A boundary-integral formulation for complex three-dimensional geometries

A new boundary-integral formulation is proposed to analyse the heat transfer in complex three-dimensional geometries. One example of such geometry is the die sets in the injection moulding process. Networks of cooling conduits within the mould and the closely spaced die surfaces require special attention both in formulation and numerical treatment of the integral equations. The proposed formulation couples the boundary formula, the gradient of the boundary formula and the exterior formula. The derivation of the integral equations is presented here along with an efficient method for integration of some of the kernels in these equations and a semi-analytical procedure for the integration of the highly singular integrands which result from differentiating the boundary formula. Although the techniques introduced here are applied to a particular problem in heat transfer, their potential application is much broader.     

Structural Behavior of Single Key Joints in Precast Concrete Segmental Bridges

A group of five full-depth male–female shear key specimens were match cast and tested to examine the shear capacity of epoxy-jointed single keys. Another group of four specimens were match cast using full-scale dimensions of a segmental construction bridge deck system for testing the fatigue and water tightness at a segment joint. Both cold-weather and hot-weather epoxy types were used to join the specimens. In addition to the experimental testing, finite-element analysis was also used to model the static response of the joint specimens. The observed failure mode of all shear-key specimens was fracture of concrete along the joint with shearing of the key. Good agreement was observed between the experimental test results and the finite-element analysis in terms of the failure mode of unreinforced specimen and the load of crack initiation of the specimens. Fatigue loading had a minor effect on the behavior of the posttensioning bars. The contribution of either the cold-weather or hot-weather epoxies to the joint shear strength was significant knowing that for similar concrete properties, the hot-weather epoxy specimens showed an increase of about 28% in the shear capacity, in comparison to the cold-weather epoxy specimens. The excellent performance of the epoxy-jointed shear keys was verified by field application on a prototype model simulating a portion of the Wacker Drive Bridge system. It was concluded that implementing AASHTO procedures result in conservative estimates of the shear strength of the single keyed joint since it neglects the contribution of the epoxy and underestimates the strength of the key itself.     

Emerging Advances of Nanotechnology in Drug and Vaccine Delivery against Viral Associated Respiratory Infectious Diseases (VARID)

Viral-associated respiratory infectious diseases are one of the most prominent subsets of respiratory failures, known as viral respiratory infections (VRI). VRIs are proceeded by an infection caused by viruses infecting the respiratory system. For the past 100 years, viral associated respiratory epidemics have been the most common cause of infectious disease worldwide. Due to several drawbacks of the current anti-viral treatments, such as drug resistance generation and non-targeting of viral proteins, the development of novel nanotherapeutic or nano-vaccine strategies can be considered essential. Due to their specific physical and biological properties, nanoparticles hold promising opportunities for both anti-viral treatments and vaccines against viral infections. Besides the specific physiological properties of the respiratory system, there is a significant demand for utilizing nano-designs in the production of vaccines or antiviral agents for airway-localized administration. SARS-CoV-2, as an immediate example of respiratory viruses, is an enveloped, positive-sense, single-stranded RNA virus belonging to the coronaviridae family. COVID-19 can lead to acute respiratory distress syndrome, similarly to other members of the coronaviridae. Hence, reviewing the current and past emerging nanotechnology-based medications on similar respiratory viral diseases can identify pathways towards generating novel SARS-CoV-2 nanotherapeutics and/or nano-vaccines.     

Rapid Analysis of Styrene in Drinking Water and Tea Samples Using Dispersive Liquid-Liquid Microextraction Combined with Liquid Chromatography-Ultraviolet Detection

In this project, a simple, low-cost and rapid procedure based on dispersive liquid–liquid microextraction (DLLME) technique coupled with high performance liquid chromatography-ultraviolet detector (HPLC-UV) has been used for the extraction and determination of styrene in aqueous solutions. Several factors, such as type of extraction and dispersive solvents and their volumes, salt addition, and pH were optimized. Under optimal conditions, the recoveries of styrene for tea and water samples spiked with 10 and 15 ng mL^?1 were in the range of 91.4–97.8 %, whereas the temperature was set at 0, 4, 20, 70 and 91 °C for 15, 30, 60, 1440, and 14,400 min. The linear range was obtained in the interval of 1.86–50 ng mL^?1. The limits of detection (S/N = 3) and quantitation (S/N = 10) were 0.6 and 1.86 ng mL^?1, respectively. The relative standard deviations (RSDs) for three replicated analysis of styrene in aqueous samples ranged from 0.01 to 0.3 %.     

Microscopic retinal blood vessels detection and segmentation using support vector machine and K-nearest neighbors

The retina is the deepest layer of texture covering the rear of the eye, recorded by fundus images. Vessel detection and segmentation are useful in disease diagnosis. The retina's blood vessels could help diagnose maladies such as glaucoma, diabetic retinopathy, and blood pressure. A mix of supervised and unsupervised strategies exists for the detection and segmentation of blood vessels images. The tree structure of retinal blood vessels, their random area, and different thickness have caused vessel detection difficulties at machine learning calculations. Since the green band of retinal images conveys more information about the vessels, they are utilized for microscopic vessels detection. The current research proposes an administered calculation for segmentation of retinal vessels, where two upgrading stages depending on filtering and comparative histogram were applied after pre-processing and image quality improvement. At that point, statistical features of vessel tracking, maximum curvature and curvelet coefficient are extracted for each pixel. The extracted features are classified by support vector machine and the k-nearest neighbors. The morphological operators then enhance the classified image at the final stage to segment with higher accuracy. The dice coefficient is utilized for the evaluation of the proposed method. The proposed approach is concluded to be better than different strategies with a normal of 92%.     

Topological surrogates for computationally efficient seismic robustness optimization of water pipe networks

The criticality of seismic robustness of the water pipe networks cannot be overstated. Current methodologies for optimizing seismic robustness of city‐scale water pipe networks are scarce. A very few studies that can be found are also prone to long optimization runtimes due to the requirement of repeated hydraulic analysis. Hence, there is a critical need for the identification of computationally efficient surrogate optimization methods for maximizing seismic robustness of water pipe networks. To address this need, this research was conducted to identify, for the first time, computationally efficient topological surrogates for hydraulic simulation‐based optimization. The computational efficiency of surrogate optimization was measured in terms of solution quality (i.e., post‐earthquake serviceability) and computational runtime. Ten different topological connectivity metrics were evaluated out of which five were considered computationally infeasible due to their prohibitive optimization runtime. Five remaining metrics were then used to formulate five surrogate objective functions for seismic robustness of water pipe networks. Each of these functions was optimized using a simulated annealing‐based algorithm. Application of the proposed approach to city‐level benchmark networks helped to identify two metrics out of ten that offered a substantial reduction in optimization runtime with a minimal loss in solution quality. These findings will be highly valuable to water distribution network managers for identifying economical rehabilitation policies for enhancing the seismic robustness at a city‐scale within a reasonable amount of time.     

On The Dynamic and Thermal Performance of a Zero Clearance Auxiliary Bearing(zcab) for a Magnetic Bearing System

Structural and thermal analysis of a zero clearance auxiliary bearing (ZCAB) for magnetic bearing systems is presented. The ZCAB consists a series of rollers whose centers are initially placed on a circle. At the open condition all rollers have an initial clearance about the rotating shaft. As the shaft drops on the ZCAB rollers, either due to failure of the magnetic bearing system or a transient shock, the centers of the rollers move circumferentially along a curve path and after eliminate the initial clearance by closing around the shaft and re-centering it. This is known as the closed condition. The overall stiffness of the ZCAB will then depend on the stiffness of each single roller and the initial clearance between the rollers and the shaft. This is affected by the number of rollers that will touch the shaft which will also vary the load applied on the rollers. The low shaft-rollers traction coefficient and overall dynamic support characteristics obviate the possibility of backward whirl, however this traction and the generated heat in the rolling element embedded in the rollers are sources of heat generation. This paper presents the results of a transient analysis for the ZCAB structural stiffness. A preliminary thermal model of the ZCAB and comparison between the predictions and test results are also discussed. Some design guidelines are presented to help improve the performance of the ZCAB in the case of high temperature working conditions.     

Existence of Good Bonding between Coated B4C Reinforcement and Al Matrix via Semisolid Techniques: Enhancement of Wear Resistance and Mechanical Properties

An Al 6061 alloy matrix reinforced with the coated B₄C particles was used for the present study. The cohesion of the reinforcing ceramic particles is poor at temperatures near the melting point of aluminum and leads to inferior mechanical and tribological properties of developed aluminum matrix composites with nonuniform distribution of the reinforcement. The main reason for coating the particles is to improve the bond between the reinforcement and molten alloy and thus to eliminate interfacial reactions. The great enhancement in strength values of the composites in this study can be ascribed to the effective load-bearing capacity of disintegrated B₄C particles that are adherently bonded to the matrix alloy. Homogeneity and reduction in the particle size of B₄C during the extrusion process is evidenced in the microstructural studies.     

Vibration modeling and modification of cutting platform in a harvest combine by means of operational modal analysis (OMA)

Vibration in combine cutting platform causes increase in grain loss, reduction of vehicle lifetime and driver’s comfort, and also affects the machine working precision. In order to determine vibration behavior of a mechanical structure, the model which relates acting forces on the structure with the resulting responses of it plays a significant role. For a great deal of mechanical structures, only response data are measurable while the actual loading conditions are unknown. Therefore, the system identification process will need to build on the output-only data. The use of such processes allows the identification of modal models of structures which are excited by unknown ambient vibration. In this contribution, controlled vibration experiments were conducted on cutting platform of a combine in order to recognize and reduce its vibration problem. A finite element model is constructed representing the vibration behavior of the cutting platform. Also, the frequency domain decomposition (FDD) technique is used to estimate the modal parameters of vibrating structures in operational conditions. Then, the finite element model is successfully updated by comparing the estimated results of the operational modal analysis. It is found that there is a resonance condition around 50 Hz. Then, the mass change strategy is used to estimate the scaling-factor and frequency response function (FRF) matrix. Finally, the resonance condition and subsequently vibration of cutting platform is reduced by the structural modification technique. As a result of this modification, natural frequency of fifth mode shape (50 Hz) of the combine cutting platform is shifted to 48 Hz.     

Correlation of rheology and morphology and estimation of interfacial tension of immiscible COC/EVA blends

Rheology and morphology of cyclic olefin copolymer (COC) / ethylene vinyl acetate copolymer (EVA) immiscible blends with droplet and co-continuous morphologies were experimentally examined and theoretically analyzed using emulsion and micromechanical models. The blends showed an asymmetric phase diagram in which the EVA-rich blends had smaller dispersed size domains as compared to the COC-rich blends. This could be explained based on the higher melt elasticity and viscosity of COC as compared to EVA determined by the rheological investigations. The rheological tools were used to investigate the miscibility of the blends. From the melt viscosity data it is found that the COC/EVA blends show a positive deviation behavior at all compositions which is a hint for strong interaction between the COC and EVA. Analysis of Cole-Cole and Han diagrams revealed that COC/EVA blends, at high EVA contents, were more compatible than COC-rich blends. For the droplet morphology, Palierne model was more successful but, by increasing the dispersed phase content some deviation was observed. In the co-continuous region, the Coran model was in good correspondence with the experimental data as compared to the Veenstra’s model. The storage and loss modulus of EVA-rich blends had a better correspondence with the Palierne model than the COC-rich blends which further confirmed the morphological findings. Interfacial tension calculated for the COC/EVA blends using the Palierne model, were about 1.2 and 15 mN/m² for EVA-rich (10/90) and COC-rich blends (90/10), respectively. In both EVA-rich and COC-rich systems the interfacial tension increased with increasing the dispersed phase content.