Seismic response trends evaluation and finite element model calibration of an instrumented RC building considering soil-structure interaction and non-structural components

Peer reviewedPostprin

Seismic response trends evaluation via long term monitoring and finite element model updating of an RC building including soil-structure interaction

Peer reviewedPostprin

Progression in Photocatalytic Materials for Efficient Performance

[no abstract avaiable

Effect of Steel Fibers on Heat of Hydration and Mechanical Properties of Concrete Containing Fly Ash

This study investigated the effects of steel fibers on the fresh and hardened properties, and heat of hydration of concrete containing FA (Fly Ash). A total of 192 samples were cast comprising cubes, cylinders, and prisms, for six concrete mixes with varying contents of steel fibers by volume and a fixed content of FA i.e. 15% by weight of cement. The semi adiabatic setup was used to monitor temperature rise due to the heat of hydration in the concrete mixes for fourteen days. The use of FA increased workability, and decreased early compressive strength, tensile strength and heat of hydration of concrete. However, an increase in the compressive strength of FA concrete was observed by the addition of steel fibers up to 0.9% whereas a consistent increase in the splitting tensile strength and modulus of rupture was observed with the addition of the steel fibers from 0.4-1.8%. Further the test results showed that increasing steel fibers content decrease the evolution of heat due to hydration. It was concluded that the FA concrete with steel fibers can be used in precast industry and mass construction projects due to the improved mechanical properties and lower heat of hydration

Experimental Study on Seismic Response Characteristics of Soil On Building Models Using 1-D Shake-Table.docx

ABSTRACT. This research investigates the impact of seismic response on the scaled 1:10 multi storey steel frame-model supported by isolated shallow footings placed on sand sample. One dimensional shake-table testing was carried out on four, three and two storeys steel Frame Model subjected to El-Centro 0.46pga Earthquake. Dynamic properties acceleration, displacement, natural frequency of the frame models on isolated footing with changing of storey height were measured. Moreover, it was found that acceleration responses and natural frequencies decreased with an increase in frame model height while displacement responses increased for a given foundation type with increased height. In conclusion, soil, the structure's height, and the materials properties all affect a structures seismic response during an earthquake

In-Situ Synthesis of Nb2O5/g-C3N4 Heterostructures as Highly Efficient Photocatalysts for Molecular H2 Evolution under Solar Illumination

This work focuses on the synthesis of heterostructures with compatible band positions and a favourable surface area for the efficient photocatalytic production of molecular hydrogen (H2). In particular, 3-dimensional Nb2O5/g-C3N4 heterostructures with suitable band positions and high surface area have been synthesized employing a hydrothermal method. The combination of a Nb2O5 with a low charge carrier recombination rate and a g-C3N4 exhibiting high visible light absorption resulted in remarkable photocatalytic activity under simulated solar irradiation in the presence of various hole scavengers (triethanolamine (TEOA) and methanol). The following aspects of the novel material have been studied systematically: the influence of different molar ratios of Nb2O5 to g-C3N4 on the heterostructure properties, the role of the employed hole scavengers, and the impact of the co-catalyst and the charge carrier densities affecting the band alignment. The separation/transfer efficiency of the photogenerated electron-hole pairs is found to increase significantly as compared to that of pure Nb2O5 and g-C3N4, respectively, with the highest molecular H2 production of 110 mmol/g·h being obtained for 10 wt % of g-C3N4 over Nb2O5 as compared with that of g-C3N4 (33.46 mmol/g·h) and Nb2O5 (41.20 mmol/g·h). This enhanced photocatalytic activity is attributed to a sufficient interfacial interaction thus favouring the fast photogeneration of electron-hole pairs at the Nb2O5/g-C3N4 interface through a direct Z-scheme

Large scale production of novel g-C3N4 micro strings with high surface area and versatile photodegradation ability

An easy, scalable and environmentally benign chemical method has been developed to synthesize micro strings of graphitic-C3N4 (msg-C3N4) through pre-treatment of melamine with HNO 3 in alkaline solvent at low temperature. This methodology results in a unique string type morphology of msg-C3N4 with higher surface area. These msg-C3N4 micro strings were used as a photocatalyst under visible light for photodegradation of rhodamine B, methyl blue and methyl orange. The msg-C3N4 shows enhanced photodegradation efficiency due to its high surface area and favourable bandgap. The first order rate constant for msg-C3N4 was measured which confirms the higher performance of msg-C3N4 in comparison to other reported materials such as g-C3N4, Fe2O3/g-C3N4 and TiO2 nanotubes. Thus, the method developed here is favourable for the synthesis of materials with higher surface area and unique morphology, which are favourable for high photodegradation activity. The Royal Society of Chemistry

Enhanced Energy Savings with Adaptive Watchful Sleep Mode for Next Generation Passive Optical Network

A single watchful sleep mode (WSM) combines the features of both cyclic sleep mode (CSM) and cyclic doze mode (CDM) in a single process by periodically turning ON and OFF the optical receiver (RX) of the optical network terminal (ONT) in a symmetric manner. This results in almost the same energy savings for the ONTs as achieved by the CSM process while significantly reducing the upstream delays. However, in this study we argue that the periodic ON and OFF periods of the ONT RX is not an energy efficient approach, as it reduces the ONT Asleep (AS) state time. Instead, this study proposes an adaptive watchful sleep mode (AWSM) in which the RX ON time of ONT is minimized during ONT Watch state by choosing it according to the length of the traffic queue of the type 1 (T1) traffic class. The performance of AWSM is compared with standard WSM and CSM schemes. The investigation reveals that by minimizing the RX ON time, the AWSM scheme achieves up to 71% average energy saving per ONT at low traffic loads. The comparative study results show that the ONT energy savings achieved by AWSM are 9% higher than the symmetric WSM with almost the same delay and delay variance performance

FFRP: Dynamic firefly mating optimization inspired energy efficient routing protocol for internet of underwater wireless sensor networks

Energy-efficient and reliable data gathering using highly stable links in underwater wireless sensor networks (UWSNs) is challenging because of time and location-dependent communication characteristics of the acoustic channel. In this paper, we propose a novel dynamic firefly mating optimization inspired routing scheme called FFRP for the internet of UWSNs-based events monitoring applications. The proposed FFRP scheme during the events data gathering employs a self-learning based dynamic firefly mating optimization intelligence to find the highly stable and reliable routing paths to route packets around connectivity voids and shadow zones in UWSNs. The proposed scheme during conveying information minimizes the high energy consumption and latency issues by balancing the data traffic load evenly in a large-scale network. In additions, the data transmission over highly stable links between acoustic nodes increases the overall packets delivery ratio and network throughput in UWSNs. Several simulation experiments are carried out to verify the effectiveness of the proposed scheme against the existing schemes through NS2 and AquaSim 2.0 in UWSNs. The experimental outcomes show the better performance of the developed protocol in terms of high packets delivery ratio (PDR) and network throughput (NT) with low latency and energy consumption (EC) compared to existing routing protocols in UWSNs

Software defined communication framework for smart grid to meet energy demands in smart cities

In smart cities, the electricity is an essential component since it preserves a certain level of residents' life quality and provisions the entire spectrum of their economic activities. Thus, a smart way is essential to develop cities without disregarding energy issues. In this scope, the smart grid paradigm offers power supply in an efficient, sustainable and economical manner with minimal impact on the environment and can meet the future energy demands. However, real-time monitoring and control of the smart grid (SG) for continuous and quality-aware power supply in smart cities (SCs) is challenging and requires an advanced quality of service (QoS)-aware communication framework. In this context, this research aims to present a novel data-gathering scheme by using the Internet of software-defined mobile sinks (SDMSs) and wireless sensor networks (WSNs) in the smart grid. The extensive simulation results conducted through the EstiNet9.0 indicate that the designed scheme outperforms existing approaches and achieves its defined goals for events-drive applications in the SG