Dielectrophoretic force distribution of growing microwires

1. Introduction The assembly of colloidal particles holds promise for the miniaturization of photonic and electrical circuits and their stacking in the third dimension [1]. Important recent developments in the field of creating miniaturized electrically functional structures include the synthesis of electronic elements by templated growth in membrane channels [2] and their assembly and characterization [3], formation of electrical connections and electronic elements by electro-deposition [4], …     

The homogenization of a class of degenerate quasilinear parabolic equations

1. Introduction and main results 1.1 Introduction Let 0T> and nW be an open bounded domain with with Lipschitz boundary, consider the following initial-boundary value problem : () 0div (,,)(,) in (0,)(,)0 on (0,) (0,)|()tTtuuftTPutTuuxeeeeeWWeeW-==?洞=xaxxxin the space [0,;]pXLTV=, where 1,0(,)pVWemW= is a weighted Sobolev space, p is a constant larger than 1, and e is a positive constant, t and x are variables of the functions a and u. The degenerati…     

Entire functions sharing a value with its weight

Introduction Let f and g be two meromorphic functions defined in the open complex plane C, and k be a nonnegative integer or infinity. For {}aC违U, denote by (;)kEaf the set of all a-points of f where an a-point of multiplicity m is counted m times if mk and otherwise k+1 times. If (;)(;)kkEafEag=, then, f and g are considered to share the value a with weight k, which is expressed by f and g share (a ,k). Clearly if f and g share (a ,k), then they share (a ,p) for all integer p in 0pk#. It…     

Robust sliding mode control for uncertain discrete time systems

1. Introduction Sliding mode variable structure control (SMVSC) as a general design approach for a robust control system is well established. In recent years, a considerable amount of effort has been put into studying discrete sliding variable structure control (DSMVSC) with the development and application of computer [1-4]. However, theoretically speaking, DSMVSC can not be obtained from the continuous counterpart by means of simple equivalence [4]. Most of the research on DSMVSC f…     

Do principal-educators have the ability to transform schools?: A South African perspective

Post-1994 South Africa adopted a new education system that would seemingly break with the past practices of the apartheid education system (Naicker, 1999) and produce citizens prepared for a democratic dispensation in South Africa. Accordingly, the new system of outcomes-based education was introduced in order to create the critical mass needed for the transformation of society. Thus, schools would become the sites where democratic practices for democratic citizenship would be fostered. Government duly promulgated the applicable policy documents (55 and 67).     

Legitimate Peripheral Participation (LPP) – The case for Recognition of Prior Learning sites and knowledges in South Africa's transforming education system

By definition and purpose, education is the development of human capital towards meeting the individual and social needs of learners and their societies. This transdisciplinary collaboration parallels the underpinning principle of Lave and Wenger's Legitimate Peripheral Participation (Lave & Wenger, 1990) to South Africa's post-colonial legitimation of alternative sites and enskilment canons. Central to both is legitimation of knowledge acquisition from communities of practice or sites and ‘knowers’ (Mphahlele, 1992) ‘outside formal institutions’ of teaching/learning. Considered and termed ‘informal’ and by deduction, less legitimate for meritorious enskilment, the 62 and 65 decrees a transformative paradigm and method of validating these sites and their skills production. SAQA highlights the fact that the pedagogical approach of such sites is context- and learner-centred with demonstrable socially valuable skills. This post-colonial mandate thus centres the Recognition of Prior Learning (RPL) as an acknowledgement of multiple foci of skills production, decreeing their overdue certification, as in our case study of the Van Wyk situation. The approach confronts and deconstructs the colonial marginalisation of human capital from outside ‘formal’/official institutions. It is part of the ideological framework of redressing the race and class exclusion mechanisms of artisans and others from the landscape of skills possession. It subscribes therefore to the canon of different ‘ways of knowing’ (Mosala, 1998). Van Wyk's narrative exemplify the merits of ‘outside-institutions’ learning and enskilment to various levels of complexity. The objective of such legitimation is that certification provides credibility and legitimacy, thereby widening the marketability of apprentices' skills. The social recognition and accorded certification thereof carries uncontested confirmation of expertise.     

Field emission from Si tips coated with nanocrystalline diamond films

1. Introduction Recently, carbon nanotubes have attracted a lot of interest because of their outstanding electrical properties and their potential application as a possible material for fabrication of cold cathodes [1-3]. It was found that the field enhancement from carbon nano-tubes exhibited large local field enhancement and considerable field emission currents at relatively low applied voltage. Carbon nanotube-based field emission displays have been fabricated using well-aligned nano-tubes …     

Anti-periodic traveling wave solution to a forced two-dimensional generalized KdV-Burgers equation

1. Introducton The two-dimensional KdV equation was first derived by Kadomtsev and Petviashvili in 1970 [1], and it is also referred to as the KP equation. Periodic Traveling wave solutions to the KP and modified KP equation were investigated by Chen and Wen [2]. The author considers the generalized inhomogeneous two-dimensional KdV-Burgers equation as follows. {}[()] 0,,,0,txxxxxxxyyufuuuugxytabd+++++=纬% (1.1) where f C2(); b, d and a are given constant…     

Damage assessment of a continuous beam bridge based on the strain mode

1. Introduction In the structural damage identification, the confirmation of parameters sensitive to damage is the foremost, namely to decide what parameters are to be adopted, the next is to distinguish damaged from undamaged, and to determine the position and severity of damages. For local damage, an identifying parameter should be a local quantity and accord the following 4 basic conditions: 1) it is sensitive to local damages and is a monotone function depicting the severity of structural …