Sharif Digital Repository

The distribution of water fluxes is strongly influenced by the properties of the media adjacent to the cathode catalyst layer (CCL), viz. polymer electrolyte membrane (PEM) and gas diffusion media (GDM). We propose a model that is applied under varying humidification of the cathode feed gas, with water removal in liquid and vapor form. The model warrants the definition of a critical current density up to which water removal out of the CCL could proceed completely via vapor diffusion to the cathode side. Above the critical current density, excessive water generation leads to the build-up of an excess liquid pressure in the CCL, which drives hydraulic fluxes to PEM and GDM sides. Experimental... 

Gasification of biomass in supercritical water is a successful technology for hydrogen production especially by using wet biomass. The whole process, from feeding to purification of hydrogen, consists of a lot of equipment, such as pumps, heat exchangers, heaters, reactors, etc. Because the main reactions take place in the gasification reactor, the gasifier is the most important equipment of the process. In this article, a thermodynamic model, including chemical equilibrium in the reactor that is based on Gibbs free energy minimization, is developed to estimate equilibrium composition for gasification of biomass in supercritical water for hydrogen production. For this analysis, we use three... 

Increasing concerns about the lack of energy resources, global warming and environmental pollution have pushed the relevant organizations to develop energy saving strategies such as energy labeling programs. In this research, a new energy labeling program is developed and evaluated for the wet cooling towers in Iran. The cooling tower parameters, including its cooling capacity and the fan power consumption, are measured using an experimental setup. The experimental data are standardized to compensate the effect of the ambient wet bulb temperature on the cooling tower performance which cannot be controlled during the experiments. The results show that the cooling tower capacity and the fan... 

A steady-state equilibrium-stage model based on MESH equations was proposed to simulate saline extractive distillation columns. The interaction parameters between each component of water-CaCl 2 and ethanol-water were obtained from mean ionic activity coefficients and vapor-liquid equilibrium (VLE) experimental data. Additionally, the interaction coefficients for the ethanol-CaCl 2 pair were fitted to experimental VLE data which were reported by Nishi for the ethanol-water-CaCl 2 system. It should be noted that adjustable parameters between each pair were considered to be temperature dependent. The results confirmed that the proposed model could accurately predict the experimental... 

Noise analysis techniques including Feynman-α (variance-to-mean) and Rossi-α (correlation) have been simulated by MCNP computer code to calculate the prompt neutron decay constant (α0), effective delayed neutron fraction (βeff) and neutron generation time (Λ) in a subcritical condition for the first operating core configuration of Tehran Research Reactor (TRR). The reactor core is considered to be in zero power (reactor power is less than 1 W) in the entire simulation process. The effect of some key parameters such as detector efficiency, detector position and its dead time on the results of simulation has been discussed as well. The results of proposed method in the current study are... 

This study presents a semi analytical solution for the transient weakly underexpanded jet. Different polytropic processes are compared with available experimental data in the literature to assess the best process for steady and transient weakly underexpanded jets. The steady state results agree reasonably well with the experimental and analytical data. It is also shown that isentropic process evaluates steady injection better than other processes. Tip penetration of transient results was compared with available data in literature, and no exact agreement for isothermal and isentropic is observed. This appears due to the linearization of equation of state. It is suggested that more accurate... 

In this paper, a constitutive model with a temperature and strain rate dependent flow stress (Bergstrom hardening rule) and modified Armstrong-Frederick kinematic evolution equation for elastoplastic hardening materials is introduced. Based on the multiplicative decomposition of the deformation gradient,new kinematic relations for the elastic and plastic left stretch tensors as well as the plastic deformation-dependent spin tensor are proposed. Also, a closed-form solution has been obtained for the elastic and plastic left stretch tensors for the simple shear problem.To evaluate model validity, results are compared with known experimental data for SUS 304 stainless steel, which shows a good... 

Nowadays, applying sustainable development strategies in designation and production of various products has attracted specific attention. In order to consider ecological sustainable development for a product, reducing its environmental impacts should be observed. Concrete technology and its products are not exceptions, and therefore, the same has been a concern for concrete industry. Alongside, concrete recycling is one of the measures used to reduce the environmental impacts of concrete products during their life cycle. On the other side, positive performance of silica nano-particles has been proven in numerous researches as one super pozzolanic material. Hence, in this study, we aimed on... 

Spontaneous imbibition of water into the matrix blocks because of capillary forces is an important recovery mechanism for oil recovery from naturally fractured reservoirs. In modeling this process, it has been assumed classically that local equilibrium is reached and, therefore, capillary pressure and relative permeability functions are only a function of water saturation, resulting in the appearance of the self-similarity condition. In some works published in the last 2 decades, it has, however, been claimed that local equilibrium is not reached in porous media, and therefore, opposite the classical local-equilibrium/self-similar approach, non-equilibrium effects should be taken into... 

A multilayer back propagation learning algorithm was used as an artificial neural network tool to predict the mechanical properties of porous NiTi shape memory alloys fabricated by press/sintering of the mixed powders. Effects of green porosity, sintering time and the ratio of the average Ti to Ni particle sizes on properties of the product were investigated. Hardness and tensile strength of the compacts were determined by hardness Rockwell B method and shear punch test. Three-fourths of 36 pairs of experimental data were used for training the network within the toolbox of the MATLAB software. Porosity, sintering time and particle size ratios were defined as the input variables of the model.... 

This paper presents a precise solution to predict the behavior of steel fiber reinforced concrete (SFRC) under the four point bending test (FPBT). All the force components at the beam section (before and after cracking) are formulated by applying these assumptions: a realistic stress-strain model is used for concrete behavior in compression, a linear response is considered for the uncracked tension region in a concrete constitutive model, and an exponential relationship is proposed as a stress-crack opening in the crack region which requires two parameters. Then the moment capacity of the critical cracked section is calculated by using these forces and satisfying equilibrium law at the... 

A numerical treatment for the prediction of cavitating flows is presented and assessed. The algorithm uses the preconditioned multiphase Euler equations with appropriate mass transfer terms. A central difference finite volume scheme with suitable dissipation terms to account for density jumps across the cavity interface is shown to yield an effective method for solving the multiphase Euler equations. The Euler equations are utilized herein for the cavitation modeling, because some certain characteristics of cavitating flows can be obtained using the solution of this system of equations with relative low computational effort. In addition, the Euler equations are appropriate for the assessment... 

In this study the kinetic modeling of visbreaking reactions for a number of vacuum residue feeds was investigated using available experimental data from the literature. A continuous lumping model was developed for kinetic analysis of visbreaking reactions. The normalized boiling point was used to describe each feed as a continuous mixture and the concentration distribution of the mixture would change under reaction conditions. A continuous model with five adjustable parameters was used to describe visbreaking reactions, and these parameters were optimized for each feed for reaction temperatures in the range of 400-430 C using available experimental data. The model was able to accurately... 

Intelligent deep-drawing is an instrumental research field in sheet metal forming. A set of 28 different experimental data have been employed in this paper, investigating the roles of die radius, punch radius, friction coefficients and drawing ratios for axisymmetric workpieces deep drawing. This paper focuses an evolutionary neural network, specifically, error back propagation in collaboration with genetic algorithm. The neural network encompasses a number of different functional nodes defined through the established principles. The input parameters, i.e., punch radii, die radii, friction coefficients and drawing ratios are set to the network; thereafter, the material outputs at two... 

Macroporous styrene-divinylbenzene copolymers with different degree of crosslinking were prepared by suspension polymerization in presence of different binary mixtures of toluene and heptane, as diluent. Specific surface area, bulk and apparent densities, and pore volume of the resulting beads were determined experimentally. Applying the least square method to the experimental data, correlations for prediction of these properties were obtained. Effects of divinylbenzene concentration, diluent to comonomer volume ratio, and composition of the diluent mixture were considered in developing the aforementioned correlations. The influence of the reaction recipe on porous structure of the samples... 

Intravitreal injection (IVI) is the most common treatment for eye posterior segment diseases such as endopthalmitis, retinitis, age-related macular degeneration, diabetic retinopathy, uveitis, and retinal detachment. Most of the drugs used to treat vitreoretinal diseases, have a narrow concentration range in which they are effective, and may be toxic at higher concentrations. Therefore, it is critical to know the drug distribution within the eye following intravitreal injection. Having knowledge of drug distribution, ophthalmologists can decide on drug injection frequency while minimizing damage to tissues. The goal of this study was to develop a computer model to predict intraocular... 

In this study, hot extrusion of AA6061-5% SiCp composite was studied to determine the composite thermo-mechanical behaviour during deformation and the mechanical properties of extruded composite. Hot compression tests were first carried out to obtain the flow stress behaviour of the composite at different temperatures and strain rates. Then a mathematical model was used to estimate the required energy as well as to predict temperature and strain distributions during the process. Finally, hot extrusion experiments were performed in order to verify the predictions and, also, tensile and hardness testing were conducted to evaluate mechanical properties of extruded material. Comparison between... 

In this research, the developing turbulent swirling flow in the entrance region of a pipe is investigated analytically by using the boundary layer integral method. The governing equations are integrated through the boundary layer and obtained differential equations are solved with forth-order Adams predictor-corrector method. The general tangential velocity is applied at the inlet region to consider both free and forced vortex velocity profiles. The comparison between present model and available experimental data demonstrates the capability of the model in predicting boundary layer parameters (e.g. boundary layer growth, shear rate and swirl intensity decay rate). Analytical results showed... 

Nanofluid is the term applied to a suspension of solid, nanometer-sized particles in conventional fluids; the most prominent features of such fluids include enhanced heat characteristics, such as convective heat transfer coefficient, in comparison to the base fluid without considerable alterations in physical and chemical properties. In this study, nanofluids of aluminum oxide and copper oxide were prepared in ethylene glycol separately. The effect of forced convective heat transfer coefficient in turbulent flow was calculated using a double pipe and plate heat exchangers. Furthermore, we calculated the forced convective heat transfer coefficient of the nanofluids using theoretical... 

High capacity pulse tube refrigerator (HCPTR) is a new generation of cryocoolers tailored to provide more than 250 W of cooling power at cryogenic temperatures. The most important characteristics of HCPTR when compared to other types of pulse tube refrigerators are a powerful pressure wave generator, and an accurate design. In this paper the influence of geometrical and operating parameters on the performance of a double inlet pulse tube refrigerator (DIPTR) is studied. The model is validated with the existing experimental data. As a result of this optimization, a new configuration of HCPTR is proposed. This configuration provides 335 W at 80 K cold end temperature with a frequency of 50 Hz...