ASRSM: A Sequential Experimental Design for Response Surface Optimization

Most preset response surface methodology (RSM) designs offer ease of implementation and good performance over a wide range of process and design optimization applications. These designs often lack the ability to adapt the design on the basis of the characteristics of application and experimental space so as to reduce the number of experiments necessary. Hence, they are not cost‐effective for applications where the cost of experimentation is high or when the experimentation resources are limited. In this paper, we present an adaptive sequential response surface methodology (ASRSM) for industrial experiments with high experimentation cost, limited experimental resources, and high design optimization performance requirement. The proposed approach is a sequential adaptive experimentation approach that combines concepts from nonlinear optimization, design of experiments, and response surface optimization. The ASRSM uses the information gained from the previous experiments to design the subsequent experiment by simultaneously reducing the region of interest and identifying factor combinations for new experiments. Its major advantage is the experimentation efficiency such that for a given response target, it identifies the input factor combination (or containing region) in less number of experiments than the classical single‐shot RSM designs. Through extensive simulated experiments and real‐world case studies, we show that the proposed ASRSM method outperforms the popular central composite design method and compares favorably with optimal designs. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Siting of PV power plants on inclined terrains

Most of the studies conducted on solar energy assessment and solar system siting focus on flat terrains that are usually difficult and expensive to acquire in urban areas. This paper investigates the possibility of using inclined terrains for siting photovoltaic (PV) power plants surrounding urban area. Both analytical analysis and simulations are carried out in order to analyse and validate the effectiveness and benefits of the use of inclined land for PV siting. Geographical information system and numerical weather prediction were used to implement the suggested original approach and to select suitable inclined terrains for the PV system installation and to calculate the total generation potential for energy production. Muscat, the capital of Oman, was selected as a reference for the implementation of this approach.     

Testing of starch-based carbohydrate polymer coatings for enhanced urea performance

In this study, starch–urea–borate adhesives were developed for coating the slow release urea. The physical properties of the developed adhesives were studied as a function of temperature, heating time, stirring rate, and pH. It was found that for certain specific adhesive composition, pH and stirring rate, the complete gelatinization time and corresponding adhesive viscosity do not remain constant with temperature. The suspension heated at 75°C reached its maximum viscosity after 21 min of heating, thereafter, remained constant over time. In contrast, the suspension heated at 80°C reached its peak viscosity after 12 min of heating. Further heating after 12 min caused a steady decrease in viscosity from its peak value of 450–339 cP. Once the adhesive physical properties were completely understood, a dripping solution technique was used to coat the urea granules with coating thickness ranging from 0.15 to 0.7 mm. It was noticed that the overall nutrients release time of the coated urea was three times higher than the uncoated urea. It was also concluded that the mechanical strength of coated urea strongly depends on the adhesive composition and coating thickness.     

Impact of Offloading on the Efficiency of Wireless Access Networks

International Journal of Wireless Information Networks - Wireless access networks need to deliver a satisfactory level of Quality of Service (QoS) to their subscribers. The service quality can be...     

Graphene‐based ternary composites for supercapacitors

The research on electrode materials for supercapacitor application continues to evolve as the request of high‐energy storage system has increased globally due to the demand for energy consumption. Over the past decades, various types of carbon‐based materials have been employed as electrode materials for high‐performance supercapacitor application. Among them, graphene is 1 of the most widely used carbon‐based materials due to its excellent properties including high surface area and excellent conductivity. To exploit more of its interesting properties, graphene is tailored to produce graphene oxide and reduced graphene oxide to improve the dispersibility in water and easy to be incorporated with other materials to form binary composites or even ternary composites. Nowadays, ternary composites have attracted enormous interest as 2 materials (binary composites) cannot satisfy the requirement of the high‐performance supercapacitor. Thus, many approaches have been employed to fabricate ternary composites by combining 3 different types of electroactive materials for high‐performance supercapacitor application. This review focuses on the supercapacitive performance of graphene‐based ternary composites with different types of active materials, ie, conducting polymers, metal oxide, and other carbon‐based materials.     

Prediction of heavy oil viscosity using a radial basis function neural network

Heavy oil and extra heavy oil resources comprise about 75% of petroleum resources. The most important characteristic of heavy oils is their viscosity. Consequently, to extract and prepare these kinds of crude oil for use, great emphasis should be put on viscosity. The present study highlights the application of intelligent model named radial basis function (RBF) network optimized by genetic algorithm for estimation of diluted heavy oil viscosity in presence on kerosene. The input parameters of model were temperature and mass fraction of kerosene. The output of model was viscosity of heavy oil. Genetic algorithm was utilized to optimize the tuning parameters of RBF model. The outcomes of this study showed that the proposed model is accurate in estimation of target data.     

Corrosion of Mg alloys EV31A,WE43B,and ZE41A in chloride- and sulfate-containing solutions saturated with magnesium hydroxide

This study studied corrosion in 0.1 M Na₂SO₄, 0.1 M NaCl, and 0.6 M NaCl, all saturated with Mg(OH)₂, using weight loss, hydrogen evolution, and electrochemical measurements. Corrosion was similar in all cases. Nevertheless, the corrosion rates were alloy-dependent, were somewhat lower in 0.1 M Na₂SO₄ than in 0.1 M NaCl, and increased with NaCl concentration. The corrosion damage morphology was similar for all solutions; the extent correlated with the corrosion rate. The corrosion rates evaluated by the electrochemical methods were lower than those evaluated from hydrogen evolution, consistent with the Mg corrosion mechanism involving the unipositive Mg⁺ ion.     

TiO2/Al2O3 membrane reactor equipped with a methanol recovery unit to produce palm oil biodiesel

In this study, the central composite design of the response surface methodology was employed to investigate the effects of reaction temperature, catalyst concentration and cross flow circulation velocity on the production of biodiesel in a TiO₂/Al₂O₃ membrane reactor. High‐quality palm oil biodiesel was produced by combination of alkali transesterification and separation processes in the ceramic membrane reactor. The optimum conditions for the conversion of palm oil to biodiesel in the ceramic membrane reactor were as follows: 70°C reaction temperature, 1.12 wt% catalyst concentration and 0.211 cm s^{? 1} cross flow circulation velocity. The physical and chemical properties of the produced biodiesel were determined and compared with the standard specifications. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.