A novel in situ fracture stage has been used to conduct micro compact tension (micro-CT) tests within the preparation chamber of a time-of-flight secondary-ion mass spectrometry (ToF-SIMS) instrument. Tests have been undertaken in the usual ultra high vacuum (UHV) conditions and in an ambient air atmosphere for comparison. A plain polyester resin system has been compared to an organically modif...

This study thoroughly explores the use of time-of-flight secondary ion mass spectrometry (ToF-SIMS) for determining the deposition sequence of fingermarks and ink on a porous paper surface. Our experimental work has demonstrated that mapping selected endogenous components present in natural fingermarks enables the observation of friction ridges on a laser-printed surface, only when a fingerprin...

The increasing use of nanoparticles (NP) in commercial products requires elaborated techniques to detect NP in the tissue of exposed organisms. However, due to the low amount of material, the detection and exact localization of NP within tissue sections is demanding. In this respect, Time-of-Flight Secondary Ion Mass Spectrometry (ToF-SIMS) and Ion Beam Microscopy (IBM) are promising techniques...

Secondary ion mass spectrometry (SIMS) is a powerful technique in the study of materials that demonstrate compositional changes as a function of depth from the surface. This is due to the high chemical sensitivity of SIMS (sensitive to ppb) and potential for high depth resolution. However, as a semi-quantitative technique, the application of SIMS to quantitative studies can be problematic witho...

This 19th century US gynaecologist still arouses controversy in the 21st century " PASS ME THE SIMS " is a request heard every day during gynaecological surgery and as often in outpatient practice. The Sims speculum has been a valuable gynaecological aid throughout the world since the first example was crudely fashioned from a pewter spoon in 1845 by James Marion Sims, a general practitioner in...

This paper is a preliminary description on an integrated benchmark suite for database systems, SIMS, which offers generic benchmarks and custom benchmarks to users in a unified interface. Currently SIMS supports three generic benchmarks (Wisconsin, BORD, and TPC-C) and four user-defined benchmarks. Any new custom benchmarks can be easily accommodated into SIMS. SIMS consists of four modules. Ea...

This article discusses some ideological issues related with the simulation of social systems in The Sims, proposing an interpretation of The Sims as an ideological game. This paper will focus on describing The Sims as a social simulator of a postcapitalist society: what The Sims proposes as an ideological game is a simulation of a specific set of values linked with a capitalist culture. Therefo...

High resolution imaging mass spectrometry could become a valuable tool for cell and developmental biology, but both, high spatial and mass spectral resolution are needed to enable this. In this report, we employed Bi3 bombardment time-of-flight (Bi3 ToF-SIMS) and C60 bombardment Fourier transform ion cyclotron resonance secondary ion mass spectrometry (C60 FTICR-SIMS) to image Dictyostelium dis...

This is the report of a project with the aim to make a new implementation of the Schreier-Sims algorithm in GAP, specialized for matrix groups. The standard Schreier-Sims algorithm is described in some detail, followed by descriptions of the probabilistic Schreier-Sims algorithm and the Schreier-Todd-Coxeter-Sims algorithm. Then we discuss our implementation and some optimisations, and finally ...