The present study aims to convert obsidian rocks into spongy gravel for the use in the production of lightweight and heat insulating concrete. The rocks were burned at 960°C to achieve maximum swelling of the samples, then broken into gravel and sand sizes. For comparison purposes, two other types of aggregates were used, namely pumice and basalt. The main physical tests, such as specific gravity, bulk density, porosity, and water absorption were performed. For testing the resistance of samples to alkalinity, KOH and Na OH solutions were used. The results showed that the obsidian sample gave the best specifications, where its specific gravity was 0.33, while the values were 1.1 for pumice and 2.7 for basalt, with the

Reinforced concrete (RC) beams containing a longitudinal cavity have become an innovative development and advantage for economic purposes of light-weight members without largely affecting their resistance against the applied loads. This type of openings can also be used for maintenance purposes and usage space of communication lines, pipelines, etc. RC beams are primarily loaded in the plane of the members, which are two-dimensional in a plane stress state and the dominant structural behaviours include bending, shear, or combination of both. In the present study, six numerical models of RC beams with and without openings were simulated by using commercial finite element software ANSYS to evaluate the structural behaviours of those b

A novel demountable shear connector is proposed to link a concrete slab to steel sections in a way that resulting steel-concrete composite floor is demountable, i.e. it can be easily dismantled at the end of its service life. The proposed connectors consist of two parts: the first part is a hollow steel tube with internal threads at its lower end. The second part is a compatible partially threaded bolted stud. After linking the stud to the steel section, the hollow steel tube can be fastened over the threaded stud, which create a complete demountable shear connector. The connector is suitable for use in both composite bridges and buildings, and using cast in-situ slabs, precast solid slabs, or hollow-core precast slabs. A series of push-off

The study aimed to analyze the relationship between the internal public debt and the public budget deficit in Iraq during the period 2010–2020 using descriptive and analytical approaches to the data of the financial phenomenon. Furthermore, to track the development of public debt and the percentage of its contribution to the public budget of Iraq during the study period. The study showed that the origin of the debt with its benefits consumes a large proportion of oil revenues through what is deducted from these revenues to pay the principal debt with interest, which hinders the development process in the country. It has been shownthat although there was a surplus in some years of study, it was not

The research aimed to use HIIT exercises, and to know the effect of HIIT exercises on some physiological and physical indicators of the young badminton players, and to identify the degree of competition anxiety and the performance of some offense skills among the young badminton players. The research community (the young badminton players), the research sample and its selection method (the research sample was chosen by the intentional method (8) badminton player from the Athwari Club), the scientific method (the experimental method with pre and post tests), measurement tools: physiological tests (high and low blood pressure) , pulse, and physical exams (explosive force of arms and legs) and the offense skills and the scale of competit

The research aimed to use HIIT exercises, and to know the effect of HIIT exercises on some physiological and physical indicators of the young badminton players, and to identify the degree of competition anxiety and the performance of some offense skills among the young badminton players. The research community (the young badminton players), the research sample and its selection method (the research sample was chosen by the intentional method (8) badminton player from the Athwari Club), the scientific method (the experimental method with pre and post tests), measurement tools: physiological tests (high and low blood pressure) , pulse, and physical exams (explosive force of arms and legs) and the offense skills and the scale of competition an

The rehabilitation of deteriorated pavements using Asphalt Concrete (AC) overlays consistently confronts the reflection cracking challenge, where inherent cracks and joints from an existing pavement layer are mirrored in the new overlay. To address this issue, the current study evaluates the effectiveness of Engineered Cementitious Composite (ECC) and geotextile fabric as mitigation strategies. ECC, characterized by its tensile ductility, fracture resistance, and high deformation capacity, was examined in interlayer thicknesses of 7, 12, and 17 mm. Additionally, the impact of geotextile fabric positioning at the base and at 1/3 depth of the AC specimen was explored. Utilizing the Overlay Testing Machine (OTM) for evaluations, the research d

In this paper we proposes the philosophy of the Darwinian selection as synthesis method called Genetic algorithm ( GA ), and include new merit function with simple form then its uses in other works for designing one of the kinds of multilayer optical filters called high reflection mirror. Here we intend to investigate solutions for many practical problems. This work appears designed high reflection mirror that have good performance with reduction the number of layers, which can enable one to controlling the errors effect of the thickness layers on the final product, where in this work we can yield such a solution in a very shorter time by controlling the length of the chromosome and optimal genetic operators . Res

A perturbed linear system with property of strong observability ensures that there is a sliding mode observer to estimate the unknown form inputs together with states estimation. In the case of the electro-hydraulic system with piston position measured output, the above property is not met. In this paper, the output and its derivatives estimation were used to build a dynamic structure that satisfy the condition of strongly observable. A high order sliding mode observer (HOSMO) was used to estimate both the resulting unknown perturbation term and the output derivatives. Thereafter with one signal from the whole system (piton position), the piston position make tracking to desire one with a simple linear output feedback controller after ca