Enthalpies of mixing in binary Cu–Eu and ternary Al–Cu–Eu liquid alloys

The enthalpies of mixing in liquid alloys of the binary Cu-Eu and ternary Al-Cu-Eu systems were determined over a wide range of compositions by means of isoperibolic calorimetry in the temperature range 1 300 - 1450 K. The enthalpies of mixing in the Cu-Eu system demonstrate small exothermic effects (ΔHmin = -4.1 ± 0.5 kJ · mol-1at xCu = 0.70). The measurements for the liquid ternary Al- Cu-Eu alloys were performed along five sections (xCu/ xEu = 0.70/0.30; 0.50/0.50 and 0.27/0.73 for xAl changed from 0 up to 0.30 and xAl/xEu = 0.20/0.80 and 0.47/0.53 for xCu changed from 0 up to 0.30). The enthalpies of mixing in the ternary system were found to be exothermic and increasing in absolute values from the Al corner towards the Al0.40Cu0.60-Al0.60Eu0.40section and from the constituent binary Cu-Eu system towards the same section. The minimum value of the integral enthalpy of mixing is expected in the vicinity of the Al0.6Eu0.4composition of the binary constituent Al-Eu system (about -23.00 kJ · mol-1).

Kvistur: Vélræn stofnhlutagreining samsettra orða

Compounding is extremely productive in Icelandic and multi-word compounds are common. The likelihood of finding previously unseen compounds in texts is thus very high, which makes out-of-vocabulary words a problem in the use of NLP tools. Kvistur, the decompounder described in this paper, splits Icelandic compounds and shows their binary constituent structure. The probability of a constituent in an unknown (or unanalysed) compound forming a combined constituent with either of its neighbours is estimated, with the use of data on the constituent structure of over 240 thousand compounds from the Database of Modern Icelandic Inflection (Kristín Bjarna-dótt ir 2012), and word frequencies from Íslenskur orðasjóður, a corpus of approx. 550 million words. Thus, the structure of an unknown compound is derived by comparison with compounds with partially the same constituents and similar structure in the training data. The granularity of the split returned by the decompounder is important in tasks such as semantic analysis or machine translation, where a fl at (non-structured) sequence of constituents is insufficient.

Characterization of the Lateral Distribution of Fluorescent Lipid in Binary-Constituent Lipid Monolayers by Principal Component Analysis

Lipid lateral organization in binary-constituent monolayers consisting of fluorescent and nonfluorescent lipids has been investigated by acquiring multiple emission spectra during measurement of each force-area isotherm. The emission spectra reflect BODIPY-labeled lipid surface concentration and lateral mixing with different nonfluorescent lipid species. Using principal component analysis (PCA) each spectrum could be approximated as the linear combination of only two principal vectors. One point on a plane could be associated with each spectrum, where the coordinates of the point are the coefficients of the linear combination. Points belonging to the same lipid constituents and experimental conditions form a curve on the plane, where each point belongs to a different mole fraction. The location and shape of the curve reflects the lateral organization of the fluorescent lipid mixed with a specific nonfluorescent lipid. The method provides massive data compression that preserves and emphasizes key information pertaining to lipid distribution in different lipid monolayer phases. Collectively, the capacity of PCA for handling large spectral data sets, the nanoscale resolution afforded by the fluorescence signal, and the inherent versatility of monolayers for characterization of lipid lateral interactions enable significantly enhanced resolution of lipid lateral organizational changes induced by different lipid compositions.

Focus in Bantu: verbal morphology and function

Although verb forms encoding focus were recorded in various Bantu languages during the twentieth century it was not until the late 1970's that they became the centre of serious attention, starting with the work of Hyman and Watters. In the last decade this attention has grown. While focus can be expressed variously, this paper concentrates largely on its morphological, partly on its tonal expression. On the basis of morphological and tonal behaviour, it identifies four blocks of languages, representing less than a third of all Bantu languages: those with metatony, those with a binary constituent contrast between verb ("disjunctive") and post-verbal ("conjunctive") focus, those with a three-way contrast, and those with verb initial /ni-/. Following Güldemann's lead, it is shown there is a fairly widespread grammaticalisation path whereby focus markers may come to encode progressive aspect, then present tense. Many Bantu languages today have a pre-stem morpheme /a/ 'non-past' and it is hypothesized that many of these /a/, which are otherwise hard to explain historically, may derive from an older focus marker.

Generative metrics and Old French octosyllabic verse

Both Old French meters and their Modern French descendants are usually thought to lack the internal binary constituent structure of, say, English or German iambic verse. In this article, however, an underlying iambic structure for the Old French octosyllable is established through quantitative analysis of a large corpus of texts written from c. 975 to 1180 (42 distinct works, including over 22,000 lines). Because no texts conform absolutely to the grammar of English iambic verse (Halle & Keyser, 1971; Kiparsky, 1977), certain measures are proposed for the degree to which a sample deviates from the iambic pattern; these values are then compared with the (chance) deviation of normal Old French prose. A significant correlation emerges between these measures and date of composition, author, and genre: early texts are almost perfectly iambic, and late 12th-century texts approach, but do not reach, chance levels. It is concluded that the grammar of meter used by Old French authors underwent a gradual change during the 12th century, a change comparable to more familiar phonological and syntactic changes.