Description: In this article, the authors report an atomistic simulation study of the behavior of nanocomposite materials that are formed by incorporating single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs), with three different diameters, and a multiwalled carbon nanotube (MWCNT) into a single-crystal nickel matrix. The interactions between carbon and nickel atoms are described by a modified embedded atom method potential. Mechanical properties of these nanocomposite materials are predicted by atomistic calculations and compared with that of fcc nickel and pristine CNTs. The authors' simulations predict that all Ni/CNT composites studied in this work are mechanically stable. Their elastic properties depend on the volume fraction and diameter of embedded CNTs. The single-crystal Young's modulus (E₁₁) of Ni/SWCNT composites exhibit a large increase in the direction of CNTs alignment compared to that of a single-crystal nickel. However, a moderate but gradual decrease is seen for E₂₂ and E₃₃ in the transverse directions with increase in CNT diameters. As a consequence, Ni/SWCNTs show a gradual decrease for the polycrystalline Young's, bulk and shear moduli with the increasing CNT diameters and volume fractions. These reductions, although moderate, suggest that enhancement of mechanical properties for polycrystalline Ni/SWCNT nanocomposites are not achievable at any CNT volume fraction. The Ni/MWCNT composite ...

Description: This articles discusses an analysis of multiple ignition sites, primary circuits, and burst phase delay distributions. All higher order central nervous systems exhibit spontaneous neural activity, though the purpose and mechanistic origin of such activity remains poorly understood. The authors quantitatively analyzed the ignition and spread of collective spontaneous electrophysiological activity in networks of cultured cortical neurons growing in microelectrode arrays. Leader neurons, which form a mono-synaptically connected primary circuit, and initiate a majority of network bursts were found to be a small subset of recorded neurons. Leader/follower firing delay times formed temporally stable positively skewed distributions. Blocking inhibitory synapses usually resulted in shorter delay times with reduced variance. These distributions are characterizations of general aspects of internal network dynamics and provide estimates of pair-wise synaptic distances. The resulting analysis produced specific quantitative constraints and insights into the activation patterns of collective neuronal activity in self-organized cortical networks, which may prove useful for models emulating spontaneously active systems.

Description: This article discusses K-shell x-ray-production cross sections. Abstract: K-shell x-ray-production cross sections are reported for elements with K-shell x-ray energies between 277 eV (C) and 1487 eV (Al). The x-ray measurements were made with a windowless Si(Li) detector that was calibrated for efficiency by comparing bremsstrahlung spectra from electron bombardment of thin foils of aluminum, silver, and gold with theoretically determined bremsstrahlung spectral distributions. The x-ray-production cross-section measurements are compared to first-order Born and perturbed-stationary-state with energy-loss, Coulomb deflection, and relativistic corrections (ECPSSR) ionization theories using single-hole fluorescence yields. The ECPSSR and first-order Born theoretical predictions are, in general, in close agreement with each other and both generally fit the data quite well.