Two novel demountable shear connectors for precast steel-concrete composite bridges are presented. The connectors use high-strength steel bolts, which are fastened to the steel beam with the aid of a special locking configuration that prevents slip of bolts within their holes. Moreover, the connectors promote accelerated construction and overcome typical construction tolerances issues of precast structures. Most importantly, the connectors allow bridge disassembly, and therefore, can address different bridge deterioration scenarios with minimum disturbance to traffic flow, i.e. (1) precast deck panels can be rapidly uplifted and replaced; (2) connectors can be rapidly removed and replaced; and (3) steel beams can be replaced, while precast

يهدف البحث الى تحليل الخيارات الاستراتيجية للاقتراض الخارجي في العراق لاستشراف افضل الخيارات الاستراتيجية المستقبلية في مجال الاقتراض الخارجي في دائرة الدين العام في وزارة المالية ، وقد استخدم الباحث منهج دراسة الحالة وباستعمال اسلوب تحليل خوارزمية ال K-Means لتشخيص كفاءة الاقتراض الخارجي لعينة البحث البالغة (81) قرضا التي اقترضتها وزارة المالية للفترة 2007-2020 . ولقد كان الغرض الرئيسي للبحث المساهمة في تمكين وزا

An encryption system needs unpredictability and randomness property to maintain information security during transmission and storage. Although chaotic maps have this property, they have limitations such as low Lyapunov exponents, low sensitivity and limited chaotic regions. The paper presents a new improved skewed tent map to address these problems. The improved skew tent map (ISTM) increases the sensitivity to initial conditions and control parameters. It has uniform distribution of output sequences. The programs for ISTM chaotic behavior were implemented in MATLAB R2023b. The novel ISTM produces a binary sequence, with high degree of complexity and good randomness properties. The performance of the ISTM generator shows effective s

Internal conversion coefficients (ICC) and electron–positron pair conversion coefficients (PCC) for multipole transition of the core nucleus 88Sr have been calculated theoretically. The calculation is based on the relativistic Dirac–Fock (DF) solutions using the so called ‘‘Frozen Orbital’’ approximation, takes into account the effect of atomic vacancies created in the conversion process, covering a transition energies of 1–5000 keV. A large number of points were used to minimize any errors due to mesh-size effects. The internal conversion coefficients display a smooth monotonic dependence on transition energy, multipolarity and atomic shell. Comparing the values of PCC to ICC, it is interesting to note, that the energy dep

Modified algae with nano copper oxide (CuO) were used as adsorption media to remove tetracycline (TEC) from aqueous solutions. Functional groups, morphology, structure, and percentages of surfactants before and after adsorption were characterised through Fourier-transform infrared (FTIR), X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), and energy-dispersive spectroscopy (EDS). Several variables, including pH, connection time, dosage, initial concentrations, and temperature, were controlled to obtain the optimum condition. Thermodynamic studies, adsorption isotherm, and kinetics models were examined to describe and recognise the type of interactions involved. Resultantly, the best operation conditions were at pH 7, contact time