Sharif Digital Repository

A hot gas generator is a compact heat exchanger that produces high temperature or enthalpy gases. This paper presents two methods for controlling the system. The first one is an adaptive sliding mode controller that is a Lyapunov based method and proposed to confront the dynamic modeling deficiencies and system uncertainties. The second one is a linear adaptive controller that gives a new attractive ability to the system which can track a complicated requested path. Each of the presented controllers has some capabilities that may be preferred to other. In this paper, these methods are extensively compared by several transient inputs. On the other hand, since heat exchangers are typically... 

We use the Fokker-Planck equation and its moment equations to study the collective behavior of interacting particles in unsteady one-dimensional flows. Particles interact according to a longrange attractive and a short-range repulsive potential field known as Morse potential. We assume Stokesian drag force between particles and their carrier fluid and find analytic single-peaked traveling solutions for the spatial density of particles in the catastrophic phase. In steady flow conditions the streaming velocity of particles is identical to their carrier fluid, but we show that particle streaming is asynchronous with an unsteady carrier fluid. Using linear perturbation analysis, the stability... 

This paper addresses a nonlinear model predictive controller design for a single-phase PFC rectifier exploiting the Sheppard-Taylor converter. After approximation of the tracking error in the receding horizon by its Taylor-series expansion to any specified order, an analytic solution to the MPC is developed and a closed-form nonlinear predictive controller is introduced. The proposed nonlinear model predictive control (NMPC) derived using approximation can stabilize the original nonlinear systems if certain conditions, which can be met by properly choosing predictive times and the order for Taylor expansion, are satisfied. The main advantage of this digital control method is that unity power... 

In this paper CCM/CVM operation and modeling of the Sheppard-Taylor topology is reviewed and a predictive control strategy is applied for a Sheppard-Taylor-based power factor correction (PFC) rectifier. Compared to conventional boost or buck - boost PFC's, this topology allows a better current tracking at the AC side, with a relatively reduced voltage at the DC side. Consequently, the high frequency AC filters required by the buck PECs are avoided, and the voltage stresses on the boost switches are significantly reduced. Furthermore In predictive control strategy the duty cycle required to achieve unity power factor in a half line period can be calculated in advance. The main advantage of... 

We report the existence of interfacial instability in the two-dimensional channel flow of a sediment suspension whose particles diffuse in the carrier fluid due to shear-induced collisions. We derive partial differential equations that govern the deformations of the interface between the sediment suspension and the clear fluid, and devise a perturbation method that preserves the positivity of the particle volume fraction. We solve perturbed momentum, particle transport and deforming interface equations to show that a Kelvin-Helmholtz-type unstable wave develops at the interface for wavelengths longer than a critical value. Short-wavelength oscillations of the interface are damped due to... 

Water flooding is being widely used in the petroleum industry and has been considered as a simple inexpensive secondary recovery method. But in fractured formations, existence of fracture system in reservoir rock induces an adverse effect on oil recovery by water flooding. Polymer flooding has been successfully applied as an alternative enhanced oil recovery method in fractured formations. But, the role of fracture geometrical properties on macroscopic efficiency of polymer flooding is not yet well-understood, especially in fractured five-spot systems. In this work five-spot glass micromodel, because of micro-visibility, ease of multiple experimentations and also presence of the unexplored... 

The load current of three level/phase neutral point clamped rectifier could be expressed in two forms: the load current involving the current of capacitor C1, and the load current involving the current of capacitor C2. Using the Euler-Lagrange model based on the superposition law and the obtained load current, a new dual Lagrangian model of the rectifier is founded in this paper and then the two obtained nonlinear state space models are developed in dq0 reference frame. According to the new model, two positive definite Lyapunov function candidates are defined and a Lyapunov-based control is applied to the rectifier. Each of the function is utilized to control its corresponding output voltage... 

This paper presents a novel Gait Pattern Generator ((IPC) developed for the "Alice" social humanoid robot, which up to now lacked an appropriate walking pattern. Due to t he limitations of this robot, the proposed gate pattern generator was formulated based on a nine-mass model to decrease the modeling errors and t he inverse kinematics of the whole lower-body was solved in such a way that the robot remained statically stable during t he movements. The main challenge of this work was to solve t he inverse kinematics of a 7-link chain with 12 degrees of freedom. For this purpose, a new graphical-numerical technique has been provided using the definition of the kinematic equations of the robot... 

This paper presents a novel Gait Pattern Generator ((IPC) developed for the "Alice" social humanoid robot, which up to now lacked an appropriate walking pattern. Due to t he limitations of this robot, the proposed gate pattern generator was formulated based on a nine-mass model to decrease the modeling errors and t he inverse kinematics of the whole lower-body was solved in such a way that the robot remained statically stable during t he movements. The main challenge of this work was to solve t he inverse kinematics of a 7-link chain with 12 degrees of freedom. For this purpose, a new graphical-numerical technique has been provided using the definition of the kinematic equations of the robot... 

The present study investigates an energy management strategy based on reinforcement learning for series-parallel hybrid vehicles. Hybrid electric vehicles allow using more advanced power management policies because of their complexity of power management. Towards this feature, a Q-Learning algorithm is proposed to design an energy management strategy. Compared to previous studies, an online reward function is defined to optimize fuel consumption and battery life cycle. Moreover, in the provided method, prior knowledge of the cycle and exact modeling of the vehicle are not required. The introduced strategy is simulated for four driving cycles in MATLAB software linked with ADVISOR. The... 

Over the past few decades, industrial development has caused a dramatic increment in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, as a leading cause of climate change. Modifying the industrial plants' environmental performance is the main pillar of improving efficiency that can reduce the waste of resources and make achieving lower-cost global emission reduction targets of the Kyoto protocol's clean development mechanism (CDM) possible. Considering the essentiality of knowledge-based research in increasing the awareness of policymakers by providing better access to accurate and reliable information, an analytical survey on efficiency in oil, gas, and petrochemical industries has been conducted by... 

Over the past few decades, industrial development has caused a dramatic increment in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, as a leading cause of climate change. Modifying the industrial plants' environmental performance is the main pillar of improving efficiency that can reduce the waste of resources and make achieving lower-cost global emission reduction targets of the Kyoto protocol's clean development mechanism (CDM) possible. Considering the essentiality of knowledge-based research in increasing the awareness of policymakers by providing better access to accurate and reliable information, an analytical survey on efficiency in oil, gas, and petrochemical industries has been conducted by... 

This paper attempts to study the demand function of natural gas in Iran using smooth transition regression model (STR). To this end, gross domestic productions (GDP), real price of natural gas and temperature have been employed as variables explaining the natural gas demand from 1971 to 2009. The results indicate that natural gas demand follows an LSTR1 nonlinear two-regime model if the real price of natural gas is considered as the transition variable. Estimation results also indicate that the slope parameter approximately equals the high value of 10 and the threshold value is 31.82. Rials. 111 USD=24,700 Rials (IRR) at April 2013. per one cubic meter consumption of natural gas. The results... 

The role of motor control in development of low back pain is subject of many researches both in theoretical and experimental fields. In this work flexion-extension movement of lumbar spine have been controlled by three different methods, including feedback linearization (FBL), PD control and their combinations. The model involves 7 links: 1 link for pelvis, 5 links for lumbar vertebrae and 1 link for trunk. Torque actuators have been used on each joint to make them follow desired trajectory. In linear control method, equations of motion have been linearized with respect to upright position and then control signals have been applied in the direction of eigenvectors. Robustness of each method... 

Many companies regularly run Big Data analysis, and need to optimize their resource usage considering cost, deadline, and environmental impact simultaneously. The cloud allows choosing from various virtual machines (VM) where the number and type of VMs affect the outcome such as the time for data placement and data shuffle phases, a task's energy consumption and execution time, and the makespan of jobs. We provide provisioning and scheduling algorithms to minimize environmental impact, considering the above factors, for frequently executed MapReduce jobs. To mathematically model the problem and obtain the optimal solution, we present an Integer Linear Programming (ILP) model and then... 

Comprehensive numerical analyses are conducted to simulate and capture “Buzz” phenomenon in a supersonic mixed compression air inlet. The buzz is an unsteady self-sustained feature that occurs in supersonic inlets, especially when operating in their subcritical condition. In such a situation, the shock waves oscillate along the inlet and cause mass flow fluctuations inside the inlet that will deteriorate the engine performance significantly. An axisymmetric unsteady numerical simulation was used to solve the Navier–Stokes equations combined with the URANS SST k–ω turbulence model. The simulations for two different free-stream Mach numbers of M∞=2.0 and 2.2 and at two specific subcritical... 

Numerous studies yet have been carried out on downscaling of the large-scale climate data using both dynamical and statistical methods to investigate the hydrological and meteorological impacts of climate change on different parts of the world. This study was also conducted to investigate the capability of feedforward neural network with error back-propagation algorithm to downscale the provincial segmentation of Iran (30 provinces) on a daily scale. This model was proposed for the downscaling daily temperature, precipitation and wind speed data, and it was calibrated and verified by using the daily outputs derived from the National Center for Environmental Prediction (NCEP) database... 

Contingency screening and ranking is one of the most important issues for security assessment in the field of power system operation. The objective of contingency screening and ranking is to quickly and accurately select a short list of critical contingencies from a large list of potential contingencies and rank them according to their severity. Then suitable preventive control actions can be implemented considering contingencies that are likely to affect the power system performance. In this paper a novel approach is presented for contingency ranking based on static security assessment (SSA). This method uses weighted performance index with the application of Analytical Hierarchy Process... 

Resistance spot welding was used to join austenitic stainless steel and galvanized low carbon steel. The relationship between failure mode and weld fusion zone characteristics (size and microstructure) was studied. It was found that spot weld strength in the pullout failure mode is controlled by the strength and fusion zone size of the galvanized steel side. The hardness of the fusion zone which is governed by the dilution between two base metals, and fusion zone size of galvanized carbon steel side are dominant factors in determining the failure mode. © 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved  

Urban air quality is a major concern throughout the world. The concentration of human activities in a relatively small area puts enormous pressure on urban systems and has led to numerous environmental problems which have created major problems for urban air quality management. The complex nature of air pollution, especially with respect to health impacts in urban areas, has prompted attempts to define the so-called indicators that condense and simplify the available monitoring data to make them suitable for public reporting and decision makers. Several concepts and indicators exist to measure and rank urban areas in terms of their infrastructural, socioeconomic and environment-related...