Lubrication Mechanism of Phosphonium Phosphate Ionic Liquid Additive in Alkylborane–Imidazole Complexes

The assessment of ionic liquids (ILs) as lubricants in several tribological systems has shown their ability to provide remarkable reduced friction and protection against wear, whether they are used as additives or in the neat form. However, their corrosion and limited solubility in non-polar hydrocarbon oils represent the bottleneck-limiting factors for the use of ILs as lubricants. Therefore, in order to tackle these problems, mixtures of alkylborane–imidazole complexes with one halogen-free IL as additive were used in this study. The knowledge of the additive–surface interactions and hence the understanding of tribological properties are an important issue for lubricant formulations and were also investigated in this work. Thus, combination effects between two ionic liquid additives, a halogenated and a halogen-free one, were evaluated by a ball-on-disc-type tribometer under boundary lubrication conditions. Effective friction reduction and anti-wear properties have been demonstrated in tribological investigations when adding between 0.7 and 3.4 wt% of the halogen-free IL into base fluid composed of alkylborane–imidazole complexes. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy analyses of the steel specimens were conducted to study the correlation between tribological properties and chemical surface composition of the boundary films formed on the rubbing surface. This work suggests potential applications for using halogen-free ILs as additives for synthetic ionic liquid lubricants.     

On the internal structure of weakly nonlinear bores in laminar high Reynolds number flow

The paper deals with the internal structure of hydraulic jumps in near-critical single-layer flows which replaces the discontinuities predicted by hydraulic theory if viscous effects acting inside a thin laminar boundary layer are properly accounted for. In the limit of large Reynolds number this leads to a structure problem formed by the classical triple-deck equations supplemented with a novel nonlinear interaction relationship which allows for the passage through the critical state. Hydraulic jumps are shown to represent eigensolutions of the structure problem where this passage is achieved by the local thickening of the boundary layer which acts as a viscous hump. The effects of detuning and dispersion due to streamline curvature and surface tension on the internal structure of hydraulic jumps are studied in detail. In addition, the interaction of hydraulic jumps with surface mounted obstacles is investigated.     

On forecasting large and infrequent snow avalanches

Snow avalanches that threaten a highway or a residential area are often large avalanches that have a return period > 1 year. Danger assessment strongly relies on precipitation data since these avalanches are typically triggered by major snow storms. Given the extensive protection work that is in place in the European Alps, the avalanche control service (also called avalanche commission) responsible for danger assessment will usually monitor the avalanche situation throughout the winter, but only become active in case of a major snow fall. Related safety concepts describing the procedures and measures to be taken in a given danger situation are therefore often based on threshold values for new snow. By analysing the avalanche occurrence of a major avalanche path, we show that forecasting based on new snow amounts involves high uncertainty. Whereas the return period of an avalanche to, for example, the road was about 5 years, the return period for the corresponding new snow depth was substantially smaller, in our case slightly less than 2 years. Similar proportions were found for a number of other avalanche paths with different snow climate. The return period of the critical new snow depth was about 2–5 times smaller than the return period of the avalanche. This proportion is expected to increase with increasing return period. Hence, based on the return period of an avalanche path a first estimate for the critical new snow depth can be made. With a return period of the critical new snow depth of 1–2 years, avalanche prediction for individual avalanche path becomes very challenging since the false alarm ratio is expected to be high.     

Single Machine Precedence Constrained Scheduling Is a Vertex Cover Problem

In this paper we study the single machine precedence constrained scheduling problem of minimizing the sum of weighted completion time. Specifically, we settle an open problem first raised by Chudak and Hochbaum and whose answer was subsequently conjectured by Correa and Schulz. As shown by Correa and Schulz, the proof of this conjecture implies that the addressed scheduling problem is a special case of the vertex cover problem. This means that previous results for the scheduling problem can be explained, and in some cases improved, by means of vertex cover theory. For example, the conjecture implies the existence of a polynomial time algorithm for the special case of two-dimensional partial orders. This considerably extends Lawler’s result from 1978 for series-parallel orders.     

FDS simulation of the fuel fireball from a hypothetical commercial airliner crash on a generic nuclear power plant

In the aftermath of 9/11 events it became clear that the impact of a fast flying commercial airliner hitting the NPP could no longer be excluded as a potential external hazard threatening the nuclear power plant (NPP) safety. One of the potential consequences of the impact is the occurrence of a fireball, large enough to engulf the entire NPP. The knowledge about fireballs from air crashes is rather poor since it is only based on footage shot by chance. From careful physical and chemical examinations using first principles, it can be concluded that the physics and chemistry of the kerosene fireball are similar to BLEVE fireballs in gas tank accidents which have been studied during the last decades. The knowledge from these analyses can be applied to air crash fireball analysis.In order to obtain an adequate understanding of the potential hazards to a NPP engulfed by a fireball a detailed analysis of the fireball is necessary. It is only by a detailed analysis that the effect of the NPP structures on the evolution of the fireball can be derived. Though the safety-relevant parts of the NPP are strong concrete structures, according to IAEA regulations the hypothesized entry of combustion products into ventilation or air supply systems and the entry of fuel into buildings through normal openings have to be analyzed in detail. This requires local transient values of the safety-relevant fireball parameters. With the NPP being a very large structure an adequately detailed simulation requires large computing grids and substantial computing power.With the release of Version 5 of the Fire Dynamic Simulator (FDS) from NIST in 2007 a simulation tool is now available which is capable to perform simulations of large fireballs on sufficiently large computing grids. These fireball simulations can be performed also by any other CFD code in which the relevant models have been implemented.The FDS fireball simulation capabilities were validated with the help of a well-documented fireball event, in which 5.9 to of propane were burnt during a BLEVE impact experiment conducted by the German BAM in 1999.To demonstrate the applicability of FDS to nuclear safety analysis a simulation of the impact of a 90 to fireball on a generic NPP was performed. The results are presented in this paper and show that FDS release Version 5 is an adequate tool to analysis the effect of a fireball on a NPP, even if the largest possible amount of kerosene involved in the crash is assumed.The work presented in this paper is based on codes, papers, footage and material that are freely available on the Internet. The paper does not use any information that is not freely available on the Internet.     

Optimierung der Habitatmodellierung an gro?en Flie?gew?ssern unter Berücksichtigung von flussmorphologischen Prozessen auf unterschiedlichen Skalen

In light of the various anthropogenic pressures on our river systems (flood protection, navigation, recreational fisheries) and current legal requirements (European Water Framework Directive), the need for integrative evaluation tools has become increasingly apparent. The so-called habitat modeling approach addresses these integrative efforts to quantify the changing environment for target species (fish, macro-invertebrates), taking into account hydrological and/or morphological changes. Over the course of extensive monitoring on the Danube east of Vienna this specific evaluation tool has been adapted and improved to allow the assessment of river engineering measures in future, especially before their implementation and to determine their potential impacts on the ecological conditions.