Exciting forces for a wave energy device consisting of a pair of coaxial cylinders in water of finite depth

Two coaxial vertical cylinders-one is a riding hollow cylinder and the other a solid cylinder of greater radius at some distance above an impermeable horizontal bottom,were considered.This problem of diffraction by these two cylinders,which were considered as idealization of a buoy and a circular plate,can be considered as a wave energy device.The wave energy that is created and transferred by this device can be appropriately used in many applications in lieu of conventional energy.Method of separation of variables was used to obtain the analytical expressions for the diffracted potentials in four clearly identified regions.By applying the appropriate matching conditions along the three virtual boundaries between the regions,a system of linear equations was obtained,which was solved for the unknown coefficients.The potentials allowed us to obtain the exciting forces acting on both cylinders.Sets of exciting forces were obtained for different radii of the cylinders and for different gaps between the cylinders.It was observed that changes in radius and the gap had significant effect on the forces.It was found that mostly the exciting forces were significant only at lower frequencies.The exciting forces almost vanished at higher frequencies.The problem was also investigated for the base case of no plate arrangement,i.e.,the case having only the floating cylinder tethered to the sea-bed.Comparison of forces for both arrangements was carried out.In order to take care of the radiation of the cylinders due to surge motion,the corresponding added mass and the damping coefficients for both cylinders were also computed.All the results were depicted graphically and compared with available results.     

Hydrodynamic inline force prediction on vertical cylinders: a comparative study of neural network and its adaptive wavelets (wavenets)

The design of the neural network model and its adaptive wavelets (wavelet networks and wavenets) was used to estimate the wave-induced hydrodynamic inline force acting on a vertical cylinder. The data used to calibrate and validate the models were obtained from an experiment. In the brain, wavelet neural networks (WNNs) use wavelets to activate their hidden layers of neurons. In WNNs, both the position and dilation of the wavelets are optimized along with the weights. In one special approach to this kind of network construction, the position and dilation of the wavelets are fixed and only the weights of the network are optimized. In the present study, the neural network procedure and the above mentioned approach were employed to design a WNN, a so-called wavenet, using feed-forward neural network topology and its training method. Then, a comparison of these two methods was made. Numerical results demonstrate that both networks are capable of predicting hydrodynamic inline force. Furthermore, the combination of the neural network concept and the wavelet theory i.e. wavenet provides a more robust tool rather than standard feed-forward neural network, considering its more appropriate ability to predict any other data which the network had not experienced before. The results of this study can contribute to reducing the errors in future efforts to predict hydrodynamic inline force using WNNs, and thus improve the reliability of that prediction in comparison to the ANN and other methods. Therefore, this method can be applied to relevant engineering projects with satisfactory results.     

医源性高位胆管损伤的外科处理

目的探讨医源性胆管损伤和狭窄的类型、重建时机、促成损伤因素及胆道重建技术等对疗效的影响。方法回顾性分析了94例医源性胆管损伤患者,分为术中诊断、术后早期发现、引流或重建术后又出现狭窄等3组接受胆道再建手术。结果本组病例无手术死亡情况。术中诊断的31例中,22例系未辨清胆囊管和肝总管、胆总管联合部。随诊3-15年,疗效优者75例(79.8%),良者13例(13.8%),优良率达93.6%,差者6例(6.4%)。差者中已死亡5例(占5.3%,5/94)。结论除熟悉病理解剖关系外,经验和谨慎对预防医源性胆管损伤至关重要。胆道重建的疗效主要受Bismuth分型和胆道重建技术等因素的影响。     

Development of 19-plex Y STR system and polymorphism studies in Pakistani population

For the development of 19-plex Y STR system and polymorphism studies in locl ethnic populations sixteen markers of non-recombining regions (NRY) of Y chromosome, which show high power of discrimination among individuals, were selected in this study. Blood samples (600) were e.ollected from the males of three most common castes of Pakistani population (Arnin, Awan and Rajput) with different parent lineages. Three markers (DYS385a/b, DYS389Ⅰ/Ⅱ and YCAⅡa/b) among 16 Y STRs are double-targeted regions of the Y chromosome and thus provide two polymorphie peaks for each respective primer set. These 16 Y-STRs were developed into Megaplex system for simultaneous amplification of all markers within the population. The overall power of discrimination observed in focused populations was 60.5%, 66.5% and 55% in Rajput, Awan and Arain casts respectively. This discrimination power will be helpful in haman identification for forensic casework studies including sexual assaults and paternity testing.     

Exposure to noise inside transit buses in Kuwait: Measurements and passenger attitudes

Noise levels were measured, for the first time, inside 115 randomly selected transit buses, operating on 12 sample representative routes in Metropolitan Kuwait. Simultaneously with the monitoring of noise levels, the attitudes of 679 riders concerning the annoyance and long-term health impacts of noise were also surveyed. The noise and passenger attitude data were collected over 10 months (March - December 2000). The percentile distribution, equivalent noise level, traffic noise index and noise pollution levels inside four types of transit buses are presented. Riders' perceived annoyance and awareness of the long-term health impacts of noise were also determined and are discussed. The level of service and performance deficiencies of the public transit system in Kuwait, as perceived by its passengers, are also identified. A number of recommendations end the paper.     

A fuzzy AHP decision support system for selecting yard cranes in marine container terminals

One of the most important issues that planners and developers of ports have to address at the planning process of container terminals is how to effectively optimize truck turnaround times. The time that a truck spends at a container terminal for loading and/or unloading of cargo is a real cost scenario which affects not only the smooth operation of ports but also the overall cost of the container trade. The main objective of this article is to provide a decision support tool for selecting the best container yard gantry crane for loading/discharging operation of trucks at the landside of marine container terminals. Achieving this goal, this study aims at introducing and recommending the multiple attribute decision-making and the fuzzy analytical hierarchy process models that have been proven to provide a concrete basis for such a selection decision.     

作用在双圆柱桩上波浪力准确解和有限差分解的比较

The wave force exerted on vertical piles of offshore structures is the main criterion in designing them.In structures with more than one large pile,the influence of piles on each other is one of the most important issues being concerned in past researches.An efficient method for determining the interaction of piles is introduced in present research.First the wave force is calculated by the exact method using the diffraction theory,then in the finite difference numerical method the force is calculated by adding the velocity potentials of each pile and integration of pressure on their surface.The results showed that the ratio of the wave force on each of the double piles to a single pile has a damped oscillation around unity in which the amplitude of oscillation decreases with the increase in the spacing parameter.Also different wave incident directions and diffraction parameters were used and the results showed that the numerical solution has acceptable accuracy when the diffraction parameter is larger than unity.     

An approximate method for the surge response of the tension leg platform

The solution for the Duffing equation in anonlinear vibration problem is studied in this paper. Clearly,in the case of the perturb parameter being a larger value, thetraditional perturbation method is no longer valid but theHomotopy Perturbation Method （HPM） is applicable usually.HPM is used to solve the weak and strong nonlineardifferential equations for finding the perturbed frequency ofthe response. The obtained frequencies via HPM and theapproximate method have good accordance for weak andstrong nonlinear differential equations. Additionally, thecalculated responses by use of the approximate method arecompared with the responses obtained from the Numericalmethod in the time history of the response and phase plane.The results represent ~ood accordance between them.     

A computational investigation of the effects of both-sides general corrosion on the buckling/plastic collapse behaviour and strength of stiffened plates

This paper presents the results of an investigation into the post-buckling behaviour and ultimate strength of imperfect corroded stiffened steel plates used in ships and other marine-related structures. A series of elastic–plastic large deflection finite element analyses is performed on stiffened steel plates suffering general corrosion wastage with random distribution. General corrosion is introduced into the finite element models using a random thickness surface model. The effects of corroded stiffened plate parameters on the post-buckling and ultimate strengths are evaluated in detail. The stiffeners of different symmetrical or unsymmetrical cross-sections are introduced into the models for analysis. Some distinctions are explored and highlighted between the behaviours of steel plates suffering general corrosion in unstiffened and stiffened cases. Finally, a proposal is given in order to simulate the average stress–average strain relationship of stiffened steel plates having both-surface general corrosion wastage.     

Interactions between driver information,route choice,and optimal signal timing on a simple network

The interaction between driver information, route choice, and optimal traffic signal settings was investigated using a simple two-route system with a single “T” intersection and a fixed O-D demand. The logit model and the method of successive averages (MSA) were used to calculate the route choice probabilities and the stochastic equilibrium assignment. Given an assignment, signal settings which minimized average intersection delay were calculated; flow reassignment and new optimal signal settings were then obtained and this iterative process continued until convergence. The calculations were performed either directly in a combined assignment/signal optimization model or in stages using the output flows of an assignment model as inputs to TRANSYT-7F and iterating between the two models. Results show that a unique joint signal timing/assignment equilibrium is reached in all cases provided that a certain precision in drivers' perceptions is not reached. If driver information increases to this precision (bifurcation point) and beyond, results show clearly that the unique joint signal timing/assignment equilibrium no longer exists. In fact, three joint equilibria points exist after the bifurcation point. Two of these points are stable and one is not. It was found that the system yields the lowest total intersection delay when the joint equilibrium is such that all traffic and hence the major part of green time is assigned to only one of the two routes. Although this may not be feasible to implement in practice, the results indicate clearly for this simple example that there is a trade-off between a system with minimum total delay but no unique joint signal-settings/assignment equilibrium (achieved when drivers have nearly perfect information about the system) and a system with a unique joint equilibrium but with higher total delay (achieved when drivers have reasonably good but somewhat limited information). In most cases the second system seems appropriate for a number of practical reasons.