Coal fines are highly prone to be generated in all stages of Coal Seam Gas (CSG) production and development. These detached fines tend to aggregate, contributing to pore throat blockage and permeability reduction. Thus, this work explores the dispersion stability of coal fines in CSG reservoirs and proposes a new additive to be used in the formulation of the hydraulic fracturing fluid to keep the fines dispersed in the fluid. In this work, bituminous coal fines were tested in various suspensions in order to study their dispersion stability. The aggregation behavior of coal fines (dispersed phase) was analyzed in different dispersion mediums, including deionized-water, low and high sodium chloride solutions. Furthermore, the effect of Sodium Dodecyl Benzene Sulfonate (SDBS), an anionic surfactant, on fine aggregation in the suspensions was investigated over a wide alkaline range. At a known pH, the results of stability were validated with the proppant pack glass column test and further verified with microscopic images. It was observed that adding SDBS to the hydraulic fracturing fluid keeps the coal fines well-dispersed in the post-hydraulic fracturing flow back and prevents coal fines aggregation, and ultimately helps permeability enhancement. The results show that at a constant pH, as salinity increases, the zeta-potential (an indirect indicator of stability of the coal-water slurry) reduces. Also, a trace amount of SDBS substantially enhances the dispersion stability of coal fines. This enhancement dictates that coal fines will not congregate and will not plug the proppant pack. Furthermore, the results were confirmed by proppant pack glass-column tests and microscopic images, the result of which illustrate much less aggregation when having SDBS added to the suspension. Polymeric surfactants have been used in the field to disperse coal fines. However, it causes the coal matrix to swell and clog the pore throats, thus reducing the permeability. The anionic surfactant, SDBS, has never been tried in field applications to disperse coal fines. The current research demonstrates the considerable potential of SDBS, as a hydraulic fracturing fluid additive, in enhancing the dispersion stability of the coal fines.
In Nathaniel Hawthorn's The Scarlet Letter, love and hate appear as independent powers that consume their holders. In this novel, Nathaniel Hawthorn presents a picture of the Puritans which shows an important part of American history. The Scarlet Letter outlines the American's brief moment of theocracy and extreme social order. Hawthorn is one of the first American writers to explore the hidden motivations of his characters. The Puritans wanted to establish an ideal community in America that can act as a model of influence for what they saw as a corrupted civil and religious order in England. This sense of mission is the core of their religious and social identity. That is why they required a strict moral regulation. The research tackles th
... Show MoreThis study aims to conduct an exhaustive comparison between the performance of human translators and artificial intelligence-powered machine translation systems, specifically examining the top three systems: Spider-AI, Metacate, and DeepL. A variety of texts from distinct categories were evaluated to gain a profound understanding of the qualitative differences, as well as the strengths and weaknesses, between human and machine translations. The results demonstrated that human translation significantly outperforms machine translation, with larger gaps in literary texts and texts characterized by high linguistic complexity. However, the performance of machine translation systems, particularly DeepL, has improved and in some contexts
... Show MoreBackground: Axillary lymph node (ALN) enlargement with diffuse cortical thickening and conserved echogenic hilum may represent a diagnostic and therapeutic challenge. Sonographic strain elastography may help the characterization of borderline ALN.
Aim: To evaluate the strain elastography of borderline ALN and to calculate a cutoff value of strain ratio (SR) that can identify suspicious ALN with the highest sensitivity and specificity to reduce unnecessary invasive procedures.
Subjects and Methods: A prospective study included 45 patients who attended the Breast clinic in Oncology Teaching Hospital with borderline axillary lymphadenopathy (intact hilum and diffusely thic
... Show MoreIn this paper, the general framework for calculating the stability of equilibria, Hopf bifurcation of a delayed prey-predator system with an SI type of disease in the prey population, is investigated. The impact of the incubation period delay on disease transmission utilizing a nonlinear incidence rate was taken into account. For the purpose of explaining the predation process, a modified Holling type II functional response was used. First, the existence, uniform boundedness, and positivity of the solutions of the considered model system, along with the behavior of equilibria and the existence of Hopf bifurcation, are studied. The critical values of the delay parameter for which stability switches and the nature of the Hopf bifurcat
... Show MoreMonitoring and analysing of the vertical deformations or the settlements of the structures is one of the main research fields in geodetic applications, which is considered a precise periodic measurement, made at different epochs to investigate these deformations on heavy structures.
In this research, the deformation measurements were carried out on one of Baghdad University buildings,” Building of Computers Department” of dimensions (70.0 * 81.3 m.). Due to some cracks observed in their walls, it was necessary to monitor the vertical displacement of this building at some particular monitoring points by constructing a vertical network and measured in different epochs. The first epoch (zero epoch) was carried out in April 2006, the
Rating systems for evaluating the sustainability of communities are an essential tool that is increasingly applied throughout the developed world to set criteria indicators to optimize the physical, social, economic, and environmental potential within such communities. Rating systems vary based on existing disparities among societies and their unique building and physical planning practices. Iraqi cities lacked the adaptation of a formal methodology or sustainability rating system to correctly measure the built environment’s sustainability indicators. This research attempts to review the most substantial rating systems to measure the sustainability of communities worldwide to form a
Background: Among individuals who have a stenotic aortic valve, a precise assessment of aortic valve area is essential for clinical judgment. So far, no studies have been conducted to investigate and assess the role of the three dimensional echo-cardiography in the assessment of the valve stenosis. This study aims to compare and assess the precision of the measurement of the stenosis area of the aortic valve by 2D versus 3D echo-cardiography.
This study examined the correlation between binder-level fatigue properties and mixture-level cracking resistance in asphalt binders modified with five Nanomaterials (NMs): Nano-Silica (NS), Nano-Alumina (NA), and Nano-Titanium dioxide (NT) at 2%, 4%, and 6% as well as Nano-Zinc oxide (NZ) and Carbon Nanotubes (CNTs) at 1%, 2%, and 3%. Modified binders were subjected to Rolling Thin-Film Oven Test (RTFOT) and Pressure Aging Vessel (PAV) aging and tested at 25 °C using the Linear Amplitude Sweep (LAS) test to determine fatigue life (Nf) and the fatigue parameter G*.sin δ. The corresponding asphalt mixtures were evaluated using the IDEAL-CT test. The results indicated strong correlations between binder and mixture performance for
... Show MoreThe kestrel Falco tinnunculus specimens coIldeted in Iraq are found infected with one or more species of the following helminthes; Physaloptera alata (Nematoda), Cladataenia globifera (Cestoda), Prosthogonimus cuneatus (Trernatoda), and Sphaeriorostris sp. (Acanthocephala) with a total infection rate of 30.56%. The results are compared and discussed with the pertinent literature.