With increasing population and development, the resources of fossil fuels decreased, leading to the need to find alternative sources of energy. Furthermore, the use of fossil fuels is accompanied by several downsides including environmental fatality associated with toxic gas emissions from diesel engines and continuous increase of the price of diesel fuel. Biodiesel is one of the most important types of renewable energy that replaces the fossil fuel requirement (mineral diesel) and maintains eco-friendly sustainability. Calcium is an essential plant nutrient as it plays an important role in the formation of plant cell walls and membranes. Therefore, the fallen leaves of mango tree can be utilized to produce nano calcium oxide and serve as a highly effective catalyst in the transesterification process for biodiesel production. The green approach of mango leaves extract is more cost-effective, nontoxic, and environmentally friendly compared to other ways such as chemical and physical procedures. Transesterification reaction was conducted at fixed parameters of 65 ℃ reaction temperature, 3 wt.% catalyst concentration, 1.5 h reaction time, and 50% alcohol to oil weight ratio. The effects of several other parameters on the transesterification reaction were studied such as the volume of the reaction mixture, mixing speed, FFA% content, and methanol/ethanol weight ratio. The study found that methanol is more effective than ethanol as alcohol in transesterification reaction, and the FFA% has a slight effect on the catalyst to 1.8% FFA. The produced biodiesel was characterized by GC-MS and FT-IR analysis which indicate the presence of esters. The physical and fuel characteristics of the produced biodiesel were measured; it had a viscosity of 3.708 mm2/s, a density of 0.88869 g/cm3, and a flash point of 108 °C.
Reverse osmosis membrane desalination is one of the most significant water treatments that is used to offer freshwater. The aim of this research is to study the effect of controlling the value of the zeta potential on the suspended particles in the water and the proximity of the membrane surfaces in the colloidal solution, to keep the water stable electrically and disperse the colloidal particles. To achieve this aim, the experimental study was conducted in the Sanitary Engineering Laboratory, in the engineering college - University of Baghdad. Two systems were set up, one worked normally and the other worked by using the zeta rod placed before the reverse osmosis membrane. The results showed that the effect of the zeta rod increas
... Show MoreThe human kidney is one of the most important organs in the human body; it performs many functions
and has a great impact on the work of the rest of the organs. Among the most important possible treatments is
dialysis, which works as an external artificial kidney, and several studies have worked to enhance the
mechanism of dialysate flow and improve the permeability of its membrane. This study introduces a new
numerical model based on previous research discussing the variations in the concentrations of sodium,
potassium, and urea in the extracellular area in the blood during hemodialysis. We simulated the differential
equations related to mass transfer diffusion and we developed the model in MATLAB Simu
Active vibration control is the main problem in different structure. Smart material like piezoelectric make a structure smart, adaptive and self-controlling so, they are effective in active vibration control. In this paper piezoelectric elements are used as sensors and actuators in flexible structures for sensing and actuating purposes, and to control the vibration of a cantilever beam by using sliding mode control. The sliding mode controller (SMC) is designed to attenuate the vibration induced by initial tip displacement which is equal to 15 mm. It is designed based on the balance realization reduction method where three states are selected for the reduced model from the 24th states that describe the c
... Show MoreTexture synthesis using genetic algorithms is one way; proposed in the previous research, to synthesis texture in a fast and easy way. In genetic texture synthesis algorithms ,the chromosome consist of random blocks selected manually by the user .However ,this method of selection is highly dependent on the experience of user .Hence, wrong selection of blocks will greatly affect the synthesized texture result. In this paper a new method is suggested for selecting the blocks automatically without the participation of user .The results show that this method of selection eliminates some blending caused from the previous manual method of selection.
A new two-way nesting technique is presented for a multiple nested-grid ocean modelling system. The new technique uses explicit center finite difference and leapfrog schemes to exchange information between the different subcomponents of the nested-grid system. The performance of the different nesting techniques is compared, using two independent nested-grid modelling systems. In this paper, a new nesting algorithm is described and some preliminary results are demonstrated. The validity of the nesting method is shown in some problems for the depth averaged of 2D linear shallow water equation.
In this paper, an exact stiffness matrix and fixed-end load vector for nonprismatic beams having parabolic varying depth are derived. The principle of strain energy is used in the derivation of the stiffness matrix.
The effect of both shear deformation and the coupling between axial force and the bending moment are considered in the derivation of stiffness matrix. The fixed-end load vector for elements under uniformly distributed or concentrated loads is also derived. The correctness of the derived matrices is verified by numerical examples. It is found that the coupling effect between axial force and bending moment is significant for elements having axial end restraint. It was found that the decrease in bending moment was
in the
Stripping is one of the major distresses within asphalt concrete pavements caused due to penetration of water within the interface of asphalt-aggregate matrix. In this work, one grade of asphalt cement (40-50) was mixed with variable percentages of three types of additives (fly ash, fumed silica, and phosphogypsum) to obtained an modified asphalt cement to resist the effect of stripping phenomena .The specimens have been tested for physical properties according to AASHTO. The surface free energy has been measured by using two methods namely, the wilhelmy technique and the Sessile drop method according to NCHRP-104
procedures. Samples of asphalt concrete using different asphalt cement and modified asphalt cement percentages(4.1,4.6 an