Bounds for the solution of hyperbolic problems

This article describes a newly developed and implemented method for computing guaranteed errorbounds for the solution of hyperbolic initial value problems. The basic concepts—modified fixed point theorems and approximated operators—allow an a posteriori error-estimation automatically. Therefore, no a priori knowledge of Lipschitz constants, monotonicity properties or additional error analysis is necessary.     

Rapid and comprehensive indicator for evaluation of performance of treatment processes and of river waters.

Naturally occurring UV active compounds, commonly present in almost all source waters, can be rapidly monitored by their ultraviolet absorbance at 260 nm (E260). Herein, the extent of correlation between the E260 and the removal efficiency of the hazardous contaminants, endocrine disrupters and dioxins, were investigated using various treatment and river source waters. The detection of various types of hazardous contaminants using sophisticated analytical methods, such as high resolution gas chromatography (HRGC)/high resolution mass spectrometry (HRMS) and high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC)/inductively coupled plasma (ICP)/mass spectrometry (MS), as well as various short-term bioassays, can require hours or even days for results to be obtained. The removal of the E260 correlated well with those of individual contaminants, such as endocrine disruptor chemicals and dioxins, with the various treatment processes employed. In the plots of the endocrine disrupters against the DOC/E260, a correlation was found with the endocrine activity of the Korean/Japanese river waters employed in this study.     

Polygonal approximation for image segmentation

A new learning model for real-time, grey-level image segmentation is presented. The model gives excellent results for images with different shapes.     

The effects of deep zones on wetland nitrogen processing.

Twelve research wetlands were operated under varying conditions at a site west of the city of Phoenix. These were constructed as a triplicated design, with zero, one, two and three internal deep zones, all containing an inlet distribution and an outlet collection deep zone, together comprising 12.5-35% of the wetland areas. The water supply was partially nitrified effluent from a city wastewater treatment plant. Total nitrogen was reduced by about 50%, from inflow concentrations between 6 and 8 mg/L. Speciation of the inflow was approximately 25% organic nitrogen, 25% ammonium nitrogen and 50% nitrate nitrogen. Typical outflow concentrations were about 1.2 mg/L organic, 0.5 mg/L ammonium and 0.0-2.5 mg/L nitrate. Rate constants for total nitrogen were 15-20 m/year at 20 degrees C, and 20-30 m/year for nitrate, which agree well with other project reports. Temperature factors averaged 1.100 for total nitrogen, and 1.184 for nitrate. There were no differences in the internal hydraulics with deep zone numbers. Deep zone numbers in the wetlands did not affect nitrogen treatment performance. No differences with deep zone numbers were found for temperature, dissolved oxygen, pH, or nitrogen removals or rate constants. In conjunction with other reported results, there appears to be no large treatment benefit or detriment of incorporating internal deep zones in free water surface wetlands.     

Colloidal silica removal in coagulation processes for wastewater reuse in a high-tech industrial park.

Four experiments of coagulation and flocculation were conducted to investigate the characteristics of colloidal silica removal in a high-tech industrial wastewater treatment plant for reclamation and reuse of the effluent. Experimental results illustrated that poly-aluminium chloride (PACl) showed higher performances on colloidal silica removal than alum. Interestingly, the two coagulants demonstrated the same capacity on silica removal. The specific silica removal capacity was approximately 0.135 mg SiO2/mg Al2O3 when the dosage of coagulants was in the range 30-150 mg/L Al2O3. In addition, the silica was reduced significantly at the condition of pH above 8. Experimental data implied that precipitation of aluminium flocs was the major mechanism for colloid silica removal in PACl and alum coagulation, besides, charge adsorption was also important for improving removal efficiency. Moreover, the addition of polyacrylic acid (PAA) as a flocculant could slightly advance silica removal in the PACl coagulation. The combined PACl/PAA/flocs coagulation was effective for the removal of colloidal silica, soluble COD, and turbidity and also suitable as a pretreatment unit in wastewater reclamation and reuse processes.     

Mössbauer spectroscopic studies of Fe-substituted YIG

Compositional dependence of hyperfine parameters, determined through Mössbauer spectral analysis has been studied for Y_3−xFe_5+xO₁₂ (x = 0.0, 0.1, 0.3 and 0.5) garnet system at 300 K. The Mössbauer spectra have been fitted with three sextets in the ferrimagnetic state corresponding to Fe³⁺ ions at tetrahedral (d), octahedral (a) and dodecahedral (c) sites of the crystal structure. It is observed that isormershift, quadrupole shift and hyperfine field of d-site show no significant variation with Fe³⁺ concentration. The change in hyperfine fields of a- and c-sites with composition (x) has been explained on the basis of strength of exchange integrals, change in isomershift can be understood due to s-electron charge distribution and asymmetric displacement of oxygen ions surrounding the a- and c-sites seems to be responsible for observable quadrupole shift. The magneton number values obtained from magnetization and Mossbauer data are in agreement to those calculated using Neel's three sublattice model of ferrimagnetism.