A review on the multi-scaled structures and mechanical/thermal properties of tool steels fabricated by laser powder bed fusion additive manufacturing

The laser powder bed fusion(LPBF) process can integrally form geometrically complex and high-performance metallic parts that have attracted much interest,especially in the molds industry.The appearance of the LPBF makes it possible to design and produce complex conformal cooling channel systems in molds.Thus,LPBF-processed tool steels have attracted more and more attention.The complex thermal history in the LPBF process makes the microstructural characteristics and properties different from those of conventional manufactured tool steels.This paper provides an overview of LPBF-processed tool steels by describing the physical phenomena,the microstructural characteristics,and the mechanical/thermal properties,including tensile properties,wear resistance,and thermal properties.The microstructural characteristics are presented through a multiscale perspective,ranging from densification,meso-structure,microstructure,substructure in grains,to nanoprecipitates.Finally,a summary of tool steels and their challenges and outlooks are introduced.

Multi-Scale Design and Optimization of Composite Material Structure for Heavy-Duty Truck Protection Device

In this paper,to present a lightweight-developed front underrun protection device(FUPD)for heavy-duty trucks,plain weave carbon fiber reinforced plastic(CFRP)is used instead of the original high-strength steel.First,the mechanical and structural properties of plain carbon fiber composite anti-collision beams are comparatively analyzed from a multi-scale perspective.For studying the design capability of carbon fiber composite materials,we investigate the effects of TC-33 carbon fiber diameter(D),fiber yarn width(W)and height(H),and fiber yarn density(N)on the front underrun protective beam of carbon fiber compositematerials.Based on the investigation,a material-structure matching strategy suitable for the front underrun protective beam of heavy-duty trucks is proposed.Next,the composite material structure is optimized by applying size optimization and stack sequence optimization methods to obtain the higher performance carbon fiber composite front underrun protection beam of commercial vehicles.The results show that the fiber yarn height(H)has the greatest influence on the protective beam,and theH1matching scheme for the front underrun protective beamwith a carbon fiber composite structure exhibits superior performance.The proposed method achieves a weight reduction of 55.21% while still meeting regulatory requirements,which demonstrates its remarkable weight reduction effect.

A semi-analytical model for coupled flow in stress-sensitive multi-scale shale reservoirs with fractal characteristics

A large number of nanopores and complex fracture structures in shale reservoirs results in multi-scale flow of oil. With the development of shale oil reservoirs, the permeability of multi-scale media undergoes changes due to stress sensitivity, which plays a crucial role in controlling pressure propagation and oil flow. This paper proposes a multi-scale coupled flow mathematical model of matrix nanopores, induced fractures, and hydraulic fractures. In this model, the micro-scale effects of shale oil flow in fractal nanopores, fractal induced fracture network, and stress sensitivity of multi-scale media are considered. We solved the model iteratively using Pedrosa transform, semi-analytic Segmented Bessel function, Laplace transform. The results of this model exhibit good agreement with the numerical solution and field production data, confirming the high accuracy of the model. As well, the influence of stress sensitivity on permeability, pressure and production is analyzed. It is shown that the permeability and production decrease significantly when induced fractures are weakly supported. Closed induced fractures can inhibit interporosity flow in the stimulated reservoir volume (SRV). It has been shown in sensitivity analysis that hydraulic fractures are beneficial to early production, and induced fractures in SRV are beneficial to middle production. The model can characterize multi-scale flow characteristics of shale oil, providing theoretical guidance for rapid productivity evaluation.

Multi-scale physics-informed neural networks for solving high Reynolds number boundary layer flows based on matched asymptotic expansions

Multi-scale system remains a classical scientific problem in fluid dynamics,biology,etc.In the present study,a scheme of multi-scale Physics-informed neural networks is proposed to solve the boundary layer flow at high Reynolds numbers without any data.The flow is divided into several regions with different scales based on Prandtl's boundary theory.Different regions are solved with governing equations in different scales.The method of matched asymptotic expansions is used to make the flow field continuously.A flow on a semi infinite flat plate at a high Reynolds number is considered a multi-scale problem because the boundary layer scale is much smaller than the outer flow scale.The results are compared with the reference numerical solutions,which show that the msPINNs can solve the multi-scale problem of the boundary layer in high Reynolds number flows.This scheme can be developed for more multi-scale problems in the future.

Improved multi-scale inverse bottleneck residual network based on triplet parallel attention for apple leaf disease identification

Accurate diagnosis of apple leaf diseases is crucial for improving the quality of apple production and promoting the development of the apple industry. However, apple leaf diseases do not differ significantly from image texture and structural information. The difficulties in disease feature extraction in complex backgrounds slow the related research progress. To address the problems, this paper proposes an improved multi-scale inverse bottleneck residual network model based on a triplet parallel attention mechanism, which is built upon ResNet-50, while improving and combining the inception module and ResNext inverse bottleneck blocks, to recognize seven types of apple leaf(including six diseases of alternaria leaf spot, brown spot, grey spot, mosaic, rust, scab, and one healthy). First, the 3×3 convolutions in some of the residual modules are replaced by multi-scale residual convolutions, the convolution kernels of different sizes contained in each branch of the multi-scale convolution are applied to extract feature maps of different sizes, and the outputs of these branches are multi-scale fused by summing to enrich the output features of the images. Second, the global layer-wise dynamic coordinated inverse bottleneck structure is used to reduce the network feature loss. The inverse bottleneck structure makes the image information less lossy when transforming from different dimensional feature spaces. The fusion of multi-scale and layer-wise dynamic coordinated inverse bottlenecks makes the model effectively balances computational efficiency and feature representation capability, and more robust with a combination of horizontal and vertical features in the fine identification of apple leaf diseases. Finally, after each improved module, a triplet parallel attention module is integrated with cross-dimensional interactions among channels through rotations and residual transformations, which improves the parallel search efficiency of important features and the recognition rate of the network with relatively small computational costs while the dimensional dependencies are improved. To verify the validity of the model in this paper, we uniformly enhance apple leaf disease images screened from the public data sets of Plant Village, Baidu Flying Paddle, and the Internet. The final processed image count is 14,000. The ablation study, pre-processing comparison, and method comparison are conducted on the processed datasets. The experimental results demonstrate that the proposed method reaches 98.73% accuracy on the adopted datasets, which is 1.82% higher than the classical ResNet-50 model, and 0.29% better than the apple leaf disease datasets before preprocessing. It also achieves competitive results in apple leaf disease identification compared to some state-ofthe-art methods.

OptoGPT: A foundation model for inverse design in optical multilayer thin film structures

Optical multilayer thin film structures have been widely used in numerous photonic applications.However,existing inverse design methods have many drawbacks because they either fail to quickly adapt to different design targets,or are difficult to suit for different types of structures,e.g.,designing for different materials at each layer.These methods also cannot accommodate versatile design situations under different angles and polarizations.In addition,how to benefit practical fabrications and manufacturing has not been extensively considered yet.In this work,we introduce OptoGPT(Opto Generative Pretrained Transformer),a decoder-only transformer,to solve all these drawbacks and issues simultaneously.

Multi-scale analysis of carbon mineralization in lime-treated soils considering soil mineralogy

Mineral carbonation is emerging as a reliable CO_(2) capture technology that can mitigate climate change.In lime-treated clayey soils,mineral carbonation occurs through the carbonation of free lime and cementitious products derived from pozzolanic reactions.The kinetics of the reactions in lime-treated clayey soils are variable and depend primarily on soil mineralogy.The present study demonstrates the role of soil mineralogy in CO_(2) capture and the subsequent changes caused by carbon mineralization in terms of the unconfined compressive strength(UCS)of lime-treated soils during their service life.Three clayey soils(kaolin,bentonite,and silty clay)with different mineralogical characteristics were treated with 4%lime content,and the samples were cured in a controlled environment for 7 d,90 d,180 d,and 365 d.After the specified curing periods,the samples were exposed to CO_(2) in a carbonation cell for 7 d.The non-carbonated samples purged with N2 gas were used as a benchmark to compare the mechanical,chemical-mineralogical,and microstructure changes caused by carbonation reactions.Experimental investigations indicated that exposure to CO_(2) resulted in an average increase of 10%in the UCS of limetreated bentonite,whereas the strength of lime-treated kaolin and silty clay was reduced by an average of 35%.The chemical and microstructural analyses revealed that the precipitated carbonates effectively filled the macropores of the treated bentonite,compared to the inadequate cementation caused by pozzolanic reactions,resulting in strength enhancement.In contrast,strength loss in lime-treated kaolin and silty clay was attributed to the carbonation of cementitious phases and partly to the tensile stress induced by carbonate precipitation.In terms of carbon mineralization prospects,lime-treated kaolin exhibited maximum carbonation due to the higher availability of unreacted lime.The results suggest that,in addition to the increase in compressive strength,adequate calcium-bearing phases and macropores determine the efficiency of carbon mineralization in lime-treated clayey soils.

Seabed structures and foundations related to deep-sea resource development:A review based on design and research

The deep‐sea ground contains a huge amount of energy and mineral resources,for example,oil,gas,and minerals.Various infrastructures such as floating structures,seabed structures,and foundations have been developed to exploit these resources.The seabed structures and foundations can be mainly classified into three types:subsea production structures,offshore pipelines,and anchors.This study reviewed the development,installation,and operation of these infrastructures,including their structures,design,installation,marine environment loads,and applications.On this basis,the research gaps and further research directions were explored through this literature review.First,different floating structures were briefly analyzed and reviewed to introduce the design requirements of the seabed structures and foundations.Second,the subsea production structures,including subsea manifolds and their foundations,were reviewed and discussed.Third,the basic characteristics and design methods of deep‐sea pipelines,including subsea pipelines and risers,were analyzed and reviewed.Finally,the installation and bearing capacity of deep‐sea subsea anchors and seabed trench influence on the anchor were reviewed.Through the review,it was found that marine environment conditions are the key inputs for any offshore structure design.The fabrication,installation,and operation of infrastructures should carefully consider the marine loads and geological conditions.Different structures have their own mechanical problems.The fatigue and stability of pipelines mainly depend on the soil‐structure interaction.Anchor selection should consider soil types and possible trench formation.These focuses and research gaps can provide a helpful guide on further research,installation,and operation of deep‐sea structures and foundations.

Web Layout Design of Large Cavity Structures Based on Topology Optimization

Large cavity structures are widely employed in aerospace engineering, such as thin-walled cylinders, blades andwings. Enhancing performance of aerial vehicles while reducing manufacturing costs and fuel consumptionhas become a focal point for contemporary researchers. Therefore, this paper aims to investigate the topologyoptimization of large cavity structures as a means to enhance their performance, safety, and efficiency. By usingthe variable density method, lightweight design is achieved without compromising structural strength. Theoptimization model considers both concentrated and distributed loads, and utilizes techniques like sensitivityfiltering and projection to obtain a robust optimized configuration. The mechanical properties are checked bycomparing the stress distribution and displacement of the unoptimized and optimized structures under the sameload. The results confirm that the optimized structures exhibit improved mechanical properties, thus offering keyinsights for engineering lightweight, high-strength large cavity structures.

Multi-Material Topology Optimization for Spatial-Varying Porous Structures

This paper aims to propose a topology optimization method on generating porous structures comprising multiple materials.The mathematical optimization formulation is established under the constraints of individual volume fraction of constituent phase or total mass,as well as the local volume fraction of all phases.The original optimization problem with numerous constraints is converted into a box-constrained optimization problem by incorporating all constraints to the augmented Lagrangian function,avoiding the parameter dependence in the conventional aggregation process.Furthermore,the local volume percentage can be precisely satisfied.The effects including the globalmass bound,the influence radius and local volume percentage on final designs are exploited through numerical examples.The numerical results also reveal that porous structures keep a balance between the bulk design and periodic design in terms of the resulting compliance.All results,including those for irregular structures andmultiple volume fraction constraints,demonstrate that the proposedmethod can provide an efficient solution for multiple material infill structures.

Ultrafast dynamics of femtosecond laser-induced high spatial frequency periodic structures on silicon surfaces

Femtosecond laser-induced periodic surface structures(LIPSS)have been extensively studied over the past few decades.In particular,the period and groove width of high-spatial-frequency LIPSS(HSFL)is much smaller than the diffraction limit,making it a useful method for efficient nanomanufacturing.However,compared with the low-spatial-frequency LIPSS(LSFL),the structure size of the HSFL is smaller,and it is more easily submerged.Therefore,the formation mechanism of HSFL is complex and has always been a research hotspot in this field.In this study,regular LSFL with a period of 760 nm was fabricated in advance on a silicon surface with two-beam interference using an 800 nm,50 fs femtosecond laser.The ultrafast dynamics of HSFL formation on the silicon surface of prefabricated LSFL under single femtosecond laser pulse irradiation were observed and analyzed for the first time using collinear pump-probe imaging method.In general,the evolution of the surface structure undergoes five sequential stages:the LSFL begins to split,becomes uniform HSFL,degenerates into an irregular LSFL,undergoes secondary splitting into a weakly uniform HSFL,and evolves into an irregular LSFL or is submerged.The results indicate that the local enhancement of the submerged nanocavity,or the nanoplasma,in the prefabricated LSFL ridge led to the splitting of the LSFL,and the thermodynamic effect drove the homogenization of the splitting LSFL,which evolved into HSFL.

"Three-in-One" Multi-Scale Structural Design of Carbon Fiber-Based Composites for Personal Electromagnetic Protection and Thermal Management

Wearable devices with efficient thermal management and electromagnetic interference(EMI) shielding are highly desirable for improving human comfort and safety. Herein, a multifunctional wearable carbon fibers(CF) @ polyaniline(PANI)/silver nanowires(Ag NWs) composites with a “branch-trunk” interlocked micro/nanostructure were achieved through "three-in-one" multi-scale design. The reasonable assembly of the three kinds of one-dimensional(1D) materials can fully exert their excellent properties i.e., the superior flexibility of CF, the robustness of PANI, and the splendid conductivity of Ag NWs. Consequently, the constructed flexible composite demonstrates enhanced mechanical properties with a tensile stress of 1.2 MPa, which was almost 6 times that of the original material. This is mainly attributed to the fact that the PNAI(branch) was firmly attached to the CF(trunk) through polydopamine(PDA), forming a robust interlocked structure. Meanwhile, the composite possesses excellent thermal insulation and heat preservation capacity owing to the synergistically low thermal conductivity and emissivity. More importantly, the conductive path of the composite established by the three 1D materials greatly improved its EMI shielding property and Joule heating performance at low applied voltage. This work paves the way for rational utilization of the intrinsic properties of 1D materials, as well as provides a promising strategy for designing wearable electromagnetic protection and thermal energy management devices.

MSD-Net: Pneumonia Classification Model Based on Multi-Scale Directional Feature Enhancement

Computer-aided diagnosis of pneumonia based on deep learning is a research hotspot.However,there are some problems that the features of different sizes and different directions are not sufficient when extracting the features in lung X-ray images.A pneumonia classification model based on multi-scale directional feature enhancement MSD-Net is proposed in this paper.The main innovations are as follows:Firstly,the Multi-scale Residual Feature Extraction Module(MRFEM)is designed to effectively extract multi-scale features.The MRFEM uses dilated convolutions with different expansion rates to increase the receptive field and extract multi-scale features effectively.Secondly,the Multi-scale Directional Feature Perception Module(MDFPM)is designed,which uses a three-branch structure of different sizes convolution to transmit direction feature layer by layer,and focuses on the target region to enhance the feature information.Thirdly,the Axial Compression Former Module(ACFM)is designed to perform global calculations to enhance the perception ability of global features in different directions.To verify the effectiveness of the MSD-Net,comparative experiments and ablation experiments are carried out.In the COVID-19 RADIOGRAPHY DATABASE,the Accuracy,Recall,Precision,F1 Score,and Specificity of MSD-Net are 97.76%,95.57%,95.52%,95.52%,and 98.51%,respectively.In the chest X-ray dataset,the Accuracy,Recall,Precision,F1 Score and Specificity of MSD-Net are 97.78%,95.22%,96.49%,95.58%,and 98.11%,respectively.This model improves the accuracy of lung image recognition effectively and provides an important clinical reference to pneumonia Computer-Aided Diagnosis.

Multi-scale context-aware network for continuous sign language recognition

The hands and face are the most important parts for expressing sign language morphemes in sign language videos.However,we find that existing Continuous Sign Language Recognition(CSLR)methods lack the mining of hand and face information in visual backbones or use expensive and time-consuming external extractors to explore this information.In addition,the signs have different lengths,whereas previous CSLR methods typically use a fixed-length window to segment the video to capture sequential features and then perform global temporal modeling,which disturbs the perception of complete signs.In this study,we propose a Multi-Scale Context-Aware network(MSCA-Net)to solve the aforementioned problems.Our MSCA-Net contains two main modules:(1)Multi-Scale Motion Attention(MSMA),which uses the differences among frames to perceive information of the hands and face in multiple spatial scales,replacing the heavy feature extractors;and(2)Multi-Scale Temporal Modeling(MSTM),which explores crucial temporal information in the sign language video from different temporal scales.We conduct extensive experiments using three widely used sign language datasets,i.e.,RWTH-PHOENIX-Weather-2014,RWTH-PHOENIX-Weather-2014T,and CSL-Daily.The proposed MSCA-Net achieve state-of-the-art performance,demonstrating the effectiveness of our approach.

YOLO-MFD:Remote Sensing Image Object Detection with Multi-Scale Fusion Dynamic Head

Remote sensing imagery,due to its high altitude,presents inherent challenges characterized by multiple scales,limited target areas,and intricate backgrounds.These inherent traits often lead to increased miss and false detection rates when applying object recognition algorithms tailored for remote sensing imagery.Additionally,these complexities contribute to inaccuracies in target localization and hinder precise target categorization.This paper addresses these challenges by proposing a solution:The YOLO-MFD model(YOLO-MFD:Remote Sensing Image Object Detection withMulti-scale Fusion Dynamic Head).Before presenting our method,we delve into the prevalent issues faced in remote sensing imagery analysis.Specifically,we emphasize the struggles of existing object recognition algorithms in comprehensively capturing critical image features amidst varying scales and complex backgrounds.To resolve these issues,we introduce a novel approach.First,we propose the implementation of a lightweight multi-scale module called CEF.This module significantly improves the model’s ability to comprehensively capture important image features by merging multi-scale feature information.It effectively addresses the issues of missed detection and mistaken alarms that are common in remote sensing imagery.Second,an additional layer of small target detection heads is added,and a residual link is established with the higher-level feature extraction module in the backbone section.This allows the model to incorporate shallower information,significantly improving the accuracy of target localization in remotely sensed images.Finally,a dynamic head attentionmechanism is introduced.This allows themodel to exhibit greater flexibility and accuracy in recognizing shapes and targets of different sizes.Consequently,the precision of object detection is significantly improved.The trial results show that the YOLO-MFD model shows improvements of 6.3%,3.5%,and 2.5%over the original YOLOv8 model in Precision,map@0.5 and map@0.5:0.95,separately.These results illustrate the clear advantages of the method.

Transfer learning framework for multi-scale crack type classification with sparse microseismic networks

Rock fracture mechanisms can be inferred from moment tensors(MT)inverted from microseismic events.However,MT can only be inverted for events whose waveforms are acquired across a network of sensors.This is limiting for underground mines where the microseismic stations often lack azimuthal coverage.Thus,there is a need for a method to invert fracture mechanisms using waveforms acquired by a sparse microseismic network.Here,we present a novel,multi-scale framework to classify whether a rock crack contracts or dilates based on a single waveform.The framework consists of a deep learning model that is initially trained on 2400000+manually labelled field-scale seismic and microseismic waveforms acquired across 692 stations.Transfer learning is then applied to fine-tune the model on 300000+MT-labelled labscale acoustic emission waveforms from 39 individual experiments instrumented with different sensor layouts,loading,and rock types in training.The optimal model achieves over 86%F-score on unseen waveforms at both the lab-and field-scale.This model outperforms existing empirical methods in classification of rock fracture mechanisms monitored by a sparse microseismic network.This facilitates rapid assessment of,and early warning against,various rock engineering hazard such as induced earthquakes and rock bursts.

MSC-YOLO:Improved YOLOv7 Based on Multi-Scale Spatial Context for Small Object Detection in UAV-View

Accurately identifying small objects in high-resolution aerial images presents a complex and crucial task in thefield of small object detection on unmanned aerial vehicles(UAVs).This task is challenging due to variations inUAV flight altitude,differences in object scales,as well as factors like flight speed and motion blur.To enhancethe detection efficacy of small targets in drone aerial imagery,we propose an enhanced You Only Look Onceversion 7(YOLOv7)algorithm based on multi-scale spatial context.We build the MSC-YOLO model,whichincorporates an additional prediction head,denoted as P2,to improve adaptability for small objects.We replaceconventional downsampling with a Spatial-to-Depth Convolutional Combination(CSPDC)module to mitigatethe loss of intricate feature details related to small objects.Furthermore,we propose a Spatial Context Pyramidwith Multi-Scale Attention(SCPMA)module,which captures spatial and channel-dependent features of smalltargets acrossmultiple scales.This module enhances the perception of spatial contextual features and the utilizationof multiscale feature information.On the Visdrone2023 and UAVDT datasets,MSC-YOLO achieves remarkableresults,outperforming the baseline method YOLOv7 by 3.0%in terms ofmean average precision(mAP).The MSCYOLOalgorithm proposed in this paper has demonstrated satisfactory performance in detecting small targets inUAV aerial photography,providing strong support for practical applications.

An origami shield with supporting frame structures optimized by a feature-driven topology optimization method

In this paper,the design,manufacture and testing of an origami protective shield with a supporting frame structure are presented.It consists of an origami shield surface and a deployable supporting frame structure that needs to be portable and sufficiently stiff.First,for the design of the shield surface,a threestage origami crease pattern is developed to reduce the shield size in the folded state.The shield surface consists of several stiff modular panels and layered with flexible fabric.The modular panels are made of a multi-layer composite where a ceramic layer is made of small pieces to improve durability as those small pieces enable restriction of crack propagation.Then,the supporting frame structure is designed as a chain-of-bars structure in order to fold into a highly compact state as a bundle of bars and deploy in sequence.Thus,a feature-driven topology structural optimization method preserving component sequence is developed where the inter-dependence of sub-structures is taken into account.A bar with semi-circular ends is used as a basic design feature.The positions of the bar’s end points are treated as design variables and the width of the bars is kept constant.Then,a constraint on the total length of the chain of bars is introduced.Finally,the modular panels made of multi-layer composite and the full-scale prototype of the origami shield are fabricated and tested to verify the bullet-proof performance.

Multi-scale Modeling and Finite Element Analyses of Thermal Conductivity of 3D C/SiC Composites Fabricating by Flexible-Oriented Woven Process

Thermal conductivity is one of the most significant criterion of three-dimensional carbon fiber-reinforced SiC matrix composites(3D C/SiC).Represent volume element(RVE)models of microscale,void/matrix and mesoscale proposed in this work are used to simulate the thermal conductivity behaviors of the 3D C/SiC composites.An entirely new process is introduced to weave the preform with three-dimensional orthogonal architecture.The 3D steady-state analysis step is created for assessing the thermal conductivity behaviors of the composites by applying periodic temperature boundary conditions.Three RVE models of cuboid,hexagonal and fiber random distribution are respectively developed to comparatively study the influence of fiber package pattern on the thermal conductivities at the microscale.Besides,the effect of void morphology on the thermal conductivity of the matrix is analyzed by the void/matrix models.The prediction results at the mesoscale correspond closely to the experimental values.The effect of the porosities and fiber volume fractions on the thermal conductivities is also taken into consideration.The multi-scale models mentioned in this paper can be used to predict the thermal conductivity behaviors of other composites with complex structures.

Few-shot image recognition based on multi-scale features prototypical network

In order to improve the models capability in expressing features during few-shot learning,a multi-scale features prototypical network(MS-PN)algorithm is proposed.The metric learning algo-rithm is employed to extract image features and project them into a feature space,thus evaluating the similarity between samples based on their relative distances within the metric space.To sufficiently extract feature information from limited sample data and mitigate the impact of constrained data vol-ume,a multi-scale feature extraction network is presented to capture data features at various scales during the process of image feature extraction.Additionally,the position of the prototype is fine-tuned by assigning weights to data points to mitigate the influence of outliers on the experiment.The loss function integrates contrastive loss and label-smoothing to bring similar data points closer and separate dissimilar data points within the metric space.Experimental evaluations are conducted on small-sample datasets mini-ImageNet and CUB200-2011.The method in this paper can achieve higher classification accuracy.Specifically,in the 5-way 1-shot experiment,classification accuracy reaches 50.13%and 66.79%respectively on these two datasets.Moreover,in the 5-way 5-shot ex-periment,accuracy of 66.79%and 85.91%are observed,respectively.