Sharif Digital Repository

Synthesis of polyvinyl pyrrolidone (PVP) coated ultrasmall Gd2O3 nanoparticles (NPs) with enhanced T1-weighted signal intensity and r2/r1 ratio close to unity is performed by a microwave-assisted polyol process. PVP coated Gd2O3NPs with spherical shape and uniform size of 2.5 ± 0.5 nm have been synthesized below 5 min and structure and morphology confirmed by HRTEM, XRD and FTIR. The longitudinal (r1) and transversal relaxation (r2) of Gd2O3NPs is measured by a 3 T MRI scanner. The results showed considerable increasing of relaxivity for Gd2O3NPs in... 

The turbulent limit of three dimensional Burger equation was studied. An adjusting parameter emerged through the calculations, based on mean field analysis, that was the scaling exponent of conditional density-density correlations. Two kinds of solutions were also shown for velocity-increment probability density function (PDF)  

This paper addresses the problem of identifying central nodes from the information flow standpoint in a social network. Betweenness centrality is the most prominent measure that shows the node importance from the information flow standpoint in the network. High betweenness centrality nodes play crucial roles in the spread of propaganda, ideologies, or gossips in social networks, the bottlenecks in communication networks, and the connector hubs in biological systems. In this paper, we introduce DICeNod, a new approach to efficiently identify central nodes in social networks without direct measurement of each individual node using compressive sensing, which is a well-known paradigm in sparse... 

Betweenness centrality is a prominent centrality measure expressing importance of a node within a network, in terms of the fraction of shortest paths passing through that node. Nodes with high betweenness centrality have significant impacts on the spread of influence and idea in social networks, the user activity in mobile phone networks, the contagion process in biological networks, and the bottlenecks in communication networks. Thus, identifying k-highest betweenness centrality nodes in networks will be of great interest in many applications. In this paper, we introduce CS-HiBet, a new method to efficiently detect top-k betweenness centrality nodes in networks, using compressive sensing.... 

It is well known that strain localization and indeed displacement discontinuity can arise in materials exhibiting plastic behaviour. Indeed such localization is almost certain to occur if strain softening or non-associated behaviour exists, though it can be triggered even when ideal plasticity is assumed. This study is concerned mainly with the manner in which the numerical discretization process has to be devised so as to capture the localization phenomenon. In this paper, a method is presented for applying the mixed formulation to study the prediction of localization phenomenon in powder-forming processes. This study is focused on the performance of mixed u - π triangular elements to study... 

In this paper, a double-surface plasticity model, based on a combination of a convex yield surface consisting of a failure envelope, such as a Mohr-Coulomb yield surface and, a hardening cap model, is developed for the nonlinear behaviour of powder materials in the concept of a generalized plasticity formulation for the description of cyclic loading. This model reflects the yielding, frictional and densification characteristics of powder along with strain and geometrical hardening which occur during the compaction process. The solution yields details on the powder displacement from which it is possible to establish the stress state in the powder and the densification is derived from... 

Background: The researches regarding the influence of microthread design variables on the stress distribution in bone and a biomechanically optimal design for implant neck are limited. The aim of the present study is to compare the effect of different microthread designs on crestal bone stress. Materials and Methods: Six implant models were constructed for three-dimensional finite element analysis including two thread profile (coarse and fine) with three different lengths of microthreaded neck (1 mm, 2 mm, and 3 mm). A load of 200 N was applied in two angulations (0° and 30°) relative to the long axis of the implant and the resultant maximum von Mises equivalent (EQV), compressive, tensile,... 

Temporal and spatial analysis of dynamics of hybrid transversely excited atmospheric pressure (TEA)-CO2 lasers is studied using two different models with four and eight energy levels. These models are used for simulation of the laser and computing the output energy. Effects of several parameters such as input energies and gas mixture concentrations (especially presence of CO molecules) are also studied. © 2007 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved  

In this paper, a three-invariant cap plasticity model with an isotropic hardening rule is presented for numerical simulation of powder compaction processes. A general form is developed for single-cap plasticity which can be compared with some common double-surface plasticity models proposed for powders in literature. The constitutive elasto-plastic matrix and its components are derived based on the definition of yield surface, hardening parameter and non-linear elastic behaviour, as function of relative density of powder. Different aspects of the new single plasticity are illustrated by generating the classical plasticity models as special cases of the proposed model. The procedure for... 

The effect of wall cooling in tray-type solid-state fermenters was investigated by cultivation of Aspergillus niger ATCC 10 864 on wheat bran. Temperature, moisture, pH and glucoamylase activity in the bed were monitored. Application of the heat exchanger plate reduced the overall water loss but increased the heterogeneity of moisture distribution in the bed. Moisture content increased markedly close to the heat transfer plate while the upper regions of the bed dried out. The thermal conductivity of the bed was measured to be 0.19 Wm-1 K-1. At these conditions and depending on the air flow rate, 58-82% of the metabolic heat was removed via conduction towards the plate. A mathematical model... 

Modeling and analysis of information system vulnerabilities helps us to predict possible attacks to networks using the network configuration and vulnerabilities information. As a fact, exploiting most of vulnerabilities result in access rights alteration. In this paper, we propose a new vulnerability analysis method based on the Take-Grant protection model. We extend the initial Take-Grant model to address the notion of vulnerabilities and introduce the vulnerabilities rewriting rules to specify how the protection state of the system can be changed by exploiting vulnerabilities. Our analysis is based on a bounded polynomial algorithm, which generates the closure of the Take-Grant graph... 

Although an early and influential review led to the often-cited conclusion that color vision is rare among mammals, more recent findings suggest that it is actually widespread. According to Jacobs (1993, 2004), all non-nocturnal mammalian species that have been adequately examined show some color vision capacity, although the degree varies enormously. Data on the presence and characteristics of color vision in the horse, however, remain sparse (and almost none in the case of ponies). Eight Caspian pony (four mares and four stallions) were presented with a series of two-choice color vs. grey discrimination problems. Experiments were performed in a box of 3×3 meter containing a wall with two... 

Leak detection based on acoustic emission needs robust time delay estimation in the presence of various types of noise. Considering several aspects of leakage signal and noise, the present work introduces wavelet based optimized residual complexity (WORC), in order to minimize the probability of false alarms in the presence of correlated, uncorrelated, and impulsive noise. The proposed method utilizes two approaches simultaneously. First, it optimizes residual complexity “for robustness against both correlated and uncorrelated noise”, then it employs wavelet basis in order to reduce the complexity of mixture of correlated and impulsive noise. In order to compare the resolution and percentage... 

In this paper, a new computational technique is presented based on the eXtended Finite Element Method (X-FEM) in pressure-sensitive plasticity of powder compaction considering frictional contact. In X-FEM, the need for mesh adaption to discontinuity interface is neglected and the process is accomplished by partitioning the domain with some triangular sub-elements whose Gauss points are used for integration of the domain of the elements. The technique is applied by employing additional functions, which are added to approximate the displacement field of the elements located on the interface. The double-surface cap plasticity model is employed within the X-FEM framework in numerical simulation... 

We study the electronic properties of superlattice with rough interfaces in two and three dimensions using the transfer-matrix method and direct diagonalization of the Anderson Hamiltonian. The system consists of layers with an average constant width, but with stochastic roughness added to the interfaces between the layers. The numerical results indicate that, in the thermodynamic limit, the two-dimensional superlattice is an insulator in the presence of even small roughness. In three-dimensional systems, however, the superlattice exhibits a metal-insulator transition with a well-defined mobility edge located at an energy E c that we compute numerically. For three-dimensional superlattice,... 

A computational tool is developed to capture the interaction of solid object with two-phase flow. The full two-dimensional Navier–Stokes equations are solved on a regular structured grid to resolve the flow field. The level set and the immersed boundary methods are used to capture the free surface of a fluid and a solid object, respectively. A two-step projection method along with Multi-Processing (OpenMP) is employed to solve the flow equations. The computational tool is verified based on numerical and experimental data with three scenarios: a cylinder falling into a rectangular domain due to gravity, transient vertical oscillation of a cylinder by releasing above its equilibrium position,... 

Fouling in blood flow is very common and may decrease the blood flow in human body and lead to critical health issues. Upon injury in a blood vessel, the body's defensive system triggers a process to create a blood clot called “Thrombus”, which prevents bleeding. Blood clots are formed by a combination of blood cells, platelets, and fibrins. In this study, we investigate a controlled drug delivery using the magnetic nanoparticles in blood vessels under the influence of magnetic fields. For this purpose the Maxwell and the Navier-Stokes equations for the system are solved. In contrary to the previous studies it is assumed that the blood is a non-Newtonian fluid. The number of particles has... 

Soccer model and relation of players and coach has been analyzed by a learning automata-based method, called Soccer Mobility Estimator (SME), who estimates the mobility model of soccer players. During a soccer match, players play according to a certain program designed by coach. The pattern of players' mobility is not stochastic and it can be assumed that they are playing with a certain mobility model. Since knowledge about mobility model of nodes in mobile ad-hoc networks has a substantial effect on its performance evaluation, knowledge about mobility model of soccer players can be useful for coaches and experts for game analysis. In fact the mobility model of players could be an important... 

In this paper, a new fixed structure learning automaton (FSSA), with a tuning parameter for amount of its rewards, is presented and its behavior in stationary environments will be studied. This new automaton is called TFSLA (Tunable Fixed Structured Learning Automata). The proposed automaton characterizes by star shaped transition diagram and each branch of the star contains N states associated with a particular action. TFSLA is tunable, so that the automaton can receive reward flexibly, even when it accepted penalty according to its previous action. Experiments show that TFSLA converges to the optimal action faster than some older FSSAs (e.g. Krinsky and Krylov) and the analytic examination... 

Clinical assessment of capsuloligamentous structures of the glenohumeral joint has been qualitative and subjective in nature, as demonstrated by limited intra- and inter-rater reliability. Robotic devices were utilized to develop a clinically objective measurement technique for glenohumeral joint stiffness. The purpose of this study was to quantify the amount of inferior-direction stiffness of the glenohumeral joint using a safe clinical device in the asymptomatic individuals, and to determine between trial and between session reliability of the robotic device. Twenty healthy subjects were recruited via convenience sampling. Inferior-directed translation and applying force were measured...