Sharif Digital Repository

This paper studies the influence of burial depth on slope response and pipe performance under earthquake induced landslide. Three physical models are constructed and tested using 1 g shaking table device. The slope is divided into four sections as toe, lower and upper sections of the slope face and crest. The pips which perpendicularly cross the slope are embedded at these positions in three burial depths to demonstrate burial depth effect in each section. According to the experiments, dynamic slope response which moderately develops at deeper depths at toe and lower section, displays a clear downtrend at upper section and crest. Also, the pipe response depends on pipe route and slope... 

An index for characterizing wettability of reservoir rocks is presented using slope analysis of spontaneous imbibition recovery data. The slope analysis is performed using the known exact analytical solution to infinite acting period of counter-current spontaneous imbibition. The proposed theoretically based wettability index offers some advantages over existing methods: (1) it is a better measure of the spontaneous imbibition potential of rock (because the magnitude is directly proportional to the imbibition rate); (2) there is no need for forced displacement data; (3) there is no need for waiting until the spontaneous imbibition process ceases completely; and (4) the data needed to run the... 

An index for characterizing wettability of reservoir rocks is presented using slope analysis of spontaneous imbibition recovery data. The slope analysis is performed using the known exact analytical solution to infinite acting period of counter-current spontaneous imbibition. The proposed theoretically based wettability index offers some advantages over existing methods: (1) it is a better measure of the spontaneous imbibition potential of rock (because the magnitude is directly proportional to the imbibition rate); (2) there is no need for forced displacement data; (3) there is no need for waiting until the spontaneous imbibition process ceases completely; and (4) the data needed to run the... 

Existing sight distance models are applicable only to two-dimensional (2-D) separate horizontal and vertical alignments or simple elements of these separate alignments (vertical curve, horizontal curve). A new model is presented for determining the available sight distance on 3-D combined horizontal and vertical alignments. The model is based on the curved parametric elements that have been used in the finite element method. The elements presented are rectangular (4-node, 6-node, and 8-node elements) and triangular. These elements are used to represent various features of the highway surface and sight obstructions, including tangents (grades), horizontal curves, vertical curves, traveled... 

Semisolid casting and forming have attracted growing attention of both research and industry. A suitable semisolid microstructure consists of globular grains in a matrix of lower melting point phase and may be produced by various methods, including the cooling slope technique. The combined effect of cooling slope angle and mould vibration on the semisolid microstructures of AI7075 is reported. The results indicate that mould vibration decreases average grain size significantly and that the effect increases with increasing size of primary crystals entering the mould through the cooling slope. Mould vibration was also found to improve the shape factor of alloy grains after appropriate... 

In this research, theory of fuzzy sets is used to deal with the uncertain nature of soil parameters and the inaccuracy involved in the analysis simultaneously. Soil parameters are defined using suitable fuzzy sets and the uncertainty inherent in the value of factor of safety is assessed. It is believed that this approach accounts for the uncertainty in soil parameters more realistically compared to the conventional probabilistic approaches reported in the literature. The proposed method is applied to a case study and the results are discussed subsequently  

Deep excavation in urban areas can cause instability problems due to significant settlement at the ground surface and large movements at the excavation facing walls. One of the most popular methods used to stabilise these excavations is utilising soil-nailing method. This method has also been widely used to stabilise natural slopes and earth retaining structures. Because of the complexity involved in the mechanism of this stabilising system due to interacting effects of the soil, nails, grout and shotcrete, numerical modelling with high accuracy should be used to analyse the behaviour of the soil-nailed walls. Considering all aspects of soil-structure interaction in the present research, a... 

By employing a few simple models of passive dynamic walking mechanism, we have shown the possibility of extending the boundaries of the maximum stable speed of these autonomous robots merely by changing their terrain. The replaced terrain consists of a series of parallel local slopes and is recognized as a general form of a ramp-stair surface. Although here, the mechanism of stabilization of the unstable locomotion patterns is not clearly known, the technique is quite simple and works effectively. The merit to the method over other strategies, could be described in two separate aspects: First, it is still completely passive; so we do not need any external energy to control the robot. Second,... 

Various approaches have been developed by researchers to predict earthquake induced landslide displacements. This study evaluates the applicability of these approaches on sandy slopes. For this purpose, nine physical models are constructed inside a rigid box and thirty-six shaking table tests are conducted. Dynamic responses are then converted to the full scale model by applying similitude laws. Five statistical criteria are applied to compare the measured and predicted displacements and evaluate the precision of the approaches. By combining the outcomes and using a scoring procedure, the approaches are scored. Consequently, the approaches of Fotopoulou and Pitilakis [23] and Hsieh and Lee... 

This study addresses optimal walking pattern generation for SURENA III humanoid robot in a stair-climbing scenario. To this end, the kinematic configuration of the 31-DOF humanoid robot is studied. Integrating the detailed dynamic properties of the robot, a comprehensive and precise dynamic model is developed for its lower-limb. In order to generate the optimal walking pattern for the considered humanoid robot, trajectories for feet and pelvis are first designed, and then joint angles are derived by means of inverse kinematics. Such a complete model provides the designer with the necessary tools to optimize the trajectory generation. Using two different types of objective functions, namely... 

The land-sliding forces applied to buried pipelines depend on the ground condition, types of loading and pipelines features. This paper intends to numerically investigate the effect of ground condition on pipelines. The loading type and pipeline features are kept constant. The pipeline which is positioned at mid-length of the slope, is made of steel and intersects the slope at the angle of 90o. The slope material specifications are determined based on geotechnical reports andthe harmonic loading simulates a 7.5 magnitude earthquake. The descending trend of slope displacement in sandy clay, loose to medium sand, cemented sand and medium to hard clayare shown by numerical calculations. But,... 

The land-sliding forces applied to buried pipelines depend on the ground condition, types of loading and pipelines features. This paper intends to numerically investigate the effect of ground condition on pipelines. The loading type and pipeline features are kept constant. The pipeline which is positioned at mid-length of the slope, is made of steel and intersects the slope at the angle of 90o. The slope material specifications are determined based on geotechnical reports andthe harmonic loading simulates a 7.5 magnitude earthquake. The descending trend of slope displacement in sandy clay, loose to medium sand, cemented sand and medium to hard clayare shown by numerical calculations. But,... 

Synthesis of efficient, low-cost, and stable bifunctional electrocatalysts with earth-abundant resources for electrochemical water electrolysis is a challenging subject for large-scale energy conversion processes. Herein, we report a high-performance electrocatalyst based on vanadium oxysulfide/cobalt-cobalt sulfonitride (VOS/Co-CoSN) for oxygen and hydrogen evolution reaction (OER and HER). The Co-CoSN film was synthesized on a copper sheet (CS) by a facile electrodeposition method. Then, VOS was electrochemically grown onto the Co-CoSN@CS electrode at various deposition times. At the optimal deposition time (300 s), the obtained VOS-300/Co-CoSN catalyst was studied for OER and HER in... 

This paper presents an integrated two-dimensional numerical framework for simulating rainfall-induced landslides from instability initiation to post-failure flow. To describe the entire process, three steps are considered in this study: (1) a coupled hydrostability analysis which detects the failure plane using the Finite Element Method (FEM) (pre-failure stage); (2) computing the local rheology of the failed mass (wet sandy soil) based on the water saturation at the onset of failure using the saturation-based rheological model (transition stage); and (3) a continuum-based propagation analysis which solves the flow of the wet material employing the Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics (SPH)...