Design structure matrix (DSM) method application to issue of modeling and analyzing the fault tree of a wind energy asset

The perpetual energy production of a wind farm could be accomplished (under proper weather conditions) if no failures occurred. But even the best possible design, manufacturing, and maintenance of a system cannot eliminate the failure possibility. In order to understand and minimize the system failures, the most crucial components of the wind turbines, which are prone to failures, should be identified. Moreover, it is essential to determine and classify the criticality of the system failures according to the impact of these failure events on wind turbine safety. The present study is processing the failure data from a wind farm and uses the Fault Tree Analysis as a baseline for applying the Design Structure Matrix technique to reveal the failure and risk interactions between wind turbine subsystems. Based on the analysis performed and by introducing new importance measures, the “readiness to fail” of a subsystem in conjunction with the “failure riskiness” can determine the “failure criticality.” The value of the failure criticality can define the frame within which interventions could be done. The arising interventions could be applied either to the whole system or could be focused in specified pairs of wind turbine subsystems. In conclusion, the method analyzed in the present research can be effectively applied by the wind turbine manufacturers and the wind farm operators as an operation framework, which can lead to a limited (as possible) design‐out maintenance cost, failures' minimization, and safety maximization for the whole wind turbine system.     

Ballistic behavior of plain and reinforced concrete slabs under high velocity impact

This work presents a numerical simulation of ballistic penetration and high velocity impact behavior of plain and reinforced concrete slabs. In this paper, we focus on the comparison of the performance of the plain and reinforced concrete slabs of unconfined compressive strength 41 MPa under ballistic impact. The concrete slab has dimensions of 675 mm × 675 mm × 200 mm, and is meshed with 8-node hexahedron solid elements in the impact and outer zones. The ogive-nosed projectile is considered as rigid element that has a mass of 0.386 kg and a length of 152 mm. The applied velocities vary between 540 and 731 m/s. 6 mm of steel reinforcement bars were used in the reinforced concrete slabs. The constitutive material modeling of the concrete and steel reinforcement bars was performed using the Johnson-Holmquist-2 damage and the Johnson-Cook plasticity material models, respectively. The analysis was conducted using the commercial finite element package Abaqus/Explicit. Damage diameters and residual velocities obtained by the numerical model were compared with the experimental results and effect of steel reinforcement and projectile diameter were studies. The validation showed good agreement between the numerical and experimental results. The added steel reinforcements to the concrete samples were found efficient in terms of ballistic resistance comparing to the plain concrete sample.     

Effects of ethylene-octene copolymer (POE) on the brittle to ductile transition of high-density polyethylene/POE blends

Three kinds of ethylene-octene copolymers (POE) were melt-blended with high-density polyethylene (PE-HD) in different proportions. Detailed characterizations were conducted to analyze their structural differences of POE and its effects in toughening PE-HD. The higher molecular weight POE can improve the toughness of PE-HD. 60:40 PE-HD/POE is elongated to break up to 700% while impact strength is 84.7 kJ/m² at −30°C, which is 21-fold of PE-HD. In the brittle to ductile transition (BDT) during impact, the fracture mechanism changes from the crazing mode to the shear yield-plastic deformation mode. The BDT temperature decreases as the POE molecular weight and its content increase. The interface strength in tension is estimated to access their effects. The Boltzmann-type models were successfully extended to describe the typical S-shaped curves in BDT of notched impact strength vs POE content or temperature. The supplementary decay model is suggested for the attenuation in toughening. Transition map in impact is proposed to select the use range of composition (c ) and temperature (T ) for high toughness. The curves are converted into 3D graph of T -c -impact strength for illustrating their coupling-separate effects, and further into the contour map of impact strength in T -c space for finding their partial equivalence.     

Animations showing Lego manipulative tasks: Three potential moderators of effectiveness

Evidence suggests that transient visual information, such as animations, may be more challenging to learn than static visualizations. However, when a procedural-manipulative task is involved, our evolved embodied cognition seems to reverse this transitory challenge. Hence, for object manipulative tasks, instructional animations may be more suitable than statics. We investigated this argument further by comparing animations with statics using a Lego task shown to university students, by examining three potential moderators of effectiveness: (a) the environment of manipulation (virtual or physical), (b) the quality of visual information (focused or unfocused), and (c) the presence of hands (no hands or with hands). In Experiment 1 we found an advantage of animation over statics, and no differences among the environments. In Experiment 2, we again observed an animation advantage, a small advantage of focused static information compared to unfocused static information, and a positive effect of not showing the hands.     

An architecture to support scalable distributed virtual environment systems on grid

A Distributed Virtual Environment (DVE) system offers a computer-generated virtual world in which individuals located at different places in the physical world can interact with one another. In order to achieve real-time response for a large user base, DVE systems need to have a scalable architecture. In this paper, we present the design of a grid-enabled service oriented framework for facilitating the construction of scalable DVE systems on computing grids. A service component called “gamelet” is proposed, whose distinctive mark is its high mobility for supporting dynamic load sharing. We propose a gamelet migration protocol which can ensure the transparency and efficiency of gamelet migration, and an adaptive gamelet load-balancing (AGLB) algorithm for making gamelet redistribution decisions at runtime. The algorithm considers both the synchronization costs of the DVE system and network latencies inherent in the grid nodes. The activities of the users and the heterogeneity of grid resources are also considered in order to carry out load sharing more effectively. We evaluate the performance of the proposed mechanisms through a multiplayer online game prototype implemented using the Globus toolkit. The results show that our approach can achieve faster response times and higher throughputs than some existing approaches. This research is supported in part by the China National Grid project (863 program) and the HKU Foundation Seed Grant 28506002.     

浅议我国上市公司内部控制环境优化

控制环境是内部控制框架的基础,由于我国目前上市公司内部控制体系建设尚处于初级阶段,决定了其内部控制环境呈现出固有弊端.分析了我国上市公司在控制环境方面存在的缺陷,并提出了相应的优化措施,以期能对内部控制环境的完善起到一定的作用.     

理论、实践经验和实践能力

掌握了理论知识并不等于有了实战经验,更不等于有实战能力。从理论到有实战能力的飞跃,只有亲临生产线,在不断解决问题过程中实现。     

Evaluating the effects of frame of reference on spatial collaboration using desktop collaborative virtual environments

Spatial collaboration is an everyday activity in which people work together to solve a spatial problem. For example, a group of people will often arrange furniture together or exchange directions with one another. Collaborative virtual environments using desktop PCs are particularly useful for spatial activities when the participants are distributed. This work investigates ways to enhance distributed, collaborative spatial activities. This paper explores how different frames of reference affect spatial collaboration. Specifically, it reports on an experiment that examines different combinations of exocentric and egocentric frames of reference with two users. Tasks involve manipulating an object, where one participant knows the objective (director) and the other performs the interactions (actor). It discusses the advantages and disadvantages of the different combinations for a spatial collaboration task. Findings from this study demonstrate that frames of reference affect collaboration in a variety of ways and simple exocentric-egocentric combinations do not always provide the most usable solution.     

渤海湾盆地济阳——临清东部煤系烃源岩形成环境

钻井、地震、测井及测试资料综合研究认为:渤海湾盆地济阳—临清东部地区石炭—二叠系主要发育一套浅海碳酸盐岩台地相灰岩、障壁—潟湖、潮坪、沼泽及三角洲相陆源碎屑岩和煤层.从纵向发育的沉积特征来看,上石炭统本溪组发育浅海台地相碳酸盐岩和浅海陆棚相(陆表海)砂泥岩,太原组主要发育障壁—潟湖、潮坪、沼泽相碳酸盐岩、陆源碎屑岩和煤的混合沉积;二叠系山西组主要发育三角洲相和三角洲平原沼泽相砂泥岩及煤,下石盒子组和上石盒子组则以发育近海陆相碎屑岩沉积为主,局部有河流沼泽的泥炭和煤发育.沉积环境总体具有自下而上、由南向北由浅海相、海陆交互相逐步过渡为陆相的基本特点.成煤环境以晚石炭世—早二叠世太原、山西期潮坪、潟湖过渡带之潮坪沼泽环境及三角洲平原沼泽环境为最佳.      

上海市水环境生态安全评价

从“状态—压力—响应”指标框架体系出发,针对上海市水环境生态系统的现状特点,从时间变化和空间对比分析角度分别建立了上海市水环境生态安全评价指标体系;利用标准化和变异系数法确定各指标的标准化值和权重,采用综合指数评价法得到安全评价的综合指数值。在此基础上采用等级划分法,建立起综合指数值与生态安全评判的等级关系。各指标层的变化趋势揭示了上海市水环境生态安全的现状和发展趋势,即中心城区的水环境生态安全等级普遍低于郊区;在年际变化上,状态指标层评价值呈下降趋势,需要持续保护水环境生态系统;而压力和响应指标层评价值不断上升,保证了总体的良性发展趋势。