Six proposed simply supported high strength-steel fiber reinforced concrete (HS-SFRC) beams reinforced with FRP (fiber reinforced polymer) rebars were numerically tested by finite element method using ABAQUS software to investigate their behavior under the flexural failure. The beams were divided into two groups depending on their cross sectional shape. Group A consisted of four trapezoidal beams with dimensions of (height 200 mm, top width 250 mm, and bottom width 125 mm), while group B consisted of two rectangular beams with dimensions of (125 ×200) mm. All specimens have same total length of 1500 mm, and they were also considered to be made of same high strength concrete designed material with 1% volume fraction of steel fiber. Different types and ratios of FRP rebar were used to reinforce these test beams. The study’s principle variables were the amount and type of flexural reinforcement (glass FRP and basalt FRP) and beam cross-sectional shape (rectangular and trapezoidal). The load-deflection behavior and ultimate load capacity of the beams were studied and compared with one another under flexural test with symmetrical two-point loading. The results show that increasing the reinforcement ratio resulted in higher post cracking flexural stiffness, and higher residual strength, as well as caused an increase in the first cracking load and ultimate load capacity ranged from 3 to 16.9%, and 4.6 to 7.3% respectively. When the GFRP rebars replaced by BFRP, the overall beams flexural performance showed outstanding improvements. Moreover the results indicate that increasing the top width of the beam cross section led to a significant enhancement in the first crack load ranged from 16 to 32.4%, also a remarkable increases in the ultimate load capacity in the range of 35.5 to 35.8% were indicated in the trapezoidal beams compared to rectangular beams. However the results show that the deflections were similar and were approximately 1.07–1.54 mm for all test beams. It is worth noting that the general flexural behavior of all the test beams indicated a ductile behavior with a gradual reduction in strength and high residual strength pre to failure due to proposing steel fiber presence.
The control of prostheses and their complexities is one of the greatest challenges limiting wide amputees’ use of upper limb prostheses. The main challenges include the difficulty of extracting signals for controlling the prostheses, limited number of degrees of freedom (DoF), and cost-prohibitive for complex controlling systems. In this study, a real-time hybrid control system, based on electromyography (EMG) and voice commands (VC) is designed to render the prosthesis more dexterous with the ability to accomplish amputee’s daily activities proficiently. The voice and EMG systems were combined in three proposed hybrid strategies, each strategy had different number of movements depending on the combination protocol between voic
... Show MoreEncasing glass fiber reinforced polymer (GFRP) beam with reinforced concrete (RC) improves stability, prevents buckling of the web, and enhances the fire resistance efficiency. This paper provides experimental and numerical investigations on the flexural performance of RC specimens composite with encased pultruded GFRP I-sections. The effect of using shear studs to improve the composite interaction between the GFRP beam and concrete was explored. Three specimens were tested under three-point loading. The deformations, strains in the GFRP beams, and slippages between the GFRP beams and concrete were recorded. The embedded GFRP beam enhanced the peak loads by 65% and 51% for the composite specimens with and without shear connectors,
... Show MoreA Strength Pareto Evolutionary Algorithm 2 (SPEA 2) approach for solving the multi-objective Environmental / Economic Power Dispatch (EEPD) problem is presented in this paper. In the past fuel cost consumption minimization was the aim (a single objective function) of economic power dispatch problem. Since the clean air act amendments have been applied to reduce SO2 and NOX emissions from power plants, the utilities change their strategies in order to reduce pollution and atmospheric emission as well, adding emission minimization as other objective function made economic power dispatch (EPD) a multi-objective problem having conflicting objectives. SPEA2 is the improved version of SPEA with better fitness assignment, density estimation, an
... Show MoreEmpirical equations for estimating thickening time and compressive strength of bentonitic - class "G" cement slurries were derived as a function of water to cement ratio and apparent viscosity (for any ratios). How the presence of such an equations easily extract the thickening time and compressive strength values of the oil field saves time without reference to the untreated control laboratory tests such as pressurized consistometer for thickening time test and Hydraulic Cement Mortars including water bath ( 24 hours ) for compressive strength test those may have more than one day.
The aim of the study was to find out the correlations and impact between the variable of ethical leadership behavior and university performance at Sumer University. Use the descriptive analytical method by adopting the questionnaire tool to collect data. The questionnaire was distributed electronically to 113 teachers at Sumer University and the response was from 105 teachers. The research results showed that there is a correlation and effect relationship between the search variables. In addition, the responding university does not have ethically defined standards in terms of performance of the work of the cadres working there. Finally, the research presented a set of recommendations aimed at tackling problems in the ethical lead
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