Investigating rock-slope failures in the Tien Shan: State-of-the-art and perspectives of international cooperation (M111).

Scientific conference (2005)

Investigating the factors for fermentative biohydrogen improvement: original bioreactors design and hydrogen partial pressure effect

in WHEC 2012, Toronto June 3rd - 7th (2012, June 05)

The anaerobic production of hydrogen from biomass offers the potential production of usable biogas from a variety of renewable resources. However, in order to produce hydrogen at high yields and ... [more ▼]

The anaerobic production of hydrogen from biomass offers the potential production of usable biogas from a variety of renewable resources. However, in order to produce hydrogen at high yields and production rates the biotechnological process needs to be further optimized and efficient bioreactors must be designed [1]. At the CWBI, a continuous horizontal rotating cylinder bioreactor has been designed and investigated to produce biohydrogen from glucose by the strain Clostridium butyricum [2] at good yields (1,9molH2•molglucose-1) and production rates (48,6mmolH2•Lmilieu-1.molhexose-1•h-1). This reactor has an internal volume of 2.3L and a small working volume (300ml) (fig.1). It enhances the hydrogen production rates (by about three times more than a completely stirred bioreactor) by partially immobilizing the bacteria on the porous support. Moreover, the rotating cylinder design enables efficient H2 gas transfer from the liquid phase increasing hydrogen yields by about 25% compared to a completely stirred bioreactor [3-4]. Other original bioreactors, such as a trickle bed, have been built with the same aim of lowering the hydrogen partial pressure and led to similar results. Our work shows the importance of a good liquid to gas transfers in the biohydrogen-producing reactors to reach higher performances. [less ▲]

Investigating the liquid distribution in a reactive distillation packing using high energy X-ray tomography

Conference (1996)

Investigating the performance of model order reduction techniques for nonlinear radiative heat transfer problems

in Proceedings of the International Conference on Advanced Computational Methods in Engineering (2011)

The problem of nonlinear radiative heat transfer is one of great importance to the aerospace industry. However, analysing large-scale, nonlinear, multiphysical, dynamical structures, by using mathematical ... [more ▼]

The problem of nonlinear radiative heat transfer is one of great importance to the aerospace industry. However, analysing large-scale, nonlinear, multiphysical, dynamical structures, by using mathematical modelling and simulation, e.g. Finite Element Modelling (FEM), can be computationally expensive. This provides motivation for the development of Model-Order Reduction (MOR) techniques capable of reducing simulation times without the loss of important information. The objective is to demonstrate the method of Proper Orthogonal Decompostition (POD) as a technique for nonlinear MOR. The nonlinear radiative exchanges between a linear benchmark beam within an external box (Figure 1) are analysed and a reduction procedure for this fully coupled, nonlinear, multiphysical, thermomechanical system is established. The solution to the strongly coupled, thermomechanical equations of motion is found by making use of an extended version of the implicit generalized-alpha scheme. In the reduced model, the residual of the unreduced system of equations need to be evaluated at each Newton iteration of each time step. In order to optimise the efficiency of the reduction method it is shown that the internal forces can be split into their linear and nonlinear counterparts. Only the nonlinear terms change at each time step, thus only these terms need to remain in the iterative loop significantly reducing the number of parameters that are to be computed at each step. These efficiency improvements to the method are discussed and the results are given. [less ▲]

Investigating the role of myostatin in the determinism of double muscling characterizing Belgian Texel sheep

(1998)

Investigating the tinnitus brain using resting-state fMRI.

Conference (2012, June)

Investigating the Variability in Daily Traffic Counts Trough Use of ARIMAX and SARIMAX Models: Assessing the Effect of Holidays on Two Site Locations

in Transportation Research Record: Journal of the Transportation Research Board (2009), 2136

In this paper, daily traffic counts are explained and forecast by different modeling philosophies: an approach using autoregressive integrated moving average (ARIMA) models with explanatory variables (i.e ... [more ▼]

In this paper, daily traffic counts are explained and forecast by different modeling philosophies: an approach using autoregressive integrated moving average (ARIMA) models with explanatory variables (i.e., the ARIMAX model) and approaches using a seasonal autoregressive integrated moving average (SARIMA) model as well as a SARIMA model with explanatory variables (i.e., the SARIMAX model). Special emphasis is placed on the investigation of seasonality in daily traffic data and on the identification and comparison of holiday effects at different sites. To get insight into prior cyclic patterns in the daily traffic counts, spectral analysis provides the required framework to highlight periodicities in the data. The analyses use data from single inductive loop detectors, which were collected in 2003, 2004, and 2005. Four traffic count locations are investigated in this study: an upstream and a downstream traffic count site on a highway used extensively by commuters, and an upstream and a downstream traffic count site on a highway typically used for leisure travel. The different modeling techniques show that weekly cycles appear to determine the variation in daily traffic counts. The comparison between seasonal and holiday effects at different site locations reveals that both the ARIMAX and the SARIMAX modeling approaches are valid frameworks for identifying and quantifying possible influencing effects. The techniques yield the insight that holidays have a noticeable impact on highways extensively used by commuters, while having a more ambiguous impact on highways typically used for leisure travel. Future research challenges are the modeling of daily traffic counts on secondary roads and the simultaneous modeling of underlying reasons for travel and revealed traffic patterns. [less ▲]

Investigating the X-ray emission from the massive WR+O binary WR 22 using 3D hydrodynamical models

in Astronomy and Astrophysics (2011), 530

<BR /> Aims: We examine the dependence of the wind-wind collision and subsequent X-ray emission from the massive WR+O star binary WR 22 on the acceleration of the stellar winds, radiative cooling, and ... [more ▼]

<BR /> Aims: We examine the dependence of the wind-wind collision and subsequent X-ray emission from the massive WR+O star binary WR 22 on the acceleration of the stellar winds, radiative cooling, and orbital motion. <BR /> Methods: Three dimensional (3D) adaptive-mesh refinement (AMR) simulations are presented that include radiative driving, gravity, optically-thin radiative cooling, and orbital motion. Simulations were performed with instantaneously accelerated and radiatively driven stellar winds. Radiative transfer calculations were performed on the simulation output to generate synthetic X-ray data, which are used to conduct a detailed comparison against observations. <BR /> Results: When instantaneously accelerated stellar winds are adopted in the simulation, a stable wind-wind collision region (WCR) is established at all orbital phases. In contrast, when the stellar winds are radiatively driven, and thus the acceleration regions of the winds are accounted for, the WCR is far more unstable. As the stars approach periastron, the ram pressure of the WR's wind overwhelms the O star's and, following a significant disruption of the shocks by non-linear thin-shell instabilities (NTSIs), the WCR collapses onto the O star. X-ray calculations reveal that when a stable WCR exists the models over-predict the observed X-ray flux by more than two orders of magnitude. The collapse of the WCR onto the O star substantially reduces the discrepancy in the 2-10keV flux to a factor of ≃ 6 at φ = 0.994. However, the observed spectrum is not well matched by the models. <BR /> Conclusions: We conclude that the agreement between the models and observations could be improved by increasing the ratio of the mass-loss rates in favour of the WR star to the extent that a normal wind ram pressure balance does not occur at any orbital phase, potentially leading to a sustained collapse of the WCR onto the O star. Radiative braking may then play a significant rôle for the WCR dynamics and resulting X-ray emission. [less ▲]

Investigating word recognition in intercomprehension: methods and findings

in Linguistics (in press)

Investigation biologique des allergies alimentaires chez l'enfant

Conference (2011, October 13)