The main aim of this paper is studied the punching shear and behavior of reinforced concrete slabs exposed to fires, the possibility of punching shear failure occurred as a result of the fires and their inability to withstand the loads. Simulation by finite element analysis is made to predict the type of failure, distribution temperature through the thickness of the slabs, deformation and punching strength. Nonlinear finite element transient thermal-structural analysis at fire conditions are analyzed by ANSYS package. The validity of the modeling is performed for the mechanical and thermal properties of materials from earlier works from literature to decrea

Flexible joint robot (FJR) manipulators can offer many attractive features over rigid manipulators, including light weight, safe operation, and high power efficiency. However, the tracking control of the FJR is challenging due to its inherent problems, such as underactuation, coupling, nonlinearities, uncertainties, and unknown external disturbances. In this article, a terminal sliding mode control (TSMC) is proposed for the FJR system to guarantee the finite-time convergence of the systems output, and to achieve the total robustness against the lumped disturbance and estimation error. By using two coordinate transformations, the FJR dynamics is turned into a canonical form. A cascaded finite-time sliding mode observer (CFTSMO) is construct

Furfural is a toxic aromatic aldehyde that can cause a severe environmental problem especially the wastewater drown from petroleum refinery units. In the present work, a useless by-product from local furniture manufacturing industry; sawdust was used as raw material for the preparation of activated carbon which is chemically activated with phosphoric acid. The effect of adsorption variables which include initial pH of solution (2-9), agitation speed (50-250) rpm, agitation time (15-120) min, initial concentration of furfural (50-250) ppm, and amount of adsorbent material (0.5-2.5) g for the three adsorbents used (prepared activated carbon, commercial activated carbon and raw sawdust) were investigated in a batch process

Levan is an exopolysaccharide produced by various microorganisms and has a variety of applications. In this research, the aim was to demonstrate the biological activity of levan which produced from B. phenoliresistens KX139300. These were done via study the antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, anticancer and antileishmanial activities in vitro. The antioxidant levan was shown 80.9% activity at 1250 µg/mL concentration. The efficient anti-inflammatory activity of 88% protein inhibition was noticed with levan concentration at 35 µg/mL. The cytotoxic activity of levan at 2500 µg/mL concentration showed a maximum cytotoxic effect on L20B cell line and promastigotes of Leishmani tropica. Levan has dose-dependent anticancer and antileishman

This research utilized natural asphalt (NA) deposits from sulfur springs in western Iraq. Laboratory tests were conducted to evaluate the performance of an asphalt mixture incorporating NA and verify its suitability for local pavement applications. To achieve this, a combination of two types of NA, namely soft SNA and hard HNA, was blended to create a binder known as Type HSNA. The resulting HSNA exhibited a penetration grade that adhered to Iraqi specifications. Various percentages of NA (20%, 40%, 60%, and 80%) were added to petroleum asphalt. The findings revealed enhanced physical properties of HSNA, which also satisfied the requirements outlined in the Iraqi specifications for asphalt cement.

Consequently, HS

This study aims to derive a general relation between line loads that acting on two-way slab system and the equivalent uniformly distributed loads. This relation will be so useful to structural designer that are used to working with a uniformly distributed load and enable them to use the traditional methods for analysis of two-way systems (e.g. Direct Design Method). Two types of slab systems, Slab System with Beams and Flat Slab Systems, have been considered in this study to include the effect of aspect ratio and type of slab on the proposed relation. Five aspect ratios, l2/l1 of 0.5, 0.75, 1.0, 1.5 and 2.0, have been considered for both types of two-way systems.
All necessary finite element analyses have been executed with SAFE Soft