Assessing the sustainability of a manufacturing process using life cycle assessment technique—a case of an Indian pharmaceutical company

Clean Technologies and Environmental Policy - Manufacturing organizations are under continuous pressure to implement sustainability in their activities. There is a need to identify the...     

Effect of dynamic strain ageing on the tensile properties of a modified 9Cr–1Mo steel

Tensile testing of a modified 9Cr–1Mo steel in two microstructural conditions (710T– normalized at 1100°C, tempered at 710°C, and 550T – normalized at 1100°C tempered at 550°C) in the temperature range 25–450°C, under strain rates of 2.3×10-5–2.3×10-3s-1, exhibited serrated flow curves, with serrations appearing almost at the onset of deformation and disappearing before ultimate strengths were attained. The serrated flow curves (characteristics of dynamic strain ageing) were accompanied by increased ultimate strengths, loss of ductility and negative strain-rate sensitivity, relative to the ambient temperature properties. However, the increase in ultimate strength and the reduction in ductility were much larger for 710T specimens, as compared to 550T ones. In the dynamic strain ageing regime, the work-hardenability of 710T specimens increased rapidly while that of 550T specimens remained practically unaffected. Based on the microstructural consideration and the observed activation energy of 45 kJ mol-1, it is proposed that serrations are initiated by a nitrogen atmosphere formation on the waiting dislocations by a pipe diffusion mechanism, and they disappear by diffusion to the precipitate sinks during deformation. Because the fine alloy carbide precipitates in 550T specimens are more effective sinks than those of 710T ones, they can cause much faster depletion of the atmosphere, resulting in a much smaller effect of dynamic strain ageing on the tensile properties of 550T specimens.     

SHELF-LIFE MODELING OF SWEETENED CONDENSED MILK BASED ON KINETICS OF MAILLARD BROWNING

Nonenzymatic browning and related changes were monitored in commercial sweetened condensed milk stored at 7, 15, 30, 45 and 55C. Darkening of the color measured in terms of absorbance (100 - reflectance percent) followed zero-order kinetics, the apparent activation energy (E_a) being 45.2 kJ/mol at 7–30C and 139.9 kJ/mol at > 30–55C. Hydroxy-methyl-furfural (HMF) showed a first-order increase, the associated E_a values being smaller than those for absorbance. The pH exhibited a linear decline after a small initial rise at 30C and below. As browning progressed, the coffee whitening ability of the product decreased along zero-order kinetics. The Q₁₀ values for these variables ranged from 1.21 to 1.84 for temperatures up to 30C and were nearly 2–3 times higher above 30C. The sensory color score was negatively correlated with absorbance. The linear regression of color score on absorbance and the temperature dependence of the latter as expressed by Arrhenius relationship were combined into a mathematical model which could be useful in predicting the product's shelf-life.     

Effects of Gamma Irradiation on Proteins and Fatty Acids of Soybean

Two hundred grams of soybean seeds (moisture contents of 7.4, 15.3, 22.5, and 30.5%) were irradiated at dose levels of 0, 1, 5, 10, 20, 40, 60, 80 and 100 KGy using Cobalt-60 source. Radiation dose of 100 KGy caused a decrease in the percentage of nitrogen solubility from 80.3 to 67.2, 80.3 to 57.8, and 68.1 to 48.8 when deionized H₂O, 0.6M NaCl, and 0.2M Cacl₂ were used as solvents, respectively. Inhibition of 71% of lipoxygenase activities, 25.4% trypsin inhibitor activities, and 16.7% chymotrypsin inhibitor activities were found when the soybean seeds were irradiated at 100 KGy.     

RESIDENCE TIME DISTRIBUTION (RTD) AND GOODNESS OF MIXING (GM) DURING CO2-INJECTION IN TWIN-SCREW EXTRUSION PART II: GM STUDIES

Experimental residence-time distribution (RTD) characteristics of an extrusion process may be used to estimate the extent of mixing experienced in the extruder. Using earlier theories of laminar mixing and striation thickness reduction, a new approach to estimate efficacy of mixing of two phases in the mixing zone of the extruder is proposed. Predicting the time required to achieve complete mixing and comparing it with the minimum time (plug flow time) that the extrudate spends in the mixing zone gives a ratio that can be used to evaluate the adequacy of extruder operating conditions for good mixing of gas/fluid injection and extrudate. Twin-screw extrusion of cornmeal with carbon dioxide injection were used to investigate the effect of CO₂ injection pressure and extruder screw speeds on mixing. Lower CO₂ injection pressures (25 bars) and lower screw speeds (150 rpm) were theoretically shown to enhance mixing. Scanning electron micrographs (SEMs) of experimental samples taken showed smaller and more uniform cell structures for those conditions which were predicted to favor better mixing.     

Some new distance measures for type-2 fuzzy sets and distance measure based ranking for group decision making problems

In this paper, we propose some distance measures between type-2 fuzzy sets, and also a new family of utmost distance measures are presented. Several properties of differ- ent proposed distance measures have been introduced. Also, we have introduced a new ranking method for the ordering of type-2 fuzzy sets based on the proposed distance measure. The proposed ranking method satisfies the reasonable prop- erties for the ordering of fuzzy quantities. Some properties such as robustness, order relation have been presented. Lim- itations of existing ranking methods have been studied. Fur- ther for practical use, a new method for selecting the best alternative, for group decision making problems is proposed. This method is illustrated with a numerical example.     

Assessment of the Impact of Stormwater Characteristics on Clogging in Stormwater Filters

Hydraulic conductivity of granular filter media and its evolution over time is a key design parameter for stormwater filtration and infiltration systems that are now widely used in management of polluted urban runoff. In fact, clogging of filter media is recognised as the main limiting factor of these stormwater treatment systems. This paper focuses on the effect of stormwater characteristics on the clogging of stormwater filters. Effect of five different operational regimes has been tested in this study of sediment concentration; pollutant concentrations; stormwater sediment size; loading rate and stormwater loading/dosing regime and compared with the Base case. For each operational condition, five column replicates were tested. Results suggest that sediment concentration in stormwater is a significant parameter affecting hydraulic and treatment performance, eventually affecting longevity of these stormwater treatment systems. Further, the size of sediments (and their relation to the size of filter media grains) in stormwater was found to be an important parameter to be considered in design of coarse filters with high infiltration rates that are used for stormwater treatment. As expected, the addition of metals and nutrients had limited or no contribution to changes in hydraulic or sediment removal performance of the studied stormwater filters. Whilst loading rate was found to be an important parameter affecting the hydraulic and treatment performance of these systems, any variation in the stormwater loading regime had a limited effect on their performance. This study therefore develops an understanding of the effect of catchment characteristics on design of filters and hence their longevity and maintenance needs.     

Understanding the effect of <Emphasis Type="Italic">n</Emphasis>-type and <Emphasis Type="Italic">p</Emphasis>-type doping in the channel of graphene nanoribbon transistor

In this paper, device performance of graphene nanoribbon field effect transistor (GNRFET) with different doping concentrations in different parts of the channel is reported. The study is performed by using atomistic simulations based on self-consistent solution of Schrodinger’s and Poisson’s equation within the non-equilibrium Green’s function formalism. The transfer and output characteristics suggest that device performance with n-type doping in the channel is better with smaller supply voltage compared to higher supply voltage. On increasing the n-type doping concentration, we obtained better on-current and output characteristics in comparison with undoped and p-type doped channel GNRFET. Further, we introduced step-doping profile in the graphene nanoribbon (GNR) channel and found that the device gives better on-current and good saturation condition when compared to undoped or uniformly-doped channel.     

Robust object matching for persistent tracking with heterogeneous features

This paper addresses the problem of matching vehicles across multiple sightings under variations in illumination and camera poses. Since multiple observations of a vehicle are separated in large temporal and/or spatial gaps, thus prohibiting the use of standard frame-to-frame data association, we employ features extracted over a sequence during one time interval as a vehicle fingerprint that is used to compute the likelihood that two or more sequence observations are from the same or different vehicles. Furthermore, since our domain is aerial video tracking, in order to deal with poor image quality and large resolution and quality variations, our approach employs robust alignment and match measures for different stages of vehicle matching. Most notably, we employ a heterogeneous collection of features such as lines, points, and regions in an integrated matching framework. Heterogeneous features are shown to be important. Line and point features provide accurate localization and are employed for robust alignment across disparate views. The challenges of change in pose, aspect, and appearances across two disparate observations are handled by combining a novel feature-based quasi-rigid alignment with flexible matching between two or more sequences. However, since lines and points are relatively sparse, they are not adequate to delineate the object and provide a comprehensive matching set that covers the complete object. Region features provide a high degree of coverage and are employed for continuous frames to provide a delineation of the vehicle region for subsequent generation of a match measure. Our approach reliably delineates objects by representing regions as robust blob features and matching multiple regions to multiple regions using Earth Mover's Distance (EMD). Extensive experimentation under a variety of real-world scenarios and over hundreds of thousands of Confirmatory Identification (CID) trails has demonstrated about 95 percent accuracy in vehicle reacquisition with both visible and Infrared (IR) imaging cameras.