Sharif Digital Repository

The equilibrium signal-setting problem is stated and subsequently formulated as a continuous equilibrium network design problem. The bilevel formulation is nonconvex and therefore cannot be solved for global optima by using descent solution algorithms. Therefore, a lower bound using a system optimal flow pattern is proposed that will be quite tight in both uncongested and highly congested network traffic situations. A solution algorithm based on the standard steepest-descent method is proposed for the lower-bound problem. Performance of the solution algorithm on a network problem is reported  

For more than a decade, stent implantation has been strategically used for solving gastrointestinal dilemmas such as biliary stenosis. Predicaments like insufficient radial strength, low twisting ability, inappropriate dynamic behaviour and restenosis are expected to be solved by the introduction of new designs. Superelastic Nitinol stent is an interesting alternative for minimising these tight spots. The application of finite element method to predict metallurgical and geometric behaviour of superelastic Nitinol stents for biliary duct dilatation is supported by conventional crimp tests. Model calculations show that all stents encounter the highest stress in their intersegment curvature.... 

Nitinol stents are used to minimize improper dynamic behavior, low twistability, and inadequate radial mechanical strength of femoral artery stents. In this study, finite element method is used to investigate the effect of crimping and Austenite finish temperature (A f) of Nitinol on mechanical performance of Z-shaped open-cell femoral stent under crimping conditions. Results show that low A f Nitinol has better mechanical and clinical performance due to small chronic outward force, large radial resistive force, and appropriate superelastic behavior  

Fully supramolecular dendrosomes (FSD) as bi-phase drug delivery systems are reported in this work. For preparation of FSD, amphiphilic linear-dendritic supramolecular systems (ALDSS) have been synthesized by host-guest interactions between hyperbranched polyglycerol having β-cyclodextrin core and bi-chain polycaprolactone (BPCL) with a fluorescine focal point. Self-assembly of ALDSS in aqueous solutions led to FSD. They were able to encapsulate paclitaxel with a high loading capacity. The dendrosome-based drug delivery systems were highly sensitive to pH and temperature. They were stable at 20-37. °C and pH7-8, but dissociated and released drug at temperatures lower than 20. °C or higher... 

Considering the role of black hole singularity in quantum evolution, a resolution to the firewall paradox is presented. It is emphasized that if an observer has the singularity as a part of his spacetime, then the semi-classical evolution would be non-unitary as viewed by him. Specifically, a free-falling observer inside the black hole would have a Hilbert space with non-unitary evolution; a quantum jump for particles encountering the singularity to outside of the horizon as late Hawking radiations. The non-unitarity in the jump resembles the one in collapse of wave function, but preserves entanglements. Accordingly, we elaborate the first postulate of black hole complementarity: freely... 

Stent implantation has been regarded as a major strategy to solve gastrointestinal diseases such as biliary obstruction during the last decade. The application of nitinol superelastic stents has been recently considered for minimising such problems as restenosis after stent implantation, the ability to low stent twist, unsuitable dynamic behaviour and inadequate strength radial of stent. In the present article, the effects of material properties on mechanical performance of Z shaped nitinol wire stent under crushing test for clinical applications are studied by finite element modelling. Nitinol stent shows better mechanical and clinical performance after applying 90% crushing, less chronic... 

Effects of pH, D2EHPA, Cyanex® 272 and Cyanex® 302 on extraction of zinc, manganese and cobalt from a Zn-Mn-Co-Cd-Ni containing solution at the room temperature was comprehensively investigated. Addition of Cyanex® 302 indicated a left-shifting-effect on the extraction curve of zinc, a right-shifting-effect on the extraction curve of manganese and no effect on the extraction of cobalt. Addition of Cyanex® 272 shifted all three curves to the right. Therefore, the most suitable extractant for separation of zinc from manganese was therefore 0.3-0.3 mixture of D2EHPA and Cyanex® 302, and that for separation of manganese from cobalt was pure D2EHPA. The stoichiometric coefficient for the... 

Compound 3-benzyl-2H-pyrano[3,2-c]chromene-2,5(6H)-dione(3), was prepared and fully characterized. The vibrational modes (FT-IR) and NMR data ( 1H and 13C chemical shifts) were compared with the results of Density Functional Theory (DFT) method at the B3LYP/cc-PVTZ level. The calculated vibrational frequencies and NMR chemical shifts are in good agreement with the experimental results. The electronic (UV-Vis) spectrum was calculated using the TD-DFT method in CH2Cl2 with the Polarizable Continuum Model using the integral equation formalism variant (IEFPCM) and was correlated to the experimental spectra. The assignment and analysis of the frontier HOMO and LUMO orbitals indicate that... 

Various researchers have contributed to the identification of the mass and stiffness matrices of two dimensional (2-D) shear building structural models for a given set of vibratory frequencies. The suggested methods are based on the specific characteristics of the Jacobi matrices, i.e., symmetric, tri-diagonal and semi-positive definite matrices. However, in case of three dimensional (3-D) structural models, those methods are no longer applicable, since their stiffness matrices are not tri-diagonal. In this paper the inverse problem for a special class of vibratory structural systems, i.e., 3-D shear building models, is investigated. A practical algorithm is proposed for solving the inverse... 

A holding or a multi-business corporate seeks to coordinate its supply for minimum overall costs. A Corporate Supply Optimizer (CSO), as a central entity taking advantage, of the notion of flow networks, gathers necessary operational information from members of the corporate supply chain. The CSO then guides supply chain members on ordering decisions for a minimum overall cost for the entire supply chain. Its computational engine models the entire supply chain with multiple members in four stages to satisfy customer demand. The CSO seeks a solution with minimum total costs, unlike noncooperative supply chains where individual members compete, to optimize, their local costs. The existing... 

Kinematic and dynamic parameters of robot manipulators are difficult to measure exactly. Also, time varying unknown dynamical parameters of human arm, during interaction with the master robot and unknown parameters of environment during interaction with the slave robot, in teleoperation systems, insert further uncertainties. Furthermore, unknown parameters, unmodeled dynamics of master/slave robots, human arm model and environment introduce more uncertainties. In this paper, a robust adaptive master-slave teleoperation control strategy is introduced which require neither the exact knowledge about the parameters of the master/slave robots, human arm and environment, because of the... 

In the framework of chiral kinetic theory (CKT), we consider a system of right-and left-handed Weyl fermions out of thermal equilibrium in a homogeneous weak magnetic field. We show that the Lorentz invariance implies a modification in the definition of the momentum current in the phase space, compared to the case in which the system is in global equilibrium. Using this modified momentum current, we derive the linearized conservation equations from the kinetic equation up to second order in the derivative expansion. It turns out that the eigenmodes of these equations, namely the hydrodynamic modes, differ from those obtained from the hydrodynamic in the Landau-Lifshitz (LL) frame at the same... 

The objective of this paper is to predict the effect of hydrocarbon contamination on the shear strength parameters of sand by using various machine learning platforms. Multilayer perceptron, support vector machine, random forest, gradient boosting method, and multi-output support vector machine were methods used to predict the hydrocarbon contamination impacts on the internal friction angle and cohesion of contaminated sand. Random forest exhibited the best results for cohesion, whereas, for the friction angle, the gradient boosting method outperformed other approaches. Moreover, the multi-output support vector machine yielded better results than those pertaining to a single support vector... 

Gimbal transmissions are non-linear direct transmissions and can be used in robotic arms replacing the traditional revolute joints. They offer potential advantages for critical cases such as joint space and task space singularities or where a different mechanical advantage is needed compared to what traditional revolute joints provide. This can be obtained by properly adjusting the different parameters of Gimbal joints used in different joints of the manipulator (such as their offset angle and/or chamfer angle). In this paper the concept of Gimbal mechanism as a joint is investigated. Then, as an example, Gimbal joints are used to replace the basic revolute joints of a 3-UPU parallel... 

Wrought aluminum sheets with thickness of 13. mm were square butt-welded by friction stir welding (FSW) and gas tungsten arc welding (GTAW) methods. Corrosion behavior of the welding zone was probed by Tafel polarization curve. Optical metallography (OM) and scanning electron microscopy together with energy dispersive spectroscopy (SEM-EDS) were used to determine morphology and semi-quantitative analysis of the welded zone. FSW resulted in equiaxed grains of about 1-2 μm, while GTAW caused dendritic structure of the welded region. Resistance to corrosion was greater for the FSW grains than the GTAW structure. In both cases, susceptibility to corrosion attack was greater in the welded region... 

This paper focuses on the effects of low temperature (subzero) treatments on microstructure and mechanical properties of H13 hot work tool steel. Cryogenic treatment at -72 °C and deep cryogenic treatment at -196 °C were applied and it was found that by applying the subzero treatments, the retained austenite was transformed to martensite. As the temperature was decreased more retained austenite was transformed to martensite and it also led to smaller and more uniform martensite laths distributed in the microstructure. The deep cryogenic treatment also resulted in precipitation of more uniform and very fine carbide particles. The microstructural modification resulted in a significant... 

Proton exchange membrane (PEM) fuel cell performance is directly related to the bipolar plate design and their channels pattern. Power enhancements can be achieved by optimal design of the type, size, or patterns of the channels. It has been realized that the bipolar plate design has significant role on reactant transport as well as water management in a PEM Fuel cell. Present work concentrates on improvements in the fuel cell performance by optimization of flow-field design and channels configurations. A three-dimensional, multi-component numerical model of flow distribution based on Navier-Stokes equations using individual computer code is presented. The simulation results showed excellent... 

The variation of morphology and mechanical properties of Al6061 automotive aluminum alloy due to friction stir welding (FSW) and gas tungsten arc welding (GTAW) was investigated by optical metallography, scanning electron microscopy, microhardness measurement, X-ray diffraction, tensile testing, and fractography. The center-line dendrite emergence and microhardness reduction in the heat-affected zone were observed in the GTAW process. Although similar microhardness reduction with respect to the base metal was observed in the FSW samples, higher HVs were obtained for the FSW rather than the GTAW process at almost all heat-affected locations. Ultimate tensile strengths of the FSW and the GTAW... 

Three-dimensional unsteady flow field around a finite circular cylinder standing in a flat-plate boundary layer is studied. For this purpose, two different numerical turbulence approaches as wall adapted local eddyviscosity LES (LES-WALE) and the zonal hybrid RANS-LES approach of Detached-Eddy Simulation (Zonal-DES) are used. Analysis is carried out for a finite circular cylinder with diameter of D = 3 mm and length-to-diameter ratio of L/D=6 which leads to the Reynolds number 2×104. Numerical simulation has been performed based on the LES-WALE and Zonal-DES turbulence models using coarse and fine grids. Ability and accuracy of two models in capturing the complex physics of present... 

Seismic response of a Single Degree of Freedom (SDOF) system containing a rigid circular cylindrical liquid tank under the earthquake excitations is considered in the presence of fluid/structure interaction. The governing differential equations of the system is derived considering the first three liquid sloshing modes (1, 1), (0, 1) and (2, 1) under different strong ground motions. The dynamic response of the system is investigated in the neighborhood of 1:1 and 1:2 internal resonances between the SDOF system and the liquid sloshing modes. These internal resonances take place by tuning the frequency of the first asymmetric sloshing mode of the liquid to the fundamental frequency of the SDOF...