Electrohydrodynamic Drying of Carrot Slices

Carrots have one of the highest levels of carotene, and they are rich in vitamins, fiber and minerals. However, since fresh carrots wilt rapidly after harvest under inappropriate storage conditions, drying has been used to improve their shelf life and retain nutritional quality. Therefore, to further investigate the potential of this method, carrot slices were dried in an EHD system in order to study the effect of different voltages on drying rate. As measures of quality, carotene content and rehydration ratio were, respectively, compared against the conventional oven drying regime. Carotene, the main component of the dried carrot, and rehydration characteristics of the dried product can both indicate quality by physical and chemical changes during the drying process. Mathematical modeling and simulation of drying curves were also performed, using root mean square error, reduced mean square of the deviation and modeling efficiency as the primary criteria to select the equation that best accounts for the variation in the drying curves of the dried samples. Theoretically, the Page model was best suited for describing the drying rate curve of carrot slices at 10kV to 30kV. Experimentally, the drying rate of carrots was notably greater in the EHD system when compared to control, and quality, as determined by carotene content and rehydration ratio, was also improved when compared to oven drying. Therefore, this work presents a facile and effective strategy for experimentally and theoretically determining the drying properties of carrots, and, as a result, it provides deeper insight into the industrial potential of the EHD drying technique

Search for TeV-scale gravity signatures in final states with leptons and jets with the ATLAS detector at s=7\sqrt{s}=7 TeV

The production of events with multiple high transverse momentum particles including charged leptons and jets is measured, using 1.04 fb(-1) of proton-proton collision data recorded by the ATLAS detector during the first half of 2011 at root s = 7 TeV. No excess beyond Standard Model expectations is observed, and upper limits on the fiducial cross sections for non-Standard Model production of these final states are set. Using models for string ball and black hole production and decay, exclusion contours are determined as a function of mass threshold and the fundamental gravity scale

Measurement of W(+/-)Z production in proton-proton collisions at root s=7 TeV with the ATLAS detector

A study of W(+/-)Z production in proton-proton collisions at root s = 7 TeV is presented using data corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 4.6 fb(-1) collected with the ATLAS detector at the Large Hadron Collider in 2011. In total, 317 candidates, with a background expectation of 68 +/- 10 events, are observed in double-leptonic decay final states with electrons, muons and missing transverse momentum. The total cross-section is determined to be sigma(tot)(WZ) = 19.0(-1.3)(+1.4)(stat.) +/- 0.9(syst.) +/- 0.4(lumi.) pb, consistent with the Standard Model expectation of 17.6(-1.0)(+1.1) pb. Limits on anomalous triple gauge boson couplings are derived using the transverse momentum spectrum of Z bosons in the selected events. The cross-section is also presented as a function of Z boson transverse momentum and diboson invariant mass

Search for high-mass new phenomena in the dilepton final state using proton–proton collisions at s=13TeV with the ATLAS detector

AbstractA search is conducted for both resonant and non-resonant high-mass new phenomena in dielectron and dimuon final states. The search uses 3.2fb−1 of proton–proton collision data, collected at s=13TeV by the ATLAS experiment at the LHC in 2015. The dilepton invariant mass is used as the discriminating variable. No significant deviation from the Standard Model prediction is observed; therefore limits are set on the signal model parameters of interest at 95% credibility level. Upper limits are set on the cross-section times branching ratio for resonances decaying to dileptons, and the limits are converted into lower limits on the resonance mass, ranging between 2.74 TeV and 3.36 TeV, depending on the model. Lower limits on the ℓℓqq contact interaction scale are set between 16.7 TeV and 25.2 TeV, also depending on the model