Sharif Digital Repository

Background: In the recent study, optimum operational conditions of cathode compartment of microbial fuel cell were determined by using Response Surface Methodology (RSM) with a central composite design to maximize power density and COD removal. Methods: The interactive effects of parameters such as, pH, buffer concentration and ionic strength on power density and COD removal were evaluated in two-chamber microbial batch-mode fuel cell. Results: Power density and COD removal for optimal conditions (pH of 6.75, buffer concentration of 0.177 M and ionic strength of cathode chamber of 4.69 mM) improve by 17 and 5%, respectively, in comparison with normal conditions (pH of 7, buffer concentration... 

A new air shower experiment of the Alborz Observatory, Alborz-I, located at the Sharif University of Technology, Iran, will be constructed in near future. An area of about 30×40 m2 will be covered by 20 plastic scintillation detectors (each with an area of 50×50 cm2). A series of experiments have been performed to optimize the height of light enclosures of the detectors for this array and the results have been compared to an extended code simulation of these detectors. Operational parameters of the detector obtained by this code are cross checked by the Geant4 simulation. There is a good agreement between the extended-code and Geant4 simulations. We also present further discussions on the... 

A new dimensionless parameter, Sh-factor, is introduced by using dimensional analysis and extending the quantum yield definition to show power-law relations among light intensity, light wavelength, distance from light source, concentrations of dye/pollutant and photocatalyst, time, and degradation percent. The Sh-factor has the same equation form for photoactivated remediation systems with particulate and thin-film photocatalysts, and it provides mathematical tools to predict degradation performance of a photocatalytic system. These power-law equations separate simply the operational parameters related to the lamp from semiconductor photocatalyst characteristics. The light scattering and... 

In this study, leaching of reverberatory furnace dust at Sarcheshmeh was investigated in H2SO4-O3 medium. Response surface methodology based on central composite face-centered design (RSM-CCF) was applied to optimize the operating parameters. The optimal conditions to achieve the principle objectives of maximizing copper dissolution and minimizing iron dissolution from dust were identified to be a temperature of 30 °C, a leaching time of 3 h, an initial pH of 0.5, a pulp density of 20%, and an ozone flow rate of 1 g/h. Under the optimum conditions, the copper and iron concentrations in the leaching solution were found to be 27.11 and 0.90 g/L, respectively. The results showed that selective... 

The oxidative desulfurization of a real refinery feedstock (i.e., non-hydrotreated kerosene with total sulfur mass content of 0.16%) with a mixture of hydrogen peroxide and acetic acid was studied. The influences of various operating parameters including reaction temperature (T), acid to sulfur molar ratio (nacid/nS), and oxidant to sulfur molar ratio (nO/nS) on the sulfur removal of kerosene were investigated. The results revealed that an increase in the reaction temperature (T) and nacid/nS enhances the sulfur removal. Moreover, there is an optimum nO/nS related to the reaction temperature and the best sulfur removal could be obtained at nO/nS8 and 23 for the reaction temperatures of 25... 

In this research, the separation of tellurium from selenium was studied from chloride solution by TBP extractant. In the batch experiments, the experimental findings indicated that the feed acidity, TBP concentration, and contact time were optimized to achieve the high separation factor. In continuous mode of pulsed disc and doughnut column, the impacts of operating parameters have been discussed on the distribution coefficients of selenium and tellurium, and mass transfer enhancement. A new model for predicting Koca was proposed in terms of holdup values, Sherwood, Reynolds, and Schmidt numbers, which has an acceptable agreement with the mass transfer data. © 2020 Taylor & Francis Group,... 

In this paper, the hydrodynamic behaviour of the chemical reaction system (selenium, tellurium, and TBP) was interpreted in the Oldshue-Rushton extraction column. The optimum operating parameters for extracting the selenium and tellurium from chloride medium were carried out by using the batch experiments. The feed acidity of 5 molar and solvent phase with 20% (v/v) TBP in kerosene were optimised to examine the hydrodynamic parameters of the mentioned column. The impacts of operating variables such as rotor speed, inlet aqueous phase velocity, and inlet solvent phase velocity on the dispersed phase hold-up, mean drop size, slip velocity, drop size distribution, and extraction rate were... 

One of the most important operating parameters which affects the performance and efficiency of active solar stills is brine depth. In all of the previous experimental or theoretical studies, effects of water depth were investigated during only the first 24-hour period (or even shorter periods) of the operation of active solar stills. In other words, only the first day was taken into account. However, the production of an active solar still depends on several parameters such as brine temperature at sunrise (initial temperature), which are all affected by the depth variation after the first day of operation. However, the present research experimentally investigates the long-term effects of... 

In this research, a novel graphene-supported catalyst was prepared through which, a simultaneous chemical exfoliation of graphite and MoS2 powder performed preparing a new composite species and evaluated for the hydrodesulfurization reaction of naphtha and no sulfidation pretreatment was performed upon the catalyst. Also, the influences of the operating parameters such as temperature, and liquid hourly space velocity on HDS conversion evaluated. (Chemical Equation Presented)  

Solar collecting area is one of the most important operating parameters of active solar stills. No experimental work has been performed to investigate the effect of this parameter to date. Furthermore in all of previous theoretical studies the effect of solar collecting area was examined during only the first 24-hour period of the operation of stills with one specified brine depth. However the present work experimentally studies the long-term simultaneous effects of collector area and brine depth on the performance of active solar stills. For this purpose four parallel active solar stills with different collector areas were fabricated and experiments were conducted for 5 consecutive days... 

Considering the two main categories of rapid single flux quantum gates with destructive and nondestructive readout process, we have investigated the effects of readout cell topology and involved critical parameters on the proper functionality and stability of the states of the newly developed bidirectional T flip-flops (TFFs). It is observed that instabilities and fluctuations in the state of the gate (memory of TFF) after each transition determine the minimum time intervals between the clock pulses set by the ac bias current, further limiting the ultimate operation frequency of the circuits. The absolute values of the current levels of the junctions at each state, which play an important... 

In the light of the novel physical-chemical properties of supercritical water as a green reaction medium, we studied the synthesis of deuterated benzene in supercritical heavy water, in the presence of sodium deutroxide, as a catalyst. The effects of operational parameters including temperature, time, pressure (density), catalyst amount and benzene/D2O volumetric ratio on the degree of deuteriation (D%) and deuterated benzene yield were investigated extensively and the conditions for the highest degree of deuteration and product yield, were optimized. Furthermore, because of the importance of the pressure of solution inside the reaction medium on the H/D exchange process as well as the... 

In this study, for the first time a statistical analysis based on the response surface methodology (RSM) was employed to investigate individual and interaction effects of key operating parameters of the photocatalytic degradation under visible-light irradiation using Ag-S/PEG/TiO2. Ag-S/PEG/TiO2 is a visible-light-driven photocatalyst and was synthesized (based on earlier research) by co-doping of TiO2 with silver and sulphur and addition of polyethylene glycol (as a reagent template). In addition, the model pollutant was methylene orange (MO) and the studied operating parameters included the photocatalyst loading, initial concentration of the pollutant, and pH of the solution. The... 

In this study the effect of HPGR operational parameters on the dimensional properties of pellet feed was examined and optimized using factorial methodology. The operational parameters considered include feed moisture, specific pressure and roll speed. For this study, size and shape of particles with Blaine number in the range 1800–2200 cm2 g−1 was thoroughly investigated. It was deduced that increasing the specific pressure and decreasing the roll speed would result in reduction of D80 but would increase the Blaine number. The circularity, aspect ratio and roughness descriptors of the particles were measured by SEM micrographs and image analysis software. It was observed that particles... 

In this study the effect of HPGR operational parameters on the dimensional properties of pellet feed was examined and optimized using factorial methodology. The operational parameters considered include feed moisture, specific pressure and roll speed. For this study, size and shape of particles with Blaine number in the range 1800–2200 cm2g−1 was thoroughly investigated. It was deduced that increasing the specific pressure and decreasing the roll speed would result in reduction of D80 but would increase the Blaine number. The circularity, aspect ratio and roughness descriptors of the particles were measured by SEM micrographs and image analysis software. It was observed that particles tended... 

In the present experimental study, the effect of operating parameters such as inlet and outlet pressure as well as inlet temperature on the mass separation capability of vortex tubes (VTs) for a gas mixture is investigated. Specifically, concentrating heavier components of a gas mixture in the hot outlet stream is considered. Proposing a semi-empirical index from the experimental study, the simulation of different arrangements of VTs, and the effect of recycling a portion of the hot outlet stream on its mass separation performance are investigated. Moreover, the proposed separation method by VTs is economically compared with commonly used methods by distillation columns and two-phase... 

An experimental study of a lab scale rotating detonation combustor (RDC) has been conducted to identify and classify its modes of operation under different feeding conditions. The chamber uses air as oxidizer and hydrogen as fuel. The stability diagram of the RDC has been determined based on the detonation chamber Reynolds number and reactants mixture equivalence ratio values. The Reynolds number is based on the air volume flow rate, chamber annulus size, and the reactants mixture feeding slot area. Hence the effects of geometrical parameters and operational parameters on the detonation wave stability can be presented in a single stability map. This diagram identifies different zones in... 

A widely dispersed asset, electric grid has enormous impacts on people’s lives. Recently occurred various high-impact low-probability (HILP) threats have raised the concerns about the classical reliability-oriented view. Therefore, withstanding unexpected and less frequent severe situations still remain a significant challenge. As a critical infrastructure (CI), power systems are more and more expected to be resilient to HILPs. So, utilities put their endeavours to harden enough their networks against HILPs. In this regard, there is a great need to a methodology able to optimise the hardening programme investments. This scheme could potentially save a large amount of money, as well as... 

In the present study, the ACF-TiO2 catalyst was synthesised and used as a catalyst for the destruction of toxic cyanide in both synthetic and real industrial wastewaters. The ACF-TiO2 catalyst was found to be micro-porous with the BET surface area of 163 m2/g. The effect of different operational parameters such as catalyst concentration, cyanide concentration, operation time, and ozone concentration were target parameters in the present study. The findings show that 500 mg/L of catalyst is the optimum value for the photocatalytical process to completely oxidise 25 mg/L of cyanide within 10 min. While it was found that 300 mg/L of catalyst in the presence of 200 mg/h ozone is enough to remove... 

Supersonic separators are used in gas separation processes such as dehumidification of humid air due to high performance and its good pressure recovery. In the present study, a comprehensive numerical and experimental investigation on the hydrodynamic behavior of air as working fluid and dehumidification performance of supersonic separator have been accomplished. The effect of the operational parameters on shockwave's position are examined. The outcomes show that by increasing the pressure level of supersonic separator, relative error between numerical and experimental results decreases from 20% to less than 10%. The effect of the operational parameters and humidity of inlet air on the...