High tunnels, or unheated plastic greenhouses, are becoming increasingly popular among organic vegetable growers across the United States. However, the intensive production typical of these systems presents soil health challenges, including salinization due to high fertilizer or compost inputs coupled with lack of rainfall to leach salts. Legume cover crops may improve soil health in high tunnels by reducing the need for external inputs, while adding organic matter. We tested the soil health effects of a winter hairy vetch (Vicia villosa Roth) cover crop used to replace fertilizer N in an organic tomato cropping system in high tunnels. Studies were replicated across three sites differing in climate and soil type (Kansas, Kentucky, and Minnesota) over three years. We measured vetch cover crop effects on a suite of soil health indicators, including potentially mineralizable nitrogen (PMN), permanganate oxidizable carbon, and microbial biomass. Preliminary results suggest that vetch effects on PMN were highly variable. Soil mineral N, meanwhile, was often lower in the vetch treatment than in a fertilized control, both in spring and in fall. While further work on vetch effects on crop yields is needed, our results suggest that even legume cover crops such as vetch have the potential to reduce nitrate leaching.
This study aims to assess the removal efficiency andestablish the BOD5 and COD statisticalcorrelation of the sewage flowing in Al-Diwaniyah wastewater treatment plant in Iraq during the study period (2005-2016). The strength of the influent wastewater entering the plant varied from medium to high in strength. High concentrations of BOD5 and COD in the effluent were obtained due to the poor performance of the plant. This was observed from the BOD5 /COD ratios that did not confirm with the typical ratios for the treated sewage. To improve the performance of this plant, regression equations for BOD5 and COD removal percentages were suggested which can be used to facilitate evaluation of liquid waste and optimal control process. The equations
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A reinforced concrete frame is referred as "RIGID FRAMES". However, researches indicate that the Beam-Column joint (BCJ) is definitely not rigid. In addition, extensive research shows that failure may occur at the joint instead of in the beam or the column. Joint failure is known to be a catastrophic type which is difficult to repair.
This study was carried out to investigate the effect of hoops and column axial load on the shear strength of high-strength fiber reinforced Beam-Column Joints by using a numerical model based on finite element method using computer program ANSYS (Version 11.0). The variables are: diameter of hoops and magnitude of column axial load.
The theoretical results obtained from ANSYS program are in a good a
Abstract:In this research we prepared nanofibers by electrospinning from poly (Vinyl Alcohol) / TiO2. The spectrum of the solution (Emission) was studied at 772 nm. Several process parameter were Investigated as concentration of PVA, the effect of distance from nozzle tip to the grounded collector (gap distance), and final the effect of high voltage. We find the optimum condition to prepare a narrow nanofibers is at concentration of PVA 16gm, the fiber has 20nm diameter.
This work is concerned with the study of the effect of cement types, particularly OPC and SRPC, which are the main cement types manufactured in Iraq. In addition, study the effect of mineral admixtures, which are HRM and SF on the resistance of high performance concrete (HPC) to internal sulphate attack. The HRM is used at (10%) and SF is used at (8 and 10)% as a partial replacement by weight of cement for both types. The percentages of sulphate investigated are (1,2 and 3)% by adding natural gypsum as a partial replacement by weight of fine aggregate. The tests carried out in this work are: compressive strength, flexural strength, ultrasonic pulse velocity, and density at the age of 7, 28, 90 and 120 days.
The r
... Show MoreIn this research we prepared nanofibers by electrospinning
from poly (Vinyl Alcohol) / TiO2. The spectrum of the solution
(Emission) was studied at 772 nm. Several process parameter were
Investigated as concentration of PVA, the effect of distance from
nozzle tip to the grounded collector (gap distance), and final the
effect of high voltage. We find the optimum condition to prepare a
narrow nanofibers is at concentration of PVA 16gm, the fiber has
20nm diameter
In this study, an efficient compression system is introduced, it is based on using wavelet transform and two types of 3Dimension (3D) surface representations (i.e., Cubic Bezier Interpolation (CBI)) and 1 st order polynomial approximation. Each one is applied on different scales of the image; CBI is applied on the wide area of the image in order to prune the image components that show large scale variation, while the 1 st order polynomial is applied on the small area of residue component (i.e., after subtracting the cubic Bezier from the image) in order to prune the local smoothing components and getting better compression gain. Then, the produced cubic Bezier surface is subtracted from the image signal to get the residue component. Then, t
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Abstract. In this paper, a high order extended state observer (HOESO) based a sliding mode control (SMC) is proposed for a flexible joint robot (FJR) system in the presence of time varying external disturbance. A composite controller is integrated the merits of both HOESO and SMC to enhance the tracking performance of FJR system under the time varying and fast lumped disturbance. First, the HOESO estimator is constructed based on only one measured state to precisely estimate unknown system states and lumped disturbance with its high order derivatives in the FJR system. Second, the SMC scheme is designed based on such accurate estimations to govern the nominal FJR system by well compensating the estimation errors in the states and the lumped
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Abstract
In the present work the effect of bearing compliance on the performance of high speed misaligned journal bearing lined with a compliant PTFE liner lubricated with bubbly oil at high speeds has been studied. The effect of induced oil film temperature due to shearing effect has been implemented. Hydrodynamic effect of the complaint bearing and the influence of aerated oil have been examined by the classical thermohydrodynamic lubrication theory modified to include the effect of oil film turbulence and oil film temperature with suitable models for bubbly oil viscosity and density. The effect of liner elastic deformation has been implemented by using Winkler model. The effects of variable density and s
... Show MoreThe long – term behaviour of polyethylene products used out doors is affected by weathering. In the present work,
weathering test was carried out to find the effect of the environment conditions on the mechanical properties of
HDPE/LLDPE blends with different weight percents (0, 15, 30, and 45 %) relative to the LLDPE by increasing the
exposure times to (100, 150, 200, 250, 300) hr.
A series of tests (destructive), tensile, impact and hardness were carried out on the prepared samples, the results
obtained declare the changes on the material behaviour from ductile to brittle and the polymer shows a decline in the
mechanical properties with increasing the exposure times.
In the present work empirical equations were r