedom (DoF) versus backhaul load (per user) for large values of K. In particular, we characterize the optimal trade-off for all values of K, where K is an even number. For odd values of K, we characterize the trade-off within a gap of 2(k - 1)/k(k + 1), which goes to zero as K...