Effect of γ-irradiation on strength of concrete for nuclear-safety structures

Concrete applied for construction of nuclear power plant (NPP) Temelín (Czech Republic) has been exposed to γ-irradiation up to dose 6×10⁵ Gy. Depending on the level of irradiation, changes in strength, porous structure and phase composition of the concrete have been studied. It is found that irradiation lowers both the strength of concrete (about 10%) and volume (resp. surface) of porous space. On the other hand, γ-irradiation increases the ratio of calcite, CaCO₃, in the concrete. Observed effects are discussed with respect to safety of NPPs.     

Aspects of moisture kinetics of coal bottom ash in concrete

The moisture kinetics aspects of composite granular material samples composed of natural sand and bottom ash (BA) from thermoelectric power stations and the use of this material in the production of durable concretes, in relation to water transport, are here discussed. The evaluations of the phenomenon of water absorption by capillarity and the loss of water through air drying until hygroscopic equilibrium, were carried out in accordance with classic procedures found in the literature and also newly developed procedures. The results showed that due to the high porosity of BA, the water absorption by capillarity along with the absorption velocity were higher in the compositions with greater BA content. The values for moisture equilibrium from air drying, absorption from capillarity and sorptivity obtained in the hygroscopic equilibrium tests, carried out on the same samples after absorption, were also higher in the samples with BA. These samples also requited a longer drying time.     

Continuity versus Discretization

The threefold interest in architecture, biology and mathematics motivated us to examine and justify new architectural forms. We discuss some notions of rhythm: Euclidean, morphogenetic and morphologic. Contemporary relationships between structure and form are based on the generation of shape by technological processes, thus the resulting objects are restricted to their material expression. Here a phenomenological organisation of form and its continuity with the landscape arise out of the mathematical and architectural creativity. The use of the computer is applied from outside to inside instead from inside to outside; this means that we are dealing with the organisational processes via continuous methods instead of evolutionary processes given by computer simulations, known as genetic algorithms, where the resulting configurations are reduced to a matter of routine. The role of design as an aesthetic component innovates the theoretical framework of structural engineering to establish the architectural environments.     

The rim zone of cement-based materials – Barrier or fast lane for chemical degradation?

Sophisticated evaluation models for the long-term stability of cement-based systems demand a precise knowledge of the mechanisms of deterioration reactions, particularly respecting a permanent exposure to aqueous environments. Commonly, insights into these mechanisms are deduced from long-term investigations. However, these chemical reactions start immediately after exposure to aggressive environments causing rapid changes of composition and structure. Consequently, properties of its rim zone change, which affects transport processes in aqueous solutions. In laboratory experiments, the influence of these surface processes on the stability of cement-based materials exposed to different chloride solutions was studied as a function of time and temperature. Analysis of compositional and structural changes beneath the surface reveal the role of crystalline covering layers for chemical resistance. Such layers are often described as protective barriers. However, these processes in the rim zone can accelerate chemical degradation and subsequently reduce the resilience of the cement-based materials to aggressive aqueous environments.     

Classical Modal Display Logic in the Calculus of Structures and Minimal Cut-free Deep Inference Calculi for S5

We begin by showing how to faithfully encode the Classical ModalDisplay Logic (CMDL) of Wansing into the Calculus of Structures(CoS) of Guglielmi. Since every CMDL calculus enjoys cut-elimination,we obtain a cut-elimination theorem for all corresponding CoScalculi. We then show how our result leads to a minimal cut-freeCoS calculus for modal logic S5. No other existing CoS calculifor S5 enjoy both these properties simultaneously.     

A Generalization of a Lower Bound Technique due to Fredman and Saks

{In a seminal paper of 1989, Fredman and Saks proved lower bounds for some important data-structure problems in the cell probe model. In particular, lower bounds were established on worst-case and amortized operation cost for the union-find problem and the prefix sum problem. The goal of this paper is to turn their proof technique into a general tool that can be applied to different problems and computational models. To this end we define two quantities: Output Variability depends only on the model of computation. It indicates how much variation can be found in the results of a program with certain resource bounds. This measures in some sense the power of a model. Problem Variability characterizes in a similar sense the difficulty of the problem. } Our Main Theorem shows that by comparing a model's output variability to a problem's problem variability, lower bounds on the complexity of solving the problem on the given model may be inferred. The theorem thus shows how to separate the analysis of the model of computation from that of the problem when proving lower bounds. We show how the results of Fredman and Saks fit our framework by computing the output variability of the cell probe model and the problem variability for problems considered in their paper. This allows us to reprove their lower bound results, and slightly extend them. The main purpose of this paper though is to present the generalized technique. Received January 25, 1999; revised July 30, 1999.