Sequential tripping strategy for a transmission network back-upprotection expert system

This paper describes a sequential tripping strategy used in a wide area back-up protection expert system (BPES) to combat situations in which protection relays have maloperated or information is missing. The BPES is an innovative back-up protection scheme designed to prevent the occurrence of widespread blackouts. The BPES evaluates the certainty that transmission lines are likely to be affected by the fault and uses a sequential tripping strategy to isolate the fault if a firm decision is not available due to maloperated relays and/or missing information. The mode of analysis and the sequential tripping strategy ensures that the BPES will clear a fault at minimum risk to the network. An example is included to demonstrate how the certainty factor based sequential tripping strategy is employed by the BPES to clear a fault which occurred on the South Western part of the UK National Grid System     

Flotation machine design: impeller—stator interaction

The separate contributions of impellers and stators to suction are studied by means of interaction models. From these, suction can be predicted when interchangeable components are used in any combination, and in either direction of impeller rotation. Methods are devised by which numerical values of the impeller and stator terms can be simply assigned. The resulting model provides good agreement with experiment. The influence of variability in component geometry is reflected in the model parameters. Possible applications of the model are suggested.     

A STUDY OF THE PRIMARY PHASE OF FOOD FREEZE-DRYING IN VACUO

In the development of a novel freeze-drying technique in a fluidized bed at atmospheric pressure, a parallel study was undertaken using a conventional vacuum equipment. Two kinetically distinct phases were observed during freeze drying of representative Pood samples:

(1) a period during which the rate of drying was constant and (2) a second period during which the drying rate sufferedcontinual reduction. This paper focused attention on the primary drying period which corresponded with the kinetics of sublimation of pure     

The effect of secondary scattering on the induced current in a longwire over an imperfect ground from an incident EMP

The effect of secondary scattering that is produced by the induced current in an infinitely long, finitely conducting wire over a plane, finitely conducting earth from an incident electromagnetic pulse is investigated. This is accomplished by finding the field of a Hertzian dipole over the earth and identifying the part that is due to secondary scattering. Frequency-domain results for the overall induced current require that certain infinite integrals be numerically evaluated. Fourier inversion to the time domain in turn requires the numerical evaluation of another infinite integral. When the results are compared to those obtained when secondary scattering is ignored, it is found that secondary scattering slightly increases the current for the case of broadside incidence and reduces it for the case of grazing incidence by as much as two orders of magnitude. Peak currents are much smaller than previously thought. These general results hold for all of the earth parameters that were used in the study     

PCR-based procedures in detection and DNA-fingerprinting of Salmonella from samples of animal origin

The usefulness of selected PCR-protocols for the detection of Salmonella in 117 samples of animal origin (17 raw minced meat, 27 raw chicken meat, 8 raw sausages, and 25 egg samples, as well as 18 poultry faecal, and caecal swabs samples) and DNA-fingerprinting typing is shown. To establish an accurate PCR-procedure for Salmonella detection the following parameters were evaluated: two pre-PCR concentration procedures, centrifugation and immunomagnetic separation (IMS) using Dynabeads anti- Salmonella; the specificity and sensitivity of 10 sets of primers; and different conditions of the amplification reaction. In light of the results obtained from the use of PCR-based procedures alone or in combination with conventional methods, the following findings can be underlined: First, IMS is more efficient than centrifugation in the recovery of Salmonella. Second, the selected IMS/PCR-detection protocol is less time-consuming (45 h) than the IMS/culture procedure (90 h), and a good concordance between them was found when the Kappa coefficient was calculated (0·87). Third, PCR-ribotyping technique showed a very low discrimination power, being able to differentiate only three profiles. Fourth, RAPD technique using specific primers supports previous works in which it was proposed as a simple and useful tool for discriminating isolates between and within serotypes. Fifth, The efficiency, rapidity, and flexibility of the PCR-protocols applied were high, and they can be performed using two PCR-programs and the same basic equipment.