Sharif Digital Repository

Wound-Rotor (WR) resolvers are similar to two-phase synchronous generators. Their difference is related to the excitation signal. While DC voltage is used for exciting synchronous generator, high frequency AC voltage is employed for that of resolver. The common waveform for excitation signal of resolver is sinusoidal voltage. However, preparing the high frequency sinusoidal voltage in the resolver to digital converter (RDC) is always a challenge. Therefore, in this paper different high frequency AC waveforms are applied as the excitation signal of the resolver and the estimated position, resulted from RDC, is discussed. The aim of this work is to find an appropriate excitation waveform that... 

This paper is concerned with a distributed model predictive control (DMPC) method that is based on a distributed optimisation method with two-level architecture for communication. Feasibility (constraints satisfaction by the approximated solution), convergence and optimality of this distributed optimisation method are mathematically proved. For an automated irrigation channel, the satisfactory performance of the proposed DMPC method in attenuation of the undesired upstream transient error propagation and amplification phenomenon is illustrated and compared with the performance of another DMPC method that exploits a single-level architecture for communication. It is illustrated that the DMPC... 

Users often have very specific visual content in mind that they are searching for. The most natural way to communicate this content to an image search engine is to use key-words that specify various properties or attributes of the content. A naive way of dealing with such multi-attribute queries is the following: train a classifier for each attribute independently, and then combine their scores on images to judge their fit to the query. We argue that this may not be the most effective or efficient approach. Conjunctions of attribute often correspond to very characteristic appearances. It would thus be beneficial to train classifiers that detect these conjunctions as a whole. But not all... 

One of the methods that is used nowadays in enhanced oil recovery is surfactant flooding. The main mechanisms of surfactant flooding in reservoir consist of reduction of interfacial tension between water and oil and modification of rock wettability. In this study, the authors simulate the surfactant injection process in Darcy scale and in one-dimensional, multicomponent, multiphase state, and effects of physical phenomena such as adsorption, dispersion, convection, and exchange between fluids and solids are considered. Wettability alteration of reservoir rock due to presence of surfactant in injected fluid is detected in relative permeability and capillary pressure curves. First, the authors... 

In this paper, a new zero-voltage-switching high power-factor (PF) rectifier with Line-Modulated Fixed-Off-Time current control is introduced, that off time is a function of the instantaneous line voltage. The auxiliary circuit provides soft switching for all semiconductor devices, without any extra current and voltage stress on the main switches. The proposed converter is bridgeless, and all semiconductor devices are soft switched. In addition, there is no extra stress on the switches. Thus, the conduction and switching losses are reduced and maximum efficiency is achieved. A 250W, with an input ac voltage of 90265 Vrms and an output voltage 400 Vdc, 100 kHz is designed and simulated to... 

In this paper, a new zero-voltage-switching, high power-factor, bridgeless rectifier is introduced. In this topology, an auxiliary circuit provides soft switching for all of the power semiconductor devices. Thus the switching losses are reduced and the highest efficiency can be achieved. The proposed converter has been analyzed and a design procedure has been introduced. The control circuit for the converter has also been developed. Based on the given approach, a 250 W, 400 Vdc prototype converters has been designed at 100 kHz for universal input voltage (90-264 Vrms) applications. A maximum efficiency of 94.6% and a power factor correction over 0.99 has been achieved. The simulation and... 

This work presents results on the development of robust H∞ control strategy for Networked Control Systems (NCSs) by involving uncertainties in both communication and controlled plant subsystems. The network-induced delays in both communication links (to and from the controller) are assumed to behave as Markov chains. An analytical approach is presented to calculate the transition probabilities of the Markovian network-induced delays. By employing the augmentation method, the resultant system is converted into a delay-free uncertain singular Markovian jump system with bounded transition probabilities. New conditions are established to assure that the uncertain NCS satisfies an H∞ performance... 

This article is concerned with remote monitoring and control of the 2-degrees of freedom (DoF) robotic manipulators, which have nonlinear dynamics over the packet erasure channel, which is an abstract model for communication over the Internet, WiFi, or Zigbee modules. This type of communication is subject to imperfections, such as random packet dropout and rate distortion. These imperfections cause a significant challenge for monitoring and control of robotic manipulators in the industrial environments because sensitive data, such as sensor data and control commands may not ever reach to their destination resulting in significant performance degradation. Therefore, the effects of these... 

The role of emulsions as a prevalent phenomenon is broadly investigated in the petroleum industry since forming the emulsion has many severe harmful implications. Heavy components of crude oil such as wax and asphaltene make the water-in-oil (w/o) emulsion more stable, while the role of these components on the emulsion viscosity has not been fully understood. In this regard, to find a proper demulsifier to break these emulsions, it is necessary to know the mechanisms of emulsion formation by heavy oil components. In this study, the effects of waxy-oil and asphaltenic-oil on w/o emulsion were investigated by measuring volume and viscosity of the formed emulsion after an elapsed time, followed... 

Nowadays, the salinisation of groundwaters causes a substantial reduction in the yield of agricultural lands. To reduce the impact of this problem on the profitability of the lands, farmers tend to use desalination processes. However, this transition is not simple and some technical, economic, and environmental issues should be considered. In this study, we highlight some key factors for the use of desalination processes in the agricultural sector. Also, we conduct a techno-economic evaluation of using reverse osmosis desalination in a pistachio orchard as a high-value crop. Moreover, because of the solar energy potential in the location of the case study, the use of solar panels is assessed... 

Despite the great potential of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) in various areas of biomedicine, concerns regarding their carcinogenicity, inefficient dispersion in aqueous solutions and biological activity in vivo still remain. One important and feasible route to overcome these barriers is modification of CNTs with polymers, which are widely studied and play a vital role in biological and biomedical fields, especially in drug delivery. This comprehensive review focuses on the achievements of our and other groups in currently used methods to functionalize the surface of CNTs with polymers to produce anticancer drug delivery systems. We have intensively studied covalent and noncovalent interactions... 

MEG regeneration and injection unit regenerates aqueous MEG. The main goal of this unit is approaching desired MEG concentration whereas MEG loss via removed water is a big issue. Circulating glycol is polluted with Ca++ and Mg++ which forms carbonate scale and causes plugging of pipe lines, filters, lean/rich exchanger, still column packings and reboiler tube bundle and decreases their efficiency, consequently increases MEG loss via top product. Different alternatives exist according to similar experiences around the world. Using specific criteria and AHP (Analytical Hierarchy Process) method priority of these alternatives has been found. Results are as following: 1. Increasing number of... 

In this study, maleic anhydride grafted polypropylene microporous flat-sheet membranes were prepared via a thermally induced phase separation method with a mixture of dibutyl phthalate and dioctyl phthalate as a diluent. The effects of the polymer composition and coagulation bath temperature on the morphology and performance of the fabricated membranes were investigated. The hydrophilicity results of the membranes demonstrated that membrane modification reduced the water contact angle by about 45°, whereas the pure water flux was enhanced about four times. The antifouling behavior of the fabricated membranes was also investigated in a membrane bioreactor. The results show that the pure water... 

In this paper, we address the stability problem of a noiseless linear time invariant control system over parallel Gaussian channels with feedback. It is shown that the eigenvalues-rate condition which has been proved as a necessary condition, is also sufficient for stability over parallel Gaussian channels. In fact, it is proved that for stabilizing a control system over the parallel Gaussian channels, it suffices that the Shannon channel capacity obtained by the water filling technique is greater than the sum of the logarithm of the unstable eigenvalues magnitude. In order to prove this sufficient condition, we propose a new nonlinear joint source channel coding for parallel Gaussian... 

This research investigates the effect of process parameters on the geometry and properties of In625 parts, manufactured by the direct laser metal deposition (DLMD) process. For this purpose, eight parts, consisting of 5 layers on top of each other, were manufactured, and the effect of laser power, laser focal plane position, and scanning speed on the height, width, and surface smoothness of each of them was investigated using design of experiment (DOE). The experimental results showed that the height of the parts manufactured by 800 W/mm and 200 W/mm of energy density is 3.69 mm and 6.12 mm, respectively. The thickness of the parts manufactured by 80 W/mm and 200 W/mm of energy density is... 

In this study, three equations of state (EOS) in conjunction with computational fluid dynamics (CFD) modeling were used to predict the Joule – Thomson (JT) process behavior for natural gas and various pure gases. The JT effect is encountered in several industrial applications. The experimental determination of the JT coefficient (JTC) is complicated, and there is little gas pressure-volume-temperature (PVT) data available for estimating these JTC. Thus, the development of an efficient model to predict the JT effect in industrial processes is necessary. This study was carried out to attain a clear view of the single phase-flow of hydrocarbons and nitrogen in the JT process with CFD modeling.... 

The use of solar-powered reverse osmosis desalination systems is a sustainable and environmentally friendly solution in the desalination industry. However, there are some substantial technical and economic challenges due to the intermittency and fluctuation of solar energy. Recent technological improvement and feed-in tariff policies enable these systems to be competitive with conventional grid-connected reverse osmosis systems. In this paper, a feasibility study of the integration of solar panels with the grid to power small-scale reverse osmosis systems (namely up to 2000 m3/day) is conducted in Iran, as a country with a low price of electricity. For this purpose, a city located on the... 

The use of solar-powered reverse osmosis desalination systems is a sustainable and environmentally friendly solution in the desalination industry. However, there are some substantial technical and economic challenges due to the intermittency and fluctuation of solar energy. Recent technological improvement and feed-in tariff policies enable these systems to be competitive with conventional grid-connected reverse osmosis systems. In this paper, a feasibility study of the integration of solar panels with the grid to power small-scale reverse osmosis systems (namely up to 2000 m3/day) is conducted in Iran, as a country with a low price of electricity. For this purpose, a city located on the... 

This paper is concerned with tracking state trajectory at remote controller, stability and performance of linear time-invariant noiseless dynamic systems with multiple observations over the packet erasure network subject to random packet dropout and transmission delay that does not necessarily use feedback channel full time. Three cases are considered in this paper: (1) without feedback channel, (2) with feedback channel intermittently and (3) with full time availability of feedback channel. For all three cases, coding strategies that result in reliable tracking of state trajectory at remote controller with asymptotically zero mean absolute estimation error are presented. Asymptotic mean... 

This paper is concerned with the stability of linear time-invariant dynamic systems over the packet erasure channel subject to minimum bit rate constraint when an encoder and a decoder are unaware of the control signal. This assumption results in co-designing the encoder, decoder and controller. The encoder, decoder, controller and conditions relating transmission rate to packet erasure probability and eigenvalues of the system matrix A are presented for almost sure asymptotic stability of linear time-invariant dynamic systems over the packet erasure channel with feedback acknowledgment. When the eigenvalues of the system matrix A are real valued, it is shown that the obtained condition for...