We find that the spoon-like tips of the chelipeds (large claws) of the crab Pachygrapsus crassipes differ from the rest of the claw in that they are not calcified, but instead contain about 1% bromine--thus they represent a new example of a class of structural biological materials that contain heavy elements such as Zn, Mn, Fe, Cu, and Br bound in an organic matrix. X-ray absorption spectroscop...

A subtyping 0 is entailed by a set of subtyping constraints C, written C j= 0, if every valuation (mapping of type variables to ground types) that satisfies C also satisfies 0. We study the complexity of subtype entailment for simple types over lattices of base types. We show that: deciding C j= 0 is coNP-complete. decidingC j= for consistent, atomicC and ; atomic can be done in linear time. Th...

In this paper we give a programmatic overview of parame-terized computational complexity in the broad context of the problem of coping with computational intractability. We give some examples of how xed-parameter tractability techniques can deliver practical algorithms in two diierent ways: (1) by providing useful exact algorithms for small parameter ranges, and (2) by providing guidance in the...

Two models were recently proposed to explore the robust hardness of Gröbner basis computation. Given a polynomial system, both models allow an algorithm to selectively ignore some of the polynomials: the algorithm is only responsible for returning a Gröbner basis for the ideal generated by the remaining polynomials. For the q-Fractional Gröbner Basis Problem the algorithm is allowed to ignore a...

From an empirical point of view, the hardness of quantified Boolean formulas (QBFs), can be characterized by the (in)ability of current state-of-the-art QBF solvers to decide about the truth of formulas given limited computational resources. In this paper, we start from the problem of computing empirical hardness markers, i.e., features that can discriminate between hard and easy QBFs, and we e...

Surface finish and surface hardness of the components play vital role in quality of products/components, in general and failure resistance, in particular. One of the finishing process that involve surface plastic deformation and introduces compressive residual stresses and thereby improve fatigue resistance is “Burnishing”. Even though the burnishing process is widely employed, its process para...

The NP-hard 2-Club problem is, given an undirected graph G = (V,E) and ` ∈ N, to decide whether there is a vertex set S ⊆ V of size at least ` such that the induced subgraph G[S] has diameter at most two. We make progress towards a systematic classification of the complexity of 2-Club with respect to a hierarchy of prominent structural graph parameters. First, we present the following tight NP-...

The search for novel superhard materials with special structures and improved thermal stability and hardness remains considerably experimental and theoretical challenges. Recent reports proposed that higher carbon content in ternary B2CxO compounds, which are isoelectronic with diamond, would lead to increased strength and hardness. This notion was derived from the calculated elastic parameters...

This paper describes various reliability concerns of the newly developed INGRID detector. This radiation detector is fabricated by waferscale CMOS post-processing; fresh detectors show excellent performance. Since the microsystems will be used unpackaged they are susceptible to all kinds of environmental conditions. The device passed tests of micro-ESD, radiation hardness, dielectric strength; ...