Perennial biofuel and cover crops systems are important for enhancing soil health and can provide numerous soil, agricultural, and environmental benefits. The study objective was to investigate the effects of cover crops and biofuel crops on soil hydraulic properties relative to traditional management for claypan soils. The study site included selected management practices: cover crop (CC) and no cover crop (NC) with corn/soybean rotation, switchgrass (SW), and miscanthus (MI). The CC mixture consisted of cereal rye, hairy vetch, and Austrian winter pea. The research site was located at Bradford Research Center in Missouri, USA, and was implemented on a Mexico silt loam. Intact soil cores (76‐mm diam. by 76‐mm long) were taken from the

Porosity and permeability are the most difficult properties to determine in subsurface reservoir characterization. The difficulty of estimating them arising from the fact that porosity and permeability may vary significantly over the reservoir volume, and can only be sampled at well location. Secondly, the porosity values are commonly evaluated from the well log data, which are usually available from most wells in the reservoir, but permeability values, which are generally determined from core analysis, are not usually available. The aim of this study is: First, to develop correlations between the core and the well log data which can be used to estimate permeability in uncored wells, these correlations enable to estimate reservoir permeabil

Lithium doped Nickel-Zinc ferrite material with chemical formula Ni0.9−2x Zn0.1LixFe2+xO4, where x is the ratio of lithium ions Li+ (x = 0, 0.01, 0.02, 0.03 and 0.04) prepared by using sol-gel auto combustion technique. X-ray diffraction results showed that the material have pure cubic spinal structure with space group Fd-3m. The experimental values of the lattice constant (aexp) were decreased from 8.39 to 8.35 nm with doped Li ions. It was found that the decreasing of the crystallite size with addition of lithium ions concentration. The radius of tetrahedral (rtet) and octahedral (roct) site were computed from cation distribution. SEM images have been taken to show the morphology of compound. The dielectric parameters [dissipation fa

Permanent deformation (rutting) of asphalt mixtures is one of the major forms of distress. Aggregate gradation is one of the most important factors affecting the permanent deformation of asphalt mixtures. Other variables are also important to understand their effects on the mixture such as temperature, binder content and compaction level. For this purpose 6 different aggregate gradations have been chosen and each one of them has been manufactured / tested with different variables. The results showed that at relatively low temperature there is little effect of aggregate packing on the permanent deformation. However, as the temperature increases the effect of gradation becomes apparent, in that the better the packing the better the resistance

Porous asphalt paving is a modern design method that differs from the usual asphalt pavements' traditional designs. The difference is that the design structure of porous pavements allows the free passage of fluids through their layers, which controls or reduces the amount of runoff or water accumulated in the area by allowing the flow of rain and surface runoff.  The cross-structure of this type of paving works as a suitable method for managing rainwater and representing groundwater recharge. The overall benefits of porous asphalt pavements include environmental services and safety features, including controlling the build-up of contaminated metals on the road surface, rainwater management, resistance to slipping ac

Natural bitumen (NB) is a highly precious material and has drawn increasing attention due to its unique properties, especially since it is available in large quantities and has been used in limited fields. In this research, the exploitation of NB from sulfur springs as an alternative energy resource in the production of asphalt pavement is evaluated. It can be concluded from the experimental results that the chemical composition and surface morphology of NB samples are different from those of base asphalt. Besides, the rheological properties of virgin NB are not sufficient for paving work. To overcome this obstacle, NB from five different springs is modified with limestone filler (LSF) to enhance its properties. LSF is a natural material an