A review on optimization of vehicle frontal crashworthiness for passenger safety

In engineering and technology safety of human life has always been a top priority. With the increasing usage of vehicles in everyday life, probability of deaths and injuries has also increased. This paper provides a critical review on the optimization of vehicle frontal crashworthiness studied by researchers using various methods. They investigated the effects of crash at a defined speed using the method of FRB and ODB impact. It further discusses other methods that can be used to save passengers’ life. Also, the designing and manufacturing limitations faced by engineers in actual development processes. Finally, it is concluded that improved structure design and material composition can significantly increase the overall crashworthiness of the vehicle

EDDense-Net: Fully Dense Encoder Decoder Network for Joint Segmentation of Optic Cup and Disc

Glaucoma is an eye disease that causes damage to the optic nerve, which can lead to visual loss and permanent blindness. Early glaucoma detection is therefore critical in order to avoid permanent blindness. The estimation of the cup-to-disc ratio (CDR) during an examination of the optical disc (OD) is used for the diagnosis of glaucoma. In this paper, we present the EDDense-Net segmentation network for the joint segmentation of OC and OD. The encoder and decoder in this network are made up of dense blocks with a grouped convolutional layer in each block, allowing the network to acquire and convey spatial information from the image while simultaneously reducing the network's complexity. To reduce spatial information loss, the optimal number of filters in all convolution layers were utilised. In semantic segmentation, dice pixel classification is employed in the decoder to alleviate the problem of class imbalance. The proposed network was evaluated on two publicly available datasets where it outperformed existing state-of-the-art methods in terms of accuracy and efficiency. For the diagnosis and analysis of glaucoma, this method can be used as a second opinion system to assist medical ophthalmologists

Influence of Natural Zeolite and Paraffin Wax on Adhesion Strength Between Bitumen and Aggregate

Asphalt mixture that is used for the construction of flexible pavements is mainly composed of two constituents i.e. bitumen and aggregate. Sturdy adhesion among bitumen and aggregate is the sign of durability of asphalt pavements. Adhesion is considered as one of the most important factors for sustainable asphalt pavement. This is the motive why its miles utmost important to deeply understand the phenomenon of adhesion considering the effect of alternate in temperature, moisture conditions. In this study softer binder 80/100 was selected that has less adhesion compared to hard pen grades. Limestone aggregates which is commonly used for the construction of asphalt pavements has also been selected. Two types of modifiers (Zeolite and Paraffin Wax) were selected because of the extensive use in asphalt foaming and the polymer modified asphalt mixtures as temperature reducing agent. To investigate the strength of adhesive bond, Bitumen Bond Strength (BBS) was performed at different temperatures, in dry, and wet conditions. To quantify the effect of modifiers on penetration grade and softening point conventional testing is performed. For performance grading, the PG test was performed using Dynamic Shear Rheometer. The comparisons were developed among pull of tensile strength at dry and after 72hrs water conditioning while preserving the temperature at 25 .To check the effect of temperature BBS is performed at 15 . The results illustrate that 2% zeolite shows best results in terms of adhesion and performance grade while Paraffin wax has less adhesion and poor performance grade

On Combined Effects of Heat Transfer and Chemical Reaction for the Flow through an Asymmetric Channel with Orthogonally Deformable Porous Walls

The combined effects of heat transfer and chemical reaction are studied for the flow through a semi-infinite asymmetric channel with orthogonally deformable porous walls. The similarity transforms have been used to reduce the conservation laws to a corresponding system of nonlinear ordinary differential equations. The resulting equations are solved, both analytically and numerically, by using Homotopy Analysis Method (HAM) and the fourth-order Runge-Kutta (RK-4) method, respectively. The convergence of the analytical solution is assured through the so-called total squared residual error analysis. The optimal values of auxiliary parameters are obtained by minimizing the total squared residual error

Postoperative Wound Pain and Hospital Stay in Patients of Open Lumbar Discectomy (OLD) Versus Endoscopic Lumbar Discectomy (ELD) in Lumbar Disc Herniation (LDH)

Background: Endoscopic lumbar discectomy is also beneficial regarding relieving wound pain, less hospital stay and smaller incisions. We compared visual analog scores (VAS) and hospital stay in patients treated with either endoscopic lumbar discectomy or open lumbar discectomy postoperatively.Material and Methods: Half patients underwent open lumbar discectomy – OLD (group A) and half operated with endoscopic lumbar discectomy – ELD (group B). The pain was quantified through visual analog score (VAS) observation in all patients. A preoperative medical management included prescribing a combination of an analgesic and a muscle relaxant along with physiotherapy with an avoidance of lifting heavy loads. Mann- Whitney (U) tests were applied for the comparison of postoperative VAS and hospital stay between groups.Results: 85% patients were having left sided prolapsed paracentral disc, and 15% were having right sided prolapsed paracentral disc. The mean postoperative VAS was 4 in patients treated with ELD and it was 1.32 in patients treated with OLD. The mean hospital stay was 1.5 days in ELD treatment, whereas, it was 2.5 days in OLD treatment. A significant difference (p=0.037) was found in the comparison of mean post-operative VAS between two vertebral levels (i.e., L4-L5 & L5-S1). The post-operative VAS and hospital stay (days) in ELD group were statistically significantly higher than the OLD group (p values 0.000).Conclusion: ELD procedure was effective as compared to open lumbar discectomy in terms of postoperative wound site pain and hospital stay. Endoscopic Lumbar discectomy is a minimally invasive procedure for discectomy

Evaluation of combined utilization of marble dust powder and fly ash on the properties and sustainability of high‑strength concrete

With the recent increase in demand for high-strength concrete, higher cement content is utilized, which has increased the need for cement. The cement industry is one of the most energy-consuming sectors globally, contributing to 10% of global carbon dioxide (CO2) gas emissions and global warming. Similarly, with rapid urbanization and industrialization, a vast number of by-products and waste materials are being generated in abundance, which causes environmental and health issues. Focusing on these two issues, this study aimed to develop an M50-grade eco-friendly high-strength concrete incorporating waste materials like marble dust powder (MDP) and fy ash (FA) as partial cement replacement. 2.5%, 5%, 7.5%, and 10% MDP and FA by weight of total binder was utilized combinedly, such that the 5%, 10%, 15%, and 20% cement content was replaced, respectively. The fresh state properties in terms of workability and hardened state properties in terms of compres�sive and fexural strengths were evaluated at 7, 14, 28, 56, and 90 days. Furthermore, to assess the environmental impact of MDP and FA, the embodied carbon and eco-strength efciency were calculated. Based upon the results, it was observed that a combined 10% (5% MDP and 5% FA) achieved the highest strength; however, 15% (7.5% MDP and 7.5% FA) substitution could be optimal. Furthermore, the combined utilization of FA and MDP also enabled a reduction in the total embodied carbon. It decreased the cost of concrete, resulting in an eco-friendly, high-strength concrete

Aflatoxins and Hepatitis B, C Viral Associated Hepatocarcinogenesis

Hepatocellular carcinoma is a serious human disease with fatal consequences. The most distressing aspect of hepatocellular carcinoma is the limited improvement in mortality (mortality rate of more than 90%). At present, the underlying molecular mechanisms are not well understood and treatment options are often of limited efficacy. This review presents our current understanding of the burden of hepatocellular carcinoma on human health, pathogenesis and pathophysiology, and molecular mechanisms associated with the disease, as well as our knowledge of the physical barriers, cellular mechanisms and molecular elements that may be targets for therapeutic interventions and/ or the development of preventative measures. As the proposed findings present a major risk to public health, it is hoped that robust intervention measures will be introduced for aflatoxins monitoring and reduction in diet

On unsteady two-dimensional and axisymmetric squeezing flow between parallel plates

AbstractSqueezing flow of a viscous fluid is considered. Two types of flows are discussed namely, the axisymmetric flow and two dimensional flow. Similarity transform proposed by Wang (1976) [13] has been used to reduce the Navier–Stokes equations to a highly non-linear ordinary differential equation which jointly describes both types of flows. Solution to aforementioned ordinary differential equation is obtained by using Variation of Parameters Method (VPM). VPM is free from the existence of small or large parameters and hence it can be applied to a large variety of problems as compared to the perturbation method applied by Wang (1976) [13]. Comparison among present and already existing solutions is also provided to show the efficiency of VPM. A convergence analysis is also carried out. Effects of different physical parameters on the flow field is discussed and demonstrated graphically with comprehensive discussions and explanations