Evaluation of Elemental and Black Carbon Measurements from the GAViM and IMPROVE Networks

The GAViM program provides fine particulate and visibility data for several remote locations in Canada. Two long-term intercomparison studies between the GAViM and a major U.S. aerosol monitoring network, IMPROVE, were used to evaluate the uncertainty in the analytical data produced by proton induced x-ray emission (PIXE), proton elastic scattering analysis (PESA), and gravimetric analysis. GAViM and IMPROVE agreed well for elements from Fe to Zn where PIXE is the most sensitive; the relative difference between the 2 networks for Fe and Zn was <2%. Some lighter elements, e.g., sodium or sulphur, revealed a difference of 10-20%. Furthermore, an empiric conversion scheme for the GAViM absorption data produced by the laser integrated plate method (LIPM) was derived from the comparison to the IMPROVE thermal/optical reflectance (TOR) data. This conversion depends on the aerosol composition and is therefore site specific. It allows estimation of the elemental carbon concentrations from the historic raw light absorption values obtained by LIPM. If the mass attenuation coefficient of the fine aerosol collected at the 2 remote GAViM sites is assumed to be equal to 10 m 2 /g, then the results imply that the light absorption coefficient measured by LIPM is generally higher than the true value by up to a factor of 1.3 or 1.8, respectively. In both cases, LIPM overestimated the black carbon content, mostly for the lightly loaded samples.     

An improved accelerated weathering protocol to anticipate Florida exposure behavior of coatings

A new accelerated weathering protocol has been developed which closely replicates the performance of automotive and aerospace coating systems exposed in South Florida. IR spectroscopy was used to verify that the chemical composition changes that occurred during accelerated weathering in devices with a glass filter that produced a high fidelity reproduction of sunlight’s UV spectrum matched those that occurred during natural weathering. Gravimetric water absorption measurements were used to tune the volume of water absorption during accelerated weathering to match that which occurred during natural weathering in South Florida. The frequency of water exposure was then scaled to the appropriate UV dose. A variety of coating systems were used to verify the correlation between the physical failures observed in the accelerated weathering protocol and natural weathering in South Florida. The new accelerated weathering protocol correctly reproduced gloss loss, delamination, cracking, blistering, and good performance in a variety of diverse coating systems. For automotive basecoat/clearcoat paint systems, the new weathering protocol shows significant acceleration over both Florida and previous accelerated weathering tests. For monocoat aerospace systems, the new weathering protocol showed less acceleration than for automotive coatings, but was still an improvement over previous accelerated tests and was faster than Florida exposure.     

Pore network modeling of fibrous gas diffusion layers for polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cells

A pore network model of the gas diffusion layer (GDL) in a polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cell is developed and validated. The model idealizes the GDL as a regular cubic network of pore bodies and pore throats following respective size distributions. Geometric parameters of the pore network model are calibrated with respect to porosimetry and gas permeability measurements for two common GDL materials and the model is subsequently used to compute the pore-scale distribution of water and gas under drainage conditions using an invasion percolation algorithm. From this information, the relative permeability of water and gas and the effective gas diffusivity are computed as functions of water saturation using resistor-network theory. Comparison of the model predictions with those obtained from constitutive relationships commonly used in current PEMFC models indicates that the latter may significantly overestimate the gas phase transport properties. Alternative relationships are suggested that better match the pore network model results. The pore network model is also used to calculate the limiting current in a PEMFC under operating conditions for which transport through the GDL dominates mass transfer resistance. The results suggest that a dry GDL does not limit the performance of a PEMFC, but it may become a significant source of concentration polarization as the GDL becomes increasingly saturated with water.     

Seasonal patterns in hydrochemical mixing in three Great Lakes rivermouth ecosystems

Rivermouth ecosystems in the Laurentian Great Lakes represent complex hydrologic mixing zones where lake and river water combine to form biologically productive areas that are functionally similar to marine estuaries. As urban, industrial, shipping, and recreational centers, rivermouths are the focus of human interactions with the Great Lakes and, likewise, may represent critical habitat for larval fish and other biota. The hydrology and related geomorphology in these deltaic systems form the basis for ecosystem processes and wetland habitat structure but are poorly understood. To this end, we examined hydrogeomorphic structure and lake-tributary mixing in three rivermouths of intermediate size using water chemistry, stable isotopes, and current profiling over a five-month period. In rivermouths of this size, the maximum depth of the rivermouth ecosystem influenced water mixing, with temperature-related, density-dependent wedging and layering that isolated lake water below river water occurring in deeper systems. The inherent size of the rivermouth ecosystem, local geomorphology, and human modifications such as shoreline armoring and dredging influenced mixing by altering the propensity for density differences to occur. The improved scientific understanding and framework for characterizing hydrogeomorphic processes in Great Lakes rivermouths across a disturbance gradient is useful for conservation, management, restoration, and protection of critical habitats needed by native species.     

Interactions of inorganic oxide nanoparticles with sewage biosolids

The use of nanoparticles (NPs) in manufacturing continues to increase despite the growing concern over their potential environmental and health effects. Understanding the interaction of NPs and sewage sludge is crucial for determining the ultimate fate of NPs released to municipal wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) as those interactions will determine whether the bulk of the material is retained in the sludge or released in the effluent stream. Analyzing the affinity of aluminum oxide, cerium oxide, and silicon oxide NPs, which are commonly used in semiconductor manufacturing processes, for biosolids used in municipal WWTPs provides a basis for estimating their removal efficiency. Batch studies were performed and the NPs were shown to partition onto the cellular surface. At the maximum equilibrium values tested (75-92 mg nanoparticles/L), the concentration of Al(2)O(3), CeO(2) and SiO(2) associated with the sludge was 137, 238, and 28 mg/g-sludge VSS, respectively. These results suggest that electrostatic interactions play a major role in determining NP association with biosolids.     

Development and Integration of Sub-hourly Rainfall–Runoff Modeling Capability Within a Watershed Model

Increasing urbanization changes runoff patterns to be flashy and instantaneous with decreased base flow. A model with the ability to simulate sub-daily rainfall–runoff processes and continuous simulation capability is required to realistically capture the long-term flow and water quality trends in watersheds that are experiencing urbanization. Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) has been widely used in hydrologic and nonpoint sources modeling. However, its subdaily modeling capability is limited to hourly flow simulation. This paper presents the development and testing of a sub-hourly rainfall–runoff model in SWAT. SWAT algorithms for infiltration, surface runoff, flow routing, impoundments, and lagging of surface runoff have been modified to allow flow simulations with a sub-hourly time interval as small as one minute. Evapotranspiration, soil water contents, base flow, and lateral flow are estimated on a daily basis and distributed equally for each time step. The sub-hourly routines were tested on a 1.9 km² watershed (70% undeveloped) near Lost Creek in Austin Texas USA. Sensitivity analysis shows that channel flow parameters are more sensitive in sub-hourly simulations (Δt = 15 min) while base flow parameters are more important in daily simulations (Δt = 1 day). A case study shows that the sub-hourly SWAT model reasonably reproduces stream flow hydrograph under multiple storm events. Calibrated stream flow for 1 year period with 15 min simulation (R ² = 0.93) shows better performance compared to daily simulation for the same period (R ² = 0.72). A statistical analysis shows that the improvement in the model performance with sub-hourly time interval is mostly due to the improvement in predicting high flows. The sub-hourly version of SWAT is a promising tool for hydrology and non-point source pollution assessment studies, although more development on water quality modeling is still needed.     

Thermal sensor allocation for 3DICs using three dimensional thermal sensors

Stacking active layers leads to increased power density and overall higher temperatures in a three dimensional integrated circuit (3DIC). Thermal sensors are therefore crucial for run-time thermal management of 3DICs. A thermal sensor allocation method customized for 3DICs that utilizes ring oscillator based 3D sensors is introduced in this paper. A new 3D thermal map modeling method that facilitates efficient and very fast analyses is embodied in this thermal sensor distribution algorithm. Our results indicate that for a 4-layer stacked 3DIC, consisting of two layers of quad-core processors and one layer of L2 cache and one layer of main memory, less than 3.58% in maximum sensor reading error can be accomplished with a 53× speedup in the thermal evaluation time and thermal sensor distribution algorithm implementation.     

使用TPS62200作为OMAP1510的动态电压缩放器

毫无疑问的,延长便携式电子产品之电池使用寿命将有助于该产品的销售。对微处理器而言,降低内部时脉频率或降低核心电压均有助于降低其功率消耗。动态电压缩放(Dynamicvoltage scaling, DVS)技术常用来降低核心电压以降低功率消耗。本文将说明如何使用TPS62200降压型转换器来实现动态电压缩放技术并作为OMAP1510处理器之电源。下式说明了使用TI-DSP核心之微处理器的功率消耗计算方式:PC ～ (VC)2 × f其中PC代表核心功率消耗,VC为核心电压,f则为核心时脉频率。OMAP1510处理器具有两种操作模式:AWAKE(唤醒)模式以及低功耗的DE…     

CompactPCI系统管理

~~CompactPCI系统管理@Jeff Munch$凌华科技!技术长暨国际PICMG 3.0委员会主席