Sharif Digital Repository

Stimuli responsive hydrogels (SRHs) are attractive bioscaffolds for tissue engineering. The structural similarity of SRHs to the extracellular matrix (ECM) of many tissues offers great advantages for a minimally invasive tissue repair. Among various potential applications of SRHs, cartilage regeneration has attracted significant attention. The repair of cartilage damage is challenging in orthopedics owing to its low repair capacity. Recent advances include development of injectable hydrogels to minimize invasive surgery with nanostructured features and rapid stimuli-responsive characteristics. Nanostructured SRHs with more structural similarity to natural ECM up-regulate cell-material... 

We consider a population of individuals living in an uncertain environment. Individuals are able to make noisy observations of the environment and communicate using signals. We show that the model shows an order-disorder transition from an ordered phase in low communication noise in which a consensus about the environmental state is formed to a disordered phase in high communication noise in which no consensus is formed. There are different consensus states: informed consensus in which consensus on the correct belief about the environmental state is formed, and misinformed consensus in which consensus on a wrong belief is formed. Based on the consensus state reached, the ordered phase is... 

Fifteen years after introduction of Business Process Reengineering (BPR) and a series of successful and not-so-successful BPR implementation, a revised methodology is needed to incorporate cases of major and sudden organizational or environmental changes with BPR. The new methodology can also be particularly applicable to project oriented businesses. September 11, Tsunami, and other major world events show that nothing is constant but change. A reengineered process may only stay as the environment factors stay the same. Therefore, the processes can no longer be the central focus of reengineering, but the output needs. Technology has enabled us to refocus and apply reengineering constantly to... 

A remote controllable working graphite nanostructured swimmer based on a graphene jet nanomotor has been demonstrated for the first time. Graphite particles with pyramidal-like morphologies were fabricated by the creation of suitable defects in wide high-purity graphite flakes followed by a severe sonication. The particles were able to be self-exfoliated in water after Na intercalation between the graphene constituents. The self-exfoliation resulted in jet ejection of graphene flakes from the end of the swimmers (with speeds as high as ∼7000 m/s), producing a driving force (at least ∼0.7 L (pN) where L (μm) is swimmer size) and consequently the motion of the swimmer (with average speed of... 

The Earth albedo factor (EAF) is a major required parameter for the thermal analysis of low Earth orbit satellites. Satellites receive variable albedo radiation as they orbit around the Earth that is heavily dependent on the Earth's local terrain as well as the instantaneous cloud coverage. However, for satellite thermal balancing and control analysis, a constant mean EAF is usually taken based on the orbital parameters that could potentially introduce erroneous results. Recent advances in temperature-based orbit estimation (TBOE) algorithms have revealed a significant sensitivity concerning EAF giving rise to the idea of its on-line estimation for added accuracy. In this sense, a novel... 

We propose a novel hybrid learning approach to gain situation awareness in smart environments by introducing a new situation identifier that combines an expert system and a machine learning approach. Traditionally, expert systems and machine learning approaches have been widely used independently to detect ongoing situations as the main functionality in smart environments in various domains. Expert systems lack the functionality to adapt the system to each user and are expensive to design based on each setting. On the other hand, machine learning approaches fail in the challenge of cold start and making explainable decisions. Using both of these approaches enables the system to use user's... 

The Earth albedo factor (EAF) is a major required parameter for the thermal analysis of low Earth orbit (LEO) satellites. Satellites receive variable albedo radiation as they orbit around the Earth that is heavily dependent on the Earth's local terrain as well as the instantaneous cloud coverage. However, for satellite thermal balancing and control analysis, a constant mean EAF is usually taken based on the orbital parameters that could potentially introduce erroneous results. Recent advances in temperature-based orbit estimation (TBOE) algorithms have revealed a significant sensitivity concerning EAF giving rise to the idea of its on-line estimation for added accuracy. In this sense, a... 

In some industries such as the consumable product industry because of small differences between products made by various companies, customer loyalty is directly related to the availability of products required at that time. In other words, in such industries demand cannot be backlogged but can be totally or partly lost. So companies of this group use make-to-stock (MTS) production policy. Therefore, in these supply chains, final product warehouses play a very important role, which will be highlighted by considering the demand uncertainty as it happens in real world, especially in the consumable product industries in which demand easily varies according to the customer's taste variation,...