Search Results (5,269)

Discrete-Variable Quantum Key Distribution (DV-QKD) provides a mechanism for establishing secret keys between legitimate parties using quantum-state transmission and authenticated classical post-processing. In this work, the underlying quantum layer follows a biased-basis decoy-state BB84 model using phase-randomized weak coherent pulses, while additional implementation-level mechanisms are integrated to support Cyber-Physical System (CPS) communication. Exponential Double Delta Encoding-based Merkle Tree (EDDE-MT) is employed as a receiver-side detection-record integrity mechanism for detecting deletion, insertion, reordering, or modification of records relative to an authenticated committed detection-event batch. It does not establish the completeness of the original TCSPC acquisition, detect records omitted before commitment, detect physical photon loss, or increase the information-theoretic secrecy of the QKD key. Time-Correlated Single Photon Counting (TCSPC) is used for detection-event and timing acquisition, while 2’s Complement Cyclic Redundancy Check-based Low-Density Parity Check (2CCRC-LDPC) supports error reconciliation. Following privacy amplification, the legitimate parties retain matching copies of the distilled QKD key locally. Discrete Variable Quantum Mellin Transform Cryptography (DVQMTC) uses fresh, non-reused segments of this privacy-amplified key for application-layer payload protection; the Mellin-transform component is treated only as implementation-level preprocessing and not as a cryptographic key-generation mechanism. Side-channel monitoring is performed using Gini Cramer’s V Correlation-Stationary Wavelet Transform (GCVC-SWT), Helical Valley-Principal Component Analysis (HV-PCA), and an Entmax-based hyperbolic Tangent exponential Linear Unit-Bidirectional Long Short-Term Memory (E-TeLU-Bi-LSTM) classifier. On the AES-HD benchmark, E-TeLU-Bi-LSTM achieved 99.24% classification accuracy; this value represents benchmark-level classification performance and is not interpreted as experimental validation of physical side-channel protection in a deployed DV-QKD system. Frequency Division Multiple Access (FDMA) and the Halton Quasi-Sequence-Invasive Weed Optimization Algorithm (HQS-IWOA) are further incorporated as classical network-resource segmentation and load-management mechanisms and do not modify the composable QKD security bound. The contribution of the work is therefore positioned as a system-level engineering integration of QKD key establishment, detection-record integrity, reconciliation, application-layer data protection, side-channel monitoring, and network-resource management for CPS. The information-theoretic secrecy claim remains restricted to the underlying finite-key decoy-state BB84 procedure under the stated security assumptions; no new QKD security theorem, formally new cryptographic primitive, or experimentally validated physical quantum communication capability is claimed. Full article

Efflux pumps are essential components of cellular detoxification mechanisms, regulating the intracellular accumulation of xenobiotics and endogenous compounds. Among them, P-glycoprotein (P-gp) plays a role in protecting the brain from potentially toxic molecules, and alterations in its function have been associated with neurodegenerative disorders, including Parkinson’s disease (PD). Although P-gp inhibitors have been extensively investigated in the context of multidrug resistance, their effects on neuronal cells remain poorly characterized. In the present study, we investigated the biological effects of the pyridoquinoxaline-based efflux pump inhibitor 2,2′-(pyrido[2,3-g]quinoxaline-2,3-diylbis(methylene))bis(oxy)bis(N-phenylbenzamide) (10d) in PC12 cells, a widely used dopaminergic neuronal model. The effects of 10d were evaluated by an MTT-based cell viability assay, while intracellular and extracellular dopamine (DA) levels and DA metabolites were quantified by high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC). In addition, the ability of 10d to modulate MPTP-induced neurotoxicity was assessed, alone and in combination with amantadine (AMA), a known antiparkinsonian drug. Exposure to 10d (5 and 10 μM) reduced PC12 cell viability and markedly enhanced MPTP-induced cytotoxicity. Furthermore, 10d altered dopaminergic homeostasis by decreasing intracellular DA levels and modifying DA metabolite profiles, with more pronounced effects following co-treatment with MPTP. The combined administration of 10d, MPTP and AMA produced a stronger disruption of DA metabolism compared with individual treatments or 10d/MPTP co-exposure. Full article

Variable-rate pesticide spraying and fertilizer application require coordinated operation of heterogeneous agricultural machines, particularly in irregular fields where task demands, vehicle mobility, payload capacity, energy consumption, and resupply requirements vary spatially. However, most existing studies optimize aerial spraying or ground fertilization separately and do not jointly consider prescription-map demands, air–ground synchronization, pesticide-drift risk, and agricultural vehicle constraints. This study formulates collaborative UAV spraying and UGV fertilization as a multi-objective mixed-integer nonlinear programming problem with three objectives: minimizing system makespan, weighted energy consumption, and pesticide-drift penalty. A prescription-map-guided bi-level planning framework is proposed. At the upper level, the problem-specific TNSAOO solver determines UAV and UGV task sequences and collaborative resupply-point activation. At the lower level, adaptive Theta* and row-constrained Hybrid A* generate UAV spraying and UGV fertilization trajectories, respectively, while prescription-dependent application commands are assigned along active operation segments and a time-window mechanism detects and corrects residual air–ground conflicts. The framework was evaluated using 30 real farmland boundaries and 90 randomized prescription scenarios. Mean geometric coverage rates reached 98.82% for UAV spraying and 98.95% for UGV fertilization, while the mean prescription-compliance errors were 6.21% and 2.13%, respectively. In addition, 96.7% of the batch runs contained no more than one detected air–ground conflict, with a mean corrective waiting time of 1.07 s. Compared with traditional independent operation, collaborative planning reduced mean system makespan by 9.32%, weighted energy consumption by 7.21%, modeled drift penalty by 3.62%, and total path length by 5.79%. In the multi-objective comparison, TNSAOO obtained a mean hypervolume of 0.597 and a mean inverted generational distance of 0.375, showing competitive Pareto-search performance relative to established comparison algorithms, particularly NSGA-II. Additional terrain and drift sensitivity analyses produced systematic changes in energy, completion time, and modeled drift risk under controlled parameter perturbations. These findings demonstrate the simulation-based feasibility of jointly planning heterogeneous variable-rate spraying and fertilization under a shared prescription map. Physical field experiments remain necessary to validate spray deposition, fertilizer-distribution uniformity, terrain effects, and model calibration under environmental uncertainty. Full article

Elasmobranchs play a major role in shaping the structure and functioning of marine ecosystems through their position in food webs. The Lusitanian cownose ray Rhinoptera marginata, a benthopelagic species classified as Critically Endangered on the IUCN Red List, is frequently landed in fisheries off the Mauritanian coast, yet its trophic ecology remains poorly documented. We investigated the diet of R. marginata along the coast of Nouadhibou through stomach content analysis of 308 individuals sampled between March 2022 and August 2023; 135 stomachs (66 females and 69 males) contained identifiable prey and formed the basis of the analyses (disc width range 33–87 cm). Common dietary indices (frequency of occurrence, numerical and gravimetric percentages, Pinkas’ IRI, Hureau’s Q) were combined with multivariate approaches (PERMANOVA on Bray–Curtis dissimilarities, SIMPER, non-metric multidimensional scaling), measures of trophic niche breadth and specialization (Levins’ standardized index Bi, Shannon H′, Pielou’s J′, modified Costello plot), niche overlap (Pianka and Schoener indices), and ontogenetic modelling (generalized additive models). A total of 33 prey taxa were identified, dominated by Bivalvia (86.1% IRI), followed by Gastropoda (6.9%) and Crustacea (6.7%). The species exhibited a strongly specialized feeding strategy (Levins Bi = 0.06; Shannon H′ = 1.42) with high niche overlap between sexes (Pianka = 0.89). PERMANOVA detected significant compositional differences across seasons (pseudo-F = 6.98, p < 0.001) and size classes (pseudo-F = 4.98, p < 0.001) but not between sexes (pseudo-F = 1.87, p = 0.077). The proportion of bivalves significantly decreased with body size (R² = 0.176, p < 0.001), revealing a clear ontogenetic shift towards more diversified prey in larger individuals. The estimated trophic level (3.13) confirms a mesocarnivore benthic position. These results provide the first comprehensive description of the diet of R. marginata in West Africa and highlight its role as a specialized durophagous predator of bivalve molluscs, omnipresent along the northern Mauritanian coastal ecosystems. By identifying the principal prey, our findings provide a basis for identifying potentially important foraging habitats for this Critically Endangered species and informing future conservation and management strategies. Full article

Co-phase traction power supply system (CTPSS) integrated with photovoltaic (PV) and hybrid energy storage system (HESS) can enhance power supply capacity while facilitating the on-site consumption of renewable energy. This integration provides a pathway toward green development and the achievement of the “carbon peaking and carbon neutrality” goal. However, the stochastic nature of PV poses challenges to safe and economical operation of the system. Existing energy management methods remain limited in simultaneously balancing operational economy and extreme risks caused by PV uncertainty, making it difficult to achieve an effective trade-off between operating cost and constraint violation risk. To address this issue, a risk-sensitive optimal scheduling framework integrating probabilistic PV forecasting, correlated scenario generation, and risk-aware optimization is developed. First, a PV probabilistic prediction model based on parallel TCN-BiLSTM-Attention is proposed, which extracts multiscale local features and long-range temporal features from PV for accurate uncertainty quantification. Second, a t-Copula PV scenario generation method driven by weather classification and temporal correlation is proposed. On this basis, a day-ahead optimal scheduling strategy integrating chance constraints programming (CCP) and conditional value at risk (CVaR) is established to simultaneously control constraint violation risk and extreme economic risk. The proposed prediction model can accurately quantify uncertainty, achieving an R² value of 0.9979. When the allowable power supply loss probability is 0.5%, the proposed scheme’s operating cost is reduced by 1.36% compared with the baseline scheme. The results demonstrate that the proposed framework can effectively coordinate operating economy and extreme-risk control, thereby improving the risk-sensitive operational performance of CTPSS with PV and HESS. The proposed strategy balances economy and extreme risk, providing a reference for safe, low-carbon and economical operation of CTPSS with PV and HESS. Full article

This paper presents the design and analysis of a graphene-based patch antenna for terahertz (THz) communication applications. The proposed antenna has a compact footprint of 60 μm × 60 μm and employs an inset-fed modified graphene patch to achieve dual-band operation. The antenna exhibits resonances at 0.58 THz and 1.01 THz, with |S₁₁| below −30 dB, indicating excellent impedance matching. The tunability of graphene is investigated by varying the chemical potential and relaxation time, and the antenna performance is optimized accordingly. It is observed that higher values of chemical potential and relaxation time enhance the surface conductivity of graphene, resulting in improved impedance matching and radiation efficiency. A detailed parametric study is also carried out by varying the dimensions of the slot etched on the patch. The results demonstrate that slot dimensions significantly influence both impedance matching and resonance frequency tuning. The antenna achieves a gain > 2.53 dBi and total efficiency exceeding 60% across both operating bands. The radiation patterns in both E- and H-planes are nearly omnidirectional at 0.58 THz and 1.01 THz, making the design suitable for near-field THz applications. The electromagnetic performance of the proposed graphene patch antenna is analyzed using CST Microwave Studio. Full article

The laboratory fall-cone (FC) test method is widely adopted for liquid limit LL_FC determination, and in undrained shear strength s_u measurement of very soft to firm fine-grained soils. Additionally, it is used to establish the PL₁₀₀ parameter (i.e., the water content w mobilizing a 100-fold s_u increase relative to the LL_FC strength), typically determined using LL_FC data extrapolation approaches. This paper presents a theoretical and data-reanalysis investigation into the application of drop-cone (DC) methods for s_u measurement of firm to stiff fine-grained soils, and their PL₁₀₀ determination. Here, a 30° or 60° cone of modest mass M, released from a drop height h_d, contacts the test-specimen surface with an impact velocity, and penetrates into the soil, before coming to its rest position for a cone penetration depth d. Based on previously reported experimental FC and DC d:w data for ten different fine-grained soils, the authors examined the effects of (i) frictional resistance between the stem of the falling DC and its guide bearing, and (ii) the DC’s higher soil deformation rate, on the deduced PL₁₀₀ water content. An adjusted cone-factor framework for DC s_u testing, which considers the h_d/d ratio, and higher soil deformation rate, is presented. Bearing friction has the effect of deducing slightly higher s_u and PL₁₀₀ values. Small calibration adjustments to the DC setup, namely marginally increasing (i) the cone mass M, (ii) the drop height h_d, or (iii) both M and h_d, can eliminate systematic overpredictions. Theoretical 30° and 60° DC M:h_d combinations are identified for PL₁₀₀ determination. Finally, LL_FC data extrapolation for PL₁₀₀ determination, employing the bi-logarithmic log₁₀d:log₁₀w model, was found to achieve moderate levels of agreement between predicted PL₁₀₀ values and those directly measured using an 8 kg/30°–0 mm contacting cone for d = 20 mm, raising possible concerns about the generalizability of the extrapolation approach. Full article

Novel compounds based on symmetric and asymmetric 2,6-diacetylpyridine (DAP) Schiff bases were synthesized. A new salt of the symmetric Schiff base 2,6-diacetylpyridine-bis(aminoguanidine), L¹∙3HCl∙2H₂O, and its zinc(II) complex, [Zn(L¹)(SCN)₂] (1), were prepared. By template synthesis, the zinc(II) complex with an asymmetric DAP derivative containing aminoguanidine and thiosemicarbazide moieties (L²), [Zn(L²–H)Cl] (2), was obtained. All compounds were characterized by elemental analysis, FTIR spectroscopy, molar conductivity, thermogravimetric analysis, antioxidant activity measurements, and, for the complexes, SC-XRD. In 1, the first complex containing the Schiff base of DAP and aminoguanidine, the chelating ligand coordinates as a pentadentate N₅ donor through the pyridine, two azomethine, and two guanidine imino nitrogen atoms. Two SCN^– are coordinated through sulfur atoms, an uncommon coordination mode with zinc(II). In 2, the ligand acts as an N₃S tetradentate donor involving one azomethine, one hydrazine, the pyridine nitrogen, and thioamide sulfur atom. The chloride anion completes the coordination sphere. Thermal analysis demonstrated stepwise desolvation of the hydrated ligand, whereas the solvent-free complexes underwent continuous thermal decomposition with characteristic gaseous products. The ligand displayed considerable antioxidant activity, which was markedly diminished upon coordination. Full article

The emergence of hydrogen energy as a key part of the global decarbonization agenda and energy transition plans has gained traction in recent years. As one of the earliest states to adopt policies promoting hydrogen development, such as the Post COVID-19 Development Strategy (PCDS 2030) and the Sarawak Hydrogen Economy Roadmap (SHER 2025), Sarawak has paved the way for hydrogen development in Malaysia. Although the state’s commitment to invest in technology and infrastructure to support hydrogen development has been promising, the successful implementation of hydrogen energy depends not only on technological development but also on public acceptance and behavioural intention (BI), particularly among youths who will become future users and decision-makers. This study therefore aims to examine the predictive relationships between attitudes (ATTI), social norms (SN), perceived behavioural control (PBC), personal norms (PN), and behavioural intention (BI) towards hydrogen energy adoption among youths in Kuching, Sarawak. A cross-sectional survey using convenience sampling was conducted among 345 youths in Kuching, Sarawak, between 13 September and 17 December 2025, and the data were analysed using Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modelling (PLS-SEM). The results indicate that all four constructs exhibited significant positive predictive relationships with behavioural intention, with Personal Norms exhibiting the largest standardized path coefficient (β = 0.246, p < 0.001). These findings suggest the value of incorporating Personal Norms into the Theory of Planned Behaviour to enhance the understanding of behavioural intention towards hydrogen energy adoption. The study contributes to the growing body of literature on hydrogen energy adoption and offers practical insights that may assist policymakers in developing youth-focused awareness initiatives, strengthening environmental responsibility, and supporting hydrogen energy awareness and acceptance among youths in Kuching. Full article

Reliable monitoring of reclaimed cropland is hindered when one optical acquisition is unavailable or degraded. We formulate missing-modality bi-temporal optical–SAR change detection and propose the Modality-Availability-Aware Robust Change Network (MARC-Net), a new architecture that combines explicit availability conditioning, condition-aware temporal proxy stabilization, a shared residual input adapter, multi-level signed temporal interaction, dilated context refinement, and hierarchical change decoding. A two-phase condition-balanced learning strategy jointly develops mixed-missing representations and optimizes Full, Missing-O, and Missing-S behavior without reconstructing the unavailable image. On four reclaimed-cropland scenes, the final model obtains IoUs of 0.7826, 0.7039, and 0.7780, respectively, with a three-condition mean of 0.7548. It exceeds the strongest evaluated external baseline mean (0.7381) while using one checkpoint and a fixed argmax decision rule. LOSO and controlled optical-degradation experiments further characterize robustness under geographic shift and progressive observation-quality degradation. These results demonstrate that availability-aware temporal stabilization and condition-balanced optimization provide an effective operating point for incomplete-input reclaimed-cropland monitoring while preserving complete-input performance. Full article

Photodegradation limits the accuracy of fast pressure-sensitive paints (PSPs), but its dependences on irradiance and operating conditions remain insufficiently researched. Here, the photodegradation kinetics of a polymer–ceramic PSP (PC-PSP) and a mesoporous-particle PSP (MP-PSP) were investigated under independently varied irradiance (50–122 mW/cm²), pressure (0.5–100 kPa), and temperature (20–100 °C). Normalized intensity histories acquired during 900 s of continuous irradiation were fitted with a bi-exponential model, whose composite degradation rate was correlated to the studied parameters using physical relations. PC-PSP exhibited greater absolute degradation and an approximately linear irradiance dependence (m = 1.28), whereas MP-PSP showed a nonlinear dependence (m = 2.13), consistent with a greater relative contribution from photooxidative processes. The degradation rate of PC-PSP decreased predominantly with increasing pressure because oxygen quenching reduced the excited-state luminophore population. MP-PSP exhibited a non-monotonic pressure dependence: decreasing pressure initially accelerated degradation by weakening oxygen quenching, whereas further pressure reduction below the half-saturation region suppressed oxygen-limited photooxidation. Increasing temperature generally accelerated degradation in both formulations; the fitted apparent activation energies were 12.99 kJ mol⁻¹ for PC-PSP and 33.12 kJ mol⁻¹ for MP-PSP, reflecticng the stronger overall temperature dependence of MP-PSP. These findings provide a basis for quantitatively evaluating PSP photostability and assessing photodegradation-induced measurement errors. Full article

The lunar south polar region’s extreme illumination conditions impose strict energy constraints for solar-powered rover operations. Traditional Sun-synchronous path planning relies on dynamic time-dependent illumination evaluation, leading to high computational costs. We present CIRsE-Net, a spatiotemporal deep learning model that generates 72 h continuous illumination maps from hourly sequential illumination data. The model integrates a lightweight SST-VGG encoder (a customized 14-layer CNN for spatial feature extraction), BiGRU temporal modelling (a bidirectional recurrent network for capturing forward and backward temporal dependencies), and a consistency-aware spatiotemporal attention mechanism. On three different lunar illumination datasets (20 m/pixel, 5 m/pixel, and 20 m/pixel with a 2 m panel height), the model achieves Dice scores up to 0.983 and accuracy up to 0.985. When integrated with an enhanced 3ST-A* planner, the framework converts dynamic path planning into a static search task, reducing computational overhead while preserving path optimality and satisfying slope and illumination constraints. This work provides a validated methodological framework for Chang’E-7 mission planning and future lunar polar exploration missions by transforming dynamic path planning into a static search task. Full article

Adaptive reuse of industrial heritage has become an important approach for extending building life cycles, preserving cultural identity, and promoting urban regeneration. However, limited research has examined how users’ perceptions of regenerated industrial spaces relate to broader evaluations of adaptive reuse outcomes. This study investigates ZhiYin 1953, a commercially reused former textile factory complex in Shijiazhuang, China. Using an extended Stimulus–Organism–Response (S-O-R) framework, we analyzed data from 396 valid on-site questionnaires using confirmatory factor analysis and structural equation modeling. The results show that industrial heritage perception, spatial environmental quality, and commercial vitality are positively associated with place attachment (PA). PA is positively related to both behavioral intention (BI) and perceived human settlement value (PHSV), while BI is also positively associated with PHSV. Mediation analysis suggests that PA and BI represent important indirect pathways linking site-related perceptions with users’ evaluations of adaptive reuse outcomes. By contrast, commercial–industrial culture coordination does not significantly predict PA, suggesting that symbolic coordination between commercial functions and industrial cultural elements may not be sufficient to strengthen users’ emotional connections. These findings highlight the importance of evaluating industrial heritage adaptive reuse beyond physical conservation and functional transformation by considering users’ perceptions of heritage meaning, spatial quality, public life, and continued engagement. Sustainable regeneration strategies should therefore integrate heritage-sensitive design, accessible public spaces, balanced commercial activation, and meaningful cultural interpretation. Full article

Musculoskeletal fatigue precedes much of the injury burden in manufacturing, yet most monitoring schemes register an injury only once it has occurred, which becomes critical where operators share a workspace with collaborative robots. This paper presents a wearable sensing platform and a learning pipeline that track operator fatigue continuously during human–robot collaborative assembly, evaluated in silico. Eight surface electromyography (sEMG) channels, six inertial measurement units, and four force-sensitive resistors feed a 127-dimensional descriptor computed over 30 s windows. Eight classifiers were trained on 1536 simulated working hours from 24 anthropometrically diverse synthetic operators. Under leave-operators-out cross-validation, a 1D-CNN–LSTM hybrid reached 89.3% three-class accuracy and 87.1% balanced accuracy with 73.9 k parameters and 22 ms inference on a Jetson Nano; a CNN–BiLSTM–attention model gained 0.3 percentage points for 1.6 times the parameters, a difference that was not statistically significant. Ablation attributed 7.0 points of balanced accuracy to sEMG and 5.0 points to three contextual variables requiring no sensor. Alerts preceded severe fatigue by roughly 12 min, and alert-triggered task reallocation cut peak shoulder load by 43% while retaining 94% of baseline throughput. Every result characterizes a simulated environment: the study establishes internal consistency, latency feasibility, and design trade-offs, and prospective validation with human operators remains a prerequisite for deployment. Full article

Academic laboratories increasingly deploy DC motor-driven equipment, but wireless control faces two challenges: congestion in the 2.4 GHz band and the absence of application-layer confidentiality. This paper presents a 433 MHz LoRa-based wireless joystick control system with AES-128 confidentiality protection, validated using an ABU Robocon robot as a representative testbed. Performance was characterized outdoors across six Spreading Factors (SF7–SF12) under line-of-sight (LoS) and non-line-of-sight (NLoS) propagation (n = 6 per condition), and across three indoor campaigns (n ≈ 100 packets per condition) to quantify the gap between outdoor boundary estimates and indoor deployment. One-way ANOVA confirmed significant SF effects on latency, RSSI, and SNR (F = 10.4–5812, p < 0.001); normality and homogeneity-of-variance assumptions were formally tested, frequently violated for RSSI/SNR, and corroborated by Kruskal–Wallis tests, with large effect sizes (η² = 0.27–0.99). A preliminary low-antenna indoor test showed severe PDR degradation (as low as 14%), plausibly from ground-reflection multipath; elevating both antennas (≈70/60 cm) produced mixed, not uniformly improved, results. Indoor-NLoS testing showed low Spreading Factors failing almost completely beyond 5 m (SF7/SF8 near 0% PDR at 10–15 m) while SF10–SF12 remained robust (89–100%), a more consequential finding than outdoor boundary conditions (100% PDR at 5–15 m) suggest alone. Interference experiments characterized position-dependent and cross-Spreading-Factor resilience, with an explicit literature-grounded caveat rather than an unconditional quasi-orthogonality claim. SF10/SF11 with a 5 dBi antenna remains the best outdoor compromise (147–176 m range, 206–357 ms latency); indoor deployments require SF-specific de-rating and antenna-height practice. AES-128 added no measurable latency overhead. Contributions include a validated retrofit blueprint, a statistically grounded SF selection matrix spanning outdoor and indoor conditions, a practical antenna-height recommendation, and a controlled characterization of indoor interference resilience. The AES-128 ECB implementation provides confidentiality only, not authentication or replay resistance; limitations and a migration roadmap are discussed. Full article