The scope of silicone rubber (SiR) is confined due to the deprivation of its dielectric propertiesupon exposure to various ambient stresses. The aim of this research is to develop silicone rubber-based composites by employing inorganic oxide fillers for improved dielectric and high voltage insulation properties for widening its scope in the field of electrical appliances. This study reports the preparation of different composites of silicone rubber with varying concentrations of micro and nano-silica fillers. The dielectric propertytrends of these as-prepared neat and impregnated samples were examined via an indigenously developed weathering chamber capable of applying multiple stresses of acid rain, heat, humidity, UVA radiation, and salt fog. Dielectric constant values were measured before and after applying stresses. Upon applying stresses, a periodic decline in dielectric constant was observed. Improved dielectric properties were obtained by adding micro and nano-silica as fillers. A nano silica-incorporated silicone rubber product exhibited good potential for dual applications as dielectric and high voltage insulation.

Degradation of silicon rubber due to heat and humidity affect its performance in outdoor applications. To analyze the effects of high temperature and humidity on room temperature vulcanized (RTV) silicone rubber (SiR) and its composites, this study was performed. Five different sample compositions including neat silicone rubber (nSiR), microcomposites (15 wt% silica(SMC 15% SiO₂) and 15 wt% ATH(SMC 15% ATH), nanocomposite (2.5 wt% silica(SNC 2.5% SiO₂) and hybrid composite (10 wt% micro alumina trihydrate with 2 wt% nano silica(SMNC 10% ATH 2% SiO₂) were prepared and subjected to 70 ˚C temperature and 80% relative humidity in an environmental chamber for 120 h. Contact angle, optical microscopy and Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy were employed to analyze the recovery properties before and after applying stresses. Different trends of degradation and recovery were observed for different concentrations of composites. Addition of fillers improved the overall performance of composites and SMC 15% ATH composite performed better than other composites. For high temperature and humidity, the ATH-based microcomposite was recommended over silica due to its superior thermal retardation properties of ATH. It has been proved that ATH filler is able to withstand high temperature and humidity.

Silicone rubber is a promising insulating material that has been performing well for different insulating and dielectric applications. However, in outdoor applications, environmental stresses cause structural and surface degradations that diminish its insulating properties. This effect of degradation can be reduced with the addition of a suitable filler to the polymer chains. For the investigation of structural changes and hydrophobicity four different systems were fabricated, including neat silicone rubber, a micro composite (with 15% micro-silica filler), and nanocomposites (with 2.5% and 5% nanosilica filler) by subjecting them to various hydrothermal conditions. In general, remarkable results were obtained by the addition of fillers. However, nanocomposites showed the best resistance against the applied stresses. In comparison to neat silicone rubber, the stability of the structure and hydrophobic behavior was better for micro-silica, which was further enhanced in the case of nanocomposites. The inclusion of 5% nanosilica showed the best results before and after applying aging conditions.

Domain-specific accelerators for signal processing, image processing, and machine learning are increasingly being implemented on SRAM-based field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs). Owing to the inherent error tolerance of such applications, approximate arithmetic operations, in particular, the design of approximate multipliers, have become an important research problem. Truncation of lower bits is a widely used approximation approach; however, analyzing and limiting the effects of carry-propagation due to this approximation has not been explored in detail yet. In this article, an optimized carry-aware approximate radix-4 Booth multiplier design is presented that leverages the built-in slice look-up tables (LUTs) and carry-chain resources in a novel configuration. The proposed multiplier simplifies the computation of the upper and lower bits and provides significant benefits in terms of FPGA resource usage (LUTs saving 38.5%–42.9%), Power Delay Product (PDP saving 49.4%–53%), performance metric (LUTs × critical path delay (CPD) × PDP saving 68.9%–73.1%) and errors (70% improvement in mean relative error distance) compared to the latest state-of-the-art designs. Therefore, the proposed designs are an attractive choice to implement multiplication on FPGA-based accelerators.

The emergence of micro and nano-based inorganic oxide fillers with optimal filler-loadings further enhances the required insulation characteristics of neat epoxy. During manufacturing and service application, insulators and dielectrics face mechanical stresses which may alter their basic characteristics. Keeping this in mind, the facts’ influence of mechanical stresses and fillers on dielectric properties of polymeric insulators of two epoxy/silica composites were fabricated and thoroughly analyzed for dielectric characteristics under ramped mechanical compressions relative to the unfilled sample. Before compression, epoxy nanocomposites exhibited responses having an average dielectric constant of 7.68 with an average dissipation factor of 0.18. After each compression, dielectric properties of all samples were analyzed. The dissipation factor and the dielectric constant trends of each sample are plotted against a suitable frequency range. It was observed that after the successive compressions up to 25 MPa, the dielectric properties of epoxy micro-silica composites were highly affected, having an average final dielectric constant of 9.65 times that of the uncompressed sample and a dissipation factor of 2.2 times that of the uncompressed sample, and these were recorded.