• Structural Monitoring and Maintenance
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• v.2 no.4
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• pp.319-338
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• 2015

The electro-mechanical impedance (EMI) technique makes use of surface-bonded lead zirconate titanate (PZT) patches as impedance transducers measuring impedance variations monitored on host structural components. The present experimental work further evaluate an alternative to the conventional EMI technique which performs measurements of the variations in the output voltage of PZT transducers rather than computing electromechanical impedance (or admittance) itself. This paper further evaluates a variant of the EMI approach presented in a previous work of the present authors, suitable, for low-cost concrete structures monitoring applications making use of a credit card-sized Raspberry Pi single board computer as core hardware unit. This monitoring approach is also deployed by introducing a new damage identification index based on the ratio between the area of the 2-D error ellipse of specific probability of EMI-based measurements containment over that of the 2-D error circle of equivalent probability. Experimental results of damages occurring in concrete cubic and beam specimens are investigated under increasing loading conditions. Results illustrate that the proposed technique is an efficient approach for identification and early detection of damage in concrete structures.

• Structural Engineering and Mechanics
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.223-240
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• 2006

Taking into account the geometrical and material nonlinearities, an ultimate behavior of reinforced concrete cooling tower shell in hyperbolic configuration is presented. The design wind pressures suggested in the guidelines of the US (ACI) and Germany (VGB), with or without the effect of internal suction, are employed in the analysis to examine the qualitative and quantitative characteristics of each design wind pressure. The geometrical nonlinearity is incorporated by the Green-Lagrange strain tensor. The nonlinear features of concrete, such as the nonlinear stress-strain relation in compression, the tensile cracking with the smeared crack model, an effect of tension stiffening, are taken into account. The biaxial stress state in concrete is represented by an improved work-hardening plasticity model. From the perspective of quality of wind pressures, the two guidelines are determined as highly correlated each other. Through the extensive analysis on the Niederaussem cooling tower in Germany, not only the ultimate load is determined but also the mechanism of failure, distribution of cracks, damage processes, stress redistributions, and mean crack width are examined.

• Journal of the Korea institute for structural maintenance and inspection
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• v.27 no.6
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• pp.201-210
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• 2023

This study is to evaluate the ductility strengthening effect of aramid fiber sheets on piloti-type structures. Two piloti-type structure specimens were prepared and tested under statical cyclic lateral loads. The ductility strengthening effect was validated from the analysis of lateral load-displacement relationship, displacement ductility ratio, work damage index and torsion behavior. Test results showed that the post-peak behavior of piloti-type structures with columns strengthened with aramid fiber sheets tended to be ductile resulting from preventing shear failure and minimizing torsion due to the effective lateral confinement of column concrete by aramid fiber sheet. Consequently, the displacement ductility ratio and work damage index of piloti-type structures with columns with strengthened with aramid fiber sheets were 4.63 and 42.81 times higher than those of non strengthened piloti-type structures.

• Safety and Health at Work
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• v.10 no.2
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• pp.219-223
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• 2019

Background: Ice cooling vests can cause tissue damage and have no flexibility. Therefore, these two undesirable properties of ice cooling vest were optimized, and the present study was aimed to compare the impact of the optimized ice cooling vest and a commercial paraffin cooling vest on physiological and perceptual strain under controlled conditions. Methods: For optimizing, hydrogel was used to increase the flexibility and a layer of the ethylene vinyl acetate foam was placed into the inside layer of packs to prevent tissue damage. Then, 15 men with an optimized ice cooling vest, with a commercial paraffin cooling vest, and without a cooling vest performed tests including exercise on a treadmill (speed of 2.8 km/hr and slope of %0) under hot ($40^{\circ}C$) and dry (40 %) condition for 60 min. The physiological strain index and skin temperature were measured every 5 and 15 minutes, respectively. The heat strain score index and perceptual strain index were also assessed every 15 minutes. Results: The mean values of the physiological and perceptual indices differed significantly between exercise with and without cooling vests (P < 0.05). However, the difference of the mean values of the indices except the value of the skin temperature during the exercises with the commercial paraffin cooling vest and the optimized ice cooling vest was not significant (P > 0.05). Conclusions: The optimized ice cooling vest was as effective as the commercial paraffin cooling vest to control the thermal strain. However, ice has a greater latent heat and less production cost.

• Earthquakes and Structures
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• v.15 no.6
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• pp.617-627
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• 2018

After earthquakes FRP sheets are often used for the rehabilitation of damaged Reinforced Concrete (RC) beamcolumn connections. Connections with minor to moderate damage are often dealt with by applying FRP sheets after a superficial repair of the cracks using resin paste or high strength mortar but without infusion of thin resin solution under pressure into the cracking system. This technique is usually adopted in these cases due to the fast and easy-to-apply procedure. The experimental investigation reported herein aims at evaluating the effectiveness of repairing the damaged beam-column connections using FRP sheets after a meticulous but superficial repair of their cracking system using resin paste. The investigation comprises experimental results of 10 full scale beam-column joint specimens; five original joints and the corresponding retrofitted ones. The repair technique has been applied to RC joints with different joint reinforcement arrangements with minor to severe damage brought about by cyclic loading for the purposes of this work. Aiming at quantitative concluding remarks about the effectiveness of the repair technique, data concerning response loads, loading stiffness and energy absorption values have been acquired and commented upon. Furthermore, comparisons of damage index values and values of equivalent viscous damping, as obtained during the test of the original specimens, with the corresponding ones observed in the loading of the repaired ones have also been evaluated and commented. Based on these comparisons, it is deduced that the technique under investigation can be considered to be a rather satisfactory repair technique for joints with minor to moderate damage taking into account the rapid, convenient and easy-to-apply character of its application.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Combustion
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• v.22 no.4
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• pp.27-34
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• 2017

Various approaches have been proposed to predict the ash deposition (slagging and fouling) propensity of coal, which is essential in maintaining high efficiency and preventing corrosion/damage of a coal-fired boiler. The common method is to establish an index of the ash deposition propensity based on elementary coal composition and advanced characterization of ash properties, which is readily applicable to design, operation and maintenance of coal-fired boilers. Although many indexes have been developed for this purpose, their validity is still not satisfactory in actual applications to particular coal types or operating conditions. This paper reviews the status of predictive approaches for the ash deposition propensity, and assesses the performance of existing indexes by comparing the results for selected coals. This work will contribute to the development of a comprehensive and practical method for prediction of the ash deposition propensity.

• Geomechanics and Engineering
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• v.30 no.6
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• pp.551-564
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• 2022

Fragmenting the rock mass is considered as the most important work in open-pit mines. Ground vibration is the most hazardous issue of blasting which can cause critical damage to the surrounding structures. This paper focuses on developing an explicit model to predict the ground vibration through an multi objective evolutionary polynomial regression (MOGA-EPR). To this end, a database including 79 sets of data related to a quarry site in Malaysia were used. In addition, a gene expression programming (GEP) model and several empirical equations were employed to predict ground vibration, and their performances were then compared with the MOGA-EPR model using the mean absolute error (MAE), root mean square error (RMSE), mean (𝜇), standard deviation of the mean (𝜎), coefficient of determination (R²) and a20-index. Comparing the results, it was found that the MOGA-EPR model predicted the ground vibration more precisely than the GEP model and the empirical equations, where the MOGA-EPR scored lower MAE and RMSE, 𝜇 and 𝜎 closer to the optimum value, and higher R² and a20-index. Accordingly, the proposed MOGA-EPR model can be introduced as a useful method to predict ground vibration and has the capacity to be generalized to predict other blasting effects.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers A
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• v.24 no.10 s.181
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• pp.2646-2653
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• 2000

The performance of slider of a hard disk drive affects the durability of the system. Particularly, the flying ability of the slider is critical in terms of surface damage and head crash. In this work, the take-off characteristics of the slider for various types of laser zone textured bump geometries were investigated. Also, the effect of ambient pressure on the flying characteristics of the slider was experimentally observed. An index of air density which can be used as a parameter for evaluating the flying characteristic is introduced.

• Journal of Korean Neurosurgical Society
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• v.39 no.4
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• pp.271-276
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• 2006

Objective : Despite the recent progress that has been made in intracerebral monitoring, it is still difficult to quantify the exact extent of primary brain damage after severe head injury. In this work, we investigate the role of S-100B protein as a serum marker of brain damage after severe head injury. Methods : 21 patients with severe head injury [GCS score <9] were selected for this prospective study. A venous blood sample was taken as soon as possible after head injury and the serum concentration of S-100B protein was measured daily for five consecutive days. The serum level of S-100B protein was compared with the patients' outcome. The outcome was measured twice, at hospital discharge and after 6 months of follow-up using the Glasgow Outcome Scale[GOS]. Results : Those patients who died within two weeks [after head injury] had a significantly higher serum S-100B value than those who survived [median, 9.64ug/L versus 2.91ug/L]. Seven [78%] of the nine patients who died had a maximum S-100B value of 2ug/L or higher, while three [25%] of the twelve surviving patients showed a maximum S-100B protein value of more than 2ug/L [P<005]. Conclusion : These results indicate that S-100B protein appears to be the most reliable index for estimating the extent of brain damage.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
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• 2010.06a
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• pp.131-131
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• 2010

The power of semiconductor laser diodes has been limited primarily by the heating effects which occur at high optical intensities. The actual limiting event can take one of a number of forms such as. catastrophic optical damage or filamentation. A general approach to this problem is to design a heterostructure which creates a high powered output while maintaining low internal optical intensities. A graded index separate confinement heterostructure (GRIN-SCH) is one such structure that accomplishes the above task. Here, the active region is sandwiched between graded index layers where the index of refraction increases nearer to the active layer. This structure has been shown to yield a high efficiency due to the confinement of both the optical power and carriers, thereby reducing the optical intensity required to achieve higher powers. The optical confinement also reinforces the optical beam quality against high power effects. Quantum dots have long been a desirable option for laser diodes due to the enhanced optical properties associated with the zeroth dimensionality. In our work, we use PICS3D software created by Crosslight Software Inc. to simulate the performance of In0.67A10.33As/A10.2Ga0.8AsquantumdotsusedwithaGRIN-SCH. The simulation tools are used to optimize the GRIN-SCH structure for high efficiency and optical beam quality.