The Engineering of Climate Engineering

Author(s):  
Douglas G. MacMartin ◽  
Ben Kravitz

While reducing anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions remains the most essential element of any strategy to manage climate change risk, it is also in principle possible to directly cool the climate by reflecting some sunlight back to space. Such climate engineering approaches include adding aerosols to the stratosphere and marine cloud brightening. Assessing whether these ideas could reduce risk requires a broad, multidisciplinary research effort spanning climate science, social sciences, and governance. However, if such strategies were ever used, the effort would also constitute one of the most critical engineering design and control challenges ever considered: making real-time decisions for a highly uncertain and nonlinear dynamic system with many input variables, many measurements, and a vast number of internal degrees of freedom, the dynamics of which span a wide range of timescales. Here, we review the engineering design aspects of climate engineering, discussing both progress to date and remaining challenges that will need to be addressed.

Author(s):  
Miroslaw Bocian ◽  
Krzysztof Jamroziak ◽  
Mariusz Kosobudzki ◽  
Maciej Kulisiewicz

The paper presents the new way of identification of complex nonlinear dynamic systems. The method has been explained with the use of a dynamic structure (degenerated one) with 1.5 degrees-of-freedom and some nonlinear restitution force. The applied method allows for the assessment of the dynamic behavior of material in a wide range of dynamic loads. The equation of energy balance when oscillations are set harmonic is applicable to the solution. It is possible when the loading force is adjustable. The method has been computer verified using a system with cubic spring characteristic.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lucian Chan ◽  
Garrett Morris ◽  
Geoffrey Hutchison

The calculation of the entropy of flexible molecules can be challenging, since the number of possible conformers grows exponentially with molecule size and many low-energy conformers may be thermally accessible. Different methods have been proposed to approximate the contribution of conformational entropy to the molecular standard entropy, including performing thermochemistry calculations with all possible stable conformations, and developing empirical corrections from experimental data. We have performed conformer sampling on over 120,000 small molecules generating some 12 million conformers, to develop models to predict conformational entropy across a wide range of molecules. Using insight into the nature of conformational disorder, our cross-validated physically-motivated statistical model can outperform common machine learning and deep learning methods, with a mean absolute error ≈4.8 J/mol•K, or under 0.4 kcal/mol at 300 K. Beyond predicting molecular entropies and free energies, the model implies a high degree of correlation between torsions in most molecules, often as- sumed to be independent. While individual dihedral rotations may have low energetic barriers, the shape and chemical functionality of most molecules necessarily correlate their torsional degrees of freedom, and hence restrict the number of low-energy conformations immensely. Our simple models capture these correlations, and advance our understanding of small molecule conformational entropy.


2021 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Charles Gbenga Williams ◽  
Oluwapelumi O. Ojuri

AbstractAs a result of heterogeneity nature of soils and variation in its hydraulic conductivity over several orders of magnitude for various soil types from fine-grained to coarse-grained soils, predictive methods to estimate hydraulic conductivity of soils from properties considered more easily obtainable have now been given an appropriate consideration. This study evaluates the performance of artificial neural network (ANN) being one of the popular computational intelligence techniques in predicting hydraulic conductivity of wide range of soil types and compared with the traditional multiple linear regression (MLR). ANN and MLR models were developed using six input variables. Results revealed that only three input variables were statistically significant in MLR model development. Performance evaluations of the developed models using determination coefficient and mean square error show that the prediction capability of ANN is far better than MLR. In addition, comparative study with available existing models shows that the developed ANN and MLR in this study performed relatively better.


2021 ◽  
Vol 2021 (5) ◽  
Author(s):  
Brandon S. DiNunno ◽  
Niko Jokela ◽  
Juan F. Pedraza ◽  
Arttu Pönni

Abstract We study in detail various information theoretic quantities with the intent of distinguishing between different charged sectors in fractionalized states of large-N gauge theories. For concreteness, we focus on a simple holographic (2 + 1)-dimensional strongly coupled electron fluid whose charged states organize themselves into fractionalized and coherent patterns at sufficiently low temperatures. However, we expect that our results are quite generic and applicable to a wide range of systems, including non-holographic. The probes we consider include the entanglement entropy, mutual information, entanglement of purification and the butterfly velocity. The latter turns out to be particularly useful, given the universal connection between momentum and charge diffusion in the vicinity of a black hole horizon. The RT surfaces used to compute the above quantities, though, are largely insensitive to the electric flux in the bulk. To address this deficiency, we propose a generalized entanglement functional that is motivated through the Iyer-Wald formalism, applied to a gravity theory coupled to a U(1) gauge field. We argue that this functional gives rise to a coarse grained measure of entanglement in the boundary theory which is obtained by tracing over (part) of the fractionalized and cohesive charge degrees of freedom. Based on the above, we construct a candidate for an entropic c-function that accounts for the existence of bulk charges. We explore some of its general properties and their significance, and discuss how it can be used to efficiently account for charged degrees of freedom across different energy scales.


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 787
Author(s):  
Bartłomiej Ambrożkiewicz ◽  
Grzegorz Litak ◽  
Anthimos Georgiadis ◽  
Nicolas Meier ◽  
Alexander Gassner

Often the input values used in mathematical models for rolling bearings are in a wide range, i.e., very small values of deformation and damping are confronted with big values of stiffness in the governing equations, which leads to miscalculations. This paper presents a two degrees of freedom (2-DOF) dimensionless mathematical model for ball bearings describing a procedure, which helps to scale the problem and reveal the relationships between dimensionless terms and their influence on the system’s response. The derived mathematical model considers nonlinear features as stiffness, damping, and radial internal clearance referring to the Hertzian contact theory. Further, important features are also taken into account including an external load, the eccentricity of the shaft-bearing system, and shape errors on the raceway investigating variable dynamics of the ball bearing. Analysis of obtained responses with Fast Fourier Transform, phase plots, orbit plots, and recurrences provide a rich source of information about the dynamics of the system and it helped to find the transition between the periodic and chaotic response and how it affects the topology of RPs and recurrence quantificators.


Sensors ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (11) ◽  
pp. 3653
Author(s):  
Lilia Sidhom ◽  
Ines Chihi ◽  
Ernest Nlandu Kamavuako

This paper proposes an online direct closed-loop identification method based on a new dynamic sliding mode technique for robotic applications. The estimated parameters are obtained by minimizing the prediction error with respect to the vector of unknown parameters. The estimation step requires knowledge of the actual input and output of the system, as well as the successive estimate of the output derivatives. Therefore, a special robust differentiator based on higher-order sliding modes with a dynamic gain is defined. A proof of convergence is given for the robust differentiator. The dynamic parameters are estimated using the recursive least squares algorithm by the solution of a system model that is obtained from sampled positions along the closed-loop trajectory. An experimental validation is given for a 2 Degrees Of Freedom (2-DOF) robot manipulator, where direct and cross-validations are carried out. A comparative analysis is detailed to evaluate the algorithm’s effectiveness and reliability. Its performance is demonstrated by a better-quality torque prediction compared to other differentiators recently proposed in the literature. The experimental results highlight that the differentiator design strongly influences the online parametric identification and, thus, the prediction of system input variables.


2000 ◽  
Vol 122 (3) ◽  
pp. 147-152 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hui He ◽  
Mohamad Metghalchi ◽  
James C. Keck

A simple model has been developed to estimate the sensible thermodynamic properties such as Gibbs free energy, enthalpy, heat capacity, and entropy of hydrocarbons over a wide range of temperatures with special attention to the branched molecules. The model is based on statistical thermodynamic expressions incorporating translational, rotational and vibrational motions of the atoms. A method to determine the number of degrees of freedom for different motion modes (bending and torsion) has been established. Branched rotational groups, such as CH3 and OH, have been considered. A modification of the characteristic temperatures for different motion mode has been made which improves the agreement with the exact values for simple cases. The properties of branched alkanes up to 2,3,4,-trimthylpentane have been calculated and the results are in good agreement with the experimental data. A relatively small number of parameters are needed in this model to estimate the sensible thermodynamic properties of a wide range of species. The model may also be used to estimate the properties of molecules and their isomers, which have not been measured, and is simple enough to be easily programmed as a subroutine for on-line kinetic calculations. [S0195-0738(00)00902-X]


2007 ◽  
Vol 344 ◽  
pp. 143-150 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gianluca Buffa ◽  
Livan Fratini ◽  
Marion Merklein ◽  
Detlev Staud

Tight competition characterizing automotive industries in the last decades has determined a strong research effort aimed to improve utilized processes and materials in sheet stamping. As far as the latter are regarded light weight alloys, high strength steels and tailored blanks have been increasingly utilized with the aim to reduce parts weight and fuel consumptions. In the paper the mechanical properties and formability of tailored welded blanks made of a precipitation hardenable aluminum alloy but with different sheet thicknesses, have been investigated: both laser welding and friction stir welding have been developed to obtain the tailored blanks. For both welding operations a wide range of the thickness ratios has been considered. The formability of the obtained blanks has been characterized through tensile tests and cup deep drawing tests, in order to show the formability in dependency of the stress condition; what is more mechanical and metallurgical investigations have been made on the welded joints.


Author(s):  
X. Lachenal ◽  
P. M. Weaver ◽  
S. Daynes

Conventional shape-changing engineering structures use discrete parts articulated around a number of linkages. Each part carries the loads, and the articulations provide the degrees of freedom of the system, leading to heavy and complex mechanisms. Consequently, there has been increased interest in morphing structures over the past decade owing to their potential to combine the conflicting requirements of strength, flexibility and low mass. This article presents a novel type of morphing structure capable of large deformations, simply consisting of two pre-stressed flanges joined to introduce two stable configurations. The bistability is analysed through a simple analytical model, predicting the positions of the stable and unstable states for different design parameters and material properties. Good correlation is found between experimental results, finite-element modelling and predictions from the analytical model for one particular example. A wide range of design parameters and material properties is also analytically investigated, yielding a remarkable structure with zero stiffness along the twisting axis.


2016 ◽  
Vol 113 (15) ◽  
pp. 3932-3937 ◽  
Author(s):  
Steven L. Brunton ◽  
Joshua L. Proctor ◽  
J. Nathan Kutz

Extracting governing equations from data is a central challenge in many diverse areas of science and engineering. Data are abundant whereas models often remain elusive, as in climate science, neuroscience, ecology, finance, and epidemiology, to name only a few examples. In this work, we combine sparsity-promoting techniques and machine learning with nonlinear dynamical systems to discover governing equations from noisy measurement data. The only assumption about the structure of the model is that there are only a few important terms that govern the dynamics, so that the equations are sparse in the space of possible functions; this assumption holds for many physical systems in an appropriate basis. In particular, we use sparse regression to determine the fewest terms in the dynamic governing equations required to accurately represent the data. This results in parsimonious models that balance accuracy with model complexity to avoid overfitting. We demonstrate the algorithm on a wide range of problems, from simple canonical systems, including linear and nonlinear oscillators and the chaotic Lorenz system, to the fluid vortex shedding behind an obstacle. The fluid example illustrates the ability of this method to discover the underlying dynamics of a system that took experts in the community nearly 30 years to resolve. We also show that this method generalizes to parameterized systems and systems that are time-varying or have external forcing.


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