In this study, the photodegradation of Congo red dye (CR) in aqueous solution was investigated using Au-Pd/TiO2 as photocatalyst. The concentration of dye, dosage of photocatalyst, amount of H2O2, pH of the medium and temperature were examined to find the optimum values of these parameters. It has been found that 28 ppm was the best dye concentration. The optimum amount of photocatalyst was 0.09 g/75 mL of dye solution when the degradation percent was ~ 96 % after irradiation time of 12 hours, while the best amount of hydrogen peroxide was 7μl/75 mL of dye solution at degradation percent ~97 % after irradiation time of 10 hours, whereas pH 5 was the best value to carry out the reaction at the highest degradation percent. In additio

Heterocyclic compounds are crucial for medicinal chemistry and the development of therapeutic agents like broad-spectrum antibiotics. This study devised a facile procedure to synthesize novel antimicrobial bicyclic heterocycles from 2-mercapto-3-phenylquinazolin-4(3H)-one. Advanced analytical techniques including 1 H and 13C NMR, elemental analysis, and FT-IR spectroscopy characterized the intricate chemical structures of the products. In vitro assays tested the heterocycles against aerobic and anaerobic bacterial strains using fluconazole and ciprofloxacin as antifungal and antibacterial controls. Results demonstrated the formidable broad-spectrum antibacterial and antifungal activities of the synthesized compounds, with growth inhibition

Biologically active natural compounds are molecules produced by plants or plant-related microbes, such as endophytes. Many of these metabolites have a wide range of antimicrobial activities and other pharmaceutical properties. This study aimed to evaluate (in vitro) the antifungal activities of the secondary metabolites obtained from Paecilomyces sp. against the pathogenic fungus Rhizoctonia solani. The endophytic fungus Paecilomyces was isolated from Moringa oleifera leaves and cultured on potato dextrose broth for the production of the fungal metabolites. The activity of Paecilomyces filtrate against the radial growth of Rhizoctonia solani was tested by mixing the filtrate with potato dextrose agar medium at concentrations of 15%,

The cost-effective removal of heavy metal ions represents a significant challenge in environmental science. In this study, we developed a straightforward and efficient reusable adsorbent by amalgamating chitosan and vermiculite (forming the CSVT composite), and comprehensively investigated its selective adsorption mechanism. Different techniques, such as Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), zeta potential analysis, scanning electron microscopy (SEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD), and Brunauer, Emmett, Teller (BET) analysis were employed for this purpose. The prepared CSVT composite exhibited a larger surface area and higher mesoporosity increasing from 1.9 to 17.24 m2/g compared to pristine chitosan. The adsorption capabilities of the

The objective of the current research is to find an optimum design of hybrid laminated moderate thick composite plates with static constraint. The stacking sequence and ply angle is required for optimization to achieve minimum deflection for hybrid laminated composite plates consist of glass and carbon long fibers reinforcements that impeded in epoxy matrix with known plates dimension and loading. The analysis of plate is by adopting the first-order shear deformation theory and using Navier's solution with Genetic Algorithm to approach the current objective. A program written with MATLAB to find best stacking sequence and ply angles that give minimum deflection, and the results comparing with ANSYS.

Power-electronic converters are essential elements for the effective interconnection of renewable energy sources to the power grid, as well as to include energy storage units, vehicle charging stations, microgrids, etc. Converter models that provide an accurate representation of their wideband operation and interconnection with other active and passive grid components and systems are necessary for reliable steady state and transient analyses during normal or abnormal grid operating conditions. This paper introduces two Laplace domain-based approaches to model buck and boost DC-DC converters for electromagnetic transient studies. The first approach is an analytical one, where the converter is represented by a two-port admittance model via mo

In this work, an efficient energy management (EEM) approach is proposed to merge IoT technology to enhance electric smart meters by working together to satisfy the best result of the electricity customer's consumption. This proposed system is called an integrated Internet of things for electrical smart meter (2IOT-ESM) architecture. The electric smart meter (ESM) is the first and most important technique used to measure the active power, current, and energy consumption for the house’s loads. At the same time, the effectiveness of this work includes equipping ESM with an additional storage capacity that ensures that the measurements are not lost in the event of a failure or sudden outage in WiFi network. Then then these

Soil movement resulting due unsupported excavation nearby axially loaded piles imposes significant structural troubles on geotechnical engineers especially for piles that are not designed to account for loss of lateral confinement. In this study the field excavation works of 7.0 m deep open tunnel was continuously followed up by the authors. The work is related to the project of developing the Army canal in the east of Baghdad city in Iraq. A number of selected points around the field excavation are installed on the ground surface at different horizontal distance. The elevation and coordinates of points are recorded during 23 days with excavation progress period. The field excavation process was numerically simulated by using the finite