Finite-time Feedback Stabilization of a Class of Input-delay Systems With Saturating Actuators via Digital Control

In this paper, the problem of making an input-delay system with saturating actuators finite-time stable by virtue of digital control is investigated. A digital state feedback controller and digital observer-controller compensator are designed for two cases: when the state of the input-delay system are available or when it is unavailable. Sufficient conditions which guarantee finite-time stability of a closed-loop input-delay system are given and the proof procedure is presented in a heuristic way by constructing appropriate comparison functions. The condition can be transformed into the intersection of two curves satisfying some constraints, which reveals the relationship between designed parameters clearly. Finally, simulation results are presented to validate the method proposed in this paper.

Analysis of drying and saturating natural gypsum samples for mechanical testing

The stability of underground abandoned gypsum mines is dependent on the gypsum pillar's strength,and most abandoned mines are in a fully saturated condition. Moisture affects the strength of gypsum and is therefore commonly measured when testing rock strength. For most rocks, this is a simple task of weighing the rock's mass before and after oven-heating at a specified temperature and duration. For natural gypsum, however, this is not a straightforward process. Heating natural gypsum can result in dehydration and transformation of gypsum to hemihydrate and anhydrite, thus changing the physical characteristics of the gypsum such as its particle density which in turn affects the moisture content and strength measurements. To prevent transformation when determining the moisture content of gypsum,the American Society for Testing Materials(ASTM) recommends lowering the drying temperature from 110℃ to 60℃ . To investigate the temperature at which gypsum transforms to hemihydrate, we used a helium pycnometer to measure the particle densities of gypsum, hemihydrate and anhydrite. In this research, we suggest that a higher drying temperature of 80℃ can be used for drying gypsum without transforming gypsum to hemihydrate. Further, preparing saturated samples for mechanical testing,which is required in stability analyses of abandoned mines, is challenging due to the dissolution of gypsum when placed in water. To address this problem, we investigated the following methods to saturate gypsum cores taking into account the solubility of gypsum:(1) water immersion,(2) vacuum saturation, and(3) improved vacuum saturation. The research indicates that all the three methods are acceptable but they should be conducted using a saturated gypsum-water solution to minimize dissolution. Further, the research found that the improved vacuum saturation method saturated the test samples within 24 h, while duration of 30 h was required for the other two methods.

Delay and Its Time-derivative Dependent Robust Stability of Uncertain Neutral Systems with Saturating Actuators

This note concerns the problem of the robust stability of uncertain neutral systems with time-varying delay and saturating actuators. The system considered is continuous in time with norm bounded parametric uncertainties. By incorporating the free weighing matrix approach developed recently, some new delay-dependent stability conditions in terms of linear matrix inequalities （LMIs） with some tuning parameters are obtained. An estimate of the domain of attraction of the closed-loop system under a priori designed controller is proposed. The approach is based on a polytopic description of the actuator saturation nonlinearities and the Lyapunov- Krasovskii method. Numerical examples are used to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed design method.

Identification for the Low-Contrast Image Signal with Regularized Variational Term and Dynamical Saturating Nonlinearity

In recent years,image processing based on stochastic resonance(SR)has received more and more attention.In this paper,a new model combining dynamical saturating nonlinearity with regularized variational term for enhancement of low contrast image is proposed.The regularized variational term can be setting to total variation(TV),second order total generalized variation(TGV)and non-local means(NLM)in order to gradually suppress noise in the process of solving the model.In addition,the new model is tested on a mass of gray-scale images from standard test image and low contrast indoor color images from Low-Light dataset(LOL).By comparing the new model and other traditional image enhancement models,the results demonstrate the enhanced image not only obtain good perceptual quality but also get more excellent value of evaluation index compared with some previous methods.

Analysis and Design of Time-Delay Impulsive Systems Subject to Actuator Saturation

This paper investigates the exponential stability and performance analysis of nonlinear time-delay impulsive systems subject to actuator saturation. When continuous dynamics is unstable, under some conditions, it is shown that the system can be stabilized by a class of saturated delayed-impulses regardless of the length of input delays. Conversely, when the system is originally stable, it is shown that under some conditions, the system is robust with respect to sufficient small delayed-impulses. Moreover, the design problem of the controller with the goal of obtaining a maximized estimate of the domain of attraction is formulated via a convex optimization problem. Three examples are provided to demonstrate the validity of the main results.

Retraction to: Shear strength of extremely altered serpentinites based on degree of saturation (Ankara, Turkey)

The Editor in Chief has retracted this article.After publication,concerns were raised over potentially inconsistent data-for example,the author mentioned residual soil with silt fraction,but Fig.5 shows even the smallest grains are beyond silt grains.Further analysis showed that Fig.6 and Fig.9 show both loose and dense soils exhibiting very similar dilatance behaviour,which is not typical.The author shared raw data,but it was incomplete and could not be verified.The Editor in Chief,therefore,has lost confidence in the findings of this article.The author does not agree to this retraction.

Mineralogy and geochemistry of trachytic rocks from the Lichi Volcanics, Eastern Himalaya: insights into the Kerguelen mantle plume activity in the Eastern Himalayan Region

The Lichi volcanics are a suite of mafic-intermediate-felsic rocks and are considered coeval with the Abor volcanics(~132 Ma) of the Siang window in the Eastern Himalaya. Here, we present the first report of trachytic rocks from the Lichi volcanics, which are exposed in the Ranga valley, along the Kimin-Yazali road section in the Eastern Himalayan Region, Northeast India. The trachytes occur in close association with sandstones of the Gondwana Group of rocks and are characterised based on field, petrographical, and geochemical investigations.These fine-grained trachytes are composed of alkali feldspar, biotite, plagioclase, sodic-amphibole, apatite, illmenite, and titanite. The REE profiles of the evolved trachytic rocks(higher SiO_(2)content) display fractionated trends. The fractionation of accessory mineral phases, like apatite and titanite, was possibly responsible for the strongly fractionated REE patterns of the evolved samples.The trachytic rocks demonstrate high apatite saturation temperatures of 988 ± 14 ℃(1σ, n = 8). The Aluminium Saturation Index(< 1.1) and binary discrimination diagrams of these peralkaline trachytes define their affinity with A-type granitoids. Elemental ratios like Y/Nb, Nb/U,and Ce/Pb signify that the Lichi trachytes are differentiated products of mantle-derived ocean island basalts. Trace elemental discrimination diagrams Th/Yb versus Nb/Yb, Y versus Nb, and Y + Nb versus Rb reflect a within-plate tectonic regime for the trachytes. From the results presented in this work, we infer that the development of rifting events during the breakup of eastern Gondwana due to the onset of Kerguelen plume activity further led to underplating of basic magma in lower crustal levels. These parental basaltic magmas underwent fractionation processes forming differentiated trachyandesites and trachytes.Taking into consideration the similarities recorded between the Lichi volcanics and Abor volcanics, this study supports the idea that Kerguelen plume activities resulted in the emplacement of these volcanics in the Eastern Himalayas.

Nested Saturated Control of Uncertain Complex Cascade Systems Using Mixed Saturation Levels

This study addresses the problem of global asymptotic stability for uncertain complex cascade systems composed of multiple integrator systems and non-strict feedforward nonlinear systems. To tackle the complexity inherent in such structures, a novel nested saturated control design is proposed that incorporates both constant saturation levels and state-dependent saturation levels. Specifically, a modified differentiable saturation function is proposed to facilitate the saturation reduction analysis of the uncertain complex cascade systems under the presence of mixed saturation levels. In addition, the design of modified differentiable saturation function will help to construct a hierarchical global convergence strategy to improve the robustness of control design scheme. Through calculation of relevant inequalities, time derivative of boundary surface and simple Lyapunov function,saturation reduction analysis and convergence analysis are carried out, and then a set of explicit parameter conditions are provided to ensure global asymptotic stability in the closed-loop systems. Finally, a simplified system of the mechanical model is presented to validate the effectiveness of the proposed method.

Effect of Skeleton Grain Size on the Saturation of Gas Hydrate in Natural Sediments

Natural gas hydrate is prospected as a new and promising,highly clean energy resource that mainly occurs in perma-frost or at continental margins.Its formation is subject to many soil conditions,such as grain size,matrix materials,pore morphology,and permeability.In this study,we propose that grain size is the most decisive parameter that affects the saturation of gas hydrate in sediments based on data from Ocean Drilling Program Leg 164 and Mallik 5L-38,which represent marine sediments and terrestrial sediments,respectively.Our study reveals that high gas hydrate saturation generally occurs in coarse-grained sand,regardless of whether sediment formation is homogeneous or inhomogeneous,and the sorting of sediments may affect the hydrate saturation to a certain degree.Using grain size and sorting of sediments may be the most intuitive proxy method for a rough estimation of hydrate saturation.Further study is necessary to fully understand the relationship between hydrate morphology and sediment grain size,even though massive hydrates are typically found in fine clayey-rich sediments.

A guidance and control design with reduced information for a dual-spin stabilized projectile

In this paper,an integrated guidance and control method based on an adaptive path-following controller is proposed to control a spin-stabilized projectile with only translational motion information under the constraint of an actuator,uncertainties in aerodynamic parameters and measurements,and control system complexity.Owing to the fairly high rotation speed,the dynamic model of this missile is strongly nonlinear,uncertain and coupled in pitch,yaw and roll channels.A theoretical equivalent resultant force and uncertainty compensation method are comprehensively used to realize decoupling of pitch and yaw.In response to the strong nonlinear and time-varying characteristics of the dynamic system,the quasi-linear model whose parameters are obtained by interpolation of points selected as the segmentation points in the trajectory envelope,is used for calculation in each step.To cope with the system uncertainty caused by model approximation,parameter uncertainty and ballistic interference,an extended state estimator is used to compensate the output feedback according to the test ballistic angle.In order to improve the tracking efficiency and ensure the tracking error convergence with only translational motion information,the virtual guide point,whose derivative is deduced according to the Lyapunov principle,is calculated in real time according to the projection relationship between the real-time position and the reference trajectory,and a virtual line-of-sight angle and the backstepping method are used for the design of the guidance and control system.In order to avoid the influence of control input saturation on the guidance and control performance due to the actuator limitation and improve the robustness of the system,an anti-saturation compensator is designed according to the two-step method.The feasibility and effectiveness of the path-following controller is verified through closed-loop flight simulations with measurement,control,and condition uncertainties.The results indicate that the designed controller can converge to the reference path and evidently decrease the distance between the impact point and target under different uncertainties.

Deep learning-based inpainting of saturation artifacts in optical coherence tomography images

Limited by the dynamic range of the detector,saturation artifacts usually occur in optical coherence tomography(OCT)imaging for high scattering media.The available methods are difficult to remove saturation artifacts and restore texture completely in OCT images.We proposed a deep learning-based inpainting method of saturation artifacts in this paper.The generation mechanism of saturation artifacts was analyzed,and experimental and simulated datasets were built based on the mechanism.Enhanced super-resolution generative adversarial networks were trained by the clear–saturated phantom image pairs.The perfect reconstructed results of experimental zebrafish and thyroid OCT images proved its feasibility,strong generalization,and robustness.

Saturation Estimation with Complex Electrical Conductivity for Hydrate-Bearing Clayey Sediments:An Experimental Study

Clays have considerable influence on the electrical properties of hydrate-bearing sediments.It is desirable to understand the electrical properties of hydrate-bearing clayey sediments and to build hydrate saturation(S_(h))models for reservoir evaluation and monitoring.The electrical properties of tetrahydrofuran-hydrate-bearing sediments with montmorillonite are characterized by complex conductivity at frequencies from 0.01 Hz to 1 kHz.The effects of clay and Sh on the complex conductivity were analyzed.A decrease and increase in electrical conductance result from the clay-swelling-induced blockage and ion migration in the electrical double layer(EDL),respectively.The quadrature conductivity increases with the clay content up to 10%because of the increased surface site density of counterions in EDL.Both the in-phase conductivity and quadrature conductivity decrease consistently with increasing Sh from 0.50 to 0.90.Three sets of models for Sh evaluation were developed.The model based on the Simandoux equation outperforms Archie’s formula,with a root-mean-square error(E_(RMS))of 1.8%and 3.9%,respectively,highlighting the clay effects on the in-phase conductivity.The fre-quency effect correlations based on in-phase and quadrature conductivities exhibit inferior performance(E_(RMS)=11.6%and 13.2%,re-spectively)due to the challenge of choosing an appropriate pair of frequencies and intrinsic uncertainties from two measurements.The second-order Cole-Cole formula can be used to fit the complex-conductivity spectra.One pair of inverted Cole-Cole parameters,i.e.,characteristic time and chargeability,is employed to predict S_(h) with an E_(RMS) of 5.05%and 9.05%,respectively.

Topological laser on square lattice with gain–loss-induced higher-order corner modes

We investigate the higher-order topological laser in the two-dimensional(2D) coupled-cavity array. By adding staggered on-site gain and loss to the 2D Hermitian array with a trivial phase, the system will emerge degenerate topological corner modes, which are protected by bulk band gap. For such a non-Hermitian model, by adjusting the parameters of the system and introducing the pumping into the cavity at the corner, a single-mode lasing with topological protection emerges.Furthermore, single-mode lasing exists over a wide range of pumping strengths. No matter where the cavity is initially stimulated, after enough time evolution, all the cavities belonging to the topological corner mode can emit a stable laser.

Analysis of pressure response at an observation well against pressure build-up by early stage of CO_(2)geological storage project

To ensure a safe and stable CO_(2)storage,pressure responses at an observation well are expected to be an important and useful field monitoring item to estimate the CO_(2)storage behaviors and the aquifer parameters during and after injecting CO_(2),because it can detect whether the injected CO_(2)leaks to the ground surface or the bottom of the sea.In this study,pressure responses were simulated to present design factors such as well location and pressure transmitter of the observation well.Numerical simulations on the pressure response and the time-delay from pressure build-up after CO_(2)injection were conducted by considering aquifer parameters and distance from the CO_(2)injection well to an observation well.The measurement resolution of a pressure transmitter installed in the observation well was presented based on numerical simulation results of the pressure response against pressure build-up at the injection well and CO_(2)plume front propagations.Furthermore,the pressure response at an observation well was estimated by comparing the numerical simulation results with the curve of CO_(2)saturation and relative permeability.It was also suggested that the analytical solution can be used for the analysis of the pressure response tendency using pressure build-up and dimensionless parameters of hydraulic diffusivity.Thus,a criterion was established for selecting a pressure transducer installed at an observation well to monitor the pressure responses with sufficient accuracy and resolution,considering the distance from the injection well and the pressure build-up at the injection well,for future carbon capture and storage(CCS)projects.

Adaptive Sensor-Fault Tolerant Control of Unmanned Underwater Vehicles With Input Saturation

This paper investigates the tracking control problem for unmanned underwater vehicles(UUVs)systems with sensor faults,input saturation,and external disturbance caused by waves and ocean currents.An active sensor fault-tolerant control scheme is proposed.First,the developed method only requires the inertia matrix of the UUV,without other dynamic information,and can handle both additive and multiplicative sensor faults.Subsequently,an adaptive fault-tolerant controller is designed to achieve asymptotic tracking control of the UUV by employing robust integral of the sign of error feedback method.It is shown that the effect of sensor faults is online estimated and compensated by an adaptive estimator.With the proposed controller,the tracking error and estimation error can asymptotically converge to zero.Finally,simulation results are performed to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method.

A stable implicit nodal integration-based particle finite element method(N-PFEM)for modelling saturated soil dynamics

In this study,we present a novel nodal integration-based particle finite element method(N-PFEM)designed for the dynamic analysis of saturated soils.Our approach incorporates the nodal integration technique into a generalised Hellinger-Reissner(HR)variational principle,creating an implicit PFEM formulation.To mitigate the volumetric locking issue in low-order elements,we employ a node-based strain smoothing technique.By discretising field variables at the centre of smoothing cells,we achieve nodal integration over cells,eliminating the need for sophisticated mapping operations after re-meshing in the PFEM.We express the discretised governing equations as a min-max optimisation problem,which is further reformulated as a standard second-order cone programming(SOCP)problem.Stresses,pore water pressure,and displacements are simultaneously determined using the advanced primal-dual interior point method.Consequently,our numerical model offers improved accuracy for stresses and pore water pressure compared to the displacement-based PFEM formulation.Numerical experiments demonstrate that the N-PFEM efficiently captures both transient and long-term hydro-mechanical behaviour of saturated soils with high accuracy,obviating the need for stabilisation or regularisation techniques commonly employed in other nodal integration-based PFEM approaches.This work holds significant implications for the development of robust and accurate numerical tools for studying saturated soil dynamics.

Modelling of the variation of granular base materials resilient modulus with material characteristics and humidity conditions

This study aims to quantify the susceptibility of granular materials used in pavements to changes in moisture content and propose a correlation model to incorporate this susceptibility into seasonal analyses.The fines content and the percentage of fractured coarse aggregates were identified as direct indicators of the resilient modulus susceptibility to changes in water content.The results showed that the percentage of fractured coarse aggregates particles(FR)has a more significant impact on the resilient modulus(Er)of crushed granular materials used in pavement construction than the combined indicator of the fines content and sample volumetrics(nf).Crushed granular materials with a higher percentage of fractured coarse aggregates are relatively insensitive to changes in the degree of saturation,but become more sensitive as the fine fraction porosity decreases.An adjusted model was proposed based on the existing formulation,but considers a complex parameter to describe and adjust the sensitivity of base granular materials to variations in moisture content with respect to fabrication charac-teristics,fines content and volumetric properties.The model shows that the variation of Er values is below10%for fully crushed granular materials.However,it reaches approximately±12%for materials with 75%of crushed coarse aggregates andþ40%and-25%for materials with FR=50%.This model could help select good ag-gregates characteristics and adjust grain-size distribution for environments where significant moisture content variations can occur in the pavement system,such as in the Province of Quebec(Canada).As it is based on pa-rameters that can be easily determined or estimated,it also represents a valuable tool for detailed design and analysis that can consider material characteristics.

Assessing the impact of concurrent high-fructose and highsaturated fat diets on pediatric metabolic syndrome:A review

High-saturated fat(HF)or high-fructose(HFr)consumption in children predispose them to metabolic syndrome(MetS).In rodent models of MetS,diets containing individually HF or HFr lead to a variable degree of MetS.Nevertheless,simultaneous intake of HF plus HFr have synergistic effects,worsening MetS outcomes.In children,the effects of HF or HFr intake usually have been addressed individually.Therefore,we have reviewed the outcomes of HF or HFr diets in children,and we compare them with the effects reported in rodents.In humans,HFr intake causes increased lipogenesis,hypertriglyceridemia,obesity and insulin resistance.On the other hand,HF diets promote low grade-inflammation,obesity,insulin resistance.Despite the deleterious effects of simultaneous HF plus HFr intake on MetS development in rodents,there is little information about the combined effects of HF plus HFr intake in children.The aim of this review is to warn about this issue,as individually addressing the effects produced by HF or HFr may underestimate the severity of the outcomes of Western diet intake in the pediatric population.We consider that this is an alarming issue that needs to be assessed,as the simultaneous intake of HF plus HFr is common on fast food menus.

A Novel Probabilistic Saturating Counter Design for Secure Branch Predictor

In a modern processor,branch prediction is crucial in effectively exploiting the instruction-level parallelism for high-performance execution.However,recently exposed vulnerabilities reveal the urgency to improve the security of branch predictors.The vital cause of the branch predictor vulnerabilities is that the update strategy of the saturating counter is deterministic.As a fundamental building block in a modern branch predictor,previous studies have paid too much attention to the performance and hardware cost and ignored the security of saturating counter.This leaves attackers with the opportunities to perform side-channel attacks on the branch predictor.This paper focuses on the saturating counter to explore a secure and lightweight design to mitigate branch predictor side-channel attacks.Instead of applying the isolation mechanism to branch predictor resources,we propose a novel probabilistic saturating counter design to confuse the attacker's perception of the victim's behaviour.It changes the conventional deterministic state transition function to a probabilistic state transition function.When a branch is committed,the conventional saturating counter needs to be updated about whether the prediction results are correct or not.While for the probabilistic saturating counter,the branch predictor determines whether the update is performed based on the update probability.The probabilistic saturating counter dramatically reduces the ability of the attacker to spy the saturating counter's state.Our analyses using a cycle-accurate simulator suggest that the proposed mechanism incurs 2.4%performance overhead and hardware cost while providing strong protection.

Corrosion and Scaling Threat in Upstream Oil Operation

Corrosiveness or scaling is an inherent threat to oil operations. The primary cause for this threat is the presence of water having complex geochemical matrix. Unanticipated water production, particularly if it contains unwanted impurities, can significantly impact hydrocarbon production. The current paper discusses the degree of threat posed to oil operation facilities based on the water characteristics. Methodology involved the collection and analysis of water samples from major sources in oil industry such as groundwater, wellheads and seawater. The parameters tested include geochemical, microbiological and pollutants. The lab data was used to develop scaling and corrosion prediction indices such as Langelier Saturation Index (LSI), Ryznar Stability Index (RSI) and Puckorius Scaling Index (PSI). The study indicated varying water chemistry for different sources. Mixing of those waters may lead to ionic saturation and scaling in different facilities. Presence of the SRB and GAB in some water sources also posed threat to water system by forming fouling and corrosion. Seawater used for offshore oilfields water injection to maintain reservoir pressure and improve oil recovery showed scaling tendency, whereas under different reservoir pressure, it can cause corrosion. Some of the samples also had corrosion residuals such as iron, which indicated active corrosion. Current study showed higher alkalinity with high sulfate for one groundwater sample with presence of active corrosion residuals such as dissolved iron and manganese. The study showed positive value for LSI which indicated supersaturation of the water samples with respect to calcium carbonate (CaCO3) and scale forming. Similarly, for RSI and PSI, the value was below six which confirmed the scaling potential for all the samples. Even though the index value was pointing towards scaling potential, the geochemistry, microbiology and presence of other impurities indicated corrosion threat to the oil and gas industrial facilities. The study concluded the importance of different scale inhibition mechanism and corrosion control in Oil and Gas industry.