Papers by Keyword: Heterogeneous

Abstract: AlCoCrFeNi high entropy alloys (HEA) have superior strength and corrosion resistance at both room and high temperatures and are expected to application in elevated temperature environments. However, it is not clear the relationship between the harmonic structure and the mechanical properties of these HEAs at elevated temperatures. The harmonic structure is composed of dispersed coarse grains and fine grains that are networked around them. In this study, the harmonic structure AlCoCrFeNi HEA was fabricated by mechanical milling (MM) / spark plasma sintering (SPS) process and the microstructure and elevated temperature mechanical properties of AlCoCrFeNi HEA are investigated in detail. AlCoCrFeNi mixed powders with average particle sizes of 14.6 and 82.4 μm were treated with MM. The MM powders were consolidated by SPS at 1173 to 1373 K. Mechanical properties were evaluated by compression tests at room temperature to 1073 K. Microstructural observation was performed using a scanning electron microscope, electron back scattered diffraction and energy dispersive X-ray spectrometer. The conventional SPS compacts have modulated structure with BCC and B2 phase and grain boundary precipitates with FCC phase. While the MM-SPS compacts have a similar structure of the conventional compacts at dispersed region and an equiaxed nanograins including a σ phase at network region. MM compacts with harmonic microstructure demonstrate high compression strength compared to conventional compacts at room temperature to 673 K. However, conventional microstructure compacts have higher strength than harmonic structure above 873 K. These results suggest that the harmonic structure has unique deformation behavior at elevated temperatures.

Abstract: Control strategies for vehicle platoons remain a critical challenge, particularly in heterogeneous configurations. The performance of Two Leader Follower (TLF) is evaluated against the bench mark performance of Two-Predecessor Leader Following (TPLF), emphasizing the impact of different communication topologies and the role of both primary and co-leaders. Distributed Model Predictive Control (DMPC) is utilized to maintain stability across linked vehicles. The co-tier strategy, featuring Car 1 and Car 3 as leaders, shows promising performance in scenarios such as military and agricultural operations, where multiple platoons are utilized. However, simulation results indicate that the TPLF topology remains the most effective for achieving optimal performance. These findings underscore the importance of communication topology selection in platooning control, with co-tier strategies offering valuable advantages in specific application.

Abstract: Several efforts have been performed to make the biodiesel price more competitive with fossil fuels, such as using low price raw materials, including coconut oil and the use of heterogenous catalyst. In this research, the Calcined Scallop Shell was applied as a heterogeneous catalyst for synthesizing biodiesel from coconut oil. The catalyst was obtained from calcination of scallop shell waste. The catalytic activities of Calcined Scallop Shell catalyst during transesterification reaction was influenced by several reaction conditions including methanol to oil mole ratio, reaction temperature, and concentration of catalyst. The biodiesel yield of 91.7% was obtained at a methanol to coconut oil mass ratio of 12:1, 60 °C reaction temperature, and catalyst concentration of 10% wt. of oil.

Abstract: Biodiesel production waste cooking oil is usually limited by its high free fatty acid and moisture content. The synergetic effect of both base and acid source from biomass was employed to proffer way out to this challenge. This study shows the coupled development of sulfonated carbonized corn cob (S-CCC) and calcined cow-bone (C-CB) catalysts for transesterification of waste cooking oil. The catalyst was prepared by physically mixing several mass percentages of S-CCC and C-CB (fluorapatite) in strategic proportions. The maximum biodiesel yield of 96.2 % was attained for catalyst mixture of 60 wt% and 40 wt%. The developed catalyst mixture was characterized by Fourier Transform Infrared Ray (FTIR), powder X-ray diffraction (XRD), Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM), Energy Dispersive X-ray (EDX), Brunauer–Emmett-Teller (BET). The surface area (472.3 m²/g), pore size (2.4330 nm) and volume (0.1380 cc/g) were obtained for the catalyst. The XRD shows that the crystallized structure of the bifunctional catalyst was formed majorly between 2 theta 10 and 65.Also the SEM shows a well dispersive pattern of the particles of the catalyst. The developed catalyst was employed for biodiesel optimization studies by varying factors such as time, temperature, catalyst loading and methanol: oil using optimal design under the response surface methodology. Maximum yield of 98.98 % was attained at time 6 h, temperature 65 °C, catalyst loading 6 %wt/ wt of oil and methanol to oil ratio of 11.75:1. It was observed that time and temperature had notable effect on the biodiesel yield.

Abstract: Porous Hyaluronan/β-tricalcium phosphate composite scaffolds were synthesized through lyophilizing and subsequent heterogeneous crosslinking method. The morphology of the composite scaffolds were investigated by scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The swelling behavior, mechanical property, degradation behavior and cell adhesion ability of samples were also studied. The results revealed that hyaluronan mainly contributed to the polymer matrix and water adsorption, whereas β-TCP acted as a reinforcement to strengthen the porous structure, while too much β-TCP would make the structure collapse. The pose size of obtained scaffolds ranges from100μm to 200μm and the porosity decreased with the increase of β-TCP content. The degradation behavior and cell adhesion test indicated that increasing hyaluronan concentration can effectively improve the degradability of scaffolds and the incorporation of β-TCP improved the cell adhesion performance. Thus a simple way to prepare hyaluronan-based composite scaffolds was provided, which could be potentially used as an tissue engineering material.

Abstract: Homogeneous base catalyst has wide acceptability in biodiesel production because of their fast reaction rates. However, postproduction costs incurred from aqueous quenching, wastewater and loss of catalysts led to the search for alternatives. Heterogeneous base catalyst is developed to cater these problems. The advantages of heterogeneous catalyst are their high basicity and non-toxicity. This work compared the production of biodiesel using two different kind of catalysts that is homogeneous catalyst (sodium hydroxide, NaOH and potassium hydroxide, KOH) and heterogeneous catalysts (calcium, oxide, CaO catalyst derived from chicken and ostrich eggshells). Transesterification of waste cooking oil (WCO) and methanol in the presence of heterogeneous base catalyst was conducted at an optimal reaction condition (calcination temperature for catalyst: 1000 °C; catalyst loading amount: 1.5 wt%; methanol/oil molar ratio: 10:1; reaction temperature: 65 °C; reaction time: 2 hours) with 97% biodiesel yield was obtained. While, the homogeneous base catalyst gave higher biodiesel yield of 98% at optimum operating condition (catalyst concentration: 0.75 wt%; methanol/oil molar ratio: 6:1; reaction temperature: 65 °C; reaction time: 1 hours). The slight difference in the biodiesel yield was due to the stronger basic strength in the homogeneous catalyst and were not statistically not different (p=0.05). However, despite these advances, the ultimate aim of producing biodiesel at affordable low cost and minimal-environmental-impact is yet to be realized.

Abstract: The properties of Iron-based metallic glasses, such as glass-forming ability and soft magnetic properties, (MGs) have been widely investigated. However, seldom reports are available concerning the properties of these iron-based melts. In the present work, the viscosity of superheated Fe-Si-B-Nb metallic glass forming liquids (MGFLs) was measured by a torsional oscillating viscometer. It has been found that the crucial condition to get viscosity data using graphite crucibles is to reach a superheated degree of at least 250 K for melts prior to measurements. The viscosity increases monotonically with a decrease in temperature before solidification, without distinct changes of dynamic mechanism during cooling. The present work indicates that these iron-based melts are heterogeneous even above the liquidus temperature. This finding helps to understand the melts of iron-based MGs and to improve the production process of iron-based glass ribbons.

Abstract: BiVO₄/Bi₂VO_5.5 heterogeneous nanostructures with enhanced visible light photocatalytic activity were successfully prepared by a facile one-pot solvothermal method, where diethylene glycol (DEG) was used as the solvent. The as-prepared products were analyzed by X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), X-ray photoelectron spectrometry (XPS) and UV-Vis absorption spectroscopy. The results revealed that the molar ratio of Bi³⁺ to VO₄^3- played an important role in the formation of crystal and morphology. These BiVO₄/Bi₂VO_5.5 heterogeneous nanostructures exhibited higher visible-light-driven photocatalytic efficiency compared to the pure BiVO₄ and Bi₂VO_5.5. For the methyl orange (MO) degradation efficiency of BiVO₄/Bi₂VO_5.5 heterogeneous nanostructures under visible light irradiation, about 95% of MO was degraded within 40min, which is much higher than pure BiVO₄ and Bi₂VO_5.5. The enhancement of photocatalytic activity can attribute to the promoted light absorption capability and the separation efficiency of photo-generated electron-hole pairs.

Abstract: Biodiesel which comes from pure renewable resources provide an alternative fuel option for future. The rapid growth of the biodiesel industry will result in overproduction of less value glycerol and create a superfluity of this impure by-product. The synthesis of alkaline alumina catalyst for polyglycerol production via solvent free base-catalyzed etherification of low value glycerol is reported. The etherification of biodiesel derived glycerol to polyglycerol was studied in a heterogeneous catalysis under solvent free system, using alkalines over γ – alumina catalysts. All the catalysts were prepared by incipient-wetness impregnation of an aqueous solution of alkaline compounds on γ – alumina as a support. The effects of alkaline compound, reaction temperature, catalyst amount, and reaction time in conversion of glycerol to polyglycerol were investigated. The catalyst with potassium loaded on γ -alumina gave the highest basicity and the best catalytic activity for this reaction. The highest glycerol conversion into polyglycerol production was obtained with high yield 79.5% over prepared catalyst respectively. Industrially, the findings attained in this study might contribute towards promoting the biodiesel industry through utilization of its by-products.

Abstract: As a long-term source of contaminant solutes, the flow of water within a waste rock pile containing reactive sulfide minerals significantly contributes to the solutes transportation. In this paper, a waste rock pile with the internal structures and grain size distribution from a typical waste dump is introduced as the geometric configuration. A numerical model is then applied to simulate unsaturated flow within a waste rock pile constructed with two primary materials. The simulations results show that the water movement within heterogeneous pile mainly depended on the internal structures. The flow of water can be controlled by the fine material layers within the coarse materials. These fine material layers form a capillary barrier which preventing the water infiltrate towards the centre of the pile. They can retain more water than coarse materials and form a ponding effect and/or percolation points within the pile.