Abstract: New theory for functionally graded (FG) shell based on expansion of the equations of elasticity for functionally graded materials (GFMs) into Legendre polynomials series has been developed. Stress and strain tensors, vectors of displacements, traction and body forces have been expanded into Legendre polynomials series in a thickness coordinate. In the same way functions that describe functionally graded relations has been also expanded. Thereby all equations of elasticity including Hook-s law have been transformed to corresponding equations for Fourier coefficients. Then system of differential equations in term of displacements and boundary conditions for Fourier coefficients has been obtained. Cases of the first and second approximations have been considered in more details. For obtained boundary-value problems solution finite element (FE) has been used of Numerical calculations have been done with Comsol Multiphysics and Matlab.
Abstract: Group contribution methods such as the UNIFAC are
of major interest to researchers and engineers involved synthesis,
feasibility studies, design and optimization of separation processes as
well as other applications of industrial use. Reliable knowledge of
the phase equilibrium behavior is crucial for the prediction of the fate
of the chemical in the environment and other applications. The
objective of this study was to predict the solubility of selected
volatile organic compounds (VOCs) in glycol polymers and
biodiesel. Measurements can be expensive and time consuming,
hence the need for thermodynamic models. The results obtained in
this study for the infinite dilution activity coefficients compare very
well those published in literature obtained through measurements. It
is suggested that in preliminary design or feasibility studies of
absorption systems for the abatement of volatile organic compounds,
prediction procedures should be implemented while accurate fluid
phase equilibrium data should be obtained from experiment.
Abstract: In this study, single nozzle method used for
electrospinning technique which composite polymer solution with
cellulose nanowiskers (CNW) was treated by ultrasonic sonificator
have been compared with coaxial (double) nozzle method, in terms of
mechanical, thermal and morphological properties of composite
nanofiber. The effect of water content in composite polymer solution
on properties of nanofiber has also been examined. It has been seen
that single nozzle method which polymer solution does not contain
water has better results than that of coaxial method, in terms of
mechanical, thermal and morphological properties of nanofiber.
However, it is necessary to make an optimization study on setting
condition of ultrasonic treatment to get better dispersion of CNW in
composite nanofiber and to get better mechanical and thermal
properties
Abstract: The draft Auckland Unitary Plan outlines the future land used for new housing and businesses with Auckland population growth over the next thirty years. According to Auckland Unitary Plan, over the next 30 years, the population of Auckland is projected to increase by one million, and up to 70% of total new dwellings occur within the existing urban area. Intensification will not only increase the number of median or higher density houses such as terrace house, apartment building, etc. within the existing urban area but also change mean housing design data that can impact building thermal performance under the local climate. Based on mean energy consumption and building design data, and their relationships of a number of Auckland sample houses, this study is to estimate the future mean housing energy consumption associated with the change of mean housing design data and evaluate housing energy efficiency with the Auckland Unitary Plan.
Abstract: Data mining and knowledge engineering have become a tough task due to the availability of large amount of data in the web nowadays. Validity and reliability of data also become a main debate in knowledge acquisition. Besides, acquiring knowledge from different languages has become another concern. There are many language translators and corpora developed but the function of these translators and corpora are usually limited to certain languages and domains. Furthermore, search results from engines with traditional 'keyword' approach are no longer satisfying. More intelligent knowledge engineering agents are needed. To address to these problems, a system known as Multilingual Word Semantic Network is proposed. This system adapted semantic network to organize words according to concepts and relations. The system also uses open source as the development philosophy to enable the native language speakers and experts to contribute their knowledge to the system. The contributed words are then defined and linked using lexical and semantic relations. Thus, related words and derivatives can be identified and linked. From the outcome of the system implementation, it contributes to the development of semantic web and knowledge engineering.
Abstract: In textile industry, besides the conventional textile
products, technical textile goods, that have been brought external
functional properties into, are being developed for technical textile
industry. Especially these products produced with weaving
technology are widely preferred in areas such as sports, geology,
medical, automotive, construction and marine sectors. These textile
products are exposed to various stresses and large deformations under
typical conditions of use. At this point, sufficient and reliable data
could not be obtained with uniaxial tensile tests for determination of
the mechanical properties of such products due to mainly biaxial
stress state. Therefore, the most preferred method is a biaxial tensile
test method and analysis. These tests and analysis is applied to fabrics
with different functional features in order to establish the textile
material with several characteristics and mechanical properties of the
product. Planar biaxial tensile test, cylindrical inflation and bulge
tests are generally required to apply for textile products that are used
in automotive, sailing and sports areas and construction industry to
minimize accidents as long as their service life. Airbags, seat belts
and car tires in the automotive sector are also subject to the same
biaxial stress states, and can be characterized by same types of
experiments. In this study, in accordance with the research literature
related to the various biaxial test methods are compared. Results with
discussions are elaborated mainly focusing on the design of a biaxial
test apparatus to obtain applicable experimental data for developing a
finite element model. Sample experimental results on a prototype
system are expressed.
Abstract: The migration-environment nexus has gained increased interest from the social research field over the last years. While straightly connected to human security issues, this theme has pervaded through the media to the public sphere. Therefore, it is important to observe how did the discussions over environmentally induced migrations develop from the scientific basis to the media attention, passing through some political voices, and in which ways might these messages be interpreted within the broader public discourses. To achieve this purpose, the analysis of the press entries between 2004 and 2010 in three of the main Portuguese newspapers shall be presented, specially reflecting upon the events, protagonists, topics, geographical attributions and terms/expressions used to define those who migrate due to environmental degradation or disasters.
Abstract: Horizontal continuous casting is widely used to
produce semi-finished non-Ferrous products. Homogeneity in the
metallurgical characteristics and mechanical properties for this
product is vital for industrial application. In the present work, the
microstructure and mechanical properties of a horizontal continuous
cast two-phase brass billet have been studied. Impact strength and
hardness variations were examined and the phase composition and
porosity studied with image analysis software. Distinct differences in
mechanical properties were observed between the upper, middle and
lower parts of the billet, which are explained in terms of the
morphology and size of the phase in the microstructure. Hardness
variation in the length of billet is higher in upper area but impact
strength is higher in lower areas.
Abstract: This study discusses the effect of uncertainty on
production levels of a petrochemical complex. Uncertainly or
variations in some model parameters, such as prices, supply and
demand of materials, can affect the optimality or the efficiency of any
chemical process. For any petrochemical complex with many plants,
there are many sources of uncertainty and frequent variations which
require more attention. Many optimization approaches are proposed
in the literature to incorporate uncertainty within the model in order
to obtain a robust solution. In this work, a stability analysis approach
is applied to a deterministic LP model of a petrochemical complex
consists of ten plants to investigate the effect of such variations on
the obtained optimal production levels. The proposed approach can
determinate the allowable variation ranges of some parameters,
mainly objective or RHS coefficients, before the system lose its
optimality. Parameters with relatively narrow range of variations, i.e.
stability limits, are classified as sensitive parameters or constraints
that need accurate estimate or intensive monitoring. These stability
limits offer easy-to-use information to the decision maker and help in
understanding the interaction between some model parameters and
deciding when the system need to be re-optimize. The study shows
that maximum production of ethylene and the prices of intermediate
products are the most sensitive factors that affect the stability of the
optimum solution
Abstract: The effect of streamwise conduction on the thermal
characteristics of forced convection for nanofluidic flow in
rectangular microchannel heat sinks under isothermal wall has been
investigated. By applying the fin approach, models with and without
streamwise conduction term in the energy equation were developed
for hydrodynamically and thermally fully-developed flow. These two
models were solved to obtain closed form analytical solutions for the
nanofluid and solid wall temperature distributions and the analysis
emphasized details of the variations induced by the streamwise
conduction on the nanofluid heat transport characteristics. The effects
of the Peclet number, nanoparticle volume fraction, thermal
conductivity ratio on the thermal characteristics of forced convection
in microchannel heat sinks are analyzed. Due to the anomalous
increase in the effective thermal conductivity of nanofluid compared
to its base fluid, the effect of streamwise conduction is expected to be
more significant. This study reveals the significance of the effect of
streamwise conduction under certain conditions of which the
streamwise conduction should not be neglected in the forced
convective heat transfer analysis of microchannel heat sinks.
Abstract: The purpose of this research study is to investigate the manner in which various loads affect the mechanical properties of the formed mild steel plates. The investigation focuses on examining the cross-sectional area of the metal plate at the centre of the formed mild steel plate. Six mild steel plates were deformed with different loads. The loads applied on the plates had a magnitude of 5 kg, 10 kg, 15 kg, 20 kg, 25 kg and 30 kg. The radius of the punching die was 120 mm and the loads were applied at room temperature. The investigations established that the applied load causes the Vickers microhardness at the cross-sectional area of the plate to increase due to strain hardening. Hence, the percentage increase of the hardness due to the load was found to be directly proportional to the increase in the load. Furthermore, the tensile test results for the parent material showed that the average Ultimate Tensile Strength (UTS) for the three samples was 308 MPa while the average Yield Strength and Percentage Elongation were 227 MPa and 38 % respectively. Similarly, the UTS of the formed components increased after the deformation of the plate, as such it can be concluded that the forming loads alter the mechanical properties of the materials by improving and strengthening the material properties.
Abstract: This paper investigates the relationship between different dimensions of customer relationship management and innovation capabilities in Melli Bank of Iran. Five dimensions of CRM include information sharing, customer involvement, long-term partnership, joint problem solving and technology-based CRM are selected to measure their relationship with innovation capabilities including innovation in product, innovation in process, innovation in administrative affairs, innovation in marketing, and finally innovation in services. Research findings indicate that there is significant relationship between CRM dimensions and innovation capabilities in Melli bank of Iran.
Abstract: We deal with the numerical solution of time-dependent convection-diffusion-reaction equations. We combine the local projection stabilization method for the space discretization with two different time discretization schemes: the continuous Galerkin-Petrov (cGP) method and the discontinuous Galerkin (dG) method of polynomial of degree k. We establish the optimal error estimates and present numerical results which shows that the cGP(k) and dG(k)- methods are accurate of order k +1, respectively, in the whole time interval. Moreover, the cGP(k)-method is superconvergent of order 2k and dG(k)-method is of order 2k +1 at the discrete time points. Furthermore, the dependence of the results on the choice of the stabilization parameter are discussed and compared.
Abstract: This paper reports an experimental study on a sleeping
thermal manikin in a room equipped with a mixing ventilation
system. In the experimental work, heat loss from the sleeping thermal
manikin was measured under different conditions. The supply air
temperature was in a range of 17°C to 27°C. Apart from the heat loss
of the sleeping thermal manikin, the velocity distributions and
temperature distributions were also measured in the experiments for
subsequent analysis.
Abstract: Circular tubes have been widely used as structural
members in engineering application. Therefore, its collapse behavior
has been studied for many decades, focusing on its energy absorption
characteristics. In order to predict the collapse behavior of members,
one could rely on the use of finite element codes or experiments.
These tools are helpful and high accuracy but costly and require
extensive running time. Therefore, an approximating model of tubes
collapse mechanism is an alternative for early step of design. This
paper is also aimed to develop a closed-form solution of thin-walled
circular tube subjected to bending. It has extended the Elchalakani et
al.-s model (Int. J. Mech. Sci.2002; 44:1117-1143) to include the
rate of energy dissipation of rolling hinge in the circumferential
direction. The 3-D geometrical collapse mechanism was analyzed by
adding the oblique hinge lines along the longitudinal tube within the
length of plastically deforming zone. The model was based on the
principal of energy rate conservation. Therefore, the rates of internal
energy dissipation were calculated for each hinge lines which are
defined in term of velocity field. Inextensional deformation and
perfect plastic material behavior was assumed in the derivation of
deformation energy rate. The analytical result was compared with
experimental result. The experiment was conducted with a number of
tubes having various D/t ratios. Good agreement between analytical
and experiment was achieved.
Abstract: The present work describes an experimental
investigation concerning the determination of viscosity behavior with
shear rate and temperature of edible oils: canola; sunflower; corn;
soybean and the no edible oil: Jatropha curcas. Besides these, it was
tested a blend of canola, corn and sunflower oils as well as sunflower
and soybean biodiesel. Based on experiments, it was obtained shear
stress and viscosity at different shear rates of each sample at 40ºC, as
well as viscosity of each sample at various temperatures in the range
of 24 to 85ºC. Furthermore, it was compared the curves obtained for
the viscosity versus temperature with the curves obtained by
modeling the viscosity dependency on temperature using the Vogel
equation. Also a test in a stationary engine was performed in order to
study the energy generation using blends of soybean oil and soybean
biodiesel with diesel.
Abstract: In recent years, the underground water sources in
southern Taiwan have become salinized because of saltwater
intrusions. This study explores the adsorption characteristics of
activated carbon on salinizing inorganic salts using isothermal
adsorption experiments and provides a model analysis. The
temperature range for the isothermal adsorption experiments ranged
between 5 to 45 ℃, and the amount adsorbed varied between 28.21 to
33.87 mg/g. All experimental data of adsorption can be fitted to both
the Langmuir and the Freundlich models. The thermodynamic
parameters for per chlorate onto granular activated carbon were
calculated as -0.99 to -1.11 kcal/mol for DG°, -0.6 kcal/mol for DH°,
and 1.21 to 1.84 kcal/mol for DS°. This shows that the adsorption
process of granular activated carbon is spontaneously exothermic. The
observation of adsorption behaviors under low ionic strength, low pH
values, and low temperatures is beneficial to the adsorption removal of
perchlorate with granular activated carbon.
Abstract: The product development process (PDP) in the
Technology group plays a very important role in the launch of any
product. While a manufacturing process encourages the use of certain
measures to reduce health, safety and environmental (HSE) risks on
the shop floor, the PDP concentrates on the use of Geometric
Dimensioning and Tolerancing (GD&T) to develop a flawless design.
Furthermore, PDP distributes and coordinates activities between
different departments such as marketing, purchasing, and
manufacturing. However, it is seldom realized that PDP makes a
significant contribution to developing a product that reduces HSE
risks by encouraging the Technology group to use effective GD&T.
The GD&T is a precise communication tool that uses a set of
symbols, rules, and definitions to mathematically define parts to be
manufactured. It is a quality assurance method widely used in the oil
and gas sector. Traditionally it is used to ensure the
interchangeability of a part without affecting its form, fit, and
function. Parts that do not meet these requirements are rejected
during quality audits.
This paper discusses how the Technology group integrates this
quality assurance tool into the PDP and how the tool plays a major
role in helping the HSE department in its goal towards eliminating
HSE incidents. The PDP involves a thorough risk assessment and
establishes a method to address those risks during the design stage.
An illustration shows how GD&T helped reduce safety risks by
ergonomically improving assembling operations. A brief discussion
explains how tolerances provided on a part help prevent finger injury.
This tool has equipped Technology to produce fixtures, which are
used daily in operations as well as manufacturing. By applying
GD&T to create good fits, HSE risks are mitigated for operating
personnel. Both customers and service providers benefit from
reduced safety risks.
Abstract: In this study, we present an advanced detection
technique for mass type breast cancer based on texture information
of organs. The proposed method detects the cancer areas in three
stages. In the first stage, the midpoints of mass area are determined
based on AHE (Adaptive Histogram Equalization). In the second
stage, we set the threshold coefficient of homogeneity by using
MLE (Maximum Likelihood Estimation) to compute the uniformity
of texture. Finally, mass type cancer tissues are extracted from the
original image. As a result, it was observed that the proposed
method shows an improved detection performance on dense breast
tissues of Korean women compared with the existing methods. It is
expected that the proposed method may provide additional
diagnostic information for detection of mass-type breast cancer.
Abstract: The purpose of this article is to introduce an advanced
system for the support of processing of medical image information,
and the terminology related to this system, which can be an important
element to a faster transition to a fully digitalized hospital.
The core of the system is a set of DICOM compliant applications
running over a dedicated computer network. The whole integrated
system creates a collaborative platform supporting daily routines in
the radiology community, developing communication channels,
supporting the exchange of information and special consultations
among various medical institutions as well as supporting medical
training for practicing radiologists and medical students. It gives the
users outside of hospitals the tools to work in almost the same
conditions as in the radiology departments.