Sharif Digital Repository

Increased environmental concerns and high oil prices have encouraged highway agencies to maximize the use of recycled materials like Reclaimed Asphalt Pavements (RAP) in pavement construction. However, utilization of RAP has limited to low percentage, generally less than 25%. This is due aged, stiffer, and less strain tolerant asphalt binder in RAP. As the RAP proportion increases, a large amount of the aged binder will be introduced into the mixture. The excessive stiffness of HMA mixture tends to lead to less workable mixture. Studies were conducted to examine the effect of Sasobit on the workablility of high RAP mixtures. The results indicated while the utilization of Sasobit had improved... 

This thesis suggests a practical system designed for the implementation of vision-based virtual assistants, aligning with the identified needs in the research background. Distinguishing itself from current literature, this study thoroughly explores and delineates the computing hierarchy while also suggesting the appropriate software architecture customized for the effective utilization of virtual assistants. Focusing on the most common application in vision-based virtual assistants—object detection and tracking—the research introduces an efficient multi-object tracking method using the tracking-by-detection paradigm. Notably, the proposed tracker stands out for its minimal computational... 

Numerical investigation of flow field and determination of velocity components in swirl flow are novel and important subjects in combustion chamber of swirl flow. The exact understanding of vortex phenomena and flow structures in vortex engine results in better design and control in terms of stability, geometry, cooling, and combustion efficiency. Although, numerical approaches are computationally complex, they are worthwhile and efficient. The aim of this work is to study the velocity field in a bidirectional swirl flow within the combustion chamber using numerical approaches. The investigation of flow field has been performed in the cold chamber. Four different models (RSM and LES) have... 

We present here an analysis of controlling the Polymer Electrolyte Membrane Fuel Cells (PEMFCs) using the Q-learning algorithm, the most widely-known among reinforcement learning (RL) techniques. The method is to train the controller to guide and sustain the fuel cell power output in the 2.5 kW mark by way of manipulating elements of the reaction subsystem including the fuel cell current, the relative humidity, and the anode/cathode pressures. As the Q-learning algorithm need be implemented within a fuel cell simulation environment, the mathematical model known as Amphlett steady-state model of the PEM fuel cell was employed. The semi-empirical nature of this model necessitates the... 

Aluminum sulfate is widely used in water treatment as a polyelectrolyte. Its dissolution and recrystallization into nanoparticles directly affects the working conditions. This study concerns determination of the metastable zone and induction time in nucleation of aluminum sulfate nanoparticles in aqueous media and in presence of acetone as anti-solvent. Later the effect of SDS on the metastable zone and induction time are also studied.. The study also shows if the presence of anti-solvents and surface active agents can vary this phenomenon. The study also adds to our understanding of the media in creation and stabilization of nanoparticles. This project has a special focus on the changes... 

Taghizadeh Manzari, M. (In this work, a modified Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics (SPH) method, with a new moving solid boundary treatment approach, is utilized to simulate the particulateflow problems. The renormalized first and second derivative schemes which lead tothe consistency of the method, are also used along with a modification to the continuityequation which prevents the spurious pressure oscillations. The proposed methodis validated by solving benchmark problems of solid body motion in channel flows.There is a good agreement between the obtained results and those reported in theliterature. The convergence of solutions for different domain discretizations is alsoassessed. In order... 

The solution to the hyperbolic conservation laws may involve discontinuities or shocks even if initial condition is smooth. Devising low cost methods which can identify shocks accurately, has always been a challenge. This project focuses on applying high resolution schemes to the solution of two and three phase Buckley-Leverett equation and hyperbolic conservation laws in general.Buckley-Leverett equation is a transport equation which is used to describe two and three phase flows in porous media. Weighted Essentially Non-Oscillatory (WENO) schemes with reconstruction on fluxes in finite difference formulation are used to solve one dimensional systems of equations including Euler equation as... 

Nowadays energy consumption increases in our daily life and incredibly enhancement of growth rate can be seen recent years. Hence, the use of renewable energy is prioritized. Solar energy is one of the choices because it is free and available. In this research, it has been tried to get electrical and thermal power at a reasonable cost both during the day and night. The system is equipped with a linear parabolic concentrator with a collector installed in the center of the concentrator which has been installed on its faces photovoltaic cells and thermoelectric modules, and five different systems have been tested with different components. Also, the paraffin has been used as a phase change... 

Today, with the expansion of the use of renewable energy and the increase in the production of electrical products, which has resulted in the increase of active consumers in the electricity market, making an optimal decision about the production and consumption of electrical energy has become particularly important. This research examines a sequential decision-making problem in an environment with high uncertainties in which an active household consumer and a renewable producer are simultaneously present in the electricity market. The main goal of this research is to provide an optimal model for making decisions regarding the consumption and production of electric power in the power market... 

Learning of shape classes from a set of given data is of special practical importance in computer vision. Large variations in the surrounding objects makes the problem of shape learning a very di°cult one. These di°culties may vary according to diferences in pose and part articulations of shapes. Despite all of the problems, large applications of this problem in areas such as tracking, object recognition and text recognition inspires many groups to work on it. In this thesis we aim to investigate a solution for this problem  

Many human inventions are inspired by nature, such as fish swimming, bird/insect flight, etc. A basic consideration for the design of swimming machines is the design of propulsors. A creative design of propulsors can be inspired by fish locomotion. The term locomotion means that thrust is generated by undulation of fish body. Thus, there is no need to have an external propulsor. We need to understand how thrust is obtained by fish locomotion. In this study, sub-carangiform motion, which is a well known locomotion and which is practiced by most fish, is simulated numerically using Lattice Boltzmann method (LBM). To simulate the geometry of fishlike body, the profile of a flexible airfoil... 

Magnetorheological fluids are suspensions of magnetic solid particles suspended in a nonmagnetic matrix fluid. By imposing an external magnetic field, particles are arranged in microstructures aligned with the external field and hence, dramatically affect the fluid flow. Since the strength of the magnetic field determines the resistance of these microstructures against flow, the rheology of the suspension is a function of the intensity of the external magnetic field. The goal of the present work is to study the role of non-gap-spanning magnetic clusters on the rheology of a magnetorheological fluid. Here, first a robust tool for direct numerical simulation of magnetic suspensions is... 

Multiphase flows in porous media hold significant importance in industrial processes and natural phenomena, being related to topics such as hydrocarbon recovery, groundwater flow, catalysts, and fuel cells. In recent decades, numerous experimental methods have been employed to study these issues, enabling the observation of dynamic interface behavior on a large scale, although accurately describing fluid flow details at the pore scale remains challenging. Laboratory studies using micromodels can predict the fingering patterns and their initial growth but do not provide useful information about the evolution and growth of fingering in later stages. Numerical simulators can complement... 

Lithium-ion battery is a type of rechargeable batteries that operates based on the movement of lithium ions within the battery, generating an electric current in the circuit. During charging and discharging, these batteries generate heat; therefore, it is crucial to employ an efficient battery thermal management system to maintain the temperature within a safe range. In this research, we analyze the temperature control of a battery pack comprising 168 largescale lithium-ion cells, configured as a rectangular cube with a capacity of 53 Ah, under a high discharge rate (5C). The analysis utilizes a hybrid battery thermal management system based on phase change materials (PCMs) and liquid... 

High-Speed Crafts’ motion has lots of hydrodynamic complexities, so analytical study of their motion is not feasible. Meanwhile, experimental analysis of their reactions in water is not time-consuming & cost-effective. In spite of code generating & developing problems and complexities in the primary stage of numerical modeling of such problems, this method is the most popular & efficient one. On the other hand, flow around high-speed craft bodies has a turbulent nature and needs special cares to predict reasonable results. In the present study, after representing an introduction about the turbulence modeling, we discissed about governing equation such as momentum, volume fraction and rigid... 

Part 1
1,3-dipolar cycloaddition reactions offer convenient routes for the construction of a variety of five-membered heterocycles. This thesis represents a simple synthetic method via 1,3-dipolar cycloaddition reaction to prepare a novel class of spiro pyrrolidines and spiro pyrrolizidines which exhibit many biological activities. Non-stabilized azomethine ylides which generated in situ by the decarboxylative condensation of ninhydrin with proline and sarcosine were used as a 1,3-dipoles. On the other hand, chalcone and its derivatives with an impressive array of pharmacological activities were the dipolarophiles in these reactions. The reactions were carried out through reflax...