Moving-Wheel Fatigue for Bridge Decks Strengthened with CFRP Strips Subject to Negative Bending

This paper presents the negative bending of reinforced concrete slabs strengthened with near-surface mounted (NSM) carbon fiber-reinforced polymer (CFRP) strips. Six slab specimens, three of which are strengthened with CFRP strips, are tested in static and fatigue loads. A wheel-running fatigue test machine is used to simulate vehicular loads on a bridge deck. The effectiveness of CFRP strengthening for bridge decks in cantilever and pseudonegative bending is examined based on moment-carrying capacity and cyclic behavior under the wheel-running fatigue loads, including crack patterns and damage accumulation. The moment-carrying capacity (static) of the cantilever slab strengthened with the NSM CFRP strips is improved by 68.4% when compared to that of an unstrengthened slab. The damage accumulation rate of the strengthened cantilever slab owing to the fatigue load is significantly lower than that of the unstrengthened slab. The damage accumulation of the strengthened slab gradually increases and is irreversible when the fatigue cycles increase. The fatigue-induced flexural cracks of the slabs develop along the wheel-running direction. A simple predictive model is presented to estimate the fatigue life of the test slabs.     

Transesterification of phytosterol and edible oil by lipase powder at high temperature

Phytosterol, which is hardly soluble in edible oil, was solubilized at a high concentration by converting it to FA esters by lipase-catalyzed transesterification at temperatures higher than 100°C using powdered Lipase QLM (Meito Sangyo Co., Ltd., Nagoya, Japan). Transesterification was conducted, in sunflower oil containing 10% phytosterol, without adding water or solvent, at 100°C. The conversion rate was 97.1% after 7 h of reaction. The effect of temperature on the conversion rate was also examined. Maximum enzyme activity occurred in the 100–120°C range, and 20% of the maximum activity was retained even at 130°C. When the lipase was recovered by filtration and recycled for repeated reactions at 90°C, the half-life of lipase activity was 260 h. Thus, edible oils with nutritional value could be produced by blending the phytosterol-containing sunflower oil into other edible oils.     

Synergistic hydrogen production by nuclear-heated steam reforming of fossil fuels

Processes and technologies to produce hydrogen synergistically by the nuclear-heated steam reforming reaction of fossil fuels are reviewed. Formulas of chemical reactions, required heats for reactions, saving of fuel consumption, reduction of carbon dioxide emission, and possible processes are investigated for such fossil fuels as natural gas, petroleum and coal.

In this investigation, examined are the steam reforming processes using the “membrane reformer” and adopting the recirculation of reaction products in a closed loop configuration. The recirculation-type membrane reformer process is considered to be the most advantageous among various synergistic hydrogen production processes. Typical merits of this process are; nuclear heat supply at medium temperature around 550°C, compact plant size and membrane area for hydrogen production, efficient conversion of a feed fossil fuel, appreciable reduction of carbon dioxide emission, high purity hydrogen without any additional process, and ease of separating carbon dioxide for future sequestration requirements.

The synergistic hydrogen production using fossil fuels and nuclear energy can be an effective solution in this century for the world which has to use fossil fuels to some extent, according to various estimates of global energy supply, while reducing carbon dioxide emission.     

Numerical investigation of multi-dimensional characteristics in sodium combustion

Multi-dimensional sodium combustion behavior has been numerically investigated in the present paper. A new computer code AQUA-SF has been developed for this purpose. The code includes two sodium combustion models (so called ‘spray combustion’ and ‘pool combustion’), a mass and heat transfer model considering a six-flux gas radiation and a coagulation and sedimentation model of sodium oxide and hydroxide aerosols. The sodium spray combustion rate is evaluated by a summation of the combustion rate of each sodium droplet with an individual diameter. A flame sheet model is applied to situations where sodium spreads out on the floor and a pool combustion takes place. The model assumes an infinitely thin flame above the pool surface and is based on a mass and energy balance in the flame. As the results of numerical analyses of a sodium spray combustion test, a location of high-temperature core region and a maximum temperature agrees with the experiment. Good agreements of an overall transient behavior are obtained in a large-scale sodium combustion test analysis. The numerical analyses also demonstrate that the distributions of temperature and chemical species concentration vary with sodium combustion modes. If sodium scatters and the spray combustion is dominant, the distributions vary in space. When a large amount of sodium exists on a floor and the pool area is enlarged, the distributions are more uniform in space.     

Surface-plasmon-enhanced light emitters based on InGaN quantum wells

Since 1993, InGaN light-emitting diodes (LEDs) have been improved and commercialized, but these devices have not fulfilled their original promise as solid-state replacements for light bulbs as their light-emission efficiencies have been limited. Here we describe a method to enhance this efficiency through the energy transfer between quantum wells (QWs) and surface plasmons (SPs). SPs can increase the density of states and the spontaneous emission rate in the semiconductor, and lead to the enhancement of light emission by SP-QW coupling. Large enhancements of the internal quantum efficiencies (eta(int)) were measured when silver or aluminium layers were deposited 10 nm above an InGaN light-emitting layer, whereas no such enhancements were obtained from gold-coated samples. Our results indicate that the use of SPs would lead to a new class of very bright LEDs, and highly efficient solid-state light sources.     

Geometric design of a face gear drive with a helical pinion

The application of face gear drives, which have been used recently instead of bevel and hypoid gears for helicopter transmission, has resulted in renewed interest in such drives. A helical pinion must be utilized to change the composition of the contact surface freely. In this work, the problem of where to place the pinion with respect to a gear is solved by defining a reference point. The effect of the helix angle on the composition of the surface contact lines is clarified. A geometric design method that recognizes meshing singularity is proposed. Two unique lines on which specific sliding becomes infinite are regarded as design indexes. Results show that the contribution of the surface contact lines changes significantly depending on the helix angle, and the offset distances influence the effective tooth width of the gear.     

A study of the heat transfer characteristics for a horizontal dry storage system for LWR spent fuel assemblies

Heat transfer experiments were carried out for natural convection in an enclosure, simulating a dry shielded canister with 24 PWR spent fuel assemblies. The objectives of this study were to investigate the thermal hydraulic characteristics of natural convection in the canister and to establish an evaluation method for heat removal from the canister under combined natural convection and thermal radiation. In these experiments, a neon and nitrogen gas mixture was used as a working fluid, based on a thermal hydraulic similarity, in order to simulate exactly the ratio of natural convection and thermal radiation in the experimental apparatus to that in an actual system. The results were analyzed in detail by using a thermal hydraulic analysis computation. It was found that the temperature difference ΔT in the canister was proportional to P^−0.3 and the average heat transfer coefficient correlated approximately with the equation: Nu = 0.07Ra^1/4. © 1998 Scripta Technica, Heat Trans Jpn Res, 27(4): 284–298, 1998     

Electric double layer capacitance on hierarchical porous carbons in an organic electrolyte

Nanoporous carbons were prepared by using colloidal crystal as a template. Nitrogen adsorption/desorption isotherms and transmission electron microscope images revealed that the porous carbons exhibit hierarchical porous structures with meso/macropores and micropores. Electric double layer capacitor performance of the porous carbons was investigated in an organic electrolyte of 1 M LiClO₄ in propylene carbonate and dimethoxy ethane. The hierarchical porous carbons exhibited large specific double layer capacitance of ca. 120 F g⁻¹ due to their large surface areas. In addition, the large capacitance was still obtained at a large current density up to 10 A g⁻¹, which satisfies demands from the high power application such as hybrid electric vehicles. Capacitance analysis of the hierarchical porous structures revealed the contribution of meso/macropores and micropore to the electric double layer capacitance to be 8.4 and 8.1 μF cm⁻², respectively. The results indicated electric double layer is formed even when solvated ions are larger than pore diameters.