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A Semi-Separated Pair Decomposition (SSPD), with parameter s>1, of a set SâŠ"Rd is a set {(Ai,Bi)} of pairs of subsets of S such that for each i, there are balls DAi and DBi containing Ai and Bi respectively such that d(DAi,DBi)≥s×min(radius(DAi), radius(DBi)), and for any two points p,qâ̂̂S there is a unique index i such that pâ̂̂Ai and qâ̂̂Bi or vice versa. In this paper, we use the SSPD to obtain the following results: First, we consider the construction of geometric t-spanners in the context of imprecise points and we prove that any set SâŠ"Rd of n imprecise points, modeled as pairwise disjoint balls, admits a t-spanner with O(nlogn/(t-1)d) edges that can be computed in O(nlogn/(t-1)d)... 

We present a new optimal construction of a semi-separated pair decomposition (i.e., SSPD) for a set of n points in Rd. In the new construction each point participates in a few pairs, and it extends easily to spaces with low doubling dimension. This is the first optimal construction with these properties. As an application of the new construction, for a fixed t>1, we present a new construction of a t-spanner with O(n) edges and maximum degree O( log2n) that has a separator of size O(n1 -1/d)  

A significant segment of system identification literature on civil structures is devoted to response-only identification, simply because lack of measurements of input excitations for civil structures is a fairly common scenario. In recent years, several researchers have successfully adapted a second-order blind identification (SOBI) technique-a method originally developed for "blind source separation" of audio signals-to response-only identification of mechanical and civil structures. However, this development had been confined to fully instrumented classically damped systems. While several approaches have been proposed recently for extending SOBI to non-classically damped systems, they all... 

This paper presents a novel approach for evaluating the reliability of protective systems taking into account its components reliability. In this paper, a previously proposed extended model is used for a directional over- current scheme. In the extended model, the impacts of individual protective components are taken into account. An optimum routine test schedule is determined for each protective component as a separate unit. A comparison is made to show that the proposed approach has excellence over conventional routine test inspections. Impacts of factors such as circuit breaker inadvertent opening, required time for performing routine test inspections, human mistakes and self-checking and... 

This paper presents a novel approach for evaluating the reliability of protective systems taking into account its components reliability. In this paper, a previously proposed extended model is used for Directional Overcurrent scheme. In the extended model, the impacts of individual protective components are taken into account. An optimum routine test schedule is determined for each protective component as a separate unit. A comparison is made to show that the proposed approach has excellence over conventional routine test inspections. Impacts of factors such as circuit breaker inadvertent opening, required time for performing routine test inspections, human mistakes and self-checking and... 

Graphene oxide membranes were prepared by vacuum and pressurized ultrafiltration methods on the 12% modified Polyacrylonitrile (12mPAN) substrate to specify challenges, salient features, future directions, and potential of GO membrane for separation fields using characterization techniques and gas separation test (studied gases are CO2, He and N2), which is an efficient tool for better understanding of GO membrane behavior. GO membrane structure was examined over a wide range of parameters, such as pore size range of substrate and its surface properties, pH of GO dispersion, GO content, synthesis pressure, operating pressure and temperature. The results show that the GO content does not hold... 

Among all active flow control methods, EHD, MHD and EMHD are the only methods which operate on the basis of body force induction on flow field. The EHD plasma actuator is the proper method which has been used in various flow control applications recently. In this paper, the effects of different body force fields on different domains have been studied for separation control on NACA 0021 and the results have been discussed. The airflow velocity has been assumed to be 35 m s-1 at a post-stall angle of attack of 23°. Three different domains have been used around the airfoil to investigate body forces with different strengths and directions and those which give the best result in separation... 

To exert the optimum effect, the chemical exchange process to boron isotope separation was investigated. In this enrichment method the distillation of dimethyl ether-boron trifluoride complex, which was one of the most efficient industrial methods for purification of isotope boron-10, was optimized. In chemical exchange process of boron isotopes separation two chemical reactions occur. The first one is the decomposition reaction that is an endothermic reaction. The second one is the exchange reaction that is a pyrogenic reaction. With increasing temperature, the decomposition reaction is speeded while the exchange reaction is slowed down. Affecting on both decomposition and exchange... 

The extraction and purification of lipids from the microalgae Chlorella vulgaris have been investigated. First, a mixture of hexane and ethanol was used to extract lipids from the algal biomass. Ultrasonication was employed to disrupt the cell wall and increase the extraction performance. Under these conditions, over 90% of the fatty acids in the biomass were extracted. Second, a biphasic system was formed by adding water and hexane to the extracted crude oil. In this way, fatty acids were mainly distributed in the organic phase (mostly hexane and ethanol) while most of the contaminants remained in the aqueous phase (mostly water and ethanol). Equilibrium distribution data between the phases... 

The studies surrounding the concept of microdroplets have seen a dramatic increase in recent years. Microdroplets have applications in different fields such as chemical synthesis, biology, separation processes and micro-pumps. This study numerically investigates the effect of different parameters such as Capillary number, Length of droplets, and Magnetic Bond number on the splitting process of ferrofluid microdroplets in symmetric T-junctions using an asymmetric magnetic field. The use of said field that is applied asymmetrically to the T-junction center helps us control the splitting of ferrofluid microdroplets. During the process of numerical simulation, a magnetic field with various... 

Multi-phase flows, particularly two-phase flows, are widely used in the industries, hence in order to predict flow regime, pressure drop, heat transfer, and phase change, two-phase flows should be studied more precisely. In the petroleum industry, separation of phases such as water from petroleum is done using rotational flow and vortices; thus, the evolution of the vortex in two-phase flow should be considered. One method of separation requires the flow to enter a long tube in a free vortex. Investigating this requires sufficient knowledge of free vortex flow in a tube. The present study examined the evolution of tube-constrained two-phase free vortex using computational fluid dynamics. The... 

In this paper, a modeling procedure is carried out to numerically analyze the end bearing capacity of drilled shafts in sand. The Mohr-Coulomb elastic plastic constitutive law with stress dependent elastic parameters is used for all numerical analyses performed in this study. The numerical results are compared with the available experimental equations. It is seen that numerical results are in good agreement with experimental equations. The variation of the end bearing capacity of drilled shafts versus embedment depth is also studied. Numerical results show that with increase in pile embedment depth, the end bearing capacity increases. However, the rate of increase becomes smaller as the pile... 

This paper deals with the dynamic analysis of a delaminated composite beam under the action of moving oscillatory mass. The beam is analyzed as four interconnected sub-beams using the delamination limits as their boundaries. The constrained model is used to model the delamination region. The continuity and equilibrium conditions are satisfied between the adjoining beams. The beam response variation due to the delamination with respect to the intact beam has been investigated. Furthermore, the possible separation of the moving oscillator from the beam during the course of the motion is investigated by monitoring the contact force between the oscillator and the beam. The effect of the... 

Mixed-matrix membranes (MMMs) are promising candidates for carbon dioxide separation. However, their application is limited due to improper dispersion of fillers within the polymer matrix, poor interaction of fillers with polymer chains, and formation of defects and micro-voids at the interface of both phases, which all result in the decline of the gas separation performance of MMMs. In this work, we present a new method to overcome these challenges. To this end, a series of MMMs based on polyethersulfone (PES) as the continuous polymer matrix and MIL-53-derived MOFs as the dispersed filler were prepared. FTIR-ATR, XRD, TGA, FESEM, and N2 adsorption/desorption analyses were employed to... 

Metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) have recently achieved much attention to eliminating toxic pollutants because of their attractive attributes, including large specific surface area, ultra-high porosity, abundant active adsorption sites, tunable surface chemistry, well-controlled pore size distribution, and strong host–guest interactions. Among the many developed MOFs, the Zr-based MOFs, particularly the UiO-66 family, are considered extremely attractive for wastewater treatment applications. The fascinating properties of UiO-66 such as high thermal stability, superior chemical resistance towards several solvents, including benzene, acetone, different alcohols, dimethylformamide, acidic and... 

In this study, NH2-MIL-101(Al) metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) covered with 3-aminopropyltriethoxysilane (APTES) were incorporated into the polyethersulfone (PES) to produce mixed-matrix membranes (MMMs) for CO2 separation. The APTES functionalization was performed to improve the MOF dispersion in the PES matrix. Different analyses such as X-ray diffraction (XRD), Brunauer–Emmett–Teller (BET), Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy, thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), and field emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM) revealed that the MOFs surface successfully functionalized with APTES. An improvement in CO2/CH4 separation efficiency was observed in MMMs, and the performance... 

Human society is becoming more intransigent on removing organic dyes from polluted water before discharging to the environment. To fulfill this goal, a magnetic metal-organic framework adsorbent based on functionalized magnetic Fe3O4 nanoparticles and highly water stable UiO-66 with high porosity and sensitivity to the external magnetic field was designed and synthesized via an easy step-by-step self-assembly technique. The synthesized adsorbent magnetic nanoparticles (Fe3O4@UiO-66) were applied to remove organic dyes, i.e., methyl orange (MO) and methylene blue (MB), from a contaminated aqueous solution. The experiments displayed that magnetic Fe3O4@UiO-66 has good adsorption uptake for MO... 

In this study, NH2-MIL-101(Al) metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) covered with 3-aminopropyltriethoxysilane (APTES) were incorporated into the polyethersulfone (PES) to produce mixed-matrix membranes (MMMs) for CO2 separation. The APTES functionalization was performed to improve the MOF dispersion in the PES matrix. Different analyses such as X-ray diffraction (XRD), Brunauer–Emmett–Teller (BET), Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy, thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), and field emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM) revealed that the MOFs surface successfully functionalized with APTES. An improvement in CO2/CH4 separation efficiency was observed in MMMs, and the performance... 

Human society is becoming more intransigent on removing organic dyes from polluted water before discharging to the environment. To fulfill this goal, a magnetic metal-organic framework adsorbent based on functionalized magnetic Fe3O4 nanoparticles and highly water stable UiO-66 with high porosity and sensitivity to the external magnetic field was designed and synthesized via an easy step-by-step self-assembly technique. The synthesized adsorbent magnetic nanoparticles (Fe3O4@UiO-66) were applied to remove organic dyes, i.e., methyl orange (MO) and methylene blue (MB), from a contaminated aqueous solution. The experiments displayed that magnetic Fe3O4@UiO-66 has good adsorption uptake for MO... 

In the present work, a series of polysulfone (PSf) mixed-matrix nanofiltration membranes containing highly water stable UiO-66 metal-organic framework (MOF) were prepared via a simple phase inversion technique. At first, UiO-66 particles were synthesized via a solvothermal technique, activated via two various activation methods, including Soxhlet extraction and centrifugation methods. Then their adsorption performance was investigated for adsorption of anionic methyl orange (MO)/methyl red (MR) and cationic methylene blue (MB)/malachite green (MG) dyes from water. The activated UiO-66 particles via the Soxhlet extraction method (named S-UiO-66) showed better performance for dye adsorption...