Sharif Digital Repository

As accelerators develop, literature about their distinctive characteristics and functions grow. Primary studies about business accelerators focused on defining the model and finding the distinctive characteristics of business accelerators. Later studies started to ask different kind of questions about outcome, functions and especially different models of accelerators. . Accelerators in developing countries are new phenomenon. Considering the fact that economic and entrepreneurial ecosystem are different in developing countries, accelerators in these countries have some distinctive characteristics which are not studied deeply in small accelerators literature.Employing Pauwels’ design elements... 

Ocean waves are a huge, renewable energy resource, and the potential for extracting energy from waves is high. So a lot of different systems have been designed but most of them are hydraulically and have a lot of problems and they are very complex. In this thesis, the mechanism designed is purely mechanical and very simple and innovative. It has some gears in special combination with together. The mechanism can convert any form of oscillation to rotation movement; this event has been shown in results and prototype. According to the results and discussion, Designed mechanism needs very low maintenance and has low lost. So, efficiency is between 80-95%  

Walking is one of the most important physical activities in daily life and it plays an important role on body health. Despite the importance of this issue, today many people suffering from walking abnormalities. This thesis aims at designing an exoskeleton for the rehabilitation in order to help patient’s lower limb movement. The hip joint is crucial for walking and is problematic for a large number of aged people or the patients who suffered from paralysis. A number of hip and knee model checked, one model for knee and one for hip selected to combine in order to achieve a unique model for walking exoskeleton. A mechanism consisting of six link and seven joints with four degrees of freedom... 

Exoskeleton is a wearable active device used to augment human power in upper or lower extremities. The integration of robotic devices and conventional physiotherapy is becoming more and more acceptable worldwide. The main scope of this thesis is to design and develop a prototype of a light, low-cost and wearable robotic exoskeleton to rehabilitate the upper extremity in stroke patients at home. For this purpose mechanism of a wearable exoskeleton will be proposed compatible with upper extremity degrees of freedoms with minimum number of actuators which is constructed inexpensively to eliminate the demand of expensive and professional therapists. The conceptual design of such a system should... 

In this research a robotic fish was designed and fabricated. For this propose different types of manufactured robotic fish were investigated and this model was developed and made with a one-piece flexible tail with an actuator that creates lateral movement through cable strings attached to the tail. Proposed mechanism has a simple, low cost structure that facilitates the control of the robotic fish movement. To control this robotic fish, a four-channel radio controller with 40 kHz frequency, was used. Swimming mode of this robotic fish is categorized in Subcarangiform swimming mode which is faster and has better maneuverability compared to its counterparts. It should be noted that the... 

Soft computing consists of a set of powerful methods that have been successfully applied to many different application domains, including business, engineering, and bioinformatics. In this research we propose an innovative approach that uses genetic algorithms to mine a set of behavior data output by a biological system in order to determine the kinetic parameters of the system. In our approach, the machine learning method is integrated with the framework of existent biological information in a wiring diagram so that its findings are expressed in a form of system dynamic behavior. An application of the method to the cell division cycle model has shown that the method can discover optimum... 

Elevated water tanks are one of the most critical elements in civilized society to provide safe servicing resources of drinking water after natural and human-made disasters. Dynamic analysis plays a vital role in investigating structural behavior of the elevated storage system subjected to the earthquake-induced vibration. The main scope of this paper is to address the structural stability analysis of the Kish Island’s elevated reinforced concrete water tank employing finite element method. A complete solid model of the structure with detailed design was constructed, and finite element analysis was carried out utilizing ABAQUS software. To investigate the dynamic behavior of the structure, a... 

In the first part of the thesis, we introduce the structure of a Nano-Newton CMOS-MEMS capacitive force sensor. This force sensor has been utilized out-of-plane sensing mechanism with high accuracy and reliability. Also, we discuss about sensitivity analysis of this force sensor. The largest change of capacitance (increased capacitance + decreased capacitance) occurs in ℓ=2/3. Sensitivity for increased capacitance grows by 8.33% and for decreased capacitance grows by 2.27%. The proposed method provides useful guidelines to increase the sensitivity of the sensor up to 250%. In the second part, a fixed structure controller, PID type, is proposed to control and suppress the in-plane vibration... 

In this thesis, a dynamic model of the biomimetic robotic fish with a flexible tail is developed. In this model, the oscillating frequency of the tail controls the forward velocity, and the body spline offset parameter controls the heading angle. The robotic fish were divided to two parts: a rigid body, and a flexible tail. The rigid body includes the head and the electrical and mechanical equipment. The bond graph model was developed and the numerical values were extracted from constructed robotic fish have also been hydrodynamically analyzed. Simulation results were quantitatively compared and verified with Matlab Simmechanics simulations. These simulations described the lateral movement... 

Precise dynamic modeling, control, and stability evaluation of quadruped robots are crucial for improving their performance in diverse environments, particularly on rough or uneven terrains where wheeled robots face limitations. This thesis employs SimMechanics software to model, validate, and analyze the dynamic behavior of quadruped robots, providing a comprehensive understanding of their performance in various conditions. To ensure accuracy and robustness, a comparative analysis is conducted between the SimMechanics model and a bond graph model developed by a fellow researcher. The expectation is that both models will produce consistent results, confirming the effectiveness of the... 

Quadruped robots are highly valued in robotics due to their excellent mobility and adaptability to rough terrains, where traditional wheeled robots may fail. These robots can traverse uneven surfaces, climb obstacles, and maintain stability, making them ideal for applications in environments that are difficult to access by other robotic platforms. The Argos [1] quadruped robot is an example of such a robot, designed for environmental auditing in agricultural settings. It is well-suited to tackle challenges such as uneven terrain, narrow spaces, and the need for gentle interaction with delicate plants. This thesis focuses on the development and validation of a highly accurate and efficient... 

Todays, the exoskeleton is known as a practical device for use in robotic rehabilitation and elderly assistance and has attracted the attention of many researchers. Impedance control is the most widely recognized control strategy in research on exoskeletons. Impedance control can properly handle soft interaction of robots with the environment. Optimal target impedance selection can increase the performance of the overall system and guarantee the stability. The main objective of this research was to introduce a variable impedance control system and verifying the presented control system on an exoskeleton. In this research, an exoskeleton with 4 active DoF and 8 semi-passive DoF is designed... 

The aerial vehicle capable of vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL), have created an interest in the community of researchers and admirers of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles. Among the existing UAV's, those with the capability of vertical takeoff and landing are prominent due to their higher maneuverability and hover capability. Quadrotors mostly have been considered as a flying robot for save and rescue operations in dangerous and unreachable places in addition to its military application. In cross shape of Quadrotor platform on each edge is appointed an electric motor with light rotors that usually are controled by considering motor rates as their only inputs. This thesis aims, to simulate and... 

Non-uniform laminated beams are being used in many engineering applications as primary elements. Helicopter blades, wind turbine blades and robot arms are examples of applications of these structures, in which the high stiffness-to-weight ratio and the non-uniform geometry are of high importance. Changing the thickness in laminated structures is a big challenge in fabrication view as different tapering configurations may significantly alter the stiffness of the structure. Thus, increasing the stiffness and dynamics characteristics of tapered beams with simple configuration is of high importance. The present work aims to investigate the effect of adding nano particles in resin during the... 

Pipeline systems are one of the cheapest ways for distribution and transportation of petroleum and natural gas. The testing of pipes used in the petroleum industry is necessary to avoid unplanned process interruptions, environmental pollution and provide good safety. One of the methods which is used for pipeline inspection is the ultrasonic non-destructive testing (NDT) technique. The use of conventional NDT techniques such as ultrasonic thickness gauging is a slow inspection process, which becomes very expensive when full inspection is needed. Ultrasonic guided waves provide an appropriate fast screening technique. These waves stress the whole pipe wall and propagate along the length of the... 

Marine cranes are installed on vessels to transfer or transport payloads between ships or between ships and decks. One of the most critical issues in this case is the safety during load transferring. Marine cranes move or sway in unexpected direction, when they are influenced by wave, wind and storm. Theprocess of controlling them became difficult without using automatic control methods. Ingeneral, the movement of cranes has no prescribed path.This master thesis is about dynamic modeling and control of fixed crane placed on an offshore vessel. The main challenging problem in this work will be developing an accurate mathematical model of the crane. Therefore, bond graph method which is known... 

A heat exchanger is a piece of equipment is built for efficient heat transfer from one medium to another. They are widely used in air conditioning, chemical plants and petrochemical plants, so studying the different failures and problems of them is important.
One of the common problems is fracturing of the tubes. This will allow the hot water to enters them and then hit the refractory of the tubesheet. This coating slowly washing away and that will lead to direct contact between the hot fluid and the tubesheet. Tubesheet is not designed for such a hot thermal load so cracks will initiate on it due to this new situation. They will shut the fractured tube by shut it down and welding a... 

In recent years, industrial robots have been greatly used as orienting devices in industry, especially in the automotive, shipbuilding and aerospace manufacturing industries. Industrial robots are gradually finding their niche in manufacturing, replacing less universal and more expensive CNC-machines. Application area of robots is constantly growing; they begin to be used for the assembly, pick-and-place operations, machining operations and etc. The use of robots for machining operations is growing because of their flexibility to perform a broad spectrum of tasks at a lower cost when compared with machine tools. Recently, parallel robots have attracted more and more researchers’ attention in...