Sharif Digital Repository

This paper presents a method to control a manipulator system grasping a rigid-body payload so that the motion of the combined system as a consequence of external applied forces is the same as any other free-floating rigid-body (with different inertial properties). This allows 0-g emulation of a scaled spacecraft prototype under the test in a 1-g laboratory environment. The controller consisting of motion feedback and force/moment feedback adjusts the motion of the test spacecraft so as to match that of the flight spacecraft, even if the latter has flexible appendages (such as solar panels) and the former is rigid. The stability of the overall system is analytically investigated, and the... 

Time delay in attitude sensors is one of the performance limiting factors in controlling the satellite attitude. In this paper, we investigate attitude control of a fully actuated satellite in presence of constant and known delay in attitude measurement. The proposed controller consists of a matrix gain which is computed by solving a time varying matrix differential equation depending on the time delay. We assume that the moment-of-inertia matrix of the satellite is unknown. The controller guarantees asymptotic convergence of the satellite attitude and angular velocity to their desired values in presence of delay. Finally, a simulation example is presented that illustrates performance of the... 

Industry 4.0 is the digitalization of the manufacturing systems based on Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) for developing a manufacturing system to gain efficiency and improve productivity. Cloud Manufacturing (CM) is a paradigm of Industry 4.0. Cloud Manufacturing System (CMS) considers anything as a service. The end product is developed based on the service composition in the CMS according to consumers’ needs. Also, composite services are developed based on the interaction of MCS providers from different geographical locations. Therefore, the appropriate Manufacturing Cloud Service (MCS) composition is an important problem based on the real-world conditions in CMS. The game... 

Recently, manufacturing firms and logistics service providers have been encouraged to deploy the most recent features of Information Technology (IT) to prevail in the competitive circumstances of manufacturing industries. Industry 4.0 and Cloud manufacturing (CMfg), accompanied by a service-oriented architecture model, have been regarded as renowned approaches to enable and facilitate the transition of conventional manufacturing business models into more efficient and productive ones. Furthermore, there is an aptness among the manufacturing and logistics businesses as service providers to synergize and cut down the investment and operational costs via sharing logistics fleet and production... 

Recently, manufacturing firms and logistics service providers have been encouraged to deploy the most recent features of Information Technology (IT) to prevail in the competitive circumstances of manufacturing industries. Industry 4.0 and Cloud manufacturing (CMfg), accompanied by a service-oriented architecture model, have been regarded as renowned approaches to enable and facilitate the transition of conventional manufacturing business models into more efficient and productive ones. Furthermore, there is an aptness among the manufacturing and logistics businesses as service providers to synergize and cut down the investment and operational costs via sharing logistics fleet and production... 

Demand forecasting plays an important role as a decision support tool in power system management, especially in smart grid and liberalized power market. In this paper, a demand forecasting method is presented by using support vector regression (SVR). The proposed method is applied to practical hourly data of the Greater Tehran Electricity Distribution Company. The SVR parameters are selected by using a grid optimization process and an investigation on different kernel functions. Moreover, correlation analysis is used to find exogenous variables. Acceptable accuracy of load prediction is shown by comparing the result of SVR model to that of the artificial neural networks and the actual data,... 

The secretary problems are of types of the optimal stopping theory problems and are also distinguished as well known problems in applied probability, statistics and decision theory fields. The importance of these kinds of problems defines many new conditions which have been discussed till now. The significance of these types of problems in social issues causes to define many conditions which are vastly discussed. In this paper, a new condition of this problem is considered. These conditions which have been performed using a real time method are based on Multi-Agent Systems techniques. In this paper, after evaluating this method, the resulted answers are examined using Multi-Agent system... 

The isomerization of D-glucose to D-fructose using the immobilized glucose isomerase, as a typical model system of solid-liquid enzyme reactions has been carried out in a novel type of two-impinging-jets reactor (TIJR), which is characterized by a rotating inner cylinder in a stationary one. Because of the impinging process, turbulence, and complex trajectory of the solid particles within the reactor, the fractional conversion of glucose obtained in the TIJR increased dramatically compared to that obtained by conventional reaction systems. A compartment model was considered to describe the pattern of flow [residence time distribution (RTD) of solid particles] within the TIJR. Considering... 

A compartment model was developed to describe the flow pattern of gas within the dense zone of a membrane-assisted fluidized-bed reactor (MAFBR), in the bubbling mode of operation for steam reforming of methane both with (adiabatic) and without (isothermal) entering oxygen. Considering such a flow pattern and using the experimental data reported elsewhere [Roy S, Pruden BB, Adris AM, Grace JR, Lim CJ. Fluidized-bed steam methane reforming with oxygen input. Chem Eng Sci 1999; 54:2095-2102.], the parameters of the developed model (i.e., number of compartments for the bubble and emulsion phases) were determined and fair agreements were obtained between model predictions and experimental data.... 

In this article, the transesterification of waste cooking oil (WCO) to biodiesel fuel (BDF) has been studied using KOH loaded on millimetric γ-Al2O3 particles in a novel type of two-impinging-jets reactor (TIJR). The effects of various parameters such as KOH loading (wt %), catalyst loading, and methanol-to-oil molar ratio on the BDF yield were studied. The catalyst particles with a KOH loading of 25 wt % at appropriate reaction conditions (i.e., catalyst loading = 4 wt % and methanol-to-oil molar ratio = 15:1) and at 65 °C were used in the TIJR. The influences of various operating and design parameters such as jet Reynolds number value, feed flow rate, jet diameter, and the internozzle... 

Mixed-convection flow of nanofluids inside a vertical rectangular channel partially filled with open-cell metal foam and subject to a constant wall-heat flux was investigated experimentally and numerically. Al2O3-water nanofluids with different concentrations were prepared and their stability was examined using UV-Vis spectroscopy. Dynamic light scattering method was used to determine particle size distribution of the nanofluid feedstock. The outlet temperature and pressure drop were measured for different nanofluid flow rates (i.e., Reynolds number values). In the numerical section, a two-dimensional volume-averaged form of the governing equations was used. The velocity and temperature... 

In this article, transient hydrodynamic and heat-transfer behavior of Newtonian fluid flow in vertical parallel-plate channels partially filled with a porous medium has been investigated numerically. In this regard, the influences of macroscopic local inertial term and the viscous heating due to the viscous dissipation were taken into account in the momentum equations of porous region and the thermal energy equations, respectively. Moreover, Forchheimer-Brinkman extended Darcy model was used to model fluid flow in the porous region. In addition, an analytical solution was obtained in the case of negligible Brinkman and Forchheimer number values at the steady-state conditions. The predicted... 

In this article, adsorption of p-xylene, m-xylene, o-xylene, and ethylbenzene on Na-BETA type zeolite in liquid phase at 15, 25, and 35 °C has been studied and the single adsorption isotherms have been obtained and reported. The Langmuir isotherm model was used to describe the experimental adsorption isotherm data. It was found that p-xylene is more strongly adsorbed component followed by ethylbenzene, m-xylene and o-xylene. This means that this adsorbent is selective for p-xylene. Using Langmuir isotherm model, the saturation adsorption capacities of the adsorbent were obtained as follows 143 mg/g for p-xylene, 105 mg/g for ethylbenzene, 83 mg/g for m-xylene, and 68 mg/g for o-xylene at 25... 

The mass-transfer characteristics of a new type of two-impinging-streams reactor (TISR) was studied by means of sodium sulfite solution as the liquid phase and air as the gas phase, in the presence and absence of various types of surface-active agents (SAAs). The influences of anionic, cationic, and nonionic SAAs on the specific interfacial area and overall volumetric mass-transfer coefficient obtained in the TISR were investigated. It was found that the presence of a little amount of the above-mentioned contaminants increases the specific interfacial area and decreases the overall volumetric mass-transfer coefficient. On the basis of the experimental results obtained for various types of... 

Heterogeneous solid catalysts comprising CaO and ZrO 2 mixed oxides with various Ca-to-Zr molar ratios were synthesized by means of coprecipitation method. These synthesized mixed oxide catalysts were used for the transesterification of waste cooking oil (WCO) as feedstock with methanol to produce biodiesel fuel (BDF) at 65 °C and 1 atm. The influences of Ca-to-Zr molar ratio, catalyst loading, methanol-to-oil molar ratio, and the reaction time on the BDF yield were carefully investigated. In addition, the stability of prepared solid catalysts was studied. These catalysts were characterized by using techniques of X-ray diffraction, X-ray florescence, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, surface...