With limited investment costs, how to fully utilize the carbon-reduction capacity of a campus in terms of buildings, equipment, and energy is an important issue when realizing the low-carbon retrofit of office parks. To this end, this paper establishes a mathematical optimization model for the decarbonization-based retrofit of existing office parks, based on the genetic algorithm, taking into account the relationship between cost, energy-consumption, and carbon-emissions, and taking the maximum carbon reduction of the park over its whole life as the optimization goal. The validity of the model was verified in conjunction with a case study of an office park in Nanchang, China. The case study shows that, compared with current typical parks, the carbon reduction through an office park’s decarbonization retrofit has a non-linear correlation with the investment cost, and when the total investment cost of the park is above CNY 60 million, the increase in carbon reduction with the increase in... [more]

Inert gas distribution has a great influence on the inerting effect, especially for the multiple-bay fuel tank. In order to find out the optimal scheme, an optimization method based on the entropy-weight improvement TOPSIS method is proposed, and an experimental system of inert gas distribution is established to measure the speed index and uniformity index. The results show that the position of the inlet and outlet has a significant effect on the overall inerting effect. The inerting scheme designed by the entropy-weight improvement TOPSIS method can not only reduce the flow demand of inert gas but also make the oxygen distribution more uniform. The optimization inerting scheme of the Boeing 747 aircraft has improved the average speed index by 3.01% and the average uniformity index by 26.18%. The smoke visualization experiment also showed that the scheme designed by the entropy-weight improvement TOPSIS method has the denser white smoke, which means that the scheme has better performan... [more]

In this paper, the optimization of the flow channel structure of the U-shaped air distributor is proposed. Fluent meshing was used to mesh the multipatch meshing of the original model of the grid air distributor, and then the CFD numerical simulation was carried out by using Fluent 2022R1 to obtain the internal air flow state of the air distributor flow channel. Through the orthogonal experimental design and a comprehensive analysis method, the optimal size structure for resistance performance is obtained as S = 60 mm, RL = 125 mm, L = 160 mm, D = 100 mm, the resistance coefficient of the new structure as 1.375, and the pressure loss as 56.87 Pa, by using 3D modeling software (SOLIDWORKS 2015) and Fluent. Compared with the initial scheme, the resistance coefficient and pressure loss are reduced by 3.03% and 6.29%, respectively. To summarize, the research in this paper offers a substantial contribution to the realm of energy conservation and emission abatement in ship air conditioning s... [more]

The present study aimed to optimize the process parameters (milling depth and advanced speed) for an asphalt milling operation using a multi-response approach based on Taguchi design of experiments (DOE) and Grey Relational Analysis (GRA). Nine simulations tests were conducted using Discrete Element Method (DEM) in order to determine the forces acting on the cutting tooth support and tip. The considered performance characteristics were cutting forces (smaller is better category) and chip section area (larger is better category). A Grey Relational Grade (GRG) was determined from GRA, allowing to identify the optimal parameter levels for the asphalt milling process with multiple performance characteristics. It was found that that the optimal milling parameters for multi-response analysis are a milling depth of 200 mm and an advanced speed of 30 mm/min. Furthermore, analysis of variance (ANOVA) was used to determine the most significant factor influencing the performance characteristics.... [more]

The rapid and accurate evaluation of oil and gas assets, specifically for new development projects, poses a significant challenge due to the various project types, limited data availability, brief periods for assessment and decision making, and constraints arising from varying contractual and taxation conditions, political stability, and societal factors. This study leverages the grading standards of the evaluation index system for new oil and gas field development projects, along with relevant mathematical theories and methods for project evaluation and optimization. We developed an asset evaluation approach for new oil and gas projects by analyzing the assets of six new oil and gas field development projects in Brazil. This analysis resulted in the grading and ranking of new projects, and we tested and demonstrated four asset optimization techniques. After a comparative analysis with conventional evaluation results, we established an oil and gas project asset optimization approach ce... [more]

Post-fracturing shut-in, as an important means of improving the energy efficiency of fracturing fluid, has been widely used in the development process of unconventional reservoirs. The determination of the shut-in duration is key to the effectiveness of shut-in measures. However, the distribution characteristics of the fracturing fluid during the post-fracturing shut-in period in unconventional reservoirs, such as the Chang 7 reservoir, were not clear, and the shut-in duration needed further optimization. Therefore, this paper employed low-field nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) technology to study the distribution characteristics of the fracturing fluid during the post-fracturing shut-in period in unconventional reservoirs and optimized the shut-in duration. The study showed that the Chang 7 reservoir had a complex pore structure and relatively low porosity and permeability. During the shut-in process, the filtrate was distributed in pore throats with radii ranging from 0.0012 μm to 0.... [more]

The production quality of medical fluid bags is closely related to patient health. In this paper, we used medical fluid bags to detect whether they contained foreign bodies. A visual acquisition system for the fluid bag was built. Vignetting correction was performed on the acquired images, and a foreign body recognition detection method based on an improved Faster R-CNN model was proposed. The feature extraction network of Faster R-CNN was discussed and studied regarding the characteristics of small foreign objects in liquid bags, and the ResNet152 network replaced the VGG16 network; furthermore, the feature fusion and attention mechanism were added to the feature extraction, and CIoU replaced the IoU loss function; the anchor box parameters were optimized and improved using the K-means clustering algorithm, and ROI Align replaced the ROI Pooling module. The improved network in this paper was compared with the Faster R-CNN model, which is a modification of feature extraction networks,... [more]

The aim of this study was to examine the effectiveness of cryomilling (CM) pretreatment on the isolation of fennel seeds essential oil (EO). Therefore, the study included (i) the process optimization and comparison of the efficiencies of hydrodistillation (HD) and steam distillation (SD); (ii) the evaluation of the effect of the CM application prior to the distillation method (selected based on the results obtained in the first part) on the EO yield; (iii) the evaluation of possible quality differences of the EOs obtained with the performed isolation methods. The obtained results showed that HD (at a solid to liquid ratio 1:10 and a distillation time of 120 min) was more efficient in terms of the EO yield compared to SD (at a pressure of 0.83 bar and distillation time of 117 min as optimal conditions). Moreover, an increased EO yield or even reduced distillation time was observed when HD was combined with a 3 min or 5 min CM pretreatment. GC-MS analysis showed no qualitative difference... [more]

Parallel flow double and triple-effect vapor absorption cooling systems (VACS) are trying to meet the challenges of vapor compression cooling systems due to their better performance. Therefore, the present study deals with the review, thermodynamic analysis, and optimization of operating parameters for both double and triple-effect VACS. Lithium bromide water was selected as the working fluid, while liquified petroleum gas (LPG) and compressed natural gas (CNG) were taken as the source of energy to drive both the VACS. Detailed First Law analysis, i.e., coefficient of performance (COP), was examined along with the optimization of operating parameters (such as salt concentration and operating generators temperature at different pressure levels) and the volume flow rate of the gases. Optimization was carried out for maximum COP of the VACS using an iterative technique. Our results show that the COP of the triple-effect system was approximately 32% higher than the double effect, while 15−... [more]

The volatility and uncertainty introduced by increasingly integrated renewable energy pose challenges to the reliable and stable operation of the power system. To mitigate the operation risks, a two-stage optimal preventive control model that incorporates transient stability constraints and considers uncertainties from multiple resources is proposed. First, the uncertainties of different re-sources are modeled, with which the non-sequential Monte Carlo sampling method is used to correspondingly generate the scenarios. Thereafter, a two-stage control model that balances operational safety and economy and realizes preventive control and emergency control is built. The operation schedule from the preventive control stage aims to minimize the transient stability probability and operation costs. If any faults destabilize the system, the emergency control stage will be activated immediately to help the system recover stability with minimal control costs. To expedite the solving of the two-st... [more]

This study proposes a novel integrated energy system (IES) cluster optimization structure that uses multi-energy sharing, multi-Nash games, and asymmetric profit allocation according to the energy supply demand and energy development planning for Tibet. First, it integrates clean energy units such as concentrated solar power, power to hydrogen to power, and vacuum pressure swing adsorption to build a novel IES including electricity, heat, and oxygen. Second, multiple novel IESs are combined to form an IES cluster and the IES cluster is divided into three stages of optimization: the first stage is to achieve optimal multi-energy sharing under cluster optimization, the second stage is to conduct multi-Nash games to achieve optimal sharing cost, and the third stage is to conduct asymmetric profit allocation. Finally, the case study is conducted and the results show that the multi-Nash games and asymmetric profit allocation can effectively improve the renewable energy consumption of the IE... [more]

Research on cannabis oil has evolved to encompass the pharmaceutical industry for the therapeutic potential of the active compounds for pathologies such as Alzheimer, auto-immune disorders, and cancer. These debilitating diseases are best treated with cannabinoids such as tetrahydrocannabinol (∆9-THC), cannabigerol (CBG), and cannabinol (CBN), which relieve neuropathic pain and stimulate the immune system. We extracted cannabinoids from plants with supercritical CO2 and produced an extract with a total yield close to 26%. The three-level Box−Behnken experimental design considered four factors: Temperature, pressure, CO2 flow rate, and processing time, with predetermined parameters at low, medium, and high levels. The mathematical model was evaluated by regression analysis. The yield of ∆9-THC and CBG reached a maximum after 2 h and 15 g/min of CO2, 235 bar, 55 °C (64.3 g THC/100 g of raw material and 4.6 g CBG/100 g of raw material). After another 2 h of extraction time, the yield of C... [more]

Gas-To-Liquid (GTL) processing involves the conversion of natural gas to liquid hydrocarbons that are widely used in the chemical industry. In this process, the Fischer−Tropsch (F-T) approach is utilized and, as a result, wastewater is produced as a by-product. This wastewater commonly contains alcohols and acids as contaminants. Prior to discharge, the treatment of this wastewater is essential, and biological treatment is the common approach. However, this approach is not cost effective and poses various waste-related issues. Due to this, there is a need for a cost-effective treatment method. This study evaluated the adsorption performance of activated carbon fibers (ACFs) for the treatment of GTL wastewater. The ACF in this study exhibited a surface area of 1232.2 m2/g, which provided a significant area for the adsorption to take place. Response surface methodology (RSM) under central composite design was used to assess the effect of GTL wastewater’s pH, initial concentration and dos... [more]

Packing products into a pallet or other medium is an unavoidable activity for producing companies. In many cases, packing is based on operator experience and training using packing patterns that have worked before. Automated packing, on the other hand, requires a systematic procedure for devising packing solutions. In the scientific literature, this problem is known as 3D bin packing (3DBP) and many authors have proposed exact and heuristic solutions for many variations of the problem. There is, however, a lack of datasets that can be used to test and validate such solutions. Many of the available datasets use randomly generated products with extremely limited connection to real practice. Furthermore, they contain a reduced number of product configurations and ignore that packing relates to customers’ orders, which have specific relative mixes of products. This paper proposes a software toolbox for generating arbitrarily large datasets for 3DBPP based on real industry data. The toolbox... [more]

The intermediate fluid thermoelectric generator (IFTEG) represents a novel approach to power generation, predicated upon the principles of gravity heat pipe technology. Its key advantages include high-power output and a compact module area. The generator’s performance, however, is influenced by the variable exhaust parameters typical of automobile operation, which presents a significant challenge in the design process. The present study establishes a mathematical model to optimize the design of the IFTEG. Our findings suggest that the optimal module area sees substantial growth with an increase in both the exhaust heat exchanger area and the exhaust flow rate. Interestingly, the optimal module area appears to demonstrate a low sensitivity to changes in exhaust temperature. To address the challenge of determining the optimal module area, this study introduces the concept of peak power deviation. This method posits that any deviation from the optimal module area results in an equivalent... [more]

Heat integration by a heat exchanger network (HEN) is an important topic in chemical process system synthesis. From the perspective of optimization, the simultaneous synthesis of HEN belongs to a mixed-integer and nonlinear programming problem. Both the stage-wise superstructure (SWS) model and the chessboard model are the most widely adopted and belong to structural models, in which a framework is assumed for stream matching, and the global optimal solution outside its feasible domain may be defined by the framework. A node-wise non-structural model (NW-NSM) is proposed to find more universal stream matching options, but it requires a mass of structural variables and extra multiple correction strategies. The aim of this paper is to develop a novel matrix non-structural model (M-NSM) for HEN without stream splits from the perspectives of global optimization methods and superstructure models. In the proposed M-NSM, the heat exchanger position order is quantized by matrix elements at eac... [more]

Accurately predicting the surface finish of fused deposition modeling (FDM) parts is an important task for the engineering application of FDM technology. So far, many prediction models have been proposed by establishing a mapping relationship between printing parameters and surface roughness. Each model can work well in its specific context; however, existing prediction models cannot meet the requirements of multi-factor and multi-category prediction of surface finish and cope with imbalanced data. Aiming at these issues, a prediction method based on a combination of the adaptive particle swarm optimization and K-nearest neighbor (APSO-KNN) algorithms is proposed in this paper. Seven input variables, including nozzle diameter, layer thickness, number of perimeters, flow rate, print speed, nozzle temperature, and build orientation, are considered. The printing values of each specimen are determined using an L27 Taguchi experimental design. A total of 27 specimens are printed and experim... [more]

Efficient insulation technology is one of the key technologies for the development of large LH2 storage tanks. This paper aimed at a 4000 m3 LH2 spherical tank, many insulation schemes were designed, including multilayer insulation systems integrated with a vapor-cooled shield (VCS) and liquid-nitrogen-cooled shield (LN2CS). The heat transfer model was developed to predict the insulation performance of a LH2 spherical tank. The effect of the VCS position on insulation performance was studied, and the different configurations of double VCSs were compared and discussed. The results showed that the daily evaporation rate of MLI, hollow glass microspheres (HGMs) and vacuum was only 2.05 × 10−3%, 3.62 × 10−3% and 7.94 × 10−2% at 1.34 Pa, respectively. MLI was still the optimal insulation scheme for a 4000 m3 LH2 spherical tank. Meanwhile, it was found that when the single VCS was placed at the 10th layer, the heat leakage was reduced by approximately 40.5% compared with MLI. The heat leakag... [more]

Class and shape transformation functions are proposed to carry out the parametric design of the blade profiles because fan efficiency is closely related to the shape of blade profiles. An optimization with the objectives of fan efficiency and static pressure based on the Kriging models was established, and numerical simulation data were applied to construct the Kriging models. The dissipation function was used to analyze the fan energy loss. The prediction results show that the maximum accuracy error between the Kriging model and the experimental data is approximately 0.81%. Compared with the prototype fan, the optimized fan was able to ameliorate the distribution of the flow field pressure and velocity; the outlet static pressure increased by 9.03%, and the efficiency increased by 2.35%. The dissipation function is advantageous because it can intuitively indicate the location and amount of energy loss in the fan, while effectively obtaining the total energy loss as well. The situation... [more]

Jacq., from the Yucatan peninsula, is recognized worldwide for its pungency, flavor, and secondary metabolites content. This has resulted in an increase in its production, which has led to an increase in the number of byproducts considered waste, mainly its leaves. Capsicum chinense leaves have been demonstrated to contain polyphenols with bioactive properties (antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, antiobesogenic capacity, etc.); hence, the extraction of polyphenols through the use of natural deep eutectic solvents (NADES) with a green technology, such as an ultrasonic probe, could help to revalue these leaves by maximizing the extraction efficiency and preserving their bioactive properties. The objective of this study was to optimize the composition of a eutectic solvent for obtaining an extract rich in polyphenols from the Capsicum chinense leaf using a sonic probe. The optimum conditions of the composition of NADES for obtaining the highest Antioxidant capacity (Ax, 79.71% inhibition) wer... [more]

For a healthy industrial structure (IS) and stable economic development in China, this study proposes an improved link prediction algorithm (LP) based on complex networks. The algorithm calculates the similarity by constructing a mixed similarity index. A regional IS network model is built in the study, and the direction of IS adjustment is calculated with the mixed similarity indicators. In this study, the prediction accuracy of the proposed improved LP algorithm in the real network dataset is up to 0.944, which is significantly higher than that of the other algorithms. In the reality of IS optimization, industries of high similarity could be obtained through similarity algorithms, and reasonable coordinated development strategies are proposed. In addition, the simulated IS adjustment strategy in this study shows that it is highly sustainable in development, which is reflected in its lower carbon emissions. The optimization of IS adjustment could be achieved through IS network model a... [more]

With the development of the design technology, more and more advanced and diverse wind tunnels have been constructed to match complex requirements. However, it is hard to design a precise physical model of a wind tunnel that can be controlled. In addition, if a new wind tunnel is designed, the experimental data may be insufficient to build a controlling model. This article reports research on the following two models: (1) for a 0.6 m continuous transonic wind tunnel supported by a large amount of historical data, the false nearest neighbor (FNN) algorithm was adopted to calculate the order of the input variables, and the nonlinear auto-regressive model with the exogenous inputs−backpropagation network (NARX-BP) was proposed to build its Mach number prediction model; (2) for a new 2.4 m continuous transonic wind tunnel with only a small amount of experimental data, the method of model migration, the input and output slope/bias correction−particle swarm optimization (IOSBC-PSO) algorithm... [more]

Due to increased demands of production capacity and higher quality requirements, industries are automating at a fast pace. Industrial robots are an important component of the industrial automation ecosystem. However, the selection of appropriate robots is a challenging task due to the sheer number of alternatives present and their varied specifications. The various characteristics or attributes of industrial robots that need due consideration before selection of an optimal robot for a given application are found to be conflicting in nature. Thus, in this paper, several multi-criteria decision-making (MCDM) methods are deployed to select an optimal robot depending on the application. Three different industrial robot selection problems are solved in this paper by using Simple Additive Weighing (SAW), the Technique for Order of Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution (TOPSIS), the Linear Programming Technique (LINMAP), VIseKriterijumska Optimizacija I Kompromisno Resenje (VIKOR), Elimi... [more]

Double-pipe counter-flow heat exchangers are considered more suitable for heat recovery in the heat transfer industry. Numerous studies have been conducted to develop static tools for optimizing operating parameters of heat exchangers. Using this study, an improved heat exchanger system will be developed. This is frequently used to solve optimization problems and find optimal solutions. The Taguchi method determines the critical factor affecting a specific performance parameter of the heat exchanger by identifying the significant level of the factor affecting that parameter. Gray relational analysis was adopted to determine the gray relational grade to represent the multi-factor optimization model, and the heat exchanger gray relation coefficient target values that were predicted have been achieved using ANN with a back propagation model with the Levenberg−Marquardt drive algorithm. The genetic algorithm improved the accuracy of the gray relational grade by assigning gray relational co... [more]

The super-growth approach for carbon nanotubes synthesis is frequently used to boost the growth rate, catalyst lifespan, and height of vertically aligned carbon nanotubes. The elimination of amorphous carbon from catalyst particles, commonly made of iron, by injecting water vapor into a chemical vapor deposition process can enhance the purity, alignment, and height of carbon nanotubes and prevent the partial oxidation of the metallic catalyst. We present the development of a modified growth-optimized water-assisted super-growth vertically aligned carbon nanotube process by optimizing the catalyst layer structure and water vapor concentration for a carbon nanotube growth process for 4” diameter Si wafers. A significant finding is that under optimized water-assisted growth conditions over 4 mm, highly uniform tall, vertically aligned carbon nanotube structures can be grown with a minimum top crust layer of about ~5−10 μm thickness. This was achieved with a catalyst film comprising a >400... [more]