Photonic crystal fiber interferometers are used in many sensing applications. In this work, an in-reflection photonic crystal fiber (PCF) based on Mach-Zehnder (micro-holes collapsing) (MZ) interferometer, which exhibits high sensitivity to different volatile organic compounds (VOCs), without the needing of any permeable material. The interferometer is robust, compact, and consists of a stub photonic crystal fiber of large-mode area, photonic crystal fiber spliced to standard single mode fiber (SMF) (corning-28), this splicing occurs with optimized splice loss 0.19 dB In the splice regions the voids of the holey fiber are completely collapsed, which allows the excitation and recombination of core and cladding modes. The device reflection

Self-repairing technology based on micro-capsules is an efficient solution for repairing cracked cementitious composites. Self-repairing based on microcapsules begins with the occurrence of cracks and develops by releasing self-repairing factors in the cracks located in concrete. Based on previous comprehensive studies, this paper provides an overview of various repairing factors and investigative methodologies. There has recently been a lack of consensus on the most efficient criteria for assessing self-repairing based on microcapsules and the smart solutions for improving capsule survival ratios during mixing. The most commonly utilized self-repairing efficiency assessment indicators are mechanical resistance and durab

In this research work, a new type of concrete based on sulfur-melamine modification was introduced, and its various properties were studied. This new type of concrete was prepared based on the sulfur-melamine modification and various ingredients. The new sulfur-melamine modifier was fabricated, and its fabrication was confirmed by IR spectroscopy and TG analysis. The surface morphology resulted from this modifier was studied by SEM and EDS analysis. The components ratios in concrete, chemical and physical characteristics resulted from sulfur-melamine modifier, chemical and corrosion resistance of concrete, stability of concrete against water adsorption, stability of concrete against freezing, physical and mechanical properties and durabi

The rapid development of telemedicine services and the requirements for exchanging medical information between physicians, consultants, and health institutions have made the protection of patients’ information an important priority for any future e-health system. The protection of medical information, including the cover (i.e. medical image), has a specificity that slightly differs from the requirements for protecting other information. It is necessary to preserve the cover greatly due to its importance on the reception side as medical staff use this information to provide a diagnosis to save a patient's life. If the cover is tampered with, this leads to failure in achieving the goal of telemedicine. Therefore, this work provides an in

Numeral recognition is considered an essential preliminary step for optical character recognition, document understanding, and others. Although several handwritten numeral recognition algorithms have been proposed so far, achieving adequate recognition accuracy and execution time remain challenging to date. In particular, recognition accuracy depends on the features extraction mechanism. As such, a fast and robust numeral recognition method is essential, which meets the desired accuracy by extracting the features efficiently while maintaining fast implementation time. Furthermore, to date most of the existing studies are focused on evaluating their methods based on clean environments, thus limiting understanding of their potential a