Sharif Digital Repository

An indirect colorimetric method is presented for detection of trace amounts of hydroquinone (1), catechol (2) and pyrogallol (3). The reduction of AuCl4- to Gold nanoparticles (Au-NPs) by these phenolic compounds in the presence of cetyltrimethylammonium chloride (CTAC) produced very intense surface plasmon resonance peak of Au-NPs. The plasmon absorbance of Au-NPs allows the quantitative colorimetric detection of the phenolic compounds. The calibration curves derived from the changes in absorbance at λ = 568 nm were linear with concentration of hydroquinone, catechol and pyrogallol in the range of 7.0 × 10-7 to 1.0 × 10-4M, 6.0 × 10-6 to 2.0 × 10-4 M and 6.0 × 10-7 to 1.0 × 10-4 M,... 

In this study, we are proposing a novel nonlinear classification approach to discriminate between Alzheimer's Disease (AD) and a control group using T1-weighted and T2- weighted Magnetic Resonance Images (MRI's) of brain. Since T1-weighted images and T2-weighted images have inherent physical differences, obviously each of them has its own particular medical data and hence, we extracted some specific features from each. Then the variations of the relevant eigenvalues of the extracted features were tracked to pick up the most informative ones. The final features were assigned to two parallel systems to be nonlinearly categorized. Considering the fact that AD defects the white and gray regions... 

In this study, we are proposing a novel nonlinear classification approach to discriminate between Alzheimer's Disease (AD) and a control group using T1-weighted and T2-weighted Magnetic Resonance Images (MRI's) of brain. Since T1-weighted images and T2-weighted images have inherent physical differences, obviously each of them has its own particular medical data and hence, we extracted some specific features from each. Then the variations of the relevant eigenvalues of the extracted features were tracked to pick up the most informative ones. The final features were assigned to two parallel systems to be nonlinearly categorized. Considering the fact that AD defects the white and gray regions... 

Numerical simulation of the electrical field distribution helps in-depth understanding of the mechanisms behind the responses and the benefits of the high voltage pulse comminution. The COMSOL Multiphysics package was used to numerically simulate the effect of ore compositions in this study. Regarding phosphate ore particles shape and composition, the effects of mineral composition, particle size, particle shape and electrodes distance were investigated on the electrical field intensity and distribution. The results show that the induced electrical field is significantly dependent on the electrical properties of minerals, the feed particle size and the location of conductive minerals in... 

Numerical simulation of the electrical field distribution helps in-depth understanding of the mechanisms behind the responses and the benefits of the high voltage pulse comminution. The COMSOL Multiphysics package was used to numerically simulate the effect of ore compositions in this study. Regarding phosphate ore particles shape and composition, the effects of mineral composition, particle size, particle shape and electrodes distance were investigated on the electrical field intensity and distribution. The results show that the induced electrical field is significantly dependent on the electrical properties of minerals, the feed particle size and the location of conductive minerals in... 

The paper presents an effective algorithm to analyze MR-images in order to recognize Alzheimer's Disease (AD) which appeared in patient's brain. The features of interest are categorized in Features of the Spatial Domain (FSD's) and Features of the Frequency Domain (FFD's) which are based on the first four statistic moments of the wavelet transform. Extracted features have been classified by a multi-layer perceptron Artificial Neural Network (ANN). Before ANN, the number of features is reduced from 44 to 12 to optimize and eliminate any correlation between them. The contribution of this paper is to demonstrate that by using the wavelet transform number of features needed for AD diagnosis has... 

Changes in business environment are leading firms to adopt a new production model called agile manufacturing. This term moves away from the traditional mass production paradigm and focuses on manufacturing highly customised products when customers require them. In this paper, we present an initial approach to agile organisation based on case studies in an Iranian industrial organisation. An agile organisation conceptual model has been drawn up, based on the conclusions of the case study. The study presented here is of an exploratory factor analysis and the conclusions are drawn through path analysis, propose possible routes for future research in the field of agile organisation. By the... 

The unsaturated small strain shear modulus, Gmax, is a key reference value in predicting relationships between dynamic shear modulus and shear strain amplitude and is thus a key quantity to properly model the behavior of dynamically-loaded geotechnical systems such as pavements, rail beds, and machine foundations. From the interpretation of the experimental Gmax results for unsaturated soils, different definitions of trends between Gmax and the stress state of the unsaturated soils and material properties are proposed. However, in most of trends, the relationship between the stress state and void ratio is considered and the effect of void ratio on the unsaturated small strain shear modulus... 

Demand response (DR) is known as a key solution in modern power systems and electricity markets for mitigating wind power uncertainties. However, effective incorporation of DR into power system operation scheduling needs knowledge of the price–elastic demand curve that relies on several factors such as estimation of a customer’s elasticity as well as their participation level in DR programs. To overcome this challenge, this paper proposes a novel autonomous DR scheme without prediction of the price–elastic demand curve so that the DR providers apply their selected load profiles ranked in the high priority to the independent system operator (ISO). The energy and reserve markets clearing... 

The main point of this paper is to present a time domain strategy for drug dosage to treat psychiatric disorders. A time domain model of emotion is obtained from an extension of a recently developed fractional nonlinear dynamic model of happiness. First, the Fractional Optimal Control law for incommensurate multi state systems is obtained. It will be then applied as an optimal drug administration procedure in the line of psychiatric disorders treatment. Results of this paper show that optimal control scheme is a proper approach to face the difficulties of analysis and control the incommensurate systems. It can be also clearly seen from the simulation results that this approach is very... 

The main purpose of this paper is to use variational calculus and Pontryagin's minimum principle to propose a solution scheme for time optimal control problem stated on the fractional systems defined in the sense of Caputo. After deriving the necessary optimality conditions, a novel numerical solution is used to solve the problem. Afterwards, a simple case study shows the effectiveness of the proposed method. © 2017  

Polyurethane (PU) nanocomposites with 0, 1, 3, 5, and 7 wt-% nanoclay contents were prepared. X-ray diffraction patterns, transmission electron microscopy images, tensile test, and thermogravimetric analysis were utilised to reveal the morphological, mechanical, and thermal-resistant properties of the prepared nanocomposites. The exfoliated structure was obtained for nanoclay contents up to 3 wt-%. Incorporation of nanoclay to the PU matrix prompted the thermal stability of the polymer. A nanocomposite filled with 3 wt-% nanoclay showed the best tensile strength in the prepared nanocomposites. Subsequently, the nanocomposite with the 3 wt-% nanoclay was reinforced with carbon and glass... 

The unbounded linearly increasing responses in galloping instability make sharp-edge oscillators a beneficial solution for bladeless energy harvesting. While the performance of single square oscillators has been the subject of several studies in the past, there is still little knowledge about their hydrokinetic energy performance in tandem configurations. An optimal oscillator should display high performance in a group when all bodies are free to harness energy. In this study, the energy harvesting performance of square oscillators is examined in multiple tandem configurations under free and fixed square wakes. The harmonic oscillator model is coupled with the electromagnetic transducer to... 

The global demand for renewable energy sources has arisen significant research interests in marine hydrokinetic energy harvesting from flow induced vibrations. The current study deals with the hydrokinetic energy harvesting potentials of diamond and square oscillators at various inline configurations. Both the sharp edge sections and the wake induced vibrations in tandem arrangement can lead to galloping type of instability with high energy efficiency ratios. The present in-water towing tank experiments comprise 1DoF vibrating systems at Re ranging from 2 × 103 to 4.8 × 104. The results show that the upstream wake generally enhances the system efficiency and the mechanical work done by the... 

Direct discharge of high-strength industrial effluent often upsets municipal wastewater treatment plant processes. This pilot study was undertaken to evaluate the performance of a UASB system in pre-treating effluent from a medium-size traditional slaughterhouse. Experiments were conducted in a continuous flow 500-1 pilot plant initially inoculated with 200 1 municipal anaerobic digested sludge. With an influent COD concentration of 3000-5000 mg/l, the system was started with a loading of 1.8 kg COD/m3.d (F/M of 0.24 kg COD/kg VSS.d) at 25°C. The granules formed after 4 months of operation were dark brownish with a diameter of 1-4 mm and a settling velocity of 20 m/hr. Once granules were... 

This paper contains analysis and simulation of recent dynamic models, describing human emotion. The pharmacological discussions lead to a new model of drug taking, which also have a better performance for description of psychological and psychiatric phenomena. Studying the effects of the order of fractional model, obtains an advantage of the fractional order model over the integer order one  

In this work we present a high-throughput, low-complexity design for linear precoding in massive Multiple-Input Multiple-Output (MIMO) systems. Large number of Base Station (BS) antennas in massive MIMO at one hand has caused the performance of linear precoders to be near-optimal and at the other hand has increased their complexity due to the need for the inversion of matrices with large dimensions. To avoid this complexity, approximate inversion methods based on Neumann Series have been proposed. However, in this work, we propose an architecture for Zero Forcing (ZF) precoder based on the Neumann Series approximate inversion that further reduces the complexity by replacing matrix-matrix... 

Tributhyl phosphate (TBP) decomposition in supercritical water oxidation (SCWO) was performed with and without catalyst, at different temperatures ranging from 370 to 480 °C, and different reaction times. Ag2O, CuO, Fe2O3, MgO, and ZnO synthesized by supercritical water were examined in TBP decomposition as the catalyst. TBP structure decomposed under the non-catalytic reaction; nevertheless, the results indicated that the use of catalysts improved the reaction efficiency, which calculated based on total organic carbon (TOC) removal, by far. However, TOC removal using Fe2O3 was 20% higher than the non-catalytic reaction. Having the ability in completion of the redox cycle, iron oxide... 

In this work, the flow stress behavior of a metal matrix composite AA2017-10% SiCp was studied by means of the uni-axial compression test. The composite was first produced by stir casting technique and then, hot extrusion with the ratio of 18:1 was carried out to achieve a microstructure with a homogeneous distribution of SiC particles. In the next stage, the isothermal compression tests were conducted on the cylindrical specimens up to the true strain of 0.6. The experiments were performed at temperatures between room temperature to 400°C and strain rates of 0.003, 0.03 and 0.3s-1. Negative strain rate sensitivity was observed in the temperatures less than 250°C indicating the occurrence of...