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Applied Sciences, Volume 7, Issue 4

2017 April - 121 articles

Cover Story: Membrane distillation (MD) is an emerging non-isothermal membrane separation process having broad spectrum of applications e.g. it is a promising technique for desalting highly saline water. For an efficient process realization application of non-wetted porous hydrophobic membranes are required.
In the presented work, TiO2 and Al2O3 ceramic membranes were efficiently functionalized with fluorine-free grafting molecules. As a result, highly hydrophobic surfaces (CA = 111°–132°) possessing low surface free energy (31–52 mN•m-1) and low roughness (23–51 nm) were achieved. Membranes were subsequently tested in air gap membrane distillation showing high permeate flux and salt retention close to 100%. View the paper
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Articles (121)

  • Feature Paper
  • Article
  • Open Access
106 Citations
8,878 Views
14 Pages

24 April 2017

In this research, a two-way coupling of discrete phase model is developed in order to track the discrete nature of aluminum oxide particles in an obstructed duct with two side-by-side obstacles. Finite volume method and trajectory analysis are simult...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Recent Developments of Nanofluids)
  • Feature Paper
  • Article
  • Open Access
13 Citations
7,849 Views
11 Pages

Comparison of Light Trapping in Silicon Nanowire and Surface Textured Thin-Film Solar Cells

  • Rion Parsons,
  • Asman Tamang,
  • Vladislav Jovanov,
  • Veit Wagner and
  • Dietmar Knipp

24 April 2017

The optics of axial silicon nanowire solar cells is investigated and compared to silicon thin-film solar cells with textured contact layers. The quantum efficiency and short circuit current density are calculated taking a device geometry into account...

(This article belongs to the Section Optics and Lasers)
  • Article
  • Open Access
15 Citations
7,529 Views
12 Pages

23 April 2017

Polycrystalline diamond compact (PDC) bits are commonly used drill bits in the petroleum drilling industry. Cracks often occur on the surface of a bit, which may result in the unexpected suspension of the drilling operation, or even accidents. Theref...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) of Civil Structures)
  • Article
  • Open Access
10 Citations
6,975 Views
14 Pages

23 April 2017

This paper presents a pushover analysis using ABAQUS (Dassault Company, Providence, Rhodes Island, USA) for spatial reinforced concrete (RC) frames. The main purpose is to study the effect of the infills on failure patterns of the RC frames. The Fini...

  • Article
  • Open Access
122 Citations
12,538 Views
13 Pages

Dense Pure Tungsten Fabricated by Selective Laser Melting

  • Dianzheng Wang,
  • Chenfan Yu,
  • Xin Zhou,
  • Jing Ma,
  • Wei Liu and
  • Zhijian Shen

23 April 2017

Additive manufacturing using tungsten, a brittle material, is difficult because of its high melting point, thermal conductivity, and oxidation tendency. In this study, pure tungsten parts with densities of up to 18.53 g/cm3 (i.e., 96.0% of the theore...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Materials for 3D Printing)
  • Article
  • Open Access
27 Citations
8,279 Views
23 Pages

22 April 2017

A pounding tuned mass damper (PTMD) is introduced by making use of the energy dissipated during impact. In the proposed PTMD, a viscoelastic layer is attached to an impact limitation collar so that energy can be further consumed and transferred to he...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Energy Dissipation and Vibration Control: Modeling, Algorithm and Devices)
  • Article
  • Open Access
82 Citations
13,882 Views
21 Pages

A Scenario-Adaptive Driving Behavior Prediction Approach to Urban Autonomous Driving

  • Xinli Geng,
  • Huawei Liang,
  • Biao Yu,
  • Pan Zhao,
  • Liuwei He and
  • Rulin Huang

22 April 2017

Driving through dynamically changing traffic scenarios is a highly challenging task for autonomous vehicles, especially on urban roadways. Prediction of surrounding vehicles’ driving behaviors plays a crucial role in autonomous vehicles. Most traditi...

  • Article
  • Open Access
12 Citations
6,395 Views
18 Pages

22 April 2017

Using Petri nets (PNs) to control discrete event systems (DES) has many benefits, because of their graphical representations, the possibility of parallel process control, and their formal descriptions. Amongst the different PNs that are applied for t...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Modeling, Simulation, Operation and Control of Discrete Event Systems)
  • Article
  • Open Access
15 Citations
8,864 Views
17 Pages

21 April 2017

Sprinkler selection influences the water distribution uniformity of center pivot irrigation systems. The sprinkling uniformity of the center pivot is crucial for the yield and quality of crops on a large scale. Rotating and fixed spray plate sprinkle...

  • Article
  • Open Access
38 Citations
5,911 Views
11 Pages

21 April 2017

With the increasing proportion of photovoltaic (PV) power in power systems, the problem of its fluctuation and intermittency has become more prominent. To reduce the negative influence of the use of PV power, we propose a short-term PV power predicti...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Distribution Power Systems)
  • Article
  • Open Access
21 Citations
6,075 Views
15 Pages

21 April 2017

This study identified depths of artificial pitting corrosion on the galvanized steel wires, frequently used in bridge cables, based on the time reversal method (TRM). Specifically, the multimode longitudinal ultrasonic guided waves are excited in ter...

  • Article
  • Open Access
32 Citations
10,723 Views
29 Pages

20 April 2017

Thermoacoustic technologies rely on a direct power conversion between acoustic and thermal energies using well known thermoacoustic effects. The presence of the acoustic field leads to oscillatory heat transfer and fluid flow processes within the com...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Heat Transfer Processes in Oscillatory Flow Conditions)
  • Article
  • Open Access
24 Citations
13,108 Views
16 Pages

20 April 2017

As the last barrier of nuclear reactor, prestressed concrete containment vessels (PCCVs) play an important role in nuclear power plants (NPPs). To test the mechanical property of PCCV during the integrated leakage rate testing (ILRT), a fiber Bragg g...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) of Civil Structures)
  • Article
  • Open Access
13 Citations
7,278 Views
22 Pages

Design Point Performance and Optimization of Humid Air Turbine Power Plants

  • Giovanni D. Brighenti,
  • Pau Lluis Orts-Gonzalez,
  • Luis Sanchez-de-Leon and
  • Pavlos K. Zachos

20 April 2017

With the recent drive towards higher thermal efficiencies and lower emission levels in the power generation market, advanced cycle power plants have become an increasingly appealing option. Among these systems, humid air turbines have been previously...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Gas Turbines Propulsion and Power)
  • Article
  • Open Access
15 Citations
6,066 Views
14 Pages

Operational Temperature Effect on Positioning Accuracy of a Single-Axial Moving Carrier

  • Kun-Ying Li,
  • Win-Jet Luo,
  • Jun-Zheng Huang,
  • Yung-Chao Chan,
  • Pratikto and
  • Dini Faridah

20 April 2017

This study investigated the ambient environmental temperature effect on the positioning accuracy of a periodically-moving carrier. The moving carrier was operated in an environmental chamber in which the operational temperature could be controlled by...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Selected Papers from the 2016 International Conference on Inventions)
  • Article
  • Open Access
16 Citations
7,999 Views
15 Pages

20 April 2017

To solve the problem of multi-fault blind source separation (BSS) in the case that the observed signals are under-determined, a novel approach for single channel blind source separation (SCBSS) based on the improved tensor-based singular spectrum ana...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) of Civil Structures)
  • Article
  • Open Access
9 Citations
8,373 Views
12 Pages

19 April 2017

Proteomics research has become one of the most important topics in the field of life science and natural science. At present, research on protein–protein interaction networks (PPIN) mainly focuses on detecting protein complexes or function modules. H...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Smart Healthcare)
  • Article
  • Open Access
27 Citations
7,486 Views
18 Pages

19 April 2017

To improve the performance of single-channel, multi-fault blind source separation (BSS), a novel method based on regenerated phase-shifted sinusoid-assisted empirical mode decomposition (RPSEMD) is proposed in this paper. The RPSEMD method is used to...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) of Civil Structures)
  • Feature Paper
  • Article
  • Open Access
28 Citations
10,264 Views
11 Pages

Diffraction-Based Optical Switching with MEMS

  • Pierre-Alexandre Blanche,
  • Lloyd LaComb,
  • Youmin Wang and
  • Ming C. Wu

19 April 2017

We are presenting an overview of MEMS-based (Micro-Electro-Mechanical System) optical switch technology starting from the reflective two-dimensional (2D) and three-dimensional (3D) MEMS implementations. To further increase the speed of the MEMS from...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Optical Modulators and Switches)
  • Article
  • Open Access
7 Citations
7,626 Views
17 Pages

Fusion of Intraoperative 3D B-mode and Contrast-Enhanced Ultrasound Data for Automatic Identification of Residual Brain Tumors

  • Elisee Ilunga-Mbuyamba,
  • Dirk Lindner,
  • Juan Gabriel Avina-Cervantes,
  • Felix Arlt,
  • Horacio Rostro-Gonzalez,
  • Ivan Cruz-Aceves and
  • Claire Chalopin

19 April 2017

Intraoperative ultrasound (iUS) imaging is routinely performed to assist neurosurgeons during tumor surgery. In particular, the identification of the possible presence of residual tumors at the end of the intervention is crucial for the operation out...

  • Review
  • Open Access
10 Citations
9,980 Views
22 Pages

Self-Referenced Spectral Interferometry for Femtosecond Pulse Characterization

  • Xiong Shen,
  • Peng Wang,
  • Jun Liu,
  • Takayoshi Kobayashi and
  • Ruxin Li

18 April 2017

Since its introduction in 2010, self-referenced spectral interferometry (SRSI) has turned out to be an analytical, sensitive, accurate, and fast method for characterizing the temporal profile of femtosecond pulses. We review the underlying principle...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Ultrashort Optical Pulses)
  • Article
  • Open Access
19 Citations
7,136 Views
16 Pages

18 April 2017

In this study, a radial basis function (RBF) neural network with three-layer feed forward architecture was developed to effectively predict the viscosity ratio of different ethylene glycol/water based nanofluids. A total of 216 experimental data invo...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Recent Developments of Nanofluids)
  • Article
  • Open Access
5 Citations
5,301 Views
6 Pages

Performance Improvement of High Efficiency Mono-Crystalline Silicon Solar Cells by Modifying Rear-Side Morphology

  • Chung-Yuan Kung,
  • Chih-Hsiang Yang,
  • Chun-Wei Huang,
  • Shui-Yang Lien,
  • Wen-Zhang Zhu,
  • Hai-Jun Lin and
  • Xiao-Ying Zhang

18 April 2017

In this work, aluminum oxide films with excellent passivation effects were prepared on the rear-side surface of passivated emitter and rear cells (PERCs) using a self-developed spatial atomic layer deposition system. Various rear-side surface morphol...

(This article belongs to the Section Nanotechnology and Applied Nanosciences)
  • Article
  • Open Access
18 Citations
7,113 Views
21 Pages

18 April 2017

This paper explores Liquid Film Flow of Williamson Fluid over an Unstable Stretching Surface in a Porous Space . The Brownian motion and Thermophoresis effect of the liquid film flow on a stretching sheet have been observed. This research include, to...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Recent Developments of Nanofluids)
  • Article
  • Open Access
9 Citations
7,484 Views
23 Pages

17 April 2017

With the increase of urban population and electricity demand, in order to provide sufficient power to residents, distribution transformers are getting closer to residential buildings, and are even directly placed on the first floor or the basement of...

(This article belongs to the Section Acoustics and Vibrations)
  • Article
  • Open Access
11 Citations
5,536 Views
14 Pages

17 April 2017

Flexure-based micro-motion mechanisms activated by piezoelectric actuators have a wide range of applications in modern precision industry, due to their inherent merits. However, system performance is negatively affected by model uncertainty, disturba...

(This article belongs to the Section Mechanical Engineering)
  • Article
  • Open Access
14 Citations
8,765 Views
18 Pages

16 April 2017

As lubricants with a high thermo-oxidative stability such as synthetic esters are gaining more importance in the lubricant market, a detailed knowledge regarding their oxidative degradation behaviour is of high importance. In order to reveal their de...

(This article belongs to the Section Chemical and Molecular Sciences)
  • Article
  • Open Access
17 Citations
5,981 Views
19 Pages

FMS Scheduling under Availability Constraint with Supervisor Based on Timed Petri Nets

  • Mohamed Ali Kammoun,
  • Wajih Ezzeddine,
  • Nidhal Rezg and
  • Zied Achour

15 April 2017

This paper proposes an optimal solution to large-scale Flexible Manufacturing System (FMS) scheduling problems under availability constraints based on Timed Petri Nets (TPNs). First a decomposition method of TPNs is proposed, then a mathematical mode...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Modeling, Simulation, Operation and Control of Discrete Event Systems)
  • Article
  • Open Access
10 Citations
5,307 Views
13 Pages

15 April 2017

Two rare sulphate ellagic acid derivatives were isolated from the rhizome of Geum rivale L. in three simple steps. Their structures were identified by comprehensive NMR studies (1H NMR, 13C NMR, 1H-1H COSY, HMBC, HSQC) as 3,3′-dimethoxy-4-sulphoxyell...

(This article belongs to the Section Chemical and Molecular Sciences)
  • Article
  • Open Access
24 Citations
8,038 Views
13 Pages

A Three-Dimensional Resonant Triggering Probe for Micro-CMM

  • Qiangxian Huang,
  • Chen Chen,
  • Kui Wu,
  • Liansheng Zhang,
  • Ruijun Li and
  • Kuang-Chao Fan

15 April 2017

To achieve true 3D nano-measurement with sub-nanometer resolution and very low touch force through a micro/nano coordinate measuring machine, a new 3D resonant trigger probe based on a quartz tuning fork is proposed. In this trigger probe, a quartz t...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Dimensional Micro and Nanometrology)
  • Article
  • Open Access
61 Citations
12,940 Views
11 Pages

Hydrophobic Ceramic Membranes for Water Desalination

  • Joanna Kujawa,
  • Sophie Cerneaux,
  • Wojciech Kujawski and
  • Katarzyna Knozowska

15 April 2017

Hydrophilic ceramic membranes (tubular and planar) made of TiO2 and Al2O3 were efficiently modified with non-fluorinated hydrophobic grafting molecules. As a result of condensation reaction between hydroxyl groups on the membrane and reactive groups...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Membrane Distillation)
  • Article
  • Open Access
53 Citations
11,921 Views
21 Pages

15 April 2017

The research goal of this paper is to identify major academic branches and to detect research trends in design research using text mining techniques. In this paper, the information about scientific literature in design research isprocessed. A combina...

  • Feature Paper
  • Article
  • Open Access
23 Citations
5,965 Views
20 Pages

Hierarchical Wavelet-Aided Neural Intelligent Identification of Structural Damage in Noisy Conditions

  • Mao-Sen Cao,
  • Yu-Juan Ding,
  • Wei-Xin Ren,
  • Quan Wang,
  • Minvydas Ragulskis and
  • Zhi-Chun Ding

14 April 2017

A sophisticated hierarchical neural network model for intelligent assessment of structural damage is constructed by the synergetic action of auto-associative neural networks (AANNs) and Levenberg-Marquardt neural networks (LMNNs). With the model, AAN...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) of Civil Structures)
  • Article
  • Open Access
12 Citations
6,254 Views
12 Pages

14 April 2017

This study analyzes the modeling and dynamics of a novel passive multi-degree-of-freedom (MDOF) vibration isolation platform which can achieve a significant isolation effect. Symmetrical scissor-like structures (SLSs) are utilized in the proposed MDO...

  • Article
  • Open Access
18 Citations
6,554 Views
23 Pages

14 April 2017

Low-CO2-emission wind generation can alleviate the world energy crisis, but intermittent wind generation influences the reliability of power systems. Energy storage might smooth the wind power fluctuations and effectively improve system reliability....

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Distribution Power Systems)
  • Article
  • Open Access
52 Citations
5,454 Views
18 Pages

14 April 2017

Motor imagery EEG (MI-EEG), which reflects one’s active movement intention, has attracted increasing attention in rehabilitation therapy, and accurate and fast feature extraction is the key problem to successful applications. Based on wavelet packet...

  • Article
  • Open Access
49 Citations
6,077 Views
18 Pages

An Improved Radio Resource Management with Carrier Aggregation in LTE Advanced

  • Hasibur Rashid Chayon,
  • Kaharudin Dimyati,
  • Harikrishnan Ramiah and
  • Ahmed Wasif Reza

14 April 2017

Long term evolution-advanced (LTE-A) system introduces carrier aggregation (CA) technique to improve the user throughput by aggregating multiple component carriers (CCs). Previous research works related to downlink radio resource allocation with carr...

  • Article
  • Open Access
32 Citations
5,433 Views
22 Pages

14 April 2017

The long-span triple-tower suspension bridge is a brand-new type of structural form with typical wind-sensitive features. Inevitable wind-induced vibrations will heavily influence the driving comfort during strong winds and shorten the fatigue life o...

(This article belongs to the Section Energy Science and Technology)
  • Article
  • Open Access
58 Citations
7,395 Views
11 Pages

Study of the Diffusion of Rejuvenators and Its Effect on Aged Bitumen Binder

  • Yue Xiao,
  • Chao Li,
  • Miao Wan,
  • Xinxing Zhou,
  • Yefei Wang and
  • Shaopeng Wu

14 April 2017

Aged asphalt mixture is heavily involved in pavement maintenance and renewed construction because of the development of recycling techniques. The aged bitumen binder has partially lost its viscous behavior. Rejuvenators are therefore designed and use...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advanced Asphalt Materials and Paving Technologies)
  • Article
  • Open Access
5 Citations
5,230 Views
12 Pages

Mechanically Strong CaSiO3 Scaffolds Incorporating B2O3-ZnO Liquid Phase

  • Cijun Shuai,
  • Songlin Duan,
  • Dan Gao,
  • Ping Wu,
  • Chengde Gao,
  • Youwen Yang,
  • Long Liu,
  • Fulai Yuan,
  • Sheng Yang and
  • Pei Feng

13 April 2017

Calcium silicate (CaSiO3) scaffolds were reinforced by introducing liquid phase. The liquid phase was made of B2O3 and ZnO. The fracture toughness and compressive strength increased by 48% and 141%, respectively, compared with those of the scaffolds...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Materials for 3D Printing)
  • Article
  • Open Access
1 Citations
3,873 Views
14 Pages

13 April 2017

In chemical engineering applications, the operation of condensers and evaporators can be made more efficient by exploiting the transport properties of interfacial waves excited on the interface between a hot vapor overlying a colder liquid. Linear th...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Heat Transfer Processes in Oscillatory Flow Conditions)
  • Article
  • Open Access
7 Citations
5,197 Views
15 Pages

Stability and Dynamics of Dark-Bright Soliton Bound States Away from the Integrable Limit

  • Garyfallia C. Katsimiga,
  • Jan Stockhofe,
  • Panagiotis G. Kevrekidis and
  • Peter Schmelcher

13 April 2017

The existence, stability, and dynamics of bound pairs of symbiotic matter waves in the form of dark-bright soliton pairs in two-component mixtures of atomic Bose–Einstein condensates is investigated. Motivated by the tunability of the atomic interact...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Guided-Wave Optics)
  • Article
  • Open Access
37 Citations
7,078 Views
8 Pages

13 April 2017

Polypropylene (PP) and polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF) polymer materials have been widely used because PP has excellent piezoelectricity and PVDF has a robust tensile strength. However, few studies have been reported about PP/PVDF blends, and the main...

  • Article
  • Open Access
14 Citations
4,395 Views
9 Pages

Solar Explosive Evaporation Growth of ZnO Nanostructures

  • Arsenii Ievtushenko,
  • Vasily Tkach,
  • Victor Strelchuk,
  • Larisa Petrosian,
  • Oleksander Kolomys,
  • Oleksander Kutsay,
  • Viktor Garashchenko,
  • Olena Olifan,
  • Sergiy Korichev and
  • Volodymyr Khranovskyy
  • + 1 author

12 April 2017

For the first time, we present a novel method of explosive evaporation (MEE) for the deposition of ZnO nanostructures using concentrated solar radiation for precursor evaporation. Zinc acetylacetonate powder and a mixture of ZnO with graphite powders...

(This article belongs to the Section Nanotechnology and Applied Nanosciences)
  • Article
  • Open Access
30 Citations
9,172 Views
10 Pages

The Chemical Behaviors of Nitrogen Dioxide Absorption in Sulfite Solution

  • Ye Sun,
  • Xiaowei Hong,
  • Tianle Zhu,
  • Xiaoyan Guo and
  • Deyuan Xie

12 April 2017

The simultaneous removal of nitrogen oxides (NOx) and sulfur dioxide (SO2) by absorption is considered to be one of the most promising technologies for flue gas treatment, and sulfite is the main component of the absorption solution. To understand th...

(This article belongs to the Section Chemical and Molecular Sciences)
  • Article
  • Open Access
51 Citations
5,795 Views
11 Pages

Cable Force Health Monitoring of Tongwamen Bridge Based on Fiber Bragg Grating

  • Dongtao Hu,
  • Yongxing Guo,
  • Xianfeng Chen and
  • Congrui Zhang

12 April 2017

A normal cable force state of a suspension bridge is extremely vital to bridge safety. For cable force monitoring of already completed suspension bridges, it is not suitable to conduct direct parameter measurements by modifying the anchor cable struc...

  • Article
  • Open Access
272 Citations
14,856 Views
18 Pages

Tunable-Q Wavelet Transform Based Multiscale Entropy Measure for Automated Classification of Epileptic EEG Signals

  • Abhijit Bhattacharyya,
  • Ram Bilas Pachori,
  • Abhay Upadhyay and
  • U. Rajendra Acharya

12 April 2017

This paper analyzes the underlying complexity and non-linearity of electroencephalogram (EEG) signals by computing a novel multi-scale entropy measure for the classification of seizure, seizure-free and normal EEG signals. The quality factor (Q) base...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Application of Signal Processing Methods for Systematic Analysis of Physiological Health)
  • Article
  • Open Access
9 Citations
5,827 Views
27 Pages

12 April 2017

Flows of dense granular materials comprise regions where the material is flowing, and regions where it is static. Describing the dynamics of the interface between these two regions is a key issue to understanding the erosion and deposition processes...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Viscoelastic Solids: Mechanical Behaviour, Contact Mechanics, Fracture and Wear)
  • Article
  • Open Access
13 Citations
5,890 Views
20 Pages

On the Link between Diesel Spray Asymmetry and Off-Axis Needle Displacement

  • Giancarlo Chiatti,
  • Ornella Chiavola,
  • Pierluigi Frezzolini and
  • Fulvio Palmieri

11 April 2017

Cutting edge experiments and thorough investigations have pointed out that radial components affect the needle lift of diesel nozzles. So far, the effects of such needle “off-axis” have been investigated within the nozzle and immediately downstream f...

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Internal Combustion Engines (ICE) for Ground Transport)

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Appl. Sci. - ISSN 2076-3417