Impressed current cathodic protection of chloride-contaminated RC structures with cracking: A numerical study

Impressed current cathodic protection (ICCP) is an effective and direct method for controlling the corrosion of reinforced concrete (RC) structures. However, few investigations related to ICCP in cracked RC structures have been reported. In this study, the effect of cracks in concrete cover on ICCP of chloride-contaminated RC structures was investigated through a numerical model including steel polarisation, electrode reactions, and ionic migration. In the developed numerical model, cracked concrete cover is assumed to consist of sound concrete and cracks, and cracks have their own ionic diffusion coefficients. The results indicate that the ICCP can maintain its ability to remove Cl− if concrete cover does not completely crack. Once the complete cracking in concrete cover occurs, the Cl− removal ability of ICCP would decrease or even disappear. Cracking does not cause any adverse effect on the pH improvement of ICCP. In this case, a stronger cathodic polarisation is recommended.Materials and Environmen

Effect of natural carbonation on chloride binding behaviours in OPC paste investigated by a thermodynamic model

The combined effects of carbonation and chloride attack can accelerate the degradation of reinforced concrete (RC) structures. In this study, the effect of natural carbonation on the chloride binding behaviours in Ordinary Portland cement (OPC) paste was investigated. The phase-equilibrium model for the dissolution/precipitation reactions and the surface complexation model for the ionic adsorption of C–S–H were adopted. An experiment from the literature was used as the benchmark. The results indicate that Kuzel's salt is produced when OPC paste is exposed to a mild chloride attack. During the natural carbonation process, Kuzel's salt is converted into Friedel's salt. As the carbonation continues, the Friedel's salt disappears. Complete natural carbonation results in a total loss of chemical binding capacity, and only a partial loss of the physical binding capacity in cement-based materials. This completely differs from the accelerated carbonation commonly used in the laboratory, which can cause complete loss of both chemical and physical binding capacity. Therefore, the durability design of RC structures vulnerable to the combined attack of chloride and carbonation based on the results of the accelerated carbonation is conservative.Materials and Environmen

High-Precision Detection Method for Structure Parameters of Catenary Cantilever Devices using 3D Point Cloud Data

This article proposes an automatic high-precision detection method for structure parameters of catenary cantilever devices (SPCCDs) using 3-D point cloud data. The steps of the proposed detection method are: 1) segmenting and recognizing the components of the catenary cantilever devices, 2) extracting the detection plane and backbone component axis of catenary cantilever devices, and 3) detecting the SPCCD. The effective segmentation of components is critical for structure parameter detection. A point cloud segmentation and recognition method based on three-dimensional convolutional neural networks (3-D CNNs) is introduced to determine the different components of the catenary cantilever devices. Compared with traditional unsupervised clustering procedures for point cloud segmentation, the proposed method can improve the segmentation accuracy, does not require complex tuning procedures of parameters, and improves robustness and stability. Additionally, the segmentation method defines a recognition function, facilitating the analysis of the structural relationship between objects. Furthermore, we proposed an improved projection random sample consensus (RANSAC) method, which can effectively divide the detection plane of catenary cantilever devices to solve the multicantilever device occlusion problem. With RANSAC, it is also possible to precisely extract the backbone component axis and enhance parameter detection accuracy. The experimental results show that the structure angle and steady arm slope's error accuracy can achieve 0.1029° and 1.19%, respectively, which indicates the proposed approach can precisely detect the SPCCD.Green Open Access added to TU Delft Institutional Repository ‘You share, we take care!’ – Taverne project https://www.openaccess.nl/en/you-share-we-take-care Otherwise as indicated in the copyright section: the publisher is the copyright holder of this work and the author uses the Dutch legislation to make this work public.Railway Engineerin

Cyclic behavior of low rise concrete shear walls containing recycled coarse and fine aggregates

In this study, the cyclic behaviors of low rise concrete shear walls using recycled coarse or fine aggregates were investigated. Eight low rise Recycled Aggregates Concrete (RAC) shear wall specimens were designed and tested under a cyclic loading. The following parameters were varied: replacement percentages of recycled coarse or fine aggregates, reinforcement ratio, axial force ratio and X-shaped rebars brace. The failure characteristics, hysteretic behavior, strength and deformation capacity, strain characteristics and stiffness were studied. Test results showed that the using of the Recycled Coarse Aggregates (RCA) and its replacement ratio had almost no influence on the mechanical behavior of the shear wall; however, the using of Recycled Fine Aggregates (RFA) had a certain influence on the ductility of the shear wall. When the reinforcement ratio increased, the strength and ductility also increased. By increasing the axial force ratio, the strength increased but the ductility decreased significantly. The encased brace had a significant effect on enhancing the RAC shear walls. The experimental maximum strengths were evaluated with existing design codes, it was indicated that the strength evaluation of the low rise RAC shear walls can follow the existing design codes of the conventional concrete shear walls.Railway Engineerin

Research on conditional characteristics vision real-time detection system for conveyor belt longitudinal tear

Conveyor belt longitudinal tear is one of the most serious problems in coal mining. Existing systems cannot realise lossless and real-time detection for longitudinal tear of conveyor belt. Currently, visual detecting systems are proposed by many researchers and are becoming the future trend. A visual recognition system based on using laser and area light sources is designed in this study, which can recognise and count abrasions, incomplete-tears, and complete-tears. The advantage of the system is to prevent longitudinal tear based on multi-feature information. In the process of detecting conditional characteristics, laser and area light sources are responsible for enhancing contrast between conditional features and conveyor belt surface, meanwhile false corner filtration and single-point feature identification method are designed for improving recognition accuracy of the system. Compared with several current systems, the designed system has a better performance on recognising complex tear characteristics of conveyor belt, thus the problem of starting warning only based on single feature can be effectively avoided.Accepted Author ManuscriptTransport Engineering and Logistic

Putting precision and elegance in enzyme immobilisation with bio-orthogonal chemistry

The covalent immobilisation of enzymes generally involves the use of highly reactive crosslinkers, such as glutaraldehyde, to couple enzyme molecules to each other or to carriers through, for example, the free amino groups of lysine residues, on the enzyme surface. Unfortunately, such methods suffer from a lack of precision. Random formation of covalent linkages with reactive functional groups in the enzyme leads to disruption of the three dimensional structure and accompanying activity losses. This review focuses on recent advances in the use of bio-orthogonal chemistry in conjunction with rec-DNA to affect highly precise immobilisation of enzymes. In this way, cost-effective combination of production, purification and immobilisation of an enzyme is achieved, in a single unit operation with a high degree of precision. Various bio-orthogonal techniques for putting this precision and elegance into enzyme immobilisation are elaborated. These include, for example, fusing (grafting) peptide or protein tags to the target enzyme that enable its immobilisation in cell lysate or incorporating non-standard amino acids that enable the application of bio-orthogonal chemistry.BT/Biocatalysi

Designing an enzyme assembly line for green cascade processes using bio-orthogonal chemistry

Two non-canonical amino acids (ncAAs) with bio-orthogonal reactive groups, namely, p-azido-l-phenylalanine (p-AzF) and p-propargyloxy-l-phenylalanine (p-PaF), were genetically inserted into an aldo-keto reductase (AKR) and an alcohol dehydrogenase (ADH), respectively, at two preselected sites for each enzyme. The variants were expressed in the genome recoded bacterium Escherichia coli C321.ΔA. Supernatants of the individual cell lysates were subsequently mixed to produce orderly combi-crosslinked enzymes (O-CLEs) of AKR and ADH by co-polymerization of the two variants through their reactive bio-orthogonal groups. The site-specific cross-linked enzymes (S-CLEs) and cross-linked enzyme aggregates (CLEAs) were produced using dibenzocycloocta-4a,6a-diene-5,11-diyne (DBA) and glutaraldehyde as the crosslinking agent, respectively. The catalytic efficiencies of the O-CLEs, S-CLEs and combi-CLEAs were determined using the water soluble dihydro-4, 4-dimethyl-2, 3-furandione as a surrogate substrate in aqueous solution at 37 °C. The O-CLEs exhibited the highest catalytic efficiency (Kcat/KM = 11.36 S−1 mM−1) that was 4.24 and 22.27 times that of S-CLEs and combi-CLEAs, respectively. In the asymmetric cascade synthesis of (R)-1-(2-chlorophenyl) ethanol the product yield after 14 h using the O-CLEs, S-CLEs and the combi-CLEAs was 93%, 55% and 16%, respectively. Moreover, high activities and selectivity (ee > 99.99%) were maintained at high substrate concentrations in prolonged operation.BT/Biocatalysi

Molecular Dynamics Simulation of Microcrack Healing in Copper

The molecular dynamics method is used to simulate microcrack healing during heating or/and under compressive stress. A center microcrack in Cu crystal could be sealed under a compressive stress or by heating. The role of compressive stress and heating in crack healing was additive. During microcrack healing, dislocation generation and motion occurred. If there were pre-existed dislocations around the microcrack, the critical temperature or compressive stress necessary for microcrack healing would decrease, and the higher the number of dislocations, the lower the critical temperature or compressive stress. The critical temperature necessary for microcrack healing depended upon the orientation of crack plane. For example, the critical temperature of the crack along (001) plane was the lowest, i.e., 770 K. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved

Splash detachment and transport of loess aggregate fragments by raindrop action

Splash erosion, which results from the bombardment of raindrops on soil, is the initial stage of soil erosion by water and is mainly responsible for the detachment and transport of soil aggregates. The objective of this study was to estimate the difference between the breakdown and dispersion of soil aggregates for two typical soils (Lou soil and Drab soil) of the Loess Plateau by raindrop action and to determine the relation between raindrop size and splash distance as well as soil aggregate detachment and transport in the loess area. Simulated tests were performed using a custom-made device to generate raindrops of six different sizes (2.67 mm, 3.05 mm, 3.39 mm, 3.79 mm, 4.05 mm and 5.45 mm) and to measure splash erosion at five distance intervals (0-10 cm, 10-20 cm, 20-30 cm, 30-40 cm and 40-50 cm). The results indicated that the splash erosion was distributed at a splash distance of 0-20 cm for the Lou soil and the Drab soil. Under the same type of raindrop, the splash volume of the Drab soil was higher than that of the Lou soil. For the Lou and Drab soils, the relation between the amount of splash and raindrop size increased linearly (r(2) = 0.985 and 0.860, respectively, p = 0.967, p 0.25 mm broke apart to form micro-aggregates of < 0.25 mm. Models were developed to predict the amount of splash erosion (M) for a given raindrop size (D) and splash distance (S) as follows: M = 0.741D(4.846)S- 1.820, r(2) = 0.916, p < 0.01 and M = 2.104D4.450S- 2.135, r(2) = 0.904, p < 0.01. Thus, large amounts of micro-aggregate dispersion and breakdown result in soil surface sealing and soil pore clogging