Thesis. 1977. M.S.--Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dept. of Chemical Engineering. / MICROFICHE COPY AVAILABLE IN ARCHIVES AND SCIENCE. / Bibliography : leaves 75-76. / M.S.

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Photocopy of typescript. / Digitized by Kansas Correctional Industries

Typescript (photocopy). / Digitized by Kansas Correctional Industries

Typescript (photocopy). / Digitized by Kansas Correctional Industries

Since the need of energy conservation has become more and more urgent in the past decades, there has been an increased interest in the study and development of more efficient energy conversion systems. One of the fields that have arisen from that endeavor is a branch of physics called Finite Time Thermodynamics (FIT). It may be said that FIT was initiated through the famous paper by Curzon and Ahlborn (1975) that established new bounds on the efficiency of a finite time Carnot heat engine. Before, the traditional treatments gave a fundamental upper limit on the efficiency of any heat engine. However, this figure, the well-known Carnot efficiency, is far too optimistic in comparison to real heat engines. The reason lies in the fact that the traditional Carnot engine is operating infinitely slowly, thus having zero power output. Curzon and Ahlborn were able to improve upon this treatment and to set an upper limit on engines producing finite power.

Symbolic execution is a powerful technique used to perform various activities such as program testing, formal verification of programs, etc. However, symbolic execution does not deal with indexed variables in an adequate manner. Integration of indexed variables such as arrays into symbolic execution would increase the generality of this technique. We present an original substitution technique that produces array-term-free constraints as a counterargument to the commonly accepted belief that symbolic execution cannot handle arrays. The substitution technique deals with constraints involving array terms with a single aggregate name, array terms with multiple aggregate names, and nested array terms. Our approach to solving constraints involving array terms is based on the analysis of the relationship between the array subscripts. Dataflow dependence analysis of programs involving indexed variables suffers from problems of undecidability. We propose a separation technique in which the array subscript constraints are separated from the loop path constraints. The separation technique suggests that the problem of establishing data dependencies is not as hard as the general loop problem. In this respect, we present a new general heuristic program analysis technique which is used to preserve the properties of the relations between program variables.

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Abstract not available