Introducing realistic tire–pavement contact stresses into Pavement Analysis using Nonlinear Damage Approach (PANDA)

Realistic tire–pavement interface contact areas and stresses were incorporated into the Pavement Analysis using Nonlinear Damage Approach (PANDA) user interface (PUI). PANDA is a software library developed to simulate the complex thermo-viscoelastic–viscoplastic–viscodamage responses of the pavement to mechanical and environmental loads. The PUI is an interface generating a finite element representation of the pavement within PANDA. The application of realistic tire loading is necessary to calculate accurate pavement responses. The PUI incorporates a database of tire contact areas and stresses obtained from tire finite element simulations. The database includes tire interface characteristics with pavements for various applied loads, tire inflation pressures, vehicle speeds and scenarios of different rolling simulations. A parametric study was conducted to investigate the effect of simulations of tire contact stresses that match field measurements on viscoelastic and viscoplastic pavement responses. Pavement responses are greatly affected using realistic tire loading contact stresses and contact geometry as compared to simplified contact models. The impact on rutting and damage predictions cannot be ignored if reliable projections of pavement performance are to be made. This study confirms the importance of considering realistic three-dimensional contact stresses to design and analyse pavements.     

Antimicrobial Property,Antioxidant Capacity,and Cytotoxicity of Essential Oil from Cumin Produced in Iran

ABSTRACT: Cumin (Cuminum cyminum) is one of the commonly used spices in food preparations. It is also used in traditional medicine as a stimulant, a carminative, and an astringent. In this study, we characterized the antimicrobial, antioxidant, and cytotoxic activities of cumin. E. coli, S. aureus, and S. faecalis were sensitive to various oil dilutions. The total phenol content of the essential oil was estimated to be 33.43 μg GAE/mg of the oil. The oil showed higher antioxidant activity compared with that of BHT and BHA. The cumin essential oil exhibited a dose-dependent scavenging of DPPH radicals and 5.4 μg of the oil was sufficient to scavenge 50% of DPPH radicals/mL. At a concentration of 0.1 μL/mL, oil destructed Hela cells by 79%. The antioxidant activity of cumin essential oil might contribute to its cytotoxic activity. Acute and subchronic toxicity was studied in a 30-d oral toxicity study by administration to Wistar rats of the essential oil. A 17.38% decrease in WBCs count, and 25.77%, 14.24%, and 108.81% increase in hemoglobin concentration, hematocrit, and platelet count, respectively, were noted. LDL/HDL ratio was reduced to half, which adds to the nutritional effects of cumin. Thus, cumin with a high phenolic content and good antioxidant activity can be supplemented for both nutritional purposes and preservation of foods.     

Change in optic disk topography after trabeculectomy

PURPOSE: To investigate the relationship between optic disk topography and intraocular pressure before and after trabeculectomy with confocal scanning laser ophthalmoscopy. METHODS: The eyes of 49 consecutive patients undergoing trabeculectomy at a university-based glaucoma practice underwent preoperative and postoperative imaging using a confocal scanning laser ophthalmoscope (Heidelberg Retina Tomograph). Three images of one eye of each patient were obtained with a 15-degree field of view. Preoperative images were obtained approximately 2 months before surgery (mean +/- SD, 2.4 +/- 1.6 months). Postoperative images were obtained at least 3 months after surgery (mean, 4.5 +/- 2.6 months). RESULTS: Mean preoperative intraocular pressure, postoperative intraocular pressure, and percent change in intraocular pressure respectively were 23.1 +/- 6.8 mm Hg, 12.7 +/- 7.1 mm Hg, and 43.8% +/- 29.9%. A significant association (P < .01) was found between percent decrease in intraocular pressure and decreases in cup area, cup volume, and cup/disk area ratio as well as between percent decrease in intraocular pressure and increases in rim area, rim volume, mean height contour, retinal cross-section area, and height in contour. Between 11.7% and 31.2% of the variability (R2) in these parameters was explained by the percent change in intraocular pressure. Topography changes were more strongly associated with percent change than with mean change in intraocular pressure. We found no association between percent decrease in intraocular pressure and reference plane height or maximum cup depth. CONCLUSIONS: Changes in optic nerve topography were associated with reduction in intraocular pressure after trabeculectomy.     

Activating solution gas drive as an extra oil production mechanism after carbonated water injection

Enhanced oil recovery (EOR) methods are mostly based on different phenomena taking place at the interfaces between fluid–fluid and rock–fluid phases. Over the last decade, carbonated water injection (CWI) has been considered as one of the multi-objective EOR techniques to store CO₂ in the hydrocarbon bearing formations as well as improving oil recovery efficiency. During CWI process, as the reservoir pressure declines, the dissolved CO₂ in the oil phase evolves and gas nucleation phenomenon would occur. As a result, it can lead to oil saturation restoration and subsequently, oil displacement due to the hysteresis effect. At this condition, CO₂ would act as in-situ dissolved gas into the oil phase, and play the role of an artificial solution gas drive (SGD).In this study, the effect of SGD as an extra oil recovery mechanism after secondary and tertiary CWI (SCWI-TCWI) modes has been experimentally investigated in carbonate rocks using coreflood tests. The depressurization tests resulted in more than 25% and 18% of original oil in place (OOIP) because of the SGD after SCWI and TCWI tests, respectively. From the ultimate enhanced oil recovery point of view, the efficiency of SGD was observed to be more than one-third of that of CWI itself. Furthermore, the pressure drop data revealed that the system pressure depends more on the oil production pattern than water production.     

A novel randomized one-dimensional chaotic Chebyshev mapping for chosen plaintext attack secure image encryption with a novel chaotic breadth first traversal

Multimedia Tools and Applications - We construct a novel randomized chaotic image encryption algorithm based on the one-dimensional chaotic Chebyshev mappings. We first define a novel chaotic...     

Mechanics based model for predicting structure-induced rolling resistance (SRR) of the tire-pavement system

The structure-induced rolling resistance of pavements, and its impact on vehicle fuel consumption, is investigated in this study. The structural response of pavement causes additional rolling resistance and fuel consumption of vehicles through deformation of pavement and various dissipation mechanisms associated with inelastic material properties and damping. Accurate and computationally efficient models are required to capture these mechanisms and obtain realistic estimates of changes in vehicle fuel consumption. Two mechanistic-based approaches are currently used to calculate vehicle fuel consumption as related to structural rolling resistance: dissipation-induced and deflection-induced methods. The deflection-induced approach is adopted in this study, and realistic representation of pavement–vehicle interactions (PVIs) is incorporated. In addition to considering viscoelastic behavior of asphalt concrete layers, the realistic representation of PVIs in this study includes non-uniform three-dimensional tire contact stresses and dynamic analysis in pavement simulations. The effects of analysis type, tire contact stresses, pavement viscoelastic properties, pavement damping coefficients, vehicle speed, and pavement temperature are then investigated.     

Remediation of pharmaceutical contaminated water by use of magnetic functionalized metal organic framework. Physicochemical study of doxycycline adsorption

The presence of pharmaceutical pollutant, doxycycline (DOC) in water and waste streams has negative impact on the environment. In this research, metal organic framework was synthesized and functionalized by potassium nickel ferrocyanide (KNiFC). After characterisation, the functionalized adsorbent was used for removal of DOC from aqueous solutions. The adsorbent containing 80% of KNiFC exhibited the high adsorption capacity of 100 mg/g. The adsorption process was kinetically fast and the equilibration was established within 30 min. The used adsorbent retained 90% of its initial capacity after regeneration. The magnetic susceptibility of the adsorbent measured by VSM technique was 35 emu/g and sufficient for separation of the used adsorbent by external magnetic field. Isotherm models including Langmuir, Freundlich, Tempkin, Redlich‐Peterson, and Sips were applied to correlate the experimental equilibrium data. To evaluate the fitness of the isotherm equations error analysis methods, residual root mean square error and average relative error were used.