Search Results (3,228)

Capsaicin is a bioactive substance with diverse health-promoting properties, but its intense pungency and irritant side effects limit oral application. This study developed a Pueraria lobata particle-based Pickering emulsion (PE) as an oral delivery platform for capsaicin. Modified Pueraria lobata particles (MP-ps) were prepared using a microwave-assisted enzymolysis technique (15% hydration, 252 J/g microwave energy and 8 h pullulanase hydrolysis). MP-ps exhibited surface cracks and pores, altered starch crystallinity, and enhanced water-holding capacity and swelling power. Compared with original Pueraria lobata particles, MP-ps avoided the burst release of puerarin in the upper gastrointestinal tract, dropping from approximately 54% to 20%. An optimized capsaicin-loading PE with excellent physical stability was obtained from 4% MP-ps and a 9:1 (v/v) water-to-corn oil ratio, exhibiting complete core–shell architecture and oil-phase sequestration of capsaicin in TEM images. Gastrointestinal transit analysis in male KM mice indicated that MP-p-based PE reduced the exposure of the encapsulated lipophilic substance in the stomach and small intestine and promoted its accumulation in the colon. Irritation assays in male KM mice and Sprague-Dawley rats further demonstrated that this effective encapsulation alleviated the gastrointestinal irritation of capsaicin and improved its palatability. This study provided a food-derived material and an easy-to-build PE platform for oral lipophilic/irritant substance delivery, with potential for future health-regulating applications. Full article

Aeolian vibrations of overhead transmission conductors under light wind excitation can cause fatigue damage at line clamps, threatening grid safety. Accurately evaluating wind energy input is key for assessing vibration intensity and designing anti-vibration devices. This paper employs CFD overlapping mesh technology to establish a two-degrees-of-freedom fluid–structure interaction model of the conductor. Through numerical simulations at different Reynolds numbers, a cubic polynomial relationship between wind energy input power and amplitude ratio is derived, and a wind turbulence intensity correction factor is introduced. Using a long-span conductor as a case study, the fitted wind energy input is substituted into the energy balance equation to calculate dynamic bending strain under four conditions: no control, only vibration dampers, only damping wires, and a combined scheme. The results show that using either vibration dampers or damping wires alone cannot reduce dynamic bending strain below 200 με, while the combined scheme reduces the maximum strain within the critical frequency range to 113.09 με. This verifies the effectiveness of the fitted wind energy input formula in engineering anti-vibration design. Full article

Low-damage plasma processing of atomically thin $\mathrm{M}\mathrm{o}{\mathrm{S}}_2$ requires simultaneous control of ion species, energy, and incident angle, yet the discharge mechanisms governing $\mathrm{A}\mathrm{r}/{\mathrm{O}}_2$ plasma and their connection to surface damage remain insufficiently understood. Here, we investigate the effect of the $\mathrm{A}\mathrm{r}/{\mathrm{O}}_2$ mixing ratio on the spatial distributions of charged particles, the plasma potential, and the substrate-incident ion energy and angular distributions in a low-voltage, single-frequency capacitively coupled plasma using a two-dimensional particle-in-cell Monte Carlo collision (PIC-MCC) simulation. At a fixed pressure of 50 mTorr with the $\mathrm{A}\mathrm{r}/{\mathrm{O}}_2$ ratio varied from 9:1 to 2:8, the ion energy and angular distributions were collected at the center and edge of the powered electrode. Increasing the oxygen fraction reduced the electron density while enhancing the ${\mathrm{O}}^{-}$ density and electronegativity, driving an electropositive-to-electronegative transition near 8:2, and shifted the dominant positive ion from $\mathrm{A}{\mathrm{r}}^{+}$ to ${\mathrm{O}}_2^{+}$, with ${\mathrm{O}}^{+}$ remaining minor owing to charge-exchange loss. The plasma potential and ion-energy peaks generally increased with the oxygen fraction but showed nonmonotonic dependence, while radial edge fields tilted and broadened the angular distributions. To link the ion and oxygen-radical fluxes to $\mathrm{M}\mathrm{o}{\mathrm{S}}_2$ processing without assuming uncertain surface-response coefficients, we interpreted the ion and oxygen-radical fluxes through a phenomenological two-channel surface-reaction scheme, introducing a damaging ion fraction and a radical-to-ion flux ratio. Their opposing trends reveal an intrinsic trade-off, indicating that an intermediate ${\mathrm{O}}_2$ fraction offers a more favorable low-damage window than either $\mathrm{A}\mathrm{r}$-rich or strongly oxygen-rich conditions. Full article

This paper studies a cooperative wireless system in which a single-antenna base station (BS) communicates with a destination user (U) via a half-duplex energy-harvesting amplify-and-forward relay, while the direct BS–U link is unavailable. The destination (U) is equipped with a fluid antenna system (FAS) comprising multiple closely spaced receive ports, enabling spatial reconfigurability through instantaneous port selection. A power-splitting architecture is adopted at the relay to support simultaneous energy harvesting and information forwarding. All wireless links are modeled as flat Rayleigh fading, and the spatial correlation among the FAS ports is explicitly incorporated. To analytically characterize the impact of correlated port selection, a Gaussian copula framework is employed to model the joint distribution of the FAS-channel power gains. Exact integral expressions for the cumulative distribution function of the end-to-end signal-to-noise ratio are derived, from which the outage probability is obtained. For the special case of uncorrelated FAS ports, closed-form expressions are further developed using order statistics and special functions. In addition, asymptotic analysis is carried out to provide further insight into system performance in the high-signal-to-noise-ratio region. Numerical and Monte Carlo simulation results validate the analytical derivations and demonstrate that FAS-based receiver selection yields significant gains in outage performance, even in the presence of strong spatial correlation and energy-harvesting constraints. Full article

The sizing of rooftop solar energy systems is commonly based on the most visible load or on generic end-use allocations, leading to an inadequate distribution of the limited rooftop area between heat and electricity. This study formalizes the energy audit within a three-level deterministic framework that selects and sizes solar technologies by energy vector: demand is first decomposed by vector; the technology for the thermal vector is then selected through a levelized cost of heat selection ratio $\psi$, while the photovoltaic system of the electrical vector is sized for self-consumption; and the rooftop area is finally allocated among vectors according to marginal value per unit area. In a 75-bed university residence in Cienfuegos, Cuba, air conditioning is the dominant energy end-use in terms of installed power (accounting for $77\%$ of the connected load), whereas the thermal vector dominates annual energy consumption (domestic hot water: 127,440 versus 76,818 kWh/year for electricity; thermal-to-electric ratio $1.66$). Solar thermal technology has been selected for the thermal vector ($0.018$ versus $0.088$ USD/kWh_th; $\psi =0.21$, a robust value according to the sensitivity analysis), and the marginal value (≈111 versus ≈32 USD/(m²·year)) allocates 104 m² to solar thermal collectors and 134 m² to photovoltaic energy, thereby reversing the original design that prioritized photovoltaic energy. The resulting portfolio achieves an annual solar fraction close to $100\%$ in both vectors on an energy balance basis, avoids $86.5$ t of operational CO₂ emissions per year, and combines a simple payback of $1.1$ years (solar thermal) with a net present value of 55,327 USD and an internal rate of return of $28\%$ (photovoltaics). The sizing decision is shown to be robust to the choice of statistical design criterion (median, mean, P90, maximum), and none of the three framework decisions is reversed under $\pm 30\%$ parameter variations. By replacing the subjective weightings of multi-criteria methods with observable economic criteria, the framework provides a replicable and auditable design protocol. Full article

Older adults with type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) may exhibit early neuromuscular impairment, but the relative contribution of functional performance, mechanical capacity, body composition, and metabolic status remains unclear. This matched cross-sectional study compared 31 older adults with T2DM and 31 non-diabetic controls matched by age, sex, and body mass index (BMI). Participants completed assessments of physical function, sit-to-stand (STS)-derived muscle power, lower-limb force–velocity profiling during leg press, dual-energy X-ray absorptiometry, and fasting blood analyses. Between-group differences were examined using independent-samples t-tests, while exploratory discriminant and receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analyses were performed to evaluate within-sample group classification. Compared with controls, participants with T2DM showed longer 5-STS time (p = 0.001) and lower absolute and relative STS power (both p ≤ 0.01). In contrast, leg-press maximal force (F₀) and maximal power (Pmax) did not differ between groups, while maximal and optimal velocity were higher in the T2DM group (both p = 0.026). The T2DM group also showed lower peripheral fat mass, a higher android-to-gynoid ratio (AND/GYN), higher fasting glucose, and lower insulin and HOMA-β values. Exploratory analyses suggested that a combined model including relative STS power, V₀, HOMA-β, and AND/GYN ratio showed higher within-sample classification performance than relative STS power or leg-press maximal power alone. These findings suggest that STS-derived functional power may provide additional information on lower limb function beyond leg-press force–velocity profiling when characterizing functional status in older adults with T2DM. Full article

The accuracy of spectro-temporal features for Makhaarij al-Huroof and Sifaat distinguishes between the ten canonical Qiraát recitation styles of the Holy Quran. However, real-world room reverberations blur formant contours and corrupt inter-word energies, thus making Qiraat discrimination difficult. The current dereverberation methods were designed to work under ordinary speech conditions and are not capable of preserving phonetic qualities for domain-specific purposes. This paper introduces a four-step, phase-consistent signal-processing approach prioritizing phonetic preservation over direct reverberation suppression. The four steps are: (1) adaptive noise-floor attenuation; (2) soft-voice activity detection using power-law boundary decay; (3) application-specific spectral contour adjustment from clean Quranic reference audio; and (4) Griffin–Lim algorithm-based phase correction. A total of 48 real-world room recordings were utilized for the evaluation of this approach based on Energy Ratio (ER), Spectral Contrast (SC), and Spectral Contour Stability (SCS)—measures specific to the Quran audio domain—alongside conventional speech-quality metrics. The proposed approach yielded the highest scores in three of seven metrics, namely SC (+40.11), SCS (+822.94), and PESQ (+1.251), alongside the second-highest Energy Ratio (+19.58 dB), while being superior to Spectral Subtraction, Wiener Filtering, and WPE Dereverberation approaches. Moreover, the perceptual enhancement was verified in a synthetic controlled experiment where the proposed approach scored an improved PESQ metric (+2.495; SNR −1.874 dB). The results illustrate the fact that an optimization for general-purpose metrics does not necessarily ensure phonetic preservation required for specific classification. Full article

Ammonia is increasingly regarded as a carbon-free energy carrier for hard-to-electrify power sectors, including marine propulsion, heavy-duty transport, and distributed generation. Its direct use in internal combustion engines, however, is constrained by high ignition energy, low laminar flame speed, narrow flammability limits, slow low-temperature chemistry, and strong trade-offs among efficiency, nitrogen-containing emissions, and unburned ammonia slip. Hydrogen enrichment is one of the most effective routes for improving ammonia combustion reactivity, but it also introduces a multivariable control problem: hydrogen fraction, ammonia injection timing, injection mode, air-path dilution, ignition strategy, and aftertreatment operation are tightly coupled and strongly condition-dependent. This review synthesizes recent progress in ammonia–hydrogen and ammonia-based dual-fuel engine control from a control-oriented perspective. The discussion first summarizes application scenarios, nonlinear combustion-mode transitions, emission-formation pathways, and control-relevant metrics. It then compares actuator-level strategies, including ammonia injection timing and staging, port and direct injection, hydrogen energy-fraction scheduling, excess-air-ratio and EGR control, high-energy ignition, and turbulent jet ignition. Advanced optimization methods are further reviewed, with emphasis on model predictive control, control-oriented combustion and emission models, artificial-intelligence-based virtual sensors, and reinforcement-learning control. The analysis shows that the central challenge is no longer whether ammonia can burn in an engine, but how a controller can keep the system inside a narrow moving window bounded by misfire, knock, NO_x, N₂O, and NH₃ slip. Finally, future research priorities are proposed, including engine–aftertreatment co-optimization, physics-informed virtual sensing, digital-twin-assisted calibration, lightweight deployment on electronic control units, and robust control under fuel and aging uncertainty. Full article

Background/Objectives: Resting energy expenditure (REE) rises during critical illness, but its determinants and prognostic relevance remain incompletely characterized. Identifying a circulating signal that tracks REE could provide a bedside surrogate for metabolic demand where indirect calorimetry is unavailable. This prospective pilot study described longitudinal trajectories of indirect calorimetry-measured REE, Sequential Organ Failure Assessment (SOFA) score, serum cortisol and insulin-like growth factor-1 (IGF-1) over two weeks in the intensive care unit (ICU), examined whether the REE trajectory was attenuated by adjustment for these variables, and generated preliminary effect-size and variance estimates for mortality. Methods: This single-center pilot study enrolled 39 critically ill adults at Evangelismos General Hospital (Athens, Greece); sample size was pragmatic, not based on an a priori power calculation. REE (Q-NRG metabolic monitor), cortisol and IGF-1 were measured at admission and days 5–7, 10–11 and 13–14, alongside SOFA. Trajectories were modeled with linear mixed-effects models using all available repeated measures. Confounding was assessed by adding SOFA, cortisol and IGF-1 as covariates and evaluating attenuation of the time effect; no formal mediation analysis was performed. Causes of missing data were quantified and a completers-only sensitivity analysis was undertaken. Mortality was analyzed by Cox regression with ICU length of stay as the time variable. Estimation was emphasized throughout; point estimates and 95% confidence intervals (CIs) are reported in preference to significance testing. Results: Mean age was 54.6 ± 18.1 years; 69.2% were male; median admission SOFA was 6 (IQR 3–9). ICU and 28-day mortality were 20.5% (8/39) and 10.3% (4/39). REE/kg rose from 25.3 ± 3.7 to a peak of 27.2 ± 4.2 kcal/kg/day by days 10–11 (likelihood-ratio χ² = 17.2, p = 0.0006). Attrition was driven predominantly by discharge alive (18 of 23 patients missing at days 13–14) rather than death (n = 2), and the trajectory was preserved in a completers-only sensitivity analysis (χ² = 9.13, p = 0.028). Cortisol declined (21.1 to 13.4 μg/dL) and IGF-1 rose (80.0 to 105.4 ng/mL); SOFA was essentially unchanged. REE did not correlate with SOFA, cortisol or IGF-1 at any time-point, and the time effect was not attenuated by adjustment for them. Admission REE was not associated with ICU mortality (HR 1.00, 95% CI 1.00–1.00). Higher admission REE was associated with a longer ICU stay, and this persisted after adjustment for body mass index (p = 0.026) and fat-free mass (p = 0.001). Age (HR 1.04, 95% CI 1.00–1.09) and admission SOFA (HR 1.18, 95% CI 0.98–1.44) were the covariates most associated with ICU mortality. Conclusions: REE rose progressively over the first 10–11 days of critical illness. Its trajectory was not attenuated by adjustment for SOFA, cortisol or IGF-1, which is compatible with—but does not establish—independence from the adrenal and somatotropic markers measured here. Neither REE nor these hormones were associated with mortality; age and disease severity remained the dominant prognostic factors, supporting a larger confirmatory study. Full article

To provide reliable impact protection for a flying car power battery pack under stringent lightweight requirements, especially under takeoff, landing, and drop impact scenarios, a biomimetic metamaterial sandwich enclosure inspired by the hierarchical protective architecture of a tortoise carapace is proposed. The enclosure is composed of an outer shell, an internal sandwich core, and an inner plate, through which load diffusion and deformation buffering can be achieved by multilayer structural coordination. Firstly, three core configurations, including conventional honeycomb, a chiral structure with negative Poisson’s ratio (NPR) characteristics, and an NPR concave structure, are comparatively investigated through high-speed impact finite element simulations. The NPR concave structure is regarded as the preferred core configuration due to its more balanced energy absorption behavior and superior deformation stability. Afterwards, the NPR concave structure is embedded into the full battery pack enclosure, and the protective performances of the proposed battery pack are evaluated under representative flying car operating conditions. Compared with those of the conventional honeycomb, the maximum displacement of the proposed battery pack decreases by 49.31% under the takeoff-and-landing overload condition, and the maximum intrusion decreases by 25.94% under the drop impact condition. The results indicate that the tortoise-carapace-inspired metamaterial sandwich structure effectively enhances the deformation resistance and anti-intrusion capability of a flying car battery pack, thereby providing a feasible structural design approach for battery protection in flying car applications. Full article

Grid-connected photovoltaic (PV) systems paired with battery storage are becoming a core element of low-carbon distribution networks. This paper develops a complete closed-form formulation together with an independent, simulation-based verification of a single-phase grid-connected PV-battery microgrid sized for high-irradiance residential conditions in Saudi Arabia, using measured solar-resource and tariff data for Riyadh. A 6.25 kW monocrystalline array feeds a 400 V DC link through a perturb-and-observe boost stage; a bidirectional converter couples a 13.5 kWh LiFePO₄ battery; and an IEEE 1547 smart inverter interfaces a 230 V grid through an LCL filter. Governing equations for every subsystem are derived and evaluated numerically, and a Python re-implementation of the phasor power-flow model verifies the analysis over a 24 h cycle run to periodic steady state, reproducing the reference design values with a mean absolute error of 0.5%. Using measured monthly solar-resource and temperature data for Riyadh, a full twelve-month analysis gives an annual self-sufficiency of 51.8% and a PV self-consumption of 72.9% for the optimised energy-management scheme. A dedicated time-domain switching simulation with FFT analysis shows that the LCL filter limits grid-current total harmonic distortion to 0.8%, far below the L-filter value of 6.2% and below the 5% current-distortion reference of IEEE 519 (full compliance additionally requires the PCC short-circuit ratio). Twelve-month, battery-size and load-sensitivity studies confirm robustness, and a techno-economic assessment based on the Saudi Electricity Company residential tariff quantifies levelized cost, payback and battery degradation, showing that economic viability hinges on tariff reform. Full article

This paper quantifies PV-based power dispatch availability, termed “dynamic firm capacity” (DFC), to provide operational certainty at the power plant level. Unlike conventional PV forecasts with unavoidable errors, DFC is a conservative dispatch target designed to be reliably achievable by the PV–BESS system, enabling firm generation. Curtailment is treated as a controllable plant-level resource to improve dispatch reliability. Three methods for determining DFC are compared: a baseline using PV forecasts directly, a fixed-ratio downscaling of the PV forecast, and a deep reinforcement learning (DRL) approach based on the Proximal Policy Optimisation (PPO) algorithm. Using data from Rugby Run Solar Farm (RUGBYR1) in Queensland, Australia, PPO achieves higher accuracy with smaller battery capacity and lower curtailment than the other two methods, with the advantage widening as battery capacity and power limit grow. Against two additional tuned benchmarks (an empirical probability-of-exceedance quantile forecast and a state-of-charge-aware rule-based policy), PPO reaches comparable dispatch compliance at a fraction of the curtailed energy. The best-performing PPO agents demonstrate 100% DFC realisation and near-zero dispatch error at near-zero curtailment, with a BESS capacity equivalent to one hour of peak PV output and a 0.67 E-rate power limit. Results are reported across 100 independently trained agents per scenario using the September 2023–August 2024 period, and the method’s advantage is preserved on a chronologically later, fully unseen evaluation window (September 2024–May 2025). An open-source DRL training environment is released to support reproducible PV–BESS research. Full article

The pulsed neutron technique is a powerful, dynamic method to assay the reactivity of a multiplying system. This work presents the novel application of the pulsed neutron technique to the Inherently Safe Subcritical Assembly, an experimental configuration accepted by the International Criticality Safety Benchmark Evaluation Project Handbook. The experiments were replicated with COG11.3, a continuous-energy Monte Carlo code. The pulsed neutron data were analyzed using the Sjöstrand and Gozani area-ratio methods and by extracting the prompt neutron decay constant. Subsequent static k-eigenvalue and $\alpha$-eigenvalue simulations were also performed for the same configurations. Neutron detector dead-time effects from the experiments were corrected using the Backwards Extrapolation Method and shown to have a negligible impact on the estimated reactivities. The results highlight that capturing time-dependent effects like delayed neutron precursor buildup are essential to accurately reproduce experimental results. They also highlight the importance of shielding the detectors from generator source neutrons in deeply subcritical configurations. Full article

This study presents an integrated design-to-operation framework for a PV–battery solar highway lighting system supported by IoT-based monitoring for highway-scale deployment. The proposed framework combines pole-level PV-battery sizing, annual energy-reliability simulation, road-level techno-economic optimization, and IoT-based digital monitoring. The Shoubra–Banha Freeway in Egypt, a 40 km corridor with a two-sided lighting arrangement, was selected as the case study. In the pole-level phase, dimming strategies, PV capacities, battery sizes, and battery technologies were evaluated using sequential parametric analysis under a reliability constraint of Loss of Load Probability (LLP) below 1%. The S2 aggressive dimming profile achieved the best operating performance, with an LLP of 0.003, energy reliability of 99.70%, and 2.89 kWh annual unmet load. The minimum feasible PV capacity was 0.8 kW, while the smallest acceptable storage capacity was 4.8 kWh nominal capacity, corresponding to approximately 3.84 kWh usable capacity under an 80% allowable depth of discharge. Among the tested battery technologies, LiFePO₄ achieved the best reliability performance, with an LLP of 0.007 and a 99.25% battery deficit coverage ratio. In the road-level phase, three deployment configurations were compared. Case B, using 12 m pole height and 36 m spacing, was selected as the best-balanced solution, requiring 2224 poles, achieving 99.30% energy reliability, an LLP of 0.007, annual PV generation of 3,178,341 kWh, and total CAPEX of approximately 2.88 × 10⁸ EGP, equivalent to about 5.76 million USD based on an assumed exchange rate of 1 USD = 50 EGP. Lastly, the development of an IoT-based monitoring system design utilizing sector gateways, telemetry variables, alarm conditions, MQTT protocols, and dashboard displays was carried out. The scenario for gateways at 5 km intervals was advised due to its better fault isolation, lower gateway workload, and scalability. This indicates that the suggested approach offers a viable, cost-efficient, and technologically enabled solution for automated solar-powered street lighting systems. Full article

To address the coupling among bidding decisions, resource allocation, and coordinated utilization of environmental rights for distributed resource aggregators in multiple markets, including the energy market, peak regulation ancillary service market, carbon trading market, and tradable green certificate market, this paper proposes a bi-level optimization model for multi-market joint trading considering a limited carbon–green certificate linkage mechanism. First, a quantitative mapping relationship between the emission reduction attribute of surplus green certificates and carbon emission reduction is established, and an upper limit constraint on the offset ratio is introduced to describe the limited conversion of green certificate environmental attributes into carbon emission reduction value. Second, an upper-level bidding model for the distributed resource aggregator is constructed, aiming at profit maximization while considering revenues from the energy, peak regulation ancillary service, carbon trading, and green certificate markets, as well as the operational constraints of gas turbines, energy storage, and flexible loads. This model characterizes the aggregator’s joint bidding strategy and internal resource coordination. Then, a lower-level unified market clearing model is developed to minimize system operating cost and simulate the segmented bidding and unified clearing process of the aggregator, wind power, and thermal power units in the energy and peak regulation ancillary service markets. Finally, the bi-level model is transformed into a solvable single-level model using the Karush-Kuhn-Tucker (KKT) conditions and the Big-M method, and case studies are conducted to verify its effectiveness. The numerical results show that under the complete multi-market mechanism, the distributed resource aggregator (DRA) obtains a net profit of 2245.03 yuan, which is higher than 1450.33 yuan in the scenario without the carbon–green certificate mechanism and 773.48 yuan in the energy-only scenario. The wind curtailment rate decreases from 8.53% in the energy-only scenario to 2.71%, and the carbon emissions accounted for within the DRA boundary are reduced to 2865.40 kg. Although the price-taker scenario obtains a slightly higher net profit of 2300.20 yuan, its average regulation price reaches 455.20 yuan/MWh, compared with 412.50 yuan/MWh under the proposed model, indicating that the proposed strategy achieves a better balance between aggregator revenue and system-side regulation cost. Full article