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Enhancing bolted joint performance of woven composite laminates using 3D printed interlayers with tailored fibre architectures
No full textThis study investigates the effect of incorporating 3D printed interlayers containing continuous carbon fibres into plain weave CFRP laminates. The impact on stress distribution and the mechanical performance of bolted joints is systematically investigated. Three interlayer design strategies were developed to tailor the fibre distribution within the interlayers using filament-based 3D printing, and the resulting tailored-interlayer/woven laminates were assessed through double-shear testing to characterise the fibre load-transfer mechanisms. A filament-level multiscale finite element model was developed to capture the progressive damage evolution of the laminates. The experimental and numerical results demonstrate that incorporating 3D-printed interlayers can substantially enhance joint performance. Relative to the woven laminate baseline, enhancements were achieved across all interlayer cases. Specifically, improvements of up to 86 % in stiffness, 95 % in initial peak strength, and 59 % in ultimate bearing strength were achieved across the evaluated cases. In addition, substantial enhancements in energy absorption capacity were observed, with the initial fracture energy increasing by as much as 496 %, and the ultimate fracture energy by up to 10 %, depending on the specific architectural conditions. Among the designs, fibre steering guided by failure planes yielded most suppression of damage propagation. Together with micro-CT scans of the final failure morphologies, the simulation results provided insight into the damage progression and showed good agreement with the overall mechanical response observed experimentally. This research highlights the effectiveness of stress-adapted fibre steering in laminates and demonstrates the potential of 3D printing as a tool for locally reinforcing CFRP joints
UNHRD’s humanitarian support in South Asia via multistage stochastic programming
No full textOne of the main tasks of the United Nations Humanitarian Response Depot (UNHRD) relies on allocating relief aid to save people who suffer from disasters. This task is particularly challenging in areas like South Asia, where relief aid efforts are confronted with complex transportation conditions, significant socioeconomic disparities, and the frequent occurrence of disasters, not to mention that financial resources are often scarce. In this paper, we develop a novel Multistage Stochastic Programming model to help UNHRD support critical decisions regarding site selection and relief aid allocation. Differently from the main literature, where these decisions are often made within a two-stage paradigm, our three-stage perspective takes into account in-kind donation campaigns that are triggered depending on the disaster impact and its effects, and is paramount to improving the effectiveness and fairness of the disaster relief operation. Our objective function maximizes the effectiveness of the disaster relief operation, defined as the extent to which it fulfills the needs of the population. Considering that different regions often exhibit distinct coping capacities, the effectiveness measure also factors in a vulnerability score to encourage relief aid allocation to the most in-need populations. The overall results show the importance of in-kind donation to achieve a more equitable relief aid allocation plan and the benefit of targeting more vulnerable regions under severely scarce resources
Thermal response of hybrid steel-timber floor cross-sections exposed to standard fire: experimental and numerical investigations
No full textHybrid systems that combine steel beams with cross-laminated timber (CLT) floor slabs can be vulnerable to fire, given the combustible nature of timber. Specifically, when unprotected, heat from a fire can conduct through steel beams to the CLT panels, which in turn may experience loss of mechanical properties, and possible charring (and combustion) in the connection zone between the CLT panel and the steel beam. Accordingly, this paper aims to establish thermal profiles in hybrid steel-timber floor cross-sections exposed to fire through experimental and numerical investigations. Results from fire tests and numerical validation studies on hybrid cross-sections exposed to a standard fire are presented; a total of six experiments with unprotected, partially protected, and fully protected steel sections were conducted following an ISO 834-1 standard fire exposure. Furthermore, a two-dimensional numerical heat transfer model was developed using SAFIR software, to predict the evolution of temperatures in the hybrid cross-section. The results confirm that passive fire protection of the steelwork using intumescent coatings plays a key role in determining the extent of charring in the connection region between the CLT panel and the steel section. In addition, temperature predictions from the developed numerical model show reasonable agreement with the experimental measurements
Joint Modelling of Line and Point Data on Metric Graphs
No full textMetric graphs are useful tools for describing spatial domains like road and river networks, where spatial dependence act along the network. We take advantage of recent developments for such Gaussian Random Fields (GRFs), and consider joint spatial modelling of observations with different spatial supports. Motivated by an application to traffic state modelling in Trondheim, Norway, we consider line-referenced data, which can be described by an integral of the GRF along a line segment on the metric graph, and point-referenced data. Through a simulation study inspired by the application, we investigate the number of replicates that are needed to estimate parameters and to predict unobserved locations. The former is assessed using bias and variability, and the latter is assessed through root mean square error (RMSE), continuous rank probability scores (CRPSs), and coverage. Joint modelling is contrasted with a simplified approach that treat line-referenced observations as point-referenced observations. The results suggest joint modelling leads to strong improvements. The application to Trondheim, Norway, combines point-referenced induction loop data and line-referenced public transportation data. To ensure positive speeds, we use a non-linear link function, which requires integrals of non-linear combinations of the linear predictor. This is made computationally feasible by a combination of the R packages inlabru and MetricGraph, and new code for processing geographical line data to work with existing graph representations and fmesher methods for dealing with line support in inlabru on objects from MetricGraph. We fit the model to two datasets where we expect different spatial dependency and compare the results
High Content Drug Screening & Analysis Dataset: A comprehensive pharmacological survey across heterogeneous patient-derived GBM stem cell models
No full text384w microplate format of high throughput, high content drug screening data from image based readouts. Screening was conducted against 6 glioma stem cell lines using multple drug libraries using approved and pre-clinical compounds. The dataset includes quantified image analysis from CellProfiler pipeline outputs: Raw data and processed data (feature re-scaling/transformation, removal of redundant features, normalisation to dmso), including metadata and related plate maps/informatio
Blurred boundaries:Community treatment orders as instruments of racial surveillance
Full text linkThe Mental Health Act 1983 (MHA) authorizes the compulsory detention and treatment of people with mental disorders who are perceived to pose a risk to themselves or to others. Since its enactment, there have been concerns that the coercive powers of the Act have been disproportionately used for Black people with mental disorders. This disproportionate impact of the MHA on Black people is most clearly seen in the excessive use of Community Treatment Orders (CTOs). Although there is limited evidence on the effectiveness of CTOs, they continue to be used increasingly in the care of Black people, with latest data showing that Black people are over seven times more likely to be issued CTOs than White people (National Health Service Digital, 2024). This is particularly concerning as CTOs are commonly perceived as intrusive and have been described as a form of racial surveillance. In this paper, we explore the idea of CTOs as instruments of racial surveillance and argue that their continued use in the care of Black people with mental disorders is an extension of the intrusive powers of the State and might constitute a form of racial injustice.</p
Effect of Deliberate Physical Damage and Repair on the Icephobicity of Oil‐Infused Elastomer Coatings
No full textOil-infused elastomers have shown promise as anti-icing coatings, but their softness has led to durability concerns. The effect of damage is investigated to study the resilience of the icephobicity of silicone elastomer coatings with and without oil infusion. Physical damage is applied to specimens by abrading with grit paper or cutting with a scalpel. Surface characterization reveals morphological changes in the coatings due to damage and de-icing on the surfaces, along with changes in the static water contact angle. Abrasion of the surfaces does not overwhelmingly or universally worsen the ice adhesion strength. Some damage even lowers the ice adhesion strength, possibly due to Cassie–Baxter wetting. However, it decreases the average freezing time. Cutting causes accelerated deterioration to ice adhesion strength and worsens freezing time. Though damage to the oil-infused coatings is greater, changes in icephobicity are similar to coatings without oil infusion. Re-coating is an effective method of repairing even severely damaged surfaces and recovering icephobicity. We show oil-infused elastomers have durable icephobicity and are effective anti-icing coatings
Boost of trace methane photo-oxidation in the presence of water vapor via the interfacial hydrophobic effect
No full textThe study of water resistance of methane photo-oxidation catalysts is important and challenging for the removal of methane from the atmosphere. Herein, we investigate the mechanistic role of water in the photocatalytic oxidation of trace methane on ZnO decorated with various metal (Cu, Pt). We found that suppressing water dissociation at active sites mitigates hydroxyl-induced catalyst poisoning. Critical insight reveals that photo-generated holes (h+) mediate the conversion of passivating hydroxyl groups (OH*) into reactive hydroxyl radicals (•OH), simultaneously liberating active sites and promoting the reaction. In addition, temperature-dependent experiments revealed that increasing the temperature from 20 to 80 °C enhanced the methane conversion by approximately 4-fold, proving that partial desorption of water molecules from the catalyst surface releases active sites. The experimental results show that 0.5 % Pt/ZnO is about 2-fold more water resistant than 0.5 % Cu/ZnO. These findings provide valuable experience and guidance for both mechanistic understanding of water-mediated methane photooxidation and rational design of high-performance catalysts.</p
Learning in the experiential continuum:A philosophically informed view of professional socialisation
No full textProfessional socialisation is a concept that encapsulates the multifactorial and complex learning process through which a person becomes a member of a profession. In the field of nursing, existing literature on professional socialisation has primarily focused on describing students' key learning experiences during university education. This tendency has been crucial to identifying and characterising the relevance of students' interactions with faculty, patients, and peers and their engagement with the occupational culture and institutional norms, among other learning experiences. However, few studies have taken a step back to elaborate on the theoretical underpinnings of students' socialisation, such as the underlying approach to learning or, more fundamentally, what is understood by human experience. We argue that this omission has precluded a more comprehensive view of professional socialisation. Addressing this gap, in this article, we integrate philosophy to develop a framework that intertwines the concepts of experience, learning, and socialisation. In so doing, we propose that learning occurs within an experiential continuum. Ultimately, this framework operates as theoretical scaffolding that offers a deeper understanding of students' learning during professional socialisation and paves the way for new avenues of empirical research.</p
Dec2016 ImageXpress backup
No full text## Access ## This dataset is held in the Edinburgh DataVault, directly accessible only to authorised University of Edinburgh users.The ImageXpress MicroXl platform is a high content instrument from Molecular Devices. Incorporation of a large sensor scientific CMOS camera together with LED solid light source provides enhanced optical sensitivity and image quality over standard high content systems. New MetaXpressTM software solutions such as a “Digital Confocal Option” and “Custom Module Editor” provides increased capability and flexibility to customize image analysis routines for quantification of defined phenotypes. The AcuityXpressTM software facilitates quality control assessment across multiple plates and tissue slides and incorporates multivariate statistical and similarity profiling tools to exploit multiparametric phenotypic data. The ImageXpress platform represents a fully equipped high content solution integrated with plate handling robotics (PAA Scara 4 robot), barcode reader and an extensive image-informatics suite (MetaXpressTM and AcuityXpressTM software) that stream-lines; complex high-content analysis routines; data analysis; image storage and review
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