Vers la prévision de la rupture de disque de turbomachine : apport de la corrélation d'image numérique

This thesis addresses the amelioration of the burst prediction of turbo-engines rotating parts.The principal axis of this study was the identification of the material behaviour up fracture under multi-axial loading and the identification of the local condition at failure. To accomplish this, an integrated digital image correlation approach was employed.The other thematic axis of this thesis was the objective and robust prediction of rupture using the damage mechanics in the framework of explicit simulations and the study of the influence, on the prediction, of various scaling techniques used to decrease the computation time.Two materials were studied, the titanium alloy TA6V and the nickel alloy Udimet 500. The samples were defined to guarantee similar loading conditions as those in the disks in service and to allow the use of field measurement techniques.A commercial code (ABAQUS) is used in an integrated approach to Digital Image Correlation (DIC). The principle of this method is to optimize the correlation of the test directly with the model parameters without passing by an intermediate procedure requiring the reconstruction of the deformation field beforehand. This technique, which can be seen as highly regularising, grants a considerable robustness to the method, which allows obtaining information from degraded speckle patterns encountered at the end of the test. The entire set of constitutive parameters can be identified with only one heterogeneous test. Within this study, a particular accent was laid on the analysis of triaxiality fields by using thin and thick samples. The importance of these fields for the fracture conditions is suspected.Constitutive models were identified for plastic strains that were about three times higher than the ones achievable in uniaxial tensile test on smooth sample.The close integration of the experiments and simulations allowed the analysis of deformation and stresses of the elements near the failure surface at the instant just before failure. This allowed the testing of different criteria with a large amount of data.For the second axis of the thesis, preliminary studies examined the possibility to use limited damage rate models combined with scaling techniques. These latter allow performing explicit simulations in context of a centrifugal quasi-static loading. The results show that acceleration is possible. The errors of the rotational speeds, which lead to disk fracture, are relatively low. The simulation times are comparable to implicit quasi-static simulations, while the main advantage is the maintained robustness in explicit simulations.Cette thèse s'intéresse à l'amélioration de la prévision de l'éclatement des pièces tournantes des turbomachines. L'axe de recherche principal a été celui de l'identification du comportement du matériau jusqu'à rupture pour des sollicitations multi-axiales représentatives et l'identification des conditions de rupture locale elles mêmes. Pour cela une approche basée sur la corrélation d'image numérique intégrée a été suivie. L'autre axe abordé dans cette thèse a été celui de la prévision objective et robuste de la rupture par la mécanique de l'endommagement dans le cadre de simulations explicites utilisant des techniques de scaling pour diminuer les temps de calcul. Deux matériaux ont été étudiés, un alliage titane TA6V et un alliage nickel Udimet 500. Des éprouvettes ont été définies pour permettre d'avoir des sollicitations proches de celles en service et pour permettre d'utiliser des techniques de mesure de champs. Un code commercial (ABAQUS) est utilisé dans une approche intégrée de la corrélation des images numériques (CIN). Le principe de ces méthodes est d'optimiser la corrélation directement à partir des paramètres du modèle sans passer par une procédure intermédiaire demandant de reconstruire préalablement les champs de déformations. Cette technique, qui peut-être vu comme très régularisante, confère à la méthode une grande robustesse, ce qui permet d'obtenir des informations même en présence de mouchetis dégradés lors des phases ultimes de chargement. L'ensemble des paramètres constitutifs des modèles peut alors être identifié avec un seul essai hétérogène. Dans l'étude un accent particulier a été mis sur l'analyse des champs de triaxialité, dont l'importance sur les conditions de rupture est suspectée, en utilisant des éprouvettes fines et des éprouvettes épaisses. Des lois de comportement ont pu être identifié pour des niveaux de déformations plastiques jusqu'à 3 fois supérieurs à ceux atteints dans des essais de traction uni-axiaux et ceci en présence d'adoucissement global. L'intégration étroite des essais et des simulations a également permis d'analyser l'état de déformation et contraintes des éléments proches de la surface de rupture juste avant celle-ci et ainsi de tester des critères de rupture potentiels avec un grand nombre de données. Pour la seconde partie de la thèse, plus exploratoire faute de temps, une étude préliminaire a porté sur la possibilité d'utiliser des modèles à taux d'endommagement limités combinés avec des techniques de scaling pour utiliser des simulations explicites dans le cadre de sollicitations centrifuges quasi-statiques. Les premiers résultats montrent qu'une accélération est possible avec des niveaux d'erreurs relativement bas sur les vitesses de rotation conduisant à la rupture et ceci dans des temps comparables avec des simulations implicites quasi-statique, l'avantage étant la robustesse des analyses en dynamique explicite

It was (not) me: Causal Inference of Agency in goal-directed actions

Summary: 
The perception of one’s own actions depends on both sensory information and predictions derived from internal forward models [1]. The integration of these information sources depends critically on whether perceptual consequences are associated with one’s own action (sense of agency) or with changes in the external world that are not related to the action. The perceived effects of actions should thus critically depend on the consistency between the predicted and the actual sensory consequences of actions. To test this idea, we used a virtual-reality setup to manipulate the consistency between pointing movements and their visual consequences and investigated the influence of this manipulation on self-action perception. We then asked whether a Bayesian causal inference model, which assumes a latent agency variable controlling the attributed influence of the own action on perceptual consequences [2,3], would account for the empirical data: if the percept was attributed to the own action, visual and internal information should fuse in a Bayesian optimal manner, while this should not be the case if the visual stimulus was attributed to external influences. The model correctly fits the data, showing that small deviations between predicted and actual sensory information were still attributed to one’s own action, while this was not the case for large deviations when subjects relied more on internal information. We discuss the performance of this causal inference model in comparison to alternative biologically feasible statistical models applying methods for Bayesian model comparison.

Experiment: 
Participants were seated in front of a horizontal board on which their right hand was placed with the index finger on a haptic marker, representing the starting point for each trial. Participants were instructed to execute straight, fast (quasi-ballistic) pointing movements of fixed amplitude, but without an explicit visual target. The hand was obstructed from the view of the participants, and visual feedback about the peripheral part of the movement was provided by a cursor. Feedback was either veridical or rotated against the true direction of the hand movement by predefined angles. After each trial participants were asked to report the subjectively experienced direction of the executed hand movement by placing a mouse-cursor into that direction.

Model: 
We compared two probabilistic models: Both include a binary random gating variable (agency) that models the sense of ‘agency’; that is the belief that the visual feedback is influenced by the subject’s motor action. The first model assumes that both the visual feedback xv and the internal motor state estimate xe are directly caused by the (unobserved) real motor state xt (Fig. 1). The second model assumes instead that the expected visual feedback depends on the perceived direction of the own motor action xe (Fig. 2). 
Results: Both models are in good agreement with the data. Fig. A shows the model fit for Model 1 superpositioned to the data from a single subject. Fig. B shows the belief that the visual stimulus was influenced by the own action, which decreases for large deviations between predicted and real visual feedback. Bayesian model comparison shows a better fit for model 1.
Citations
[1] Wolpert D.M, Ghahramani, Z, Jordan, M. (1995) Science, 269, 1880-1882.
[2] Körding KP, Beierholm E, Ma WJ, Quartz S, Tenenbaum JB, et al (2007) PLoS ONE 2(9): e943.
[3] Shams, L., Beierholm, U. (2010) TiCS, 14: 425-432.
Acknowledgements
This work was supported by the BCCN Tübingen (FKZ: 01GQ1002), the CIN Tübingen, the European Union (FP7-ICT-215866 project SEARISE), the DFG and the Hermann and Lilly Schilling Foundation

GoSafeOpt: Scalable Safe Exploration for Global Optimization of Dynamical Systems

Learning optimal control policies directly on physical systems is challenging since even a single failure can lead to costly hardware damage. Most existing model-free learning methods that guarantee safety, i.e., no failures, during exploration are limited to local optima. A notable exception is the GoSafe algorithm, which, unfortunately, cannot handle high-dimensional systems and hence cannot be applied to most real-world dynamical systems. This work proposes GoSafeOpt as the first algorithm that can safely discover globally optimal policies for high-dimensional systems while giving safety and optimality guarantees. We demonstrate the superiority of GoSafeOpt over competing model-free safe learning methods on a robot arm that would be prohibitive for GoSafe

SIMAP: the similarity matrix of proteins

Similarity Matrix of Proteins (SIMAP) () provides a database based on a pre-computed similarity matrix covering the similarity space formed by >4 million amino acid sequences from public databases and completely sequenced genomes. The database is capable of handling very large datasets and is updated incrementally. For sequence similarity searches and pairwise alignments, we implemented a grid-enabled software system, which is based on FASTA heuristics and the Smith–Waterman algorithm. Our ProtInfo system allows querying by protein sequences covered by the SIMAP dataset as well as by fragments of these sequences, highly similar sequences and title words. Each sequence in the database is supplemented with pre-calculated features generated by detailed sequence analyses. By providing WWW interfaces as well as web-services, we offer the SIMAP resource as an efficient and comprehensive tool for sequence similarity searches

How Is Variety in Daily Life Related to the Expression of Personality States? An Ambulatory Assessment Study

People differ in the way they live their daily lives. For some people, daily life is characterized by multiple and diverse experiences, while others have more stability and routine in their lives. However, little is known about how variety in daily life relates to the expression of personality states. The present study examined within-person associations between variety in social partners, places, and activities with state expression. Data came from an ambulatory assessment study (N = 962, Mage = 25.49) with four assessments per day over a period of six consecutive days. The results of the multilevel modeling analyses suggest that variety in daily life is associated with some, but not all, state expressions. For instance, on days when participants experienced a greater variety in activities, they reported being less neurotic and conscientious, but also more agreeable. In addition, the links between all social partners, places, and activities with the expression of the state were examined simultaneously to obtain more detailed information on the multifaceted nature of situation-state expression links. We conclude that variety in daily life has both theoretical and empirical relevance for the expression of personality states

Life cycle assessment of innovative materials for thermal energy storage in buildings

The politically endorsed reduction of greenhouse gas emissions entails the transformation of thermal energy systems towards renewable energies, especially in the building sector. This comes along with a demand in energy storage, as there is a time offset between energy availability and demand. As sensible heat storages induce major losses and have limited energy density, current water-based solutions are only partially sufficient to meet these demands. Within the project “Speicher-LCA” the environmental performance of a variety of innovative materials available for energy storage in buildings is assessed. The project provides the first extensive comparison of environmental profiles of various thermal energy storage materials, including phase change, thermochemical and sorption materials. The specific performances in the storage cycle are taken into account. All results will be publically accessible through a spreadsheet tool including a comprehensive set of materials, components as well as their integration into different building types. This paper discusses the methodological framework of the study and presents the environmental assessment results for selected materials. It highlights the main challenges in the assessment of innovative storage materials on different system levels which require specific definition of functional units accordingly. The first assessment results on material level for selected phase change (PCM) and thermo-chemical materials (TCM) allow an environmental characterization regarding their potential application in thermal storages. In addition, ranges of required numbers of storage cycles for amortization have been calculated for the non-renewable primary energy demand. For PCMs amortization cycles range between ∼20 to 150 cycles for salt hydrates and up to ∼280 cycles for paraffins. Regarding TCM, energetic amortization of silica gel and zeolite 13x is reached after ∼60 and ∼260 cycles respectively. Since the realization of storage components and systems which can actually be used in real applications will further increase the cycle number required for amortization, these storage materials may thus not be suitable for applications with a low number of cycles over lifetime, such as seasonal storage

Sex hormones influence survival of patients with metastatic urothelial carcinoma undergoing immune checkpoint therapy

Introduction Clinical trials investigating efficacy of immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICI) revealed sex-specific divergent outcomes in urothelial cancer (UC), suggesting that sex hormones might play an important role in gender-specific dimorphisms of response upon ICI. However, further clinical investigations are still needed to understand the influence of sex hormones in UC. The aim of this study was to get further insights on the prognostic and predictive value of sex hormone levels in patients with metastatic UC (mUC) who underwent ICI. Material and methods Sex hormone levels of patients with mUC including luteinizing hormone (LH), follicle-stimulating hormone (FSH), LH/FSH ratio, prolactin, testosterone and 17β-estradiol (E2) were evaluated at baseline and during ICI at 6/8 weeks and 12/14 weeks. Results Twenty-eight patients (10 women, 18 men) with a median age of 70 years were included. Metastatic disease was confirmed in 21 patients (75%) after radical cystectomy while seven patients showed mUC at first diagnosis. Twelve patients (42.8%) received first line and 16 patients second line pembrolizumab. The objective response rate (ORR) was 39% (CR in 7%). The median progression-free survival (PFS) and overall survival (OS) was 5.5 and 20 months. Focusing on changes of sex hormone levels during ICI, a significant increase in FSH levels and decrease of the LH/FSH ratio was noticed in responders (p = 0.035), yet without sex-specific significance. When adjusted for sex and treatment line, a significant increase of FSH levels was confirmed in men during second line pembrolizumab. Focusing on baseline levels, LH/FSH ratio was significantly higher in female responders (p = 0.043) compared to non-responders. In women, increased LH levels and LH/FSH ratio were associated with better PFS (p = 0.014 for LH, p = 0.016 for LH/FSH ratio) and OS (p = 0.026 and p = 0.018). In male patients, increased E2 levels were linked with improved PFS (p < 0.001) and OS (p = 0.039). Conclusion Increased LH and LH/FSH values in women as well as high E2 levels in men were significant predictors of better survival. Elevated LH/FSH ratio was predictive of better response to ICI in women. These results show first clinical evidence of the potential role of sex hormones as prognostic and predictive biomarker in mUC. Further prospective analyses are needed to corroborate our findings

Is antibacterial treatment intensity lower in elderly patients? A retrospective cohort study in a German surgical intensive care unit

Background: Demographic change concurrent with medical progress leads to an increasing number of elderly patients in intensive care units (ICUs). Antibacterial treatment is an important, often life-saving, aspect of intensive care but burdened by the associated antimicrobial resistance risk. Elderly patients are simultaneously at greater risk of infections and may be more restrictively treated because, generally, treatment intensity declines with age. We therefore described utilization of antibacterials in ICU patients older and younger than 80 years and examined differences in the intensity of antibacterial therapy between both groups. Methods: We analysed 17,464 valid admissions from the electronic patient data management system of our surgical ICU from April 2006 – October 2013. Antibacterial treatment rates were defined as days of treatment (exposed patient days) relative to patient days of ICU stay and calculated for old and young patients. Rates were compared in zero-inflated Poisson regression models adjusted for patients’ sex, mean SAPS II- and TISS-scores, and calendar years yielding adjusted rate ratios (aRRs). Rate ratios exceeding 1 represent higher rates in old patients reflecting greater treatment intensity in old compared to younger patients. Results: Observed antibacterial treatment rates were lower in patients 80 years and older compared to younger patients (30.97 and 39.73 exposed patient days per 100 patient days in the ICU, respectively). No difference in treatment intensity, however, was found from zero-inflated Poisson regression models permitting more adequate consideration of patient days with low treatment probability: for all antibacterials the adjusted rate ratio (aRR) was 1.02 (95%CI: 0.98–1.07). Treatment intensities were higher in elderly patients for penicillins (aRR 1.37 (95%CI: 1.26–1.48)), cephalosporins (aRR 1.20 (95%CI: 1.09–1.31)), carbapenems (aRR 1.35 (95%CI: 1.20–1.50)), fluoroquinolones (aRR 1.17 (95%CI: 1.05–1.30), and imidazoles (aRR 1.34 (95%CI: 1.23–1.46)). Conclusions: Elderly patients were generally less likely to be treated with antibacterials. This observation, however, did not persist in patients with comparable treatment probability. In these, antibacterial treatment intensity did not differ between younger and older ICU patients, for some antibacterial classes treatment intensity was even higher in the latter. Patient-level covariates are instrumental for a nuanced evaluation of age-effects in antibacterial treatment in the ICU

Icing mitigation by mems-fabricated surface dielectric barrier discharge

Avoiding ice accumulation on aerodynamic components is of enormous importance to flight safety. Novel approaches utilizing surface dielectric barrier discharges (SDBDs) are expected to be more efficient and effective than conventional solutions for preventing ice accretion on aerodynamic components. In this work, the realization of SDBDs based on thin-film substrates by means of micro-electro-mechanical-systems (MEMS) technology is presented. The anti-icing performance of the MEMS SDBDs is presented and compared to SDBDs manufactured by printed circuit board (PCB) technology. It was observed that the 35 µm thick electrodes of the PCB SDBDs favor surface icing with an initial accumulation of supercooled water droplets at the electrode impact edges. This effect was not observed for 0.3 µm thick MEMS-fabricated electrodes indicating a clear advantage for MEMS-technology SDBDs for anti-icing applications. Titanium was identified as the most suitable material for MEMS electrodes. In addition, an optimization of the MEMS-SDBDs with respect to the dielectric materials as well as SDBD design is discussed