Sharif Digital Repository

Prediction of groundwater level fluctuations is absolutely necessary for the proper manag ement of these precious resources. There are different methods to predict hydrological time series such as groundwater level. Linear models inefficiency in predicting nonlinear and n on-stationary time series cause researchers widely use artificial intelligence techniques such as Artificial Neural Networks (ANN), Fuzzy Inference System (FIS), Genetic Algorithm (GA) and their hybrid models such as Artificial Neural – Fuzzy Inference System (ANFIS). These smart models are capable to simulate nonlinear and non-stationary time series in suitable accu-racy using by a few time and data. By emersion of Wavelet... 

Entrance of air to close water conduits occurs in many ways. This phenomenon makes displeasing effects on water transport structures. Two-phase flows in closed conduits are studied experimentally, numerically and theoretically. Even after decades, due to the complexity of the subject, these studies still require development and reformation. Numerical and theoretical two-phase models are often limited to a special regime of flow."Volume Of Fluid"(VOF) is a model for non-mixing two-phase flows. "Fluent" software uses this model in this field of flows. Volume of fluid is used successfully in some problems like dam break or rising bubbles. Main disadvantage of this model is distribution of the... 

Groundwater quality protection has a significant importance due to abundant applications of these resources in various fields such as agriculture, industry and drinking water. Removal of groundwater pollution is a time and money consuming process and often pollution is detected when improving the quality of groundwater is nearly impossible. For this vulnerability assessment there are three methods: Processing, Overlap-Index and Statistical Methods. Overlap-Index is composed of variety of maps such as Geology, Soil, Groundwater Depth and etc which uses in determining of vulnerability Index. In the present study for underground pollution potential determining, four indexes such as AVI، GOD،... 

Hydrologic models are the best tools to reduce hydrological uncertainties in rivers runoff estimation. Considering structure of model and calibration of parameters, there are several approaches to extend. In this study, we try to simulate daily river runoff by using two different approaches and then compare the results of them with each other. In first approach, IHACRES model is used to simulate rainfall- runoff, which is a conceptual model based on rainfall, runoff and evapotranspiration or temperature data. This model uses conceptual part to estimate effective rainfall and also it uses a transformation function to transform effective rainfall to output flow. This model works in daily time... 

There is an effective and functional connectivity between the central nervous system and the cardiovascular system, which is controlled by the autonomic nervous system. Investigating this connectivity and its direction can provide valuable insights into their functioning. To examine causal and directional relationships, EEG and ECG signals, which contain useful information about the activities of these two systems, are utilized. Granger causality is a popular method for estimating effective linear connectivity. However, the assumption of linearity in effective connectivity is not always valid, as nonlinear interactions also exist between the nervous and cardiovascular systems. Estimating... 

The purpose of this study is to investigate the entrapment and movement of air pockets in the bottom outlet of dams and numerical simulation of the process of entrapment and entrainment of air pockets. One of the most common problems with bottom outlets is the air-water mixture flow. The main purpose of this study is to investigate the causes of air pockets in pressurized tunnels before service and emergency gates in the bottom outlets and to provide effective solutions to prevent the occurrence of unwanted air entrapment and many problems resulting from it. To do this, using FLOW-3D flow simulator, the way of entraping air pockets in the Bottom outlet of Darian Dam has been investigated and... 

Density currents are occurred as a result of the intrusion of a dense fluid into a fluid with a different density. Density difference is the main agent of current’s movement. These currents are observed in nature numerously and they are one of the main reasons of the erosion and transportation of deposition in oceans, seas and rivers. Investigation of these currents is of great importance especially in dams’ reservoir as major cause of deposition and reduction of reservoir’s efficency. Density differences are typically caused by the difference in temperature, existence of solution or insoluble material and suspended solids. In this work, density current is studied experimentally. Density... 

The results of numerical simulation of underground flows are greatly affected not only by the discretization method of flow equations, but also by the way that the geological domain is upscaled. Including the detailed knowledge of heterogeneous permeability distribution is mostly neither feasible nor computationally efficient. So it is important to develop efficient grid generation and upscaling methods to simplify the fine-scale flow model while still including the impact of the heterogeneities as far as possible. Thus regions where parameters of interest have larger values or higher changes require finer grid blocks and regions with lower values or minor changes should have coarser grid... 

The advent of microfluidics as suitable environments for culturing cells is associated with some challenges such as shear stresses applied on the cells. In fact, hepatocytes lose their function as exposed to high shear stresses similar to other cell types. Moreover, among all factors needed for cell viability, feeding hepatocytes with adequate oxygen is of great importance due to their high demand for oxygen compared the other cells. In this thesis, different types of cultures including 2D and 3D has been used in order that shear stresses would be in allowed range and provision of hepatocytes with sufficient oxygen concentrations has been ensured as well. In addition to supplying hepatocytes... 

Advanced reservoir characterization methods can yield geological models at a very fine resolution, containing 1011-1018 cells while the common reservoir simulators can handle much fewer numbers of cells due to computer hardware limitations. The process of coarsening the fine-scale model to simulation models is known as upscaling. There are three fundamental steps in the procedure of upscaling, i.e. defining the coarse grid geometry, calculating the average properties for the generated coarse grid and simulation of the two-phase flow equations on the generated coarse-scale model. In this thesis, the focus will be on investigating the applicability of optimization in the context of coarse grid... 

Density currents are occurred as a result of the intrusion of a dense fluid into a fluid with a different density. Density differences are typically caused by the difference in temperature, existence of solution or insoluble material and suspended solids. A special kind of density current is called a turbidity current which is a sediment-laden density current. This is a kind of flow which is driven by the force of gravity on suspended sediment particles that causes an excess fractional density with respect to the surrounding ambient fluid. In this work, the 2-D sediment-laden density current on a sloping surface of the channel is investigated through experiments. The channel is 12 m long,... 

Sedimentation tanks are channels designed for sedimentation of suspended solids in water. These tanks are one of the most important parts of water treatment plants and their performance directly affects the functionality of water treatment plants. Therefore, researchers have tried to find better designs of sedimentation tanks. Among several design methods have been presented, modification of the geometry of tanks by installing baffles is one of the most effective and economic methods. According to the importance of performance improvement of industrial sedimentation tanks as well as the diversity in reported results, development and completion of previous studies seem to be necessary. In... 

A large number of desalination plants have been established to overcome the drinkable water scarcity in the world. These plants produce saline water as effluent, which is often discharged into local sea water. One of the applicable methods to dispose these kinds of effluents is to install an inclined nozzle below the water’s surface. Hence, an inclined negatively buoyant jet (INBJ) forms which is often fully turbulent due to the high discharge velocity. Local environmental characteristics affect the dynamics and mixing behavior of INBJs. One of these characteristics is the sea bed slope, on which the present study has been focused. Large eddy simulations (LES) are performed in the present... 

Endothelial cells that cover the inner wall of blood cells and are sensitive to receiving mechanical signals play important role in regulating many vital activities of the human body especially the function of the cardiovascular system. One of the factors affecting the mechanical functions of these cells is the shear stress applied to them. Due to blood velocity increasing or decreasing the endothelial cells shear stress change and leads to some chemical reactions and finally releasing biochemical substances including Nitrogen-Monoxide and Calcium-ion. Nitrogen-Monoxide produced by endothelial cells by affecting the smooth muscle cells in the vessel wall causes dilating of the vessel wall,... 

Today, due to the decline of drinkable water, many desalination plants have been established and operated around the world. Disposal of these brines, which have higher density and temperature than receiving water, causes many environmental impacts. Industrial power plants discharge these effluents into the seawater body mostly as submerged jets due to their higher effectiveness. Many experimental researches have been done on the negative and positive buoyant jet that discharged form desalination plants. But a few numerical studies have been done with investigating the full Navior-Stokes equations and they have been flawed in modeling. For example, some of these models have been able to... 

In this thesis, the effect of heart dynamic motion and pulsatile inflow on blood hemodynamics and LDL permeation into the arterial wall in a 3-D coronary artery bifurcation was investigated. To determine the effect of each factor alone and simultaneous effect of both factors i.e. heart dynamic motion and pulsatile inflow, flow simulations were performed in four cases i.e. steady-static, steady-dynamic, pulsatile-static, and pulsatile-dynamic. The results of flow simulations showed that dynamic geometry and pulsatile inflow have considerable impact on temporal variations of wall shear stress (WSS), even though the effect of pulsatile inflow on WSS variation dominates over the effect of...