Sharif Digital Repository

In this paper, dynamic behavior and pull-in phenomenon of electrically actuated rectangular micro plates under the effect of squeeze-film damping and nonlinear electrostatic force is studied. Finite element method is implemented in order to drive weak formulations of linear and nonlinear micro plate equations of motion based on classical plate theory (CPT) (for thin microplates with moderate nonlinearity) and squeeze-film damping based on Reynolds nonlinear equation. Finally, an efficient reduced-order model contingent on singular value decomposition method (SVD) is used to study dynamic pull-in phenomenon. This model is constructed by the global basis functions achieved from a few runs of... 

With the stricter limitations on both fuel consumption and air pollution, the advantages of a hybrid electric vehicle are becoming more evident than ever. In the present study, an energy management system for a hybrid electric vehicle is developed. Because the plant under consideration is nonlinear, multi-domain, time-varying, has multiple uncertainties and, in addition, the designed control strategy must be able to obey the driver's commands and achieve the par-internship for a new generation of vehicle regulations, the fuzzy logic approach is chosen. A feed-forward hybrid vehicle simulation model is used to demonstrate the validity and the convenience of the current approach and its... 

We use a direct simulation Monte Carlo (DSMC) method to simulate gas heating/cooling and choked subsonic flows in micro/nanoscale channels subject to either constant wall temperature or constant/variable heat flux boundary conditions. We show the effects of applying various boundary conditions on the mass flow rate and the flow parameters. We also show that it is necessary to add a buffer zone at the end of the channel if we wish to simulate more realistic conditions at the channel outlet. We also discuss why applying equilibrium-based Maxwellian distribution on molecules coming from the channel outlet, where the flow is nonequilibrium, will not disturb the DSMC solution. The current... 

A simple functional form for a general equation of state based on an effective near-neighbor pair interaction of an extended Lennard-Jones (12,6,3) type is given and tested against experimental data for a wide variety of fluids and solids. Computer simulation results for ionic liquids are used for further evaluation. For fluids, there appears to be no upper density limitation on the equation of state. The lower density limit for isotherms near the critical temperature is the critical density. The equation of state gives a good description of all types of fluids, nonpolar (including long-chain hydrocarbons), polar, hydrogen-bonded, and metallic, at temperatures ranging from the triple point... 

This paper focuses on the biomechanical aspects of the human lower extremity loading condition during backpack load carrying. A biomechanical framework was generated with the aim of employing a block-oriented structure of Simulink integrated with the Virtual Reality Toolbox of MATLAB software to provide a simulation study of the musculoskeletal system in a virtual environment. In this case, a ten-degrees-of-freedom musculoskeletal model actuated with sixteen muscles in each leg was utilized to simulate movement in the sagittal plane. An inverse dynamics based optimization approach was employed to estimate the excitation level of the muscles. In addition, distributions of the mechanical power... 

In this paper, a replacement-repair model is developed to study a warranty servicing policy for a class of multi-state deteriorating and repairable products, based on a computer simulation analysis. In each working state there is a determined probability for transition to each of the subsequent states, given that it has made a transition out of that state. There are two parameters that determine the manufacturer's decision to repair or replace a failed item, assuming that the buyer's claim is valid; the deterioration degree of the item and the length of the residual warranty period. Beside these two parameters, other inputs to the model are: the number of working and failure states, the... 

This paper applies the homotopy perturbation method to the simulation of the static response of nano-switches to electrostatic actuation and intermolecular surface forces. The model accounts for the electric force nonlinearity of the excitation and for the fringing field effect. Using a mode approximation in the Galerkin projection method, the nonlinear boundary value differential equation describing the statical behavior of nano-switch is reduced to a nonlinear algebraic equation which is solved using the homotopy perturbation method. The number of included terms in the perturbation expansion for achieving a reasonable response has been investigated. Three cases have been specifically... 

Dense underflows are continuous currents that move downslope due to their density being heavier than that of the ambient water. In this work, a steady density current with a uniform velocity and concentration from a narrow sluice gate enters into a wide channel of lighter ambient fluid and moves forward downslope. Experiments varying inlet velocity and concentration and hence inlet Richardson numbers were conducted. Numerical simulations were also performed with a low-Reynolds number k-ε model. The results of numerical simulation agree well with the experimental data. © 2009 ASCE  

Determining the time of breakthrough of injected water is important when assessing waterflood in an oil reservoir. Breakthrough time distribution for a passive tracer (for example water) in percolation porous media (near the percolation threshold) gives insights into the dynamic behavior of flow in geometrically complex systems. However, the application of such distribution to realistic two-phase displacements can be done based on scaling of all parameters. Here, we propose two new approaches for scaling of breakthrough time (characteristic times) in two-dimensional flow through percolation porous media. The first is based on the flow geometry, and the second uses the flow parameters of a... 

Oxy-moderate or intense low-oxygen dilution (MILD) combustion, which is a novel combination of oxy-fuel technology and MILD regime, is numerically studied in the present work. The effects of external preheating and CO2 dilution level on the combustion field, emission, and CO formation mechanisms are investigated in a recuperative laboratory-scale furnace with a recirculating cross-flow. Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) equations with eddy dissipation concept (EDC) model are employed to perform a 3-D simulation of the combustion field and the turbulence-chemistry interactions. In addition, a well-stirred reactor (WSR) analysis is conducted to further examine the chemical kinetics of... 

Importance measures are integral parts of risk assessment for risk-informed decision making. Because the parameters of a risk model, such as the component failure rates, are functions of time and a perturbation (change) in their values can occur during the mission time, time dependence must be considered in the evaluation of the importance measures. In this paper, it is shown that the change in system performance at time t, and consequently the importance of the parameters at time t, depends on the parameters perturbation time and their value functions during the system mission time. We consider a nonhomogeneous continuous time Markov model of a series-parallel system to propose the... 

High-altitude test facilities are usually used to evaluate the performance of space mission engines. The supersonic exhaust diffuser, a main part of high-altitude test facility, provides the required test cell vacuum conditions by self-pumping the nozzle exhaust gases to the atmosphere. However, the plume temperature is often much higher than the temperature the diffuser structure is able to withstand, usually above 2500 K. In this study, an efficient cooling system is designed and analyzed to resolve the thermal problem. A water spray cooling technique is preferred among various existing techniques. Here, a new algorithm is developed for a spray cooling system for a supersonic exhaust... 

Background: Cancer is the first cause of death in developed countries. The heterogeneous nature of cancer requires patient-specified treatment plans. One reliable approach is collecting Circulating Tumour Cells (CTCs) and using them for prognosis and drug response assessment purposes. CTCs are rare and their separation from normal cell requires high-accuracy methods. Methods: A microfluidic cell capture device to separate CTCs from peripheral blood is presented in this study. The CTC separation device applies hydrodynamic forces to categorize cells according to their sizes. The proposed device is designed and evaluated by numerical simulations and validated experimentally. The simulation... 

In this study, a year-round dynamic simulation of a Combined Cooling, Heating and Power generation (CCHP) system has been performed. The proposed system is composed of an ejector cooling system, an Organic Rankine Cycle (ORC), a solar collector field, heat exchangers and hot and cold storage tanks. It is considered that, a portion of the system input energy is provided by a solar collector field and an auxiliary heater supplies the extra required energy. The dynamic simulation of the introduced CCHP system is performed. The developed model is used to evaluate a year-round performance of the system for a residential building located in Tehran. The obtained results indicated that the proposed... 

This research aims to investigate the thermo-hydraulic characteristics of flow in the shell side of spiral-wound heat exchangers with consistent shell geometry. To achieve this end, three-dimensional computational fluid dynamics is employed. Geometrical configuration of spiral-wound heat exchangers can be completely determined by knowing six primary parameters including start factor, tube outside diameter, number of tubes in the first layer, number of layers, longitudinal pitch, and radial pitch. Dividing the longitudinal and radial pitches by tube outside diameter, the six primary geometrical parameters reduce to five non-dimensional parameters. The effects of number of tubes in the first... 

In the present study, shock-disturbances interaction in high-speed compressible inviscid flow is simulated utilizing the weighted essentially non-oscillatory (WENO) scheme by employing the shock-capturing technique. For this aim, the two-dimensional Euler equations in strong conservative form are discretized by using the explicit third-order TVD Runge–Kutta scheme in time and the fifth-order WENO finite difference scheme in space. The main advantage of using the WENO scheme is its capability for properly solving the discontinuities in the domain without needing any artificial viscosity, limiter function or filter. Hence, this scheme is stable, and thus, it is suitable for simulating very... 

This paper represents a numerical study on the effects of landslide initial submergence and its geotechnical and rheological properties on the characteristics of landslide-generated waves (LGWs) and landslide deformation. A number of 117 numerical experiments are performed using a two-layer Coulomb Mixture Flow (2LCMFlow) model on a real-sized numerical flume as a simplified cross section of the Maku dam reservoir, located in the Northwest of Iran. Three different initial locations are considered for landslide representing a subaerial (SAL), a semi-submerged (SSL), and a submarine (SML) landslide. Based on the numerical results, the majority of SMLs and in some cases SSLs generate tsunami... 

A study of the wheel and rail wear phenomenon can provide a chance for the optimal use of wheel profile, which results in cost efficiency, dynamic stability, travel comfort, and safety to prevent the derailment, especially in curves. In this paper, the experimental data are recorded based on the field measurements for worn wheels of a passenger wagon in the "Southern line" of Iran's railway system and are combined with the dynamic simulations to study the effects of severe wheel flange wear on the dynamics of wagon. The results show that the amount of wheel wear (especially the wheel flange) directly impacts the dynamic behavior of the wagon in curves. In addition, based on the history of... 

In this paper, a multiscale homogenization approach is developed for fully coupled saturated porous media to represent the idealized sugar cube model, which is generally employed in fractured porous media on the basis of dual porosity models. In this manner, an extended version of the Hill-Mandel theory that incorporates the microdynamic effects into the multiscale analysis is presented, and the concept of the deformable dual porosity model is demonstrated. Numerical simulations are performed employing the multiscale analysis and dual porosity model, and the results are compared with the direct numerical simulation through 2 numerical examples. Finally, a combined multiscale-dual porosity... 

This study considers a secure network coding problem in which some secret keys are shared among legitimate nodes, and there exists an eavesdropper that is able to hear a subset of links. We show the equivalency of secure network coding under weak and strong secrecy conditions. For linear network coding, we show a stronger result: equivalency of "perfect secrecy and zero-error constraints" to "weak secrecy and ϵ-error constraints". This is a secure version of the result obtained by Langberg and Effiros on the equivalence of zero-error and ϵ-error regions in the network coding problem with co-located sources. Jalali and Ho exploited extractor functions to prove the weak and strong rate region...