Sharif Digital Repository

This study concentrated on the formulation of self-flowing and an energy efficient lightweight aggregate foamed concrete (LAFC) to be employed as thermal insulation, thermal mass and structural material. Low density concrete mixtures (for the density values from 800 to 1300 kg/m3) were prepared by changing the volume of lightweight expanded clay aggregate (ECA) from 49.4% to 20.1%. Flowing properties of concrete mixtures were improved with the help of stable foam. Ordinary Portland cement (OPC) was replaced by the 5% and 10% silica fume (SF) to examine the influence of SF on the properties of LAFC. Compressive strength and tensile strength of LAFC mixtures were respectively enhanced from 6.5... 

Two groups of cotton growers participated in this study; the first, referred as “conventional cotton producers” (CCPs), continues to use traditional techniques. The second group, known as sustainable cotton producers (SCPs), adheres to practices that are socially acceptable, economically feasible, and environment friendly. This study was designed to undertake a thorough socio-economic analysis of CCP and SCP in terms of cost of production, yield, and adaptations for climate change. The data were collected from a total of 275 farming households (138 SCPs and 137 CCPs) from two districts, namely, Bahawalpur and Rajanpur, Punjab, Pakistan. The data were analyzed using the benefit–cost ratio... 

A localized magnetic field is a vector field that alters in space because of magnetic materials or electric currents. Some examples of localized magnetic fields are indoor localization, magnetic anomaly detection, magnetoencephalography, and quantum physics. Magnetic fields can be used to estimate the orientation and position of a device inside a building by measuring the changes in the magnetic field caused by ferromagnetic substances. On the other hand, a Tri-hybrid nanofluid can transfer heat better than a normal hybrid nanofluid by mixing three different nanoparticles with synergistic effects. It can have more varied physical and thermal properties by choosing different combinations of... 

Network function virtualization (NFV) and software-defined networking (SDN) are two promising technologies to enable 5G and 6G services and achieve cost reduction, network scalability, and deployment flexibility. However, migration to full SDN/NFV networks in order to serve these services is a time-consuming process and costly for mobile operators. This paper focuses on energy efficiency during the transition of mobile core networks (MCN) to full SDN/NFV networks and explores how energy efficiency can be addressed during such migration. We propose a general system model containing a combination of legacy nodes and links, in addition to newly introduced NFV and SDN nodes. We refer to this... 

This work presents the development of a novel antifungal ternary approach that is eco-friendly, biocompatible, and cost-effective. It consists of Bryum argenteum extract, silver nanoparticles, and healing clay smectite. The research focuses on the green production of silver nanoparticles using an aqueous extract of Bryum argenteum as a stabilizing and reducing agent, as well as the synthesis of clay dispersion and plant extract. The silver nanoparticles were characterized by FTIR, SEM, UV–Vis spectroscopy, and XRD. Using a standard phytochemical screening procedure, the aqueous, ethanolic, and acetonic extracts of Bryum argenteum were subjected to phytochemical screening. Silver... 

Although flooding and its variants are widely deployed for broadcasting by different applications, there are limited results on a complete and comprehensive analytical framework describing their behavior in general cases. We have previously published results which provide an upper bound for the performance of flooding when flooded packets have the highest serving priority. In this paper, using a different and simpler approach, we develop an analytical framework for analysis of flooding in general cases where flooding packets do not receive any special priority treatment in the network. The analysis is performed for a static multi-hop ad hoc wireless network using CSMA as its MAC layer. The... 

There are applications where important and critical data should be sent to all nodes in a wireless Ad-hoc network. Flooding and its variants are typically used to achieve this target. Network coding can also be used for broadcasting in such an environment. Energy consumption in the network, coverage and total delay are all important parameters that should be considered when an algorithm is evaluated. In this article, a reliable and energy efficient single source broadcasting algorithm is proposed based on network coding. This algorithm guarantees the delivery of desired messages to all network nodes, consumes less energy compared and reduces the total delay compared to other algorithms. This... 

Al–5·6Zn, Al–5·6Zn–2·5Mg and Al–5·6Zn–2·5Mg–1·6Cu (wt-%) powder blends were compacted at 350 MPa and sintered in nitrogen at different temperatures to study microstructural evolution during sintering. Densification, dimensional changes and mechanical properties of the Al alloys were investigated. Microstructural analyses were performed by scanning electron microscopy (SEM) coupled with energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDS), X-ray diffraction (XRD), and simultaneous thermal analysis (STA) in order to determine the temperature and chemical composition of the phases formed during sintering. It was shown that various liquids and intermetallic phases including Al0·71Zn0·29 at 438°C,... 

Rate, energy and delay are three main parameters of interest in ad-hoc networks. In this paper, we discuss the problem of maximizing network utility and minimizing energy consumption while satisfying a given transmission delay constraint for each packet. We formulate this problem in the standard convex optimization form and subsequently discuss the tradeoff between utility, energy and delay in such framework. Also, in order to adapt for the distributed nature of the network, a distributed algorithm where nodes decide on choosing transmission rates and probabilities based on their local information is introduced. ©2009 IEEE  

Flooding and its variants are the simplest and most widely used broadcasting methods. Therefore, analysis of its performance in an ad-hoc environment using realistic assumptions is an important research topic. In this article, deploying a rigorous theoretic analysis, an upper bound on the performance of probabilistic flooding running over CSMA as a real and suitable MAC layer protocol for broadcasting scenarios is derived in a static multi-hop ad-hoc network in saturated condition. This model reveals the relation between network parameters and the performance of flooding and thus, helps the designer to have a better understanding of the effect of different design parameters. Using this... 

Flooding technique is widely using to manipulate sensor network essential activities such as synchronization, data gathering, network query and in-network information processing. Reliable and low latency data broadcasting is the primary goal in design of appropriate quality of service aware flooding algorithm. This paper proposes a new error-rate adaptive reliable data flooding strategy. Energy consumption which it the main limitation in sensor network, has been considered in optimal presented scheme. Also the tradeoff between reliability, power consumption and latency has been cared to achieve the finest devise. The simulation results have shown significant enhancement in quality of data...