Comparison of the surface velocity of a debris flow at the Gadria creek using pulse compression radar and digital particle image velocimetry (DPIV).

<p><strong>Comparison of the surface velocity of a debris flow at the Gadria creek using pulse compression radar and digital particle image velocimetry (DPIV).</strong></p><p><strong> </strong></p><p>Tobias Schöffl, Georg Nagl, Johannes Hübl</p><p>Institute of Mountain Risk Engineering, University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, Vienna, Austria</p><p> </p><p>A central aspect of protection against debris flows is the understanding of the process. The flow velocity is an important parameter which is used, for example, in the dimensioning of protective structures, for technical building protection and for early warning systems. The measurement of the surface velocity which is regarded as the maximum velocity occurring within a debris flow, is therefore an essential link in the chain of fundamental process research and applied protection against natural hazards.</p><p>Due to the further development of various technologies such as video technology and high-frequency radar technology, the non-contact measurement of the surface speed of a debris flow has improved significantly in recent years. Radar technology provides a wide aspect of applications in alpine mass movements such as debris flows, avalanches and rockfall and is able to detect such processes up to a range of 2500 meters in distance. An additional beneficial feature is the possibility of non-contact measurement of the surface velocity. In the catchment area of the Gadria basin (South Tyrol, Italy), the measuring station, which has been in operation since 2016, has been extended by a pulse compression radar and a new HD video camera. On July 26, 2019 a debris flow consisting of several surges was recorded with both the radar and the HD video camera. To obtain surface velocity data from the video material, the material was analyzed and evaluated using digital particle image velocimetry by making use of the MATLAB software and its freely accessible ADD-On "PIVlab".</p><p>The results of the compared surface velocity data showed a value of up to 0.74 according to the statistical mean of the coefficient of determination. The results demonstrate the high effectiveness of the pulse compression radar and the DPIV analysis in a wide range of the assessment of surface velocity of natural debris flows. There is great potential in both measuring systems and the chosen comparative analysis provides a blueprint for future recorded debris flows.</p>

Application of Digital Particle Image Velocimetry to Insect Motion: Measurement of Incoming, Outgoing, and Lateral Honeybee Traffic

The well-being of a honeybee (Apis mellifera) colony depends on forager traffic. Consistent discrepancies in forager traffic indicate that the hive may not be healthy and require human intervention. Honeybee traffic in the vicinity of a hive can be divided into three types: incoming, outgoing, and lateral. These types constitute directional traffic, and are juxtaposed with omnidirectional traffic where bee motions are considered regardless of direction. Accurate measurement of directional honeybee traffic is fundamental to electronic beehive monitoring systems that continuously monitor honeybee colonies to detect deviations from the norm. An algorithm based on digital particle image velocimetry is proposed to measure directional traffic. The algorithm uses digital particle image velocimetry to compute motion vectors, analytically classifies them as incoming, outgoing, or lateral, and returns the classified vector counts as measurements of directional traffic levels. Dynamic time warping is used to compare the algorithm’s omnidirectional traffic curves to the curves produced by a previously proposed bee motion counting algorithm based on motion detection and deep learning and to the curves obtained from a human observer’s counts on four honeybee traffic videos (2976 video frames). The currently proposed algorithm not only approximates the human ground truth on par with the previously proposed algorithm in terms of omnidirectional bee motion counts but also provides estimates of directional bee traffic and does not require extensive training. An analysis of correlation vectors of consecutive image pairs with single bee motions indicates that correlation maps follow Gaussian distribution and the three-point Gaussian sub-pixel accuracy method appears feasible. Experimental evidence indicates it is reasonable to treat whole bees as tracers, because whole bee bodies and not parts thereof cause maximum motion. To ensure the replicability of the reported findings, these videos and frame-by-frame bee motion counts have been made public. The proposed algorithm is also used to investigate the incoming and outgoing traffic curves in a healthy hive on the same day and on different days on a dataset of 292 videos (216,956 video frames).

Wake Behavior Around Flapping Wings of Model Hawkmoth Moving Sideways

This study investigated nearwake behaviors around flapping wings moving sideways. A dynamically scaled-up flapping manipulator was installed on a servo-driven towing carriage to give the sideways movement. In the single wing configuration, the wing in the windward side did not encounter any noticeable effects on the aerodynamic characteristics. The wing in the leeward side, on the other hand, experienced a substantial lift augmentation. We found a stretched leading-edge vortex (LEV) on the wing in the leeward side, implying the additional feeding flux into the LEV. In this case, the moving sideways gave a continuous lateral wind, which became the source to maintain the lift augmentation with the less downward component. We also found that the moving sideways rather intensified the interaction between the wake of the wing in the windward side and the contralateral wing, i.e., the wing-wake interaction. Accordingly, the lift augmentation on the wing in the leeward side practically disappeared by the wing-wake interaction. A digital particle image velocimetry for nearwake behaviors found the less developed trailing-edge shear layer and wingroot vortex traces. This implied that the massive downwash induced by the wing in the windward side was the main source to neutralize the lift augmentation on the contralateral wing.

Effect on louver dampers configuration on gas maldistribution in a heat exchanger for waste heat recovery

This paper reports the results of visualization research involving a heat exchanger applied for waste heat recovery using of Digital Particle Image Velocimetry (DPIV) method. Five louver dampers configurations responsible for typical operation modes were tested. As a consequence, airflow maldistribution in the tube bundle section and bypass section were identified and described. Based on the measurements and analysis carried out, the authors have developed a way to implement design changes to optimize gas distribution inside the unit.

Efficiency of a Digital Particle Image Velocimetry (DPIV) Method for Monitoring the Surface Velocity of Hyper-Concentrated Flows

Digital particle image velocimetry records high resolution images and allows the identification of the position of points in different time instants. This paper explores the efficiency of the digital image-technique for remote monitoring of surface velocity and discharge measurement in hyper-concentrated flow by the way of laboratory experiment. One of the challenges in the application of the image-technique is the evaluation of the error in estimating surface velocity. The error quantification is complex because it depends on many factors characterizing either the experimental conditions or/and the processing algorithm. In the present work, attention is devoted to the estimation error due either to the acquisition time or to the size of the sub-images (interrogation areas) to be correlated. The analysis is conducted with the aid of data collected in a scale laboratory flume constructed at the Hydraulic laboratory of the Department of Civil, Environmental, Aerospace and of Materials Engineering (DICAM)—University of Palermo (Italy) and the image processing is carried out by the help of the PivLab algorithm in Matlab. The obtained results confirm that the number of frames used in processing procedure strongly affects the values of surface velocity; the estimation error decreases as the number of frames increases. The size of the interrogation area also exerts an important role in the flow velocity estimation. For the examined case, a reduction of the size of the interrogation area of one half compared to its original size has allowed us to obtain low values of the velocity estimation error. Results also demonstrate the ability of the digital image-technique to estimate the discharge at given cross-sections. The values of the discharge estimated by applying the digital image-technique downstream of the inflow sections by using the aforementioned size of the interrogation area compares well with those measured.