Flood risk mapping at European scale.

The aim of this article is to illustrate a framework for flood risk mapping at pan-European scale produced by the Weather-Driven Natural Hazards (WDNH) action of the EC-JRC-IES. Early results are presented in the form of flood risk index maps. We assess several flood risk factors that contribute to the occurrence of flood disasters. Among the causal factors of a flood disaster one is triggering a natural event in the form of extreme precipitation and consequently extreme river discharge and extreme flood water levels. The threatening natural event represents the hazard component in our assessment. Furthermore exposure and vulnerability are anthropogenic factors that contribute also to flood risk. In the proposed approach, flood risk is considered on the light of exposure, vulnerability and hazard. We use a methodology with a marked territorial approach for the assessment of the flood risk. Hence, based on mathematical calculations, risk is the product of hazard, exposure and vulnerability. Improvements on datasets availability and spatial scale are foreseen in the next phases of this study. This study is also a contribution to the discussion about the need for communication tools between the natural hazard scientific community and the political and decision making players in this field.     

Optimal scheduling with strict deadlines

The problem of dynamic scheduling of customers (messages) in time-critical environments is discussed. A single station (communication node) is considered, and it is assumed that each customer (message) must begin service (transmission) by an individually varying extinction time or else it is lost. Interest is in minimizing, in the sense of stochastic order, the number of messages lost over any time interval. A variety of results is proved that establishes the optimality of the shortest-time-to-extinction policy under rather general conditions. Similar results are found when messages have constraints on their complete transmission times. A network of M stations in tandem is considered under the hypothesis that a message is never lost and is scheduled irrespective of whether its extinction time (also called due date in this case) has expired or not. Under fairly general assumptions on the arrivals, deadlines, and services, it is shown that the earliest-due-date policy minimizes a form of average tardiness incurred over a finite operating horizon among all non-idling nonpreemptive policies. These problems are formulated in the context of stochastic dominance, and simple interchange arguments are used to establish all results     

Close interaction of coplanar circular cracks under shear loading

A new method is proposed for the stress analysis of an elastic space weakened by several arbitrarily located coplanar circular cracks subjected to an arbitrary shear loading. The method is based on a new type of integral equation and has definite advantages over the existing methods: equations are non-singular, the iteration procedure is rapidly convergent even for very close interactions. The method allows us to obtain a practically exact numerical solution to the problem of very close interactions. An accurate analytical solution is obtained for the case of two cracks, which are separated by a half of their radius or more. The stress intensity factors and the crack energy increase due to the interaction are computed for various distances between the cracks.The reported research was supported by a grant from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada     

Increasing the corrosion resistance of low-alloy and carbon steels for automobile construction by optimizing the metallurgical technology

It is shown that the corrosion resistance of automobile sheet can be improved by ensuring that steels of this type have a low content of corrosion-active nonmetallic inclusions (CANI). The main mechanisms responsible for the formation of CANI in automobile sheet have been established, and recommendations have been developed to reduce their concentration in this product • optimize the deoxidation processes that are used by ensuring that the proportions of the additions made to the steel are consistent with the composition of the ladle slag and that certain key temperature-time parameters of these processes are maintained • control the composition of the ladle slag to prevent the formation of solid phases in the slag and their transfer to the metal; certain conditions must also be observed in the argon blow and the introduction of the addtions. Use of the above recommendations to make automobile sheet and tube steels cleaner with respect to their content of CANI and thus help optimize out-of-furnace treatments at metallurgical and pipe plants will make it possible to improve the corrosion resistance of metal products used in automotive manufacturing. __________ Translated from Metallurg, No. 2, pp. 45–48, February, 2006.     

Use of flavour profile and consumer panels to determine differences between local water supplies and desalinated seawater.

The San Diego County Water Authority of California has initiated planning for coastal desalination facilities to augment their water supplies. Integration of the different water qualities from these facilities into existing pipelines must be achieved. This investigation determined whether, and to what degree, consumers can discriminate between desalinated seawater and imported water supplies and how these investigations can contribute to decision making regarding the need for construction of facilities to blend such supplies prior to delivery. Based upon the results of the flavour profile analysis panel and the consumer evaluation sessions, it was concluded that free chlorine versus chloramine disinfection or different concentrations of disinfectants did not significantly affect consumer perception of the taste and odour of desalinated seawater or blends with Colorado River water and State project water. Consumers were able to discern between desalinated seawater and imported water, preferring imported water when forced to make a choice. However, the investigators did not believe that the difference in consumer perception was significant enough to warrant special blending facilities to mitigate the relatively minor aesthetic quality differences between imported water supplies and desalinated seawater.     

Mean value analysis of closed queueing networks with Erlang service time distributions

The classical mean value analysis approach is extended to single class closed queueing networks containing Erlang service time distributions and FCFS scheduling disciplines. A new formula for the mean residence time of jobs is derived. Each iteration provides self-checks for validity, and is repeated whenever invalid results are detected. On the average, the solutions obtained vary by less than five percent from their respective simulation results.