Sharif Digital Repository

The most valued freshwater fish in Malaysia is the Malaysian mahseer, Tor tambroides, also known as Empurau. Due to the extended growing period, innovative feeding management is required to maintain fish health. This study looked at the effect of Lacto-sacc, a feed additive and antibiotic replacement made up of Lactobacillus acidophilus, Saccharomyces cerevisiae and Enterococcus faecium, on T. tambroides fingerlings’ growth performance, digestive enzyme activities and gut microbiota. A total of 600 fingerlings, each weighing 6.53 g ± 0.17 g, were allocated into twelve 650 L tanks, with 50 fingerlings per tank. Over a period of 20 weeks, the fish were fed four different diets: 0% Lacto-sacc... 

The authors regret the following mistakes: 1) In section 2, 3rd paragraph, the sentence:“Fe3O4/MWCNT-COOH/Extract has a much higher roughness than Fe3O4/MWCNT-COOH, which is unacceptable in agreement with similar results in the literature and electron microscopy observations [88–90].” must be replaced by “Fe3O4/MWCNT-COOH/Extract has a much higher roughness than Fe3O4/MWCNT-COOH, which is in agreement with similar results in the literature and electron microscopy observations [88–90].” 2) In section 3.8, the sentence:“The release of DOX from prepared nanocomposites were investigated under typical conditions: At 37 °C and different pH values of 7.4, 5.5, and 4.5 were tested in the phosphate... 

The optical implementation of mathematical spatial operators is a critical step toward achieving practical high-speed, low-energy analog optical processors. In recent years, it has been shown that using fractional derivatives in many engineering and science applications leads to more accurate results. In the case of optical spatial mathematical operators, the derivatives of the first and second orders have been investigated. But no research has been performed on fractional derivatives. On the other hand, in previous studies, each structure is dedicated to a single integer order derivative. This paper proposes a tunable structure made of graphene arrays on silica to implement fractional... 

One of the challenges of building complex and functional tissues and organs in tissue engineering is transporting nutrients and oxygen to the tissue. The use of oxygen-releasing materials is one solution to overcome this challenge. In this study, alginate (Alg) 4% (w/v) was used as the main material for the scaffold, and calcium peroxide (CPO) was used to release oxygen. CPO can react with water and finally release oxygen, which leads to the elimination of hypoxia and effective distribution of oxygen in the scaffold. Multiple tests, including the oxygen release profile, degradability, swelling, porosity, and SEM images, performed on the bulk of the material showed that increasing the... 

Energy communities are one of the vital puzzle pieces of future smart cities. This paper proposes a novel structure for a sustainable smart city by integrating energy communities in a multi-carrier energy network. Each energy community has a manager; the so-called Energy Community Managers (ECM), who trades energy with the upstream Multi-Carrier Network Operator (MCNO). On the other hand, MCNO participates in the upstream energy markets to satisfy the demands of energy communities by maximizing its own profit. Therefore, ECMs and MCNO should solve a bilevel optimization problem associated with some common variables at both levels such as: energy carrier price and the amount of energy carrier... 

The construction of most geo-structures like earthfill dams, roads, highways, embankments, and airport runways deals with the compaction of unsaturated soils under anisotropic cyclic/dynamic loadings. Many of these partially saturated geo-structures also experience three-dimensional dynamic loadings during service life. This paper presents a new hollow cylinder apparatus developed for the investigation of the cyclic response of unsaturated soils subjected to stress anisotropy. The device is unique as it enables, for the first time, studying the combined effects of stress anisotropy (effects of both parameters α and b) and the degree of saturation on the dynamic properties of unsaturated... 

This article proposes a novel design of the variable reluctance permanent magnet (VRPM) resolvers. It utilizes a slotless stator to reduce the resolver volume. The proposed design overcomes the complex structure of windings by replacing them with magnetic flux measurement units. The new design eliminates the computationally-expensive demodulation process of output signals by relying on none-modulated signals. An analytical model based on the nonlinear magnetic equivalent circuit method is used to extract the output signals of the proposed resolver design. The accuracy of applied analytical model is verified against the time-stepping finite-element method (TSFEM). An optimization is... 

Shallow landslides triggered by heavy rainfalls have caused casualties and economic losses to domestic infrastructures and industries worldwide. Rainfall mainly reduces the soil matric suction and the shear resistance, resulting in shallow landslides. Vegetation is an eco-friendly and cost-effective method for stabilizing slopes prone to shallow landslides. This research aims to investigate the hydrological and mechanical effects of vegetation on slope stability through a numerical study approach. Vegetated and bare slopes were subjected to a recorded climate condition and two rainfall scenarios of high intensity (HI) and low intensity (LI). Matric suction and factor of safety of vegetated... 

Light Non-Aqueous Phase Liquid (LNAPL) flow on the water table is highly mobile and is sensitive to the fluctuation of groundwater. This process is highly complex and involves the migration of three immiscible phases (i.e. water, LNAPL and air) which need the explicit definition of multiple parameters. A coupled experimental and numerical simulation methodology is performed by using Time Domain Reflectrometer (TDR) and multiphase simulation of a controlled environment to mimic the water table fluctuation and its effect on the LNAPL residual saturation. TDR probes are installed in different locations of a 2D tank (i.e. a cuboid box with relatively low off-plane thickness) and the bulk... 

Titanium alloys have been used extensively as implants. However, they generally suffer from low biocompatibility as well as antibacterial activity. To date, several strategies have been proposed to address these issues. It is of practical interest to synergistically increase both cellular adhesion and antimicrobial activity in titanium-based implants. Here, Ti–6Al–4V alloys were surface-modified by Nd:YAG laser with different scanning speeds ranging from 1 to 5 mm s−1 and subsequently coated by drug-loaded polymer nanofibers for prolonged drug release. The laser-modified samples were both physically and metallurgically characterized through XRD, OM, AFM, FESEM, hardness, and wettability... 

This paper proposes a risk analysis framework for substation structures based on reliability methods. Even though several risk assessment approaches have been developed for buildings, detailed risk analysis procedures for infrastructure components have been lacking in prior studies. The proposed framework is showcased by its application to a system of interconnected structures at a power substation in Tehran. Finite element models of structures are developed and validated in accordance with previous experiments. The uncertainties in the material, mass, and geometric properties of structures are described by random variables that are input to the finite element model. An artificial ground... 

Considering that about 90% of international trade is transported via sea and ship ventilation systems consume between 3.5% and 5.5% of the ship’s rated power, ship energy consumption is of particular interest and modelling and enhancing ventilation systems are vital to reducing and optimising energy consumption. Using Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulation, modelling heat transfer and airflow patterns helped us improve the ventilation system and temperature distribution, provide thermal comfort for staff and equipment, and increase energy efficiency. We discussed the radiation effect in CFD analysis; it affected wall temperatures significantly and temperature contours to some extent;... 

Delay in the onset of static stall via passive vortex generators (VGs) results in more efficient equipment. Nevertheless, most studies of VGs are conducted on wind turbine blades rather than other turbomachinery devices like axial fan blades. This study is feasibility research to see whether the aerodynamic performance of axial fan blades improves in the presence of VGs. Therefore, the VGs' effect of a static blade with an elliptical profile having a maximum thickness of 8% chord length and without a twist angle is investigated. Fully resolved RANS (Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes) simulation with the shear stress transport k-ω turbulence model at Re = 1 × 105 is used to discover the blade... 

According to the increasing desire towards heat transfer rate enhancement with various methods in different industries, this has been an interesting topic of many researchers. The effects of adding TiO2 and Al2O3 nanoparticles to water on heat transfer and fluid flow characteristics are investigated with a semi-analytical method in this study. Two nanofluids flow and heat transfer in a microtube are studied in presence of slip boundary conditions and magnetic fields. The nanoparticles volume fraction, magnetic fields strength, slip parameter and NBT coefficient (the ratio of Brownian to thermophoretic diffusions) effects on the nanoparticle's distribution, velocity profile, temperature... 

This paper presents a nanoscale fluid-structure interaction (FSI) model for flow-induced nonlinear vibration of multilayer graphene based-resonators in the slip and transition regimes. Based on the multibeam interlayer shear model with von Kármán geometric nonlinearity and nonlocal modified couple stress theory, the size-dependent equations of motion are obtained for beam resonators laminated of NG-graphene layer and (NG−1) interlayer crosslinks. The small-scale effect on effective viscosity and slip boundary conditions of nanoscale flow is formulated by introducing the average velocity correction factor. For unbounded and bounded (by a rigid wall) nanoflows, the closed-form expressions of... 

Results are presented from a search for the Higgs boson decay H → Zγ, where Z → ℓ+ℓ− with ℓ = e or μ. The search is performed using a sample of proton-proton (pp) collision data at a center-of-mass energy of 13 TeV, recorded by the CMS experiment at the LHC, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 138 fb−1. Events are assigned to mutually exclusive categories, which exploit differences in both event topology and kinematics of distinct Higgs production mechanisms to enhance signal sensitivity. The signal strength μ, defined as the product of the cross section and the branching fraction σpp→HBH→Zγ relative to the standard model prediction, is extracted from a simultaneous fit to the ℓ+ℓ−γ... 

The first search for nonresonant production of Higgs boson pairs (HH) with one H decaying into four leptons and the other into a pair of b quarks is presented, using proton-proton collisions recorded at a center-of-mass energy of s = 13 TeV by the CMS experiment. The analyzed data correspond to an integrated luminosity of 138 fb−1. A 95% confidence level upper limit of 32.4 is set on the signal strength modifier μ, defined as the ratio of the observed HH production rate in the HH→ ZZ∗b b ¯ → 4 ℓb b ¯ decay channel to the standard model (SM) expectation. Possible modifications of the H trilinear coupling λ HHH with respect to the SM value are investigated. The coupling modifier κλ, defined as... 

A search for the pair production of the lightest supersymmetric partner of the top quark, the top squark (t ~1), is presented. The search targets the four-body decay of the t ~1 , which is preferred when the mass difference between the top squark and the lightest supersymmetric particle is smaller than the mass of the W boson. This decay mode consists of a bottom quark, two other fermions, and the lightest neutralino (χ~10), which is assumed to be the lightest supersymmetric particle. The data correspond to an integrated luminosity of 138 fb−1 of proton-proton collisions at a center-of-mass energy of 13 TeV collected by the CMS experiment at the CERN LHC. Events are selected using the... 

3D printing is a state-of-the-art technology for the fabrication of biomaterials with myriad applications in translational medicine. After stimuli-responsive properties were introduced to 3D printing (known as 4D printing), intelligent biomaterials with shape configuration time-dependent character have been developed. Polysaccharides are biodegradable polymers sensitive to several physical, chemical, and biological stimuli, suited for 3D and 4D printing. On the other hand, engineering of mechanical strength and printability of polysaccharide-based scaffolds along with their aneural, avascular, and poor metabolic characteristics need to be optimized varying printing parameters. Multiple... 

A search is reported for heavy resonances and quantum black holes decaying into eμ, eτ, and μτ final states in proton-proton collision data recorded by the CMS experiment at the CERN LHC during 2016–2018 at s = 13 TeV, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 138 fb−1. The eμ, eτ, and μτ invariant mass spectra are reconstructed, and no evidence is found for physics beyond the standard model. Upper limits are set at 95% confidence level on the product of the cross section and branching fraction for lepton flavor violating signals. Three benchmark signals are studied: resonant τ sneutrino production in R parity violating supersymmetric models, heavy Z′ gauge bosons with lepton flavor...