Based on polarization mechanisms, such as electronic, ionic and orientational polarizations, a new equation for dielectric permittivity of soil is proposed to interpret the dielectric behavior of a mixture like soil, in terms of polarization process of its components and the interactions between its components. The dielectric permittivity is expressed in terms of a frequency-dependent part and a frequency-independent part. These two parts correspond to polarizations occurred at different frequency range. It is a new volumetric mixing model with theoretical background. Based on time domain reflectometry (TDR) measurements of saturated soil samples and test data from literature, comparisons of this model with some well established mixing models show that the curves for saturated sand soils and slurries resulted from the new equation, which agree well with TDR measurements, are close to those calculated from Birchak’s model.

To evaluate the responses of fixed and pinned pile groups under torsion, a method is presented to analyze the nonlinear behavior of free-standing pile groups with rigid pile caps. The method is capable of simulating the nonlinear soil response in the near field using p-y and τ-θ curves, the far-field interactions through Mindlin’s and Randolph’s elastic solutions, and the coupling effect of lateral resistance on torsional resistance of the individual piles using an empirical factor. Based on comparisons of the solutions for fixed- and pinned-head, 1×2, 2×2, and 3×3 pile groups subjected to torsion, it was found that pile-cap connection significantly influences the torsional capacity of pile groups and the assignment of applied torques in the pile groups. In this study, the applied torques for the pinned-head pile groups are only 44%~64% of those for the corresponding fixed-head pile groups at a twist angle of 2°. Such a difference is mainly due to the change of the lateral resistances of individual piles in the groups.

Theoretical analysis and wind tunnel tests were carried out to study wind-induced internal pressure response for the structure with single windward opening and background leakage. Its governing differential equation was derived by the Bernoulli equation in an unsteady-isentropic form. Numerical examples were provided to study the additive damping caused by background leakage in laminar and turbulent flow, and the influence of background leakage on fluctuating internal pressure response was quantized. A series of models for low-rise building with various opening ratios and background leakage were designed and wind tunnel tests were conducted. It is shown that the fluctuating internal pressure reduces when the background leakage are considered and that the effect of background leakage can be predicted accurately by the governing differential equation deduced in this paper.

This paper presents some methods that the standard acceleration design response spectra derived from the present China code for seismic design of buildings are transformed into the seismic demand spectra, and that the base shear force-roof displacement curve of structure is converted to the capacity spectrum of an equivalent single-degree-of-freedom (SDOF) system. The capacity spectrum method (CSM) is programmed by means of MATLAB7.0 computer language. A dual lateral force resisting system of 10-story steel frame-steel plate shear walls (SPSW) is designed according to the corresponding China design codes. The base shear force-roof displacement curve of structure subjected to the monotonic increasing lateral inverse triangular load is obtained by applying the equivalent strip model to stimulate SPSW and by using the finite element analysis software SAP2000 to make Pushover analysis. The seismic performance of this dual system subjected to three different conditions, i.e. the 8-intensity frequently occurred earthquake, fortification earthquake and seldom occurred earthquake, is evaluated by CSM program. The excessive safety of steel frame-SPSW system designed according to the present China design codes is pointed out and a new design method is suggested.

An optimization method for time-delayed feedback control of partially observable linear building structures subjected to seismic excitation is proposed. A time-delayed control problem of partially observable linear building structure under horizontal ground acceleration excitation is formulated and converted into that of completely observable linear structure by using separation principle. The time-delayed control forces are approximately expressed in terms of control forces without time delay. The control system is then governed by Itô stochastic differential equations for the conditional means of system states and then transformed into those for the conditional means of modal energies by using the stochastic averaging method for quasi-Hamiltonian systems. The control law is assumed to be modal velocity feedback control with time delay and the unknown control gains are determined by the modal performance indices. A three-storey building structure is taken as example to illustrate the proposal method and the numerical results are confirmed by using Monte Carlo simulation.

A method with simulation and analysis of the resin flow in a screw is presented to ease the control of some problems that may affect the efficiency and the quality of the product among existing screws in an injection machine. The physical model of a screw is established to represent the stress, the strain, the relationship between velocity and stress, and the temperature of the cells. In this paper, a working case is considered where the velocity and the temperature distributions at any section of the flow are obtained. The analysis of the computational results shows an ability to master various parameters depending on the specifications.

Fatigue crack propagation characteristics of a diesel engine crankshaft are studied by measuring the fatigue crack growth rate using a frequency sweep method on a resonant fatigue test rig. Based on the phenomenon that the system frequency will change when the crack becomes large, this method can be directly applied to a complex component or structure. Finite element analyses (FEAs) are performed to calibrate the relation between the frequency change and the crack size, and to obtain the natural frequency of the test rig and the stress intensity factor (SIF) of growing cracks. The crack growth rate i.e. da/dN-ΔK of each crack size is obtained by combining the testing-time monitored data and FEA results. The results show that the crack growth rate of engine crankshaft, which is a component with complex geometry and special surface treatment, is quite different from that of a pure material. There is an apparent turning point in the Paris’s crack partition. The cause of the fatigue crack growth is also discussed.

A modified nonlinear stochastic optimal bounded control strategy for random excited hysteretic systems with actuator saturation is proposed. First, a controlled hysteretic system is converted into an equivalent nonlinear nonhysteretic stochastic system. Then, the partially averaged Itô stochastic differential equation and dynamical programming equation are established, respectively, by using the stochastic averaging method for quasi non-integrable Hamiltonian systems and stochastic dynamical programming principle, from which the optimal control law consisting of optimal unbounded control and bang-bang control is derived. Finally, the response of optimally controlled system is predicted by solving the Fokker-Planck-Kolmogorov (FPK) equation associated with the fully averaged Itô equation. Numerical results show that the proposed control strategy has high control effectiveness and efficiency.

To satisfy the need of high speed NC (numerical control) machining, an acceleration and deceleration (acc/dec) control model is proposed, and the speed curve is also constructed by the cubic polynomial. The proposed control model provides continuity of acceleration, which avoids the intense vibration in high speed NC machining. Based on the discrete characteristic of the data sampling interpolation, the acc/dec control discrete mathematical model is also set up and the discrete expression of the theoretical deceleration length is obtained furthermore. Aiming at the question of hardly predetermining the deceleration point in acc/dec control before interpolation, the adaptive acc/dec control algorithm is deduced from the expressions of the theoretical deceleration length. The experimental result proves that the acc/dec control model has the characteristic of easy implementation, stable movement and low impact. The model has been applied in multi-axes high speed micro fabrication machining successfully.

This study investigated selected properties of soils affected by wastewater and its relationship with some heavy metals. A free survey technique involving target sampling was used in siting soil profile pits. Soil samples were collected based on horizon differentiation and analyzed using routine and special analytical techniques. Soil data were subjected to correlation analysis using SAS program. Results show that all heavy metals studied had values above critical limits in the polluted soils using known standards and that these biotoxic metals decreased with soil depths. Highly significant (P=0.01 and 0.05) relationships were established between investigated heavy metals and some soil properties, especially soil pH and organic matter. Further studies involving more edaphic properties, biotoxic metals and their bioaccessibility in crops growing on wastewater soils will surely enhance knowledge and management of these highly anthropogenically influenced soils of the study site.

Based on the Industrial Source Complex Short-Term Version 3 (ISCST3) model, a simplified modeling approach was developed to predict concentrations of congeners of polychlorinated-p-dioxins and dibenzofurans (PCDD/Fs) of agricultural soil, within a radius of 3 km from a municipal solid waste incinerator (MSWI) plant after its 4-year operation in Hangzhou, China. Comparisons were made between the measured and estimated congener-specific concentrations and the international-toxic equivalent (I-TEQ) values of soil samples with respect to distance from the stack. The results indicate that the predictions of soil PCDD/F concentrations and I-TEQ values were generally lower than their observations, and that the higher the degree of underestimation seems, the greater the further downwind one gets. Nevertheless, most of the predictions were in good agreement with the trend of measured ones and were within a factor of ten for samples located within 1 km of the plant. Besides, analysis of contributions of various deposition pathways confirms that in addition to wet particle deposition, the dry gaseous deposition is essential for realistic prediction of PCDD/F depositions to soil, especially for tetra- and penta-chlorinated dioxins.

Environmental impact prediction is an important step in many environmental studies. A wide variety of methods have been developed in this concern. During this study, remote sensing images were used for environmental impact prediction in Robatkarim area, Iran, during the years of 2005~2007. It was assumed that environmental impact could be predicted using time series satellite imageries. Natural vegetation cover was chosen as a main environmental element and a case study. Environmental impacts of the regional development on natural vegetation of the area were investigated considering the changes occurred on the extent of natural vegetation cover and the amount of biomass. Vegetation data, land use and land cover classes (as activity factors) within several years were prepared using satellite images. The amount of biomass was measured by Soil-adjusted Vegetation Index (SAVI) and Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) based on satellite images. The resulted biomass estimates were tested by the paired samples t-test method. No significant difference was observed between the average biomass of estimated and control samples at the 5% significance level. Finally, regression models were used for the environmental impacts prediction. All obtained regression models for prediction of impacts on natural vegetation cover show values over 0.9 for both correlation coefficient and R-squared. According to the resulted methodology, the prediction models of projects and plans impacts can also be developed for other environmental elements which may be derived using time series remote sensing images.

Through the transformation of hydraulic constraints into the objective functions associated with a water supply network rehabilitation problem, a non-dominated sorting Genetic Algorithm-II (NSGA-II) can be used to solve the altered multi-objective optimization model. The introduction of NSGA-II into water supply network optimal rehabilitation problem solves the conflict between one fitness value of standard genetic algorithm (SGA) and multi-objectives of rehabilitation problem. And the uncertainties brought by using weight coefficients or punish functions in conventional methods are controlled. And also by introduction of artificial inducement mutation (AIM) operation, the convergence speed of population is accelerated; this operation not only improves the convergence speed, but also improves the rationality and feasibility of solutions.

This study presents a robust design method for autonomous photovoltaic (PV)-wind hybrid power systems to obtain an optimum system configuration insensitive to design variable variations. This issue has been formulated as a constraint multi-objective optimization problem, which is solved by a multi-objective genetic algorithm, NSGA-II. Monte Carlo Simulation (MCS) method, combined with Latin Hypercube Sampling (LHS), is applied to evaluate the stochastic system performance. The potential of the proposed method has been demonstrated by a conceptual system design. A comparative study between the proposed robust method and the deterministic method presented in literature has been conducted. The results indicate that the proposed method can find a large mount of Pareto optimal system configurations with better compromising performance than the deterministic method. The trade-off information may be derived by a systematical comparison of these configurations. The proposed robust design method should be useful for hybrid power systems that require both optimality and robustness.

This paper focuses on the heat transfer performance of semi-open heat pipe which is a new type of heat pipe. After analyzing its condensation heat transfer mechanisms theoretically, several semi-open heat pipes in different length ratios and upper hole diameters are studied experimentally and compared with the same dimensions closed heat pipes. Experimental results show that the heat transfer performance of semi-open heat pipe becomes better by increasing heat transfer rate. At the first transitional point, the heat transfer performance of semi-open heat pipe approaches the level of the closed heat pipe. It is suitable to choose upper small hole about 1 mm in diameter and length ratio larger than 0.6 for the semi-open heat pipe.

Parabolic trough collectors (PTCs) are employed for a variety of applications including steam generation and hot water generation. This paper deals with the experimental results and an economic analysis of a new fibre reinforced plastic (FRP) based solar PTC with an embedded electronic controlled tracking system designed and developed for hot water generation in a restaurant in Madurai, India. The new collector performance has been tested according to ASHRAE Standard 93 (1986). The performance of a new PTC hot water generation system with a well mixed hot water storage tank is investigated by a series of extensive tests over ten months period. The average maximum storage tank water temperature observed was 74.91 °C, when no energy is withdrawn from the tank to the load during the collection period. The total cost of the new economic FRP based solar PTC for hot water generation with an embedded electronic controlled tracking system is Rs. 25000 (US$ 573) only. In the present work, life cycle savings (LCS) method is employed for a detailed economic analysis of the PTC system. A computer program is used as a tool for the economic analysis. The present worth of life cycle solar savings is evaluated for the new solar PTC hot water generation system that replaces an existing electric water heating system in the restaurant and attains a value of Rs. 23171.66 after 15 years, which is a significant saving. The LCS method and the MATLAB computer simulation program presented in this paper can be used to estimate the LCS of other renewable energy systems.

The preparation approach and calibration result of an improved type of ion selective electrode (ISE), which is used to measure the total dissolved S²⁻, are introduced in this paper. The improved Ag/Ag₂S electrode uses silver wire as the substrate, which is surrounded by electric polymer containing superfine silver powder. After the stabilization of the epoxy-resin, Ag₂S layer was formed by chemical reaction with 0.2 mol/L (NH₄)₂S solution for 5 min. With Ag/AgCl as reference electrode, the Ag/Ag₂S electrode can be used to measure dissolved S²⁻. The correlation between the measured potentials and the logarithm of dissolved S²⁻ is found to be linear, within range of the concentration of dissolved S²⁻ from 10⁻²~10⁻⁷ mol/L. The slope of the regression line between measured potential and logarithm of dissolved S²⁻ is about −27.7, which agrees well with the theoretical Nernst value −29.6. Furthermore, the performance of the improved Ag/Ag₂S electrode, such as the response time, sensitivity and stability, greatly outweighs the conventional Ag/Ag₂S electrode.

In this work we study the behaviour of the dielectric constant of BaTiO₃ single crystals doped with Cu and Fe for different ion percentages, particularly, the influence of these heterovalent substitutions on the ferroelectric-paraelectric phase transition whose temperature is found at T_c=120 °C for pure samples. The dielectric constant ε in terms of temperature shows that the Curie temperature decreases when the quantity of impurities increases and presents a broadening and flattering of the maximum of ε(T) within higher values, with the transition becoming more and more diffuse. It is interesting to have a material with very high permittivity (high-k) because of its capacity to store an important quantity of electric charges. The ε anisotropy and the Curie-Weiss law are also verified with a good ratio between the slopes of ε⁻¹(T) from both sides of the transition, leading to a Curie constant: C=13×10⁴ K for BaTiO₃:1.6%Fe in the polar phase. BaTiO₃ is a displacive ferroelectric going through a first-order phase transition. The substitutions have an effect on the dynamics of the perovskite lattice. They induce charges transfer to Ti and a diminution of elastic forces in BaTiO₃. Then we discuss the fact that the maximum of permittivity does not depend on the phase transition but on the nature of the material.