A CASE-BASED URBAN MICROCLIMATE VARIETY CLASSIFICATION PROCEDURE: FINISHING MATERIALS AND SHADING IN URBAN DESIGN.

This research work focuses on the study of microclimate conditions of two squares of Madrid, a city with a considerable Urban Heat Island. The process includes field measurements of the surface and radiant temperatures of materials on buildings façades, pavements and urban furniture. Air temperature, relative humidity and wind speed and direction were also measured. A virtual 3D model was used for sun exposure and solar radiation simulations. The urban microclimate regulation capacity of the finishing materials and shading are numerically defined. Considering the results obtained from measurements and simulations, a procedure for open spaces’ microclimate variety classification and identification is proposed: An approach to describe the thermal level for open spaces, in order to help the urban designers and planners to provide high microclimate variety for the users to meet their difference thermal demand. This is a key element to identify environmental quality and to obtain thermal comfort.

Repeated exposure to nanosecond high power pulsed microwaves increases cancer incidence in rat

High-power microwaves are used to inhibit electronics of threatening military or civilian vehicles. This work aims to assess health hazards of high-power microwaves and helps define hazard threshold levels of modulated radiofrequency exposures such as those emitted by the first generations of mobile phones.Rats were exposed to the highest possible field levels, under single acute or repetitive exposures for eight weeks. Intense microwave electric fields at 1 MV/m of nanoseconds duration were applied from two sources at different carrier frequencies of 10 and 3.7 GHz. The repetition rate was 100 pps, and the duration of train pulses lasted from 10 s to twice 8 min. The effects were studied on the central nervous system, by labelling brain inflammation marker GFAP and by performing different behavioural tests: rotarod, T-maze, beam-walking, open-field, and avoidance test. Long-time survival was measured in animals repeatedly exposed, and anatomopathological analysis was performed on animals sacrificed at two years of life or at death if earlier. One group was sham exposed.Few effects were observed on behaviour. With acute exposure, an avoidance reflex was shown at very high, thermal level (22 W/kg); GFAP was increased some days after exposure. Most importantly, with repeated exposures, survival time was 4-month shorter in the exposed group, with eleven animals exhibiting a large sub-cutaneous tumour, compared to two in the sham group. A residual X-ray exposure was also present in the beam (0.8 Gy), which is not a bias for the observed result.High power microwaves below thermal level in average, can increase cancer incidence and decrease survival time in rats, without clear effects on behaviour. The parameters of this effect need to be explored further, and a more precise dosimetry to be performed.

Electric Motor and Dry Clutch Control in Launch Manoeuvres of Mild-Hybrid Vehicles Based on AMT/DCT Transmissions

Mild-Hybrid Electric Vehicles (mild-HEVs) earned market share over the last years an as effective roadmap to limit air pollution in big cities. In addition to this role, hybrid propulsion can be used to avoid dry clutch overheating in mild-HEVs equipped with automated manual transmissions. Indeed, high thermal level could result in serious damaging of dry clutch linings with very fast decay of expected lifespan affecting vehicle reliability. This paper shows results of vehicle launch simulations to highlight how the propulsion due to electric motor can effectively reduce clutch thermal stress during the slipping phase.

Advances in thermal level measurement techniques using mathematical models, statistical models and decision support systems in blast furnace

The estimation of thermal level in blast furnace is of utmost importance, because the processes occurring inside the blast furnace are complex in nature and any drift in thermal level could lead to abnormal furnace state. The present review is made to understand the methods for estimating thermal level in blast furnace, and the drift in estimation of the thermal level. The thermal level estimation is divided into 3 categories, viz. mathematical models, statistical models and decision support systems. The mathematical models are based on the first principle of thermodynamics and give an estimate of the thermal level in blast furnace. On the other hand, the statistical models are mainly the data-based approach that uses the historical data to predict the instability in blast furnace. Lastly, the decision support systems are the prescriptive models that give the recommendations for making the necessary corrections in the process parameters to avoid occurrence of abnormality in blast furnace. Further, the drifts in estimation of thermal level by these techniques are identified and recommendations are made to improve the accuracy of thermal level estimation. The recommendations to control thermal level in blast furnace are provided which when applied in the industrial blast furnace, can avoid the occurrence of catastrophic condition.

Process Heat Generation Potential from Solar Concentration Technologies in Latin America: The Case of Argentina

This paper evaluates the potential of solar concentration technologies—compound parabolic collector (CPC), linear Fresnel collector (LFC) and parabolic trough collector (PTC)—as an alternative to conventional sources of energy for industrial processes in Latin America, where high levels of solar radiation and isolated areas without energy supply exist. The analysis is addressed from energy, economic and environmental perspective. A specific application for Argentina in which fourteen locations are analyzed is considered. Results show that solar concentration technologies can be an economically and environmentally viable alternative. Levelized cost of energy (LCOE) ranges between 2.5 and 16.9 c€/kWh/m2 and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions avoided range between 33 and 348 kgCO2/(m2·year). CPC technology stands out as the most recommendable technology when the working fluid temperature ranges from 373K to 423K. As the working fluid temperature increases the differences between the LCOE values of the CPC and LFC technologies decrease. When 523K is reached LFC technology is the one which presents the lowest LCOE values for all analyzed sites, while the LCOE values of PTC technology are close to CPC technology values. Results show that solar concentration technologies have reached economic and environmental competitiveness levels under certain scenarios, mainly linked to solar resource available, thermal level requirements and solar technology cost.

Ion-acoustic solitary waves and spectrally uniform scattering cross section enhancements

Spectra measured by incoherent scatter radars are formed predominantly by scattering of the incident signal off ion-acoustic and Langmuir waves in the ionosphere. Occasionally, the upshifted and/or downshifted lines produced by the ion-acoustic waves are enhanced well above thermal levels and referred to as naturally enhanced ion-acoustic lines. In this paper, we study another kind of enhancement, which is spectrally uniform over the whole ion-line, i.e. the up- and downshifted shoulder and the spectral valley in between. Based on observations made with the EISCAT Svalbard radar (ESR) facility, we investigate the transient and spectrally uniform power enhancements, which can be explained by ion-acoustic solitary waves. We use a theory of nonlinear waves in a magnetized plasma to determine the properties of such waves and evaluate their effects on scattered signals measured by ESR. We suggest a new mechanism that can explain backscattered power enhancements by one order of magnitude above the thermal level and show that it is consistent with observations.

Local constriction of arteriovenous anastomoses in the cooled finger

We have examined the influence of local cooling from 35 to 19 degrees C on spontaneous arterial blood velocity fluctuations in the acral skin of thermoneutral subjects. The skin temperature of one hand was gradually lowered in a water bath in two separate experimental runs. Simultaneous continuous blood velocity was measured from the third finger artery of both hands using ultrasound-Doppler. The large blood velocity fluctuations assumed to be caused by synchronous vasomotion of the arteriovenous anastomoses were invariably seen in the control finger artery throughout the two cooling periods, indicating that the subjects were in their thermoneutral zone. The velocity fluctuations on the cooled side remained nearly unchanged and closely correlated with those in the control finger artery during local cooling from 35 to approximately 21.5 degrees C. Below this temperature (range 23-20 degrees C) the velocity fluctuations ceased abruptly, and the velocity was nonfluctuating and continuously low. These results indicate a local thermal level below which there is abrupt, sustained closure of the arteriovenous anastomoses.