The dual nature of asphalt binder necessitates improvements to mitigate rutting and fatigue since it performs as an elastic material under the regime of rapid loading or cold temperatures and as a viscous fluid at elevated temperatures. The present investigation assesses the effectiveness of Nano Alumina (NA), Nano Silica (NS), and Nano Titanium Dioxide (NT) at weight percentages of 0, 2, 4, 6, and 8% in asphalt cement to enhance both asphalt binder and mixture performance. Binder evaluations include tests for consistency, thermal susceptibility, aging, and workability, while mixture assessments focus on Marshall properties, moisture susceptibility, resilient modulus, permanent deformation, and fatigue characteristics. NS notably improves binder viscosity by about 138% and reduces penetration by approximately 40.8% at 8% nanomaterial (NM) content, significantly boosting hardness and consistency. NS also enhances Marshall stability and decreases air voids, increasing the mix’s durability. For moisture resistance, NS at 8% NM content elevates the Tensile Strength Ratio (TSR) to 91.0%, substantially surpassing the 80% standard. Similarly, NA and NT also show improved TSR values at 8% NM content, with 88.0% and 84.1%, respectively. Additionally, NS, NA, and NT reduce permanent deformation by 82%, 69%, and 64% at 10,000 cycles at 8% NM content, illustrating their effectiveness in mitigating pavement distress. Notably, while higher NM content generally results in better performance across most tests, the optimal NM content for fatigue resistance is 4% for NS and 6% for both NA and NT, reflecting their peak performance against various types of pavement distresses. These results highlight the significant advantages of nanoparticles in improving asphalt’s mechanical properties, workability, stability, and durability. The study recommends further field validation to confirm these laboratory findings and ensure that enhancements translate into tangible improvements in real-world pavement performance and longevity.
Cerium oxide CeO2, or ceria, has gained increasing interest owing to its excellent catalytic applications. Under the framework of density functional theory (DFT), this contribution demonstrates the effect that introducing the element nickel (Ni) into the ceria lattice has on its electronic, structural, and optical characteristics. Electronic density of states (DOSs) analysis shows that Ni integration leads to a shrinkage of Ce 4f states and improvement of Ni 3d states in the bottom of the conduction band. Furthermore, the calculated optical absorption spectra of an Ni-doped CeO2 system shifts towards longer visible light and infrared regions. Results indicate that Ni-doping a CeO2 system would result in a decrease of the band gap. Finally,
... Show MoreCerium oxide (CeO2), or ceria, has gained increasing interest owing to its excellent catalytic applications. Under the framework of density functional theory (DFT), this contribution demonstrates the eect that introducing the element nickel (Ni) into the ceria lattice has on its electronic, structural, and optical characteristics. Electronic density of states (DOSs) analysis shows that Ni integration leads to a shrinkage of Ce 4f states and improvement of Ni 3d states in the bottom of the conduction band. Furthermore, the calculated optical absorption spectra of an Ni-doped CeO2 system shifts towards longer visible light and infrared regions. Results indicate that Ni-doping a CeO2 system would result in a decrease of the band gap. Finally,
... Show MoreAn optimization calculation is made to find the optimum properties of combined quadrupole lens which consists of electrostatic and magnetic lens. Both chromatic and spherical aberration coefficients are reduced to minimum values and the achromatic aberration is found for many cases. These calculations are achieved with the aid of transfer matrices method and using rectangular model of field distribution, where the path of charged-particles beam traversing the field has been determined by solving the trajectory equation of motion and then the optical properties for lens have been computed with the aid of the beam trajectory along the lens axis. The computations have been concentrated on determining the chromatic and spher
... Show MoreNanofiltration (NF) ceramic membrane have found increasing applications particularly in wastewater and water treatment. In order to estimate and optimize the performance of NF membranes, the membrane should be characterized correctly in terms of their basic parameters such as effective pore radius (rp) and equivalent effective thickness as well as effective surface charge ( ), the effective charge density ( ) and Donnan potential ( ). The impact of electrokinetic (zeta) potential on the membrane surface charge density, effective membrane charge density and Donnan potential at two different concentrations of the reference solutions 0.001, 0.01 M sodium chloride at various pH values from 3 to 9, and effective po
... Show MoreMoisture induced damage can cause a progressive deterioration in the performance of asphalt pavement by the loss of adhesion between asphalt binder and aggregate surface and/or loss of cohesion within the binder in the presence of water. The objective of this paper is to improve the asphalt mixtures resistance to moisture by using hydrated lime as an anti-stripping additive. For this purpose, two types of asphalt binder were utilized; asphalt grades (40-50) and (60-70) with one type of aggregate of 19.0 mm aggregate nominal maximum size, and limestone dust as a mineral filler. Marshall method was adopted to find the optimum asphalt content. Essentially, two parameters were determined to evaluate the moisture susceptibili
... Show MoreAl-Si alloys which are widely used in engineering applications due to their outstanding properties can be modified for more enhancements in their properties. Current work investigated the ability of these alloys to be modified by casting them through the addition of nanoparticles. So, Multi-wall carbon nanotubes (CNT) and titanium carbide ceramic particles (TIC) with size of (20 nm) were added with different amounts started from (0.5 up to 3%) weight to cast alloy A356 that was considered to be the base metal matrix, then stirred with different speeds of (270, 800, 1500, 2150) rpm at 520 °C for one minute. The results showed change in microstructure’ shape of the casted alloys from the dendritic to spherical gra
... Show MoreFree Space Optics (FSO) plays a vital role in modern wireless communications due to its advantages over fiber optics and RF techniques where a transmission of huge bandwidth and access to remote places become possible. The specific aim of this research is to analyze the Bit-Error Rate (BER) for FSO communication system when the signal is sent the over medium of turbulence channel, where the fading channel is described by the Gamma-Gamma model. The signal quality is improved by using Optical Space-Time Block- Code (OSTBC) and then the BER will be reduced. Optical 2×2 Alamouti scheme required 14 dB bit energy to noise ratio (Eb/N0) at 10-5 bit error rate (BER) which gives 3.5 dB gain as compared to no diversity scheme. Th
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