Numerical modelling of isothermal release and distribution of helium and hydrogen gases inside the AIHMS cylindrical enclosure

Hydrogen is a highly flammable gas and accidental release in confined space can pose serious combustion hazards. Numerical studies are required to assess the formation of flammable hydrogen cloud within confined spaces. In the present study, numerical investigations on the release of helium and hydrogen gases as high-velocity jets and their subsequent distribution inside an unventilated cylindrical enclosure (AIHMS facility) has been carried out as a first step towards numerical studies on hydrogen distribution in confined spaces for safety assessments. Experimental data for jet release of helium at volume Richardson number 0.1 and subsequent distribution has been used as benchmark data. Sensitivity studies on the influence of grid sizes, time-steps and turbulence models are performed. The performance of the validated numerical model is evaluated using statistical performance parameters. Similarity relations are used to determine input parameters for hydrogen jet for corresponding experimental data with helium jets. Finally, the mixing and flammability aspects of hydrogen distribution inside the enclosure are studied using four numerical indices that quantify mixing and deflagration potential of a distribution. It is concluded that the helium experiments can be used for validation of numerical models for hydrogen safety studies and any one of the similarity relationships, viz., equal buoyancy, equal volumetric flow, or equal concentration can be used for assessing the behaviour of hydrogen release and distribution within confined spaces.     

Thiophene adsorption studies on clean and hydrogen-preadsorbed MoS2(100) surface

It is known from temperature-programmed desorption studies that the binding energy of thiophene over Mo/-Al₂O₃ and Co-Mo/-Al₂O₃, hydrodesulfurization catalysts, is lower in the presence of hydrogen. The adsorption of thiophene on clean and hydrogen-adsorbed MoS₂ was modelled using extended Hückel tight binding band structure calculations. In the ¹ adsorption configuration the calculations show a lower binding energy for adsorption on the hydrogen-preadsorbed surface similar to that observed experimentally. The lowering is due to an increased occupancy of the Mo density of states in the presence of hydrogen.     

Modeling Evaporation-Seepage Losses for Reservoir Water Balance in Semi-arid Regions

In the water balance of reservoir system, evaporation plays a crucial role particularly so for the reservoir systems of smaller size located in the semi-arid or arid regions. Such regions are most often characterized by significant seepage losses from reservoirs, besides evaporation losses. Usually, in the optimization of a reservoir system, it is a common practice to assume evaporation loss either as some constant value or as negligible. Such assumptions, however, may affect the results of reservoir optimization. This is demonstrated in this study by a case study in the optimal scheduling of Pilavakkal reservoir system in Vaipar basin of Tamilnadu, India. For modeling reservoir losses, many models are available, of which, Penman combination model is most commonly used. In this study, an alternative approach based on Genetic Programming (GP) is proposed. The results of GP and Penman model for both evaporation loss estimation and reservoir scheduling are compared. It is found that while GP and Penman combination model performs equally well for estimating evaporation losses, GP is also able to model seepage losses (or other losses from reservoir) to a much better degree. It is also shown the reservoir scheduling does get influenced based on how the reservoir losses are modeled in the reservoir water balance equation.     

Ultrasonic velocity measurements for characterizing the annealing behaviour of cold worked austenitic stainless steel

Precise measurements of shear wave velocities have been made in 20% cold worked and annealed samples of alloy D9 (Ti-modified austenitic stainless steel) to characterize the microstructural changes during annealing. The variation in wave velocity with annealing time exhibited a three stage behaviour. In the first stage, a slight increase in the velocity during recovery regime has been observed. This is followed by a significant increase in the velocity in the recrystallization regime (second stage) and reaching saturation on completion of recrystallization (third stage). Microstructural observations using optical metallography confirmed these three stages. The maximum variation in velocity is observed only when the polarization or the propagation direction of the shear wave is alingned with the cold working direction. Variation in shear wave velocity during annealing process, in general, is just opposite to that of the variation in longitudinal wave velocity. A number of velocity measurements were made by changing the propagation and polarization directions of the shear waves with respect to the cold working direction. Based on these measurements, a suitable velocity ratio parameter is suggested for determining the degree of recrystallization during annealing of cold worked alloy D9.     

Environmental effects on low cycle fatigue of 2024-T351 and 7075-T651 aluminum alloys

The environmental effects on the low cycle fatigue (LCF) behavior of 2024-T351 and 7075-T651 aluminum alloys were studied at room temperature. The specimens were subjected to identical LCF tests at strain ratio R of −1 and frequency of 5 Hz in three environments: vacuum, air and 1% NaCl solution of pH 2. A separate group of specimens was pre-corroded in 1% NaCl solution and then LCF-tested in air. Their strain–life relations and cyclic stress–strain responses were investigated and compared. Furthermore, the fracture surface morphology was evaluated to find the association of LCF behavior and fractographic features under different environmental conditions.     

Efficient Hybrid Linear Massive MIMO Detector Using Gauss–Seidel And Successive Over-Relaxation

The initial solution of a massive multiple-input multiple-output (M-MIMO) detector for uplink (UL) is greatly influence the balance between the bit error rate (BER) performance and the computational complexity. Although the maximum likelihood (ML) detector obtains the best BER performance, it has an extremely high computational complexity. Iterative linear minimum mean square error (MMSE) detector based on the Gauss–Seidel (GS), the successive over-relaxation (SOR), and the Jacobi (JA), obtains a good performance-complexity profile when the base station (BS)-to-user-antenna-ratio (BUAR) is large. However, when the BUAR is small, the system suffers from a considerable performance loss. In this paper, a hybrid detector based on the joint GS and SOR methods is proposed where the initial solution is determined by the first iteration of GS method. Numerical results show a considerable complexity reduction and performance enhancement using the proposed GS-SOR method over all methods when the BUAR is small.

     

Continuous purification of porcine lipase by rotating annular size-exclusion chromatography

Non-accidental head injury, be it shaking, impact(s) or a combination of the two, is characterised by subdural and/or subarachnoid haemorrhages with retinal haemorrhages, but minimal or absent external cranio-facial trauma. The classical assault scenario depicts the infant being gripped around the head, face, chest and abdomen and shaken or being gripped by a limb and swung. This gripping might be expected to leave physical evidence in the form of bruising. A study was undertaken to establish the prevalence, distribution and pathological association of external bruising in 24 cases of fatal non-accidental head injury in children. At autopsy, 17 cases had new external bruises, 15 old external bruises and 13, a combination of both. However, seven (29%) cases showed no fresh external bruising and five (21%) showed no external bruising at all. Thus, external bruising may be absent in children with fatal intracranial injury. The face was shown to be the commonest site of bruising followed by the forehead and buttocks. Limb, chest and abdominal bruising were found to be uncommon. Retinal haemorrhages were confirmed in 23 (96%) cases. It is hypothesised that bruising, when present, may be a result of abuse in the form of punches and slaps rather than due to gripping during the assault. We discuss why gripping does not necessarily result in external bruising.