Efficiency and Effectiveness Concepts Applied in Shell and Tube Heat Exchanger Using Ethylene Glycol-Water Based Fluid in the Shell with Nanoparticles of Copper Oxide (CuO)

This article consists of an analytical solution for obtaining the outlet temperatures of the hot and cold fluids in a shell and tube heat exchanger. The system analyzed through the concepts of efficiency, effectiveness (ε-NTU), and irreversibility consisted of a shell and tube heat exchanger, with cold nanofluid flowing in the shell and hot water flowing in the tube. The nanofluid consists of 50% of ethylene glycol and water as the base fluid and copper oxide (CuO) nanoparticles in suspension. The volume fractions of the nanoparticles range from 0.1 to 0.5. The flow rate in the nanofluid ranges from 0.0331 to 0.0568 Kg/s, while two mass flow rates, from 0.0568 and 0.5 Kg/s, for the hot fluid, are used as parameters for analysis. Results for the efficiency, effectiveness, irreversibility, heat transfer rate, and outlet temperatures for cold and hot fluids were obtained graphically. The flow laminarization effect was observed through the results obtained and had significant relevance in the results.

Single-Phase Velocity Determination Based in Video and Sub-Images Processing:An Optical Flow Method Implemented with Support of a Programmed MatLab Structured Script

Important in many different sectors of the industry, the determination of stream velocity has become more and more important due to measurements precision necessity, in order to determine the right production rates, determine the volumetric production of undesired fluid, establish automated controls based on these measurements avoiding over-flooding or over-production, guaranteeing accurate predictive maintenance, etc. Difficulties being faced have been the determination of the velocity of specific fluids embedded in some others, for example, determining the gas bubbles stream velocity flowing throughout liquid fluid phase. Although different and already applicable methods have been researched and already implemented within the industry, a non-intrusive automated way of providing those stream velocities has its importance, and may have a huge impact in projects budget. Knowing the importance of its determination, this developed script uses a methodology of breaking-down real-time videos media into frame images, analyzing by pixel correlations possible superposition matches for further gas bubbles stream velocity estimation. In raw sense, the script bases itself in functions and procedures already available in MatLab, which can be used for image processing and treatments, allowing the methodology to be implemented. Its accuracy after the running test was of around 97% (ninety-seven percent);the raw source code with comments had almost 3000 (three thousand) characters;and the hardware placed for running the code was an Intel Core Duo 2.13 [Ghz] and 2 [Gb] RAM memory capable workstation. Even showing good results, it could be stated that just the end point correlations were actually getting to the final solution. So that, making use of self-learning functions or neural network, one could surely enhance the capability of the application to be run in real-time without getting exhaust by iterative loops.

Software Tool Development and Application Focusing in EDF Signal Readings and Polysomnography

The EDF+ (European Data Format Plus) is a flexible and open source data format created in order to store and exchange biomedical signals. It is known worldwide and used by a large variety of specialists in the area. EDF+ signals have been subjected to many researches of clinical interest amongst diagnosing and for treatment of diseases related to sleeping disorders. Nevertheless, more complete and user-friendly tools, which use these signals, are yet too few in the market. This paper presents a new tool developed in order to read and analyze EDF+ signals, focusing in the area of sleep disorders. It includes several features, such as organizing signal channels through previous montage customizations, sleep stage bars and graphics for analyzing the quality of sleep (hypnograms). It provides easiness in the whole process of interpretation and scoring of sleep events in polysomnography exams. The software development used the C++ language, due to its great versatility and efficiency, using Visual Studio Community 2013? as the Integrated Development Environment (IDE). Moreover, it implements many Digital Signal Processing (DSP) techniques, for instance, its own set of digital filters. This paper presents an application of Polysomnography analysis software and suggests a modification on the way to interpret the EDF+ standard and its usage.

Analysis of Water Temperature Influenced by Arduino-Controlled on Solar Desalinator of Low Cost

The solar desalinator is a low cost installation and operation equipment that can contribute to tackling the problem of water shortages in the world.Because of the importance of this equipment,the present work has the objective to quantify the relation of the temperature of the water with the production of the equipment.For this,a compact desalinator with glass cover in square pyramidal form and a heating system controlled by a logic programmer was built.As a result,it was verified the efficiency of the logic controller as an auxiliary tool for experimental work and the relationship between temperature ranges and desalination production.

Mathematical Modeling of Hydrogels Swelling Based on the Finite Element Method

In recent years, hydrogels have been introduced as new materials suitable for applications in areas such as biomedical engineering, agriculture, etc. The rate and degree of hydrogel swelling are important parameters that control the diffusion of drugs or solvents inside a polymer network. Therefore, the description of the dynamic swelling process of the hydrogels is very important in applications that require precise control of the absorption of solvents inside the hydrogel structure. To date, most of the numerical models developed for describing the swelling process are based in the finite difference methods. Even though numerical models supported in finite differences can be easily implemented, their use is limited to samples with very simple shapes. In this paper, a new model based on the finite element method is proposed. The diffusion equation is solved in a time-deformable grid. An original procedure is proposed to numerically solve the non-linear algebraic equation system that permits computing a new grid for each time-step. Hydrogel samples of different shapes were prepared in order to conduct experimental tests to validate the numerical proposed model. Numerical results show that the new model is able to describe the mass and shape changes in the hydrogel samples in time. An application of the numerical model to determine the relation between diffusion coefficients and density in Poly-acrylamide samples allows verifying the versatility of the model.

Synchrophasing Vibration Control of Machines Supported by Discrete Isolators

This paper describes an analytical investigation into synchrophasing,a vibration control strategy on a machinery installation in which two rotational machines are attached to a beam-like raft by discrete resilient isolators.Forces and moments introduced by sources are considered,which effectively represent a practical engineering system.Adjusting the relative phase angle between the machines has been theoretically demonstrated to greatly reduce the cost function,which is defined as the sum of velocity squares of attaching points on the raft at each frequency of interest.The effect of the position of the machine is also investigated.Results show that altering the position of the secondary source may cause a slight change to the mode shape of the composite system and therefore change the optimum phase between the two machines.Although the analysis is based on a one-dimensional Euler– Bernoulli beam and each machine is considered as a rigid-body,a key principle can be derived from the results.However,the factors that can influence the synchrophasing control performance would become coupled and highly complicated.This condition has to be considered in practice.

Study of the Positioning Influence in the Water Activity Measurement during Leak Test of Iodine-125 Seeds

In the prostate cancer treatment, brachytherapy with iodine-125 seeds has been used. lodine-125 seeds are sealed radioactive sources, made by a titanium capsule containing the radioisotope inside. In the final phase of the seeds production, it is necessary to ensure that there is no leakage of the radioactive material. A leakage test is performed, immersing the seeds in water during 24 h and measuring the resulting activity in the water. This measurement is made in a sodium iodide detector. The immersion water is transferred to a plastic tube with a cap. The tube is placed by an automated positioning system, in the detector chamber. This study aims to determine the best positioning of the tube for the detection. It is also important to determine the influence of the positioning variation intrinsic of the automated positioning system during the iodine-125 seeds production. The results obtained will be used as a reference to adjust the equipment and process control system, in the production of the iodine-125 seeds.