Groundwater Level Fluctuations in Coastal Aquifer: Using Artificial Neural Networks to Predict the Impacts of Climatical CMIP6 Scenarios

Water Resources Management - Groundwater resources play a crucial role in supplying water for domestic, industrial, and agricultural use. In this study ACCESS-CM2, HadGEM3-GC31-LL, and NESM3 were...     

Studies on the leaching of an arsenic–uranium ore

Preliminary leaching studies were carried out to develop a suitable method for the recovery of uranium and the elimination of arsenic from a low grade carbonate/silicate ore containing 64 ppm U and 2446 ppm As, as well as some Cu, Pb, Ni and Zn. An examination of the mineralogy found mostly uranium(VI) minerals, such as uraninite, and various base metal sulfides and arsenates in veins and fissures. Roasting the ore at 500–800 °C to volatilize arsenic proved to be unsuitable. Therefore, the ground ore was subjected to direct leaching with sulfuric acid, sodium sulfide and ferric chloride at 80–90 °C with a liquid to solid ratio of 1:1. With sulfuric acid at a concentration of 180 kg/t ore, complete recovery of both uranium and arsenic was achieved giving undesirable arsenic in the leach liquor. The maximum recovery of uranium and arsenic by leaching with sodium sulfide was only 20% and 18%, respectively. However, 3 M ferric chloride leached approximately 92% U(VI) and precipitated arsenic as ferric arsenate. Therefore, maximum uranium can be extracted and arsenic eliminated as impurity by selective leaching with ferric chloride.     

Mutual Coupling Reduction in Microstrip Patch Antenna Arrays Using Simple Microstrip Resonator

Wireless Personal Communications - In this paper a novel ladder resonator is introduced to reduce mutual coupling effect in the patch antenna array structure. Applied patch antennas are operating...     

Sequencing mixed-model assembly lines by considering feeding lines

A mixed-model assembly line is a type of production line where different models of a product are assembled on. Mixed-model assembly lines can respond to unanticipated changes in product demands quickly without keeping so many inventories. Designing mixed-model assembly line involves solving the traditional problems of the assembly line design (consists of balancing problem, determining cycle time, and the number and sequence of stations) in addition of determining the sequence of products in assembly line. The main goal of this paper is presenting a method in order to determine the sequence of products in mixed-model assembly line by considering Just-in-Time systems. Moreover, supplying some required components from feeding lines is considered. A mathematical model is presented which is capable of specifying the sequence of products in the mixed-model assembly line by considering main criteria and keeping feeding lines balanced. Mathematical model can be used for solving small-size problems. Because the combinatorial nature of sequencing problems typically provides an intractable search space for problems of “real world” size, the search heuristics of simulated annealing and ant colony algorithms are presented and used to find solutions for several problem sets. Experimentations show that the simulated annealing approach outperforms the ant colony approach in objective function performance.     

Novel synthesis of Zirconyl Schiff base complex-functionalized MCM-48 using in oxidation of sulfides and Knoevenagel condensation reaction

In this study the new metal complex functionalized MCM-48 was synthesized and characterized by a number of techniques including TEM, XRD, TGA, IR, EDX, BET and ICP-AES. Zirconyl Schiff base complex of MCM-48 catalyzed the selective oxidation of a variety of sulfides to the corresponding sulfoxides in high yields. Also this modified MCM-48 could have potential application as catalyst for Knoevenagel condensation of various aldehydes with malononitrile and ethyl cyanoacetate. The catalyst could readily be separated from the reaction mixture and reused for several runs without significant loss in catalytic efficiency.     

An Optimized Design of Anode Shape Based on Artificial Neural Network for Achieving Highest X-ray Yield in Plasma Focus Device

In this paper, an optimized design of anode shape in order to achieve highest X-ray yield in a plasma focus device filled with nitrogen gas based on artificial neural networks (ANNs) is presented. Multi-layer perceptron neural network structure with the back-propagation algorithm is used for the training of the proposed model. The model has achieved good agreement with the training data and has yielded satisfactory generalization. This shows that the ANN model is an accurate and reliable approach to predict the highest X-ray yield in plasma focus devices.     

A novel miniaturized power amplifier with nth harmonic suppression

In this paper, a novel miniaturized power amplifier (PA) matched by two proposed low pass filters (LPFs) with nth harmonics suppression is presented. In the proposed PA, the LPFs are employed as an output and input impedance transformer networks, which transform 50 Ω to the desired impedances. In the proposed PA the conventional output and input matching networks are eliminated, which results in 52% size reduction and 6% power added efficiency (PAE) improvement compared with the conventional PA. Moreover, using the LPFs at the output and input impressively suppress the unwanted harmonics (2nd–6th) with high level of attenuation. The proposed PA works at the 2.6 GHz, which is suitable for long term evolution (LTE) applications. The measured and simulated results are in the good agreement, which confirm the validity of the proposed method.     

High‐efficiency balanced power amplifier using miniaturized harmonics suppressed coupler

A novel balanced power amplifier (BPA) using compact coupler with rhombus resonators is presented. In this design, a new method is presented to analyze the proposed rhombus‐shaped resonator based on the LC equivalent circuit. A new class F power amplifier is designed to improve performances of the BPA. The results show that the performance of the proposed BPA is improved by using the proposed harmonic suppressed coupler at the design structure. The designed BPA operates at 1.25 GHz and delivers 29 dB output power with a gain of 17.9 dB and drain efficiency (DE) of 65.2%. The presented BPA is realized using ATF‐34143 transistors in GaAs pHEMT technology and fabricated on the RT/Duroid 5880 substrate with a thickness of 31 mil.     

Investigation of asphaltene deposition under dynamic flow conditions

Asphaltene deposition is one of the most serious problems, which usually occurs in oil wells, petroleum production, oil processing, and transportation facilities. Deposition of heavy organic components, especially asphaltene, can lead to wellbore blockage and impacts well economics due to reduction in oil production. Therefore, it is necessary to pay more attention to finding some solution to overcome this problem. In this study, a pipe-loop apparatus for investigation of oil stability was employed to measure deposition thickness using a thermal method. The effects of many factors such as oil type, oil temperature, oil velocity, inhibitors, and solvents on asphaltene deposition were investigated. The results showed that the deposition increased with the increasing value of the colloidal instability index. Besides, the deposition thickness increased with the decreasing velocity of oil, but did not change with oil temperature. In addition, n-heptane could result in more deposition; however, toluene had no effect on the deposition. Branched dodecyl benzene sulfonic acid (Branched DBSA) and Linear DBSA as inhibitors decreased the rate of asphaltene deposition.     

Controlled release of thiram pesticide from poly (L-lactic acid) nanofibers

Controlled release of pesticides is eco-friendly and cost-effective. Thiram is a pesticide for fighting fungi and protection of cultivated products. This research aimed at controlled release of thiram pesticide from Poly (L-lactic acid) (PLLA) nanofibrous matrix. Solutions of PLLA (9% w/v) in chloroform-methanol (80–20 v/v) containing 5, 10, 15, 20, and 25% (w/w) thiram relative to the PLLA were electrospun. FESEM, FTIR, and XRD were employed to characterize the electrospun nanofibers. UV spectrophotometry was employed to study the release of thiram from PLLA nanofibers in deionized water. The results showed that the controlled release of thiram from PLLA nanofibers without annealing followed Fick mechanism, but after annealing, non-Fick mechanism prevailed. It was also observed that annealing led to lower level and lower initial rate of controlled release. It is concluded that electrospun PLLA-thiram nanofibers can be used for the controlled release of thiram in long-term periods in agriculture.