University of Waterloo

About: University of Waterloo is a education organization based out in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Population & Poison control. The organization has 36093 authors who have published 93906 publications receiving 2948139 citations. The organization is also known as: UW & uwaterloo.

Optimal investment planning for distributed generation in a competitive electricity market

Abstract: This paper proposes a new heuristic approach for distributed generation (DG) capacity investment planning from the perspective of a distribution company (disco). Optimal sizing and siting decisions for DG capacity is obtained through a cost-benefit analysis approach based on a new optimization model. The model aims to minimize the disco's investment and operating costs as well as payment toward loss compensation. Bus-wise cost-benefit analysis is carried out on an hourly basis for different forecasted peak demand and market price scenarios. This approach arrives at the optimal feasible DG capacity investment plan under competitive electricity market auction as well as fixed bilateral contract scenarios. The proposed heuristic method helps alleviate the use of binary variables in the optimization model thus easing the computational burden substantially.

High mobility diketopyrrolopyrrole (DPP)-based organic semiconductor materials for organic thin film transistors and photovoltaics

Abstract: In recent years, the electron-accepting diketopyrrolopyrrole (DPP) moiety has been receiving considerable attention for constructing donor–acceptor (D–A) type organic semiconductors for a variety of applications, particularly for organic thin film transistors (OTFTs) and organic photovoltaics (OPVs). Through association of the DPP unit with appropriate electron donating building blocks, the resulting D–A molecules interact strongly in the solid state through intermolecular D–A and π–π interactions, leading to highly ordered structures at the molecular and microscopic levels. The closely packed molecules and crystalline domains are beneficial for intermolecular and interdomain (or intergranular) charge transport. Furthermore, the energy levels can be readily adjusted, affording p-type, n-type, or ambipolar organic semiconductors with highly efficient charge transport properties in OTFTs. In the past few years, a number of DPP-based small molecular and polymeric semiconductors have been reported to show mobility close to or greater than 1 cm2 V−1 s−1. DPP-based polymer semiconductors have achieved record high mobility values for p-type (hole mobility: 10.5 cm2 V−1 s−1), n-type (electron mobility: 3 cm2 V−1 s−1), and ambipolar (hole/electron mobilities: 1.18/1.86 cm2 V−1 s−1) OTFTs among the known polymer semiconductors. Many DPP-based organic semiconductors have favourable energy levels and band gaps along with high hole mobility, which enable them as promising donor materials for OPVs. Power conversion efficiencies (PCE) of up to 6.05% were achieved for OPVs using DPP-based polymers, demonstrating their potential usefulness for the organic solar cell technology. This article provides an overview of the recent exciting progress made in DPP-containing polymers and small molecules that have shown high charge carrier mobility, around 0.1 cm2 V−1 s−1 or greater. It focuses on the structural design, optoelectronic properties, molecular organization, morphology, as well as performances in OTFTs and OPVs of these high mobility DPP-based materials.

Priming with and without awareness.

Abstract: In two experiments, no evidence for perception without awareness was found in a Stroop-priming task when the threshold for detecting color-word primes was measured reliably by a forced-choice procedure. Color words and color patches were either congruent or incongruent, and no priming occurred when the words were presented at the detection threshold. However, systematic increases in the level of detection for the primes led to correlated increases in the magnitude of priming. The results provide no support for recent claims that priming is a more sensitive indicator of perceptual processing than detection based upon verbal report. A resolution to the apparent discrepancy between the present results and previously reported findings is suggested.

Preparation and measurement of three-qubit entanglement in a superconducting circuit

Abstract: Quantum entanglement, in which the states of two or more particles are inextricably linked, is a key requirement for quantum computation. In superconducting devices, two-qubit entangled states have been used to implement simple quantum algorithms. The availability of three-qubit states, which can be entangled in two fundamentally different ways (the GHZ and W states), would be a significant advance because they should make it possible to perform error correction and infer scalability to the higher numbers of qubits needed for a practical quantum-information-processing device. Two groups now report the generation of three-qubit entanglement. John Martinis and colleagues create and measure both GHZ and W-type states. Leonardo DiCarlo and colleagues generate the GHZ state and demonstrate the first step of basic quantum error correction by encoding a logical qubit into a manifold of GHZ-like states using a repetition code. Quantum entanglement is a key resource for technologies such as quantum communication and computation. A major question for solid-state quantum information processing is whether an engineered system can display the three-qubit entanglement necessary for quantum error correction. A positive answer to this question is now provided. A circuit quantum electrodynamics device has been used to demonstrate deterministic production of three-qubit entangled states and the first step of basic quantum error correction. Traditionally, quantum entanglement has been central to foundational discussions of quantum mechanics. The measurement of correlations between entangled particles can have results at odds with classical behaviour. These discrepancies grow exponentially with the number of entangled particles1. With the ample experimental2,3,4 confirmation of quantum mechanical predictions, entanglement has evolved from a philosophical conundrum into a key resource for technologies such as quantum communication and computation5. Although entanglement in superconducting circuits has been limited so far to two qubits6,7,8,9, the extension of entanglement to three, eight and ten qubits has been achieved among spins10, ions11 and photons12, respectively. A key question for solid-state quantum information processing is whether an engineered system could display the multi-qubit entanglement necessary for quantum error correction, which starts with tripartite entanglement. Here, using a circuit quantum electrodynamics architecture13,14, we demonstrate deterministic production of three-qubit Greenberger–Horne–Zeilinger (GHZ) states15 with fidelity of 88 per cent, measured with quantum state tomography. Several entanglement witnesses detect genuine three-qubit entanglement by violating biseparable bounds by 830 ± 80 per cent. We demonstrate the first step of basic quantum error correction, namely the encoding of a logical qubit into a manifold of GHZ-like states using a repetition code. The integration of this encoding with decoding and error-correcting steps in a feedback loop will be the next step for quantum computing with integrated circuits.