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  • About
  • The Global ETD Search service is a free service for researchers to find electronic theses and dissertations. This service is provided by the Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations.
    Our metadata is collected from universities around the world. If you manage a university/consortium/country archive and want to be added, details can be found on the NDLTD website.
211

Necessidade hídrica e produção do tomateiro para processamento industrial, em resposta a manejos e épocas de suspensão da irrigação / Water requirement and production of tomato for industrial processing in response to managements and times of irrigation suspension

Silva, Cícero José da 11 July 2017 (has links)
A água é um dos principais fatores que afeta o desenvolvimento, a produtividade e a qualidade industrial dos frutos de tomateiro. Assim, o objetivo deste trabalho foi quantificar durante dois anos a necessidade hídrica, desenvolvimento vegetativo e produtividade do tomateiro para processamento industrial (BRS Sena) em sistema de gotejamento enterrado, em resposta a níveis e épocas de suspensão da irrigação na região Sul de Goiás. Os experimentos foram instalados no delineamento em blocos ao acaso, com quatro repetições, em parcelas subdivididas. Nas parcelas foram aplicados cinco níveis de irrigação (50, 75, 100, 125 e 150% da evapotranspiração potencial da cultura - ETc), acumulada entre duas irrigações consecutivas. Nas subparcelas foram aplicados cinco períodos de suspensão da irrigação: 0, 7, 14, 21 e 28 dias, em antecedência à colheita. A subparcela experimental foi constituída por três linhas de plantas, de 5,5 m de comprimento, espaçadas em 1,1 m entre si e 0,30 m entre plantas. Utilizou-se o sistema de irrigação com tubo gotejador autocompensantes, com emissores espaçados de 30 cm entre si e vazão de 2,2 L h-1, com sistema antesifão, enterrado a 20 cm de profundidade. O deficit e o excesso hídrico prejudicaram o desenvolvimento vegetativo e a produtividade do tomateiro, reduziram o número de flores, frutos e aumentaram a taxa de abortamento de flores do cacho floral das plantas. As plantas cultivadas sob deficit hídrico, independentemente do período e ano de avaliação, apresentaram maiores índices de estresse hídrico da cultura (CWSI). Os níveis de irrigação em deficit e excesso prejudicam a produtividade do tomateiro. As maiores produtividades totais de frutos foram obtidas com reposições hídricas que variaram de 125,47 (615,09 mm) e 132,11% (564,00 mm) da ETc, que resultaram em uma produtividade total de frutos de 105,86 e 58,60 t ha-1, no primeiro e segundo ano do experimento, respectivamente. As plantas cultivadas sob deficit e excesso hídrico, aumentaram a incidência de frutos podres e diminuem a de frutos maduros. Irrigações que variaram de 115 a 125 % da ETc, aumentaram a taxa de maturação dos frutos, diminuiu a incidência de frutos verdes e podres. A maior produtividade da água obitida para a cultura ocorreu sob deficit hídrico, com reposição de 50% da irrigação necessária. A suspensão da irrigação em antecedência à colheita diminuiu a incidência de frutos verdes e aumentou a ocorrência de frutos podres. Quanto maior o período de suspensão da irrigação, menor a produtividade da cultura. Os níveis e suspensão da irrigação antes da colheita não influenciaram os valores de sólidos solúveis totais (SST), pH e firmeza. Porém, a acidez titulável apresentou maiores valores à medida que aumentou os níveis de irrigação na cultura Os coeficientes de cultivo do tomateiro foram estimados em aproximadamente 0,65, 1,01, 1,23, 1,25 e 0,80 em 2015. Enquanto em 2016 os valores de kc foram influenciados pelo menor desenvolvimento e produtividade das plantas, que foram afetadas com viroses influenciando e comprometendo os valores do kc. / Water is one of the main factors affecting the development, production and industrial quality of tomato fruits. Thus, the objectieve of this work was to quantify for two years the water requirement, vegetative development and tomato yield for industrial processing (BRS Sena) in buried drip system on response to levels and times of irrigation suspension in Goiás southern region. The experiments were installed under a randomized complete block design with four replications, in subdivided plots. On the plots were applied five irrigation levels (50, 75, 100, 125 and 150% of potential crop evapotranspiration - ETc), accumulated between two consecutive irrigations. In the subplots were applied five irrigation suspension periods: 0, 7, 14, 21 and 28 days in advance of harvest. Three plant lines constituted the experimental subplot with 5.5 m in length, spaced at 1.1 m apart and 0.30 m between plants. Was used an irrigation system with a self-compensating drip-tube, spaced 0.30 m apart and 2.2 L h-1, with an anti-drainage system, which was buried at 0.20 m depth. Deficit and the hydric excess impaired vegetative development and tomato productivity, reduced the number of flowers, fruits and increased the flowers abortion rate from plant flower bunch. Plants cultivated under water deficit, regardless the period and evaluation year, had higher crop water stress index (CWSI). Irrigation levels in deficit and excess damage the tomato yield. The highest total fruit yields were obtained with water replacement ranging of 125.47% (615.09 mm) and 132.11% (564.00 mm) of ETc, which resulted in a total fruit yield of 105.86 and 58.60 t ha-1, in the first and second year of the experiment, respectively. The plants cultivated under deficit and water excess, increased the rotten fruits incidence and declined that of mature fruits. Irrigations that varied from 115 to 125% of ETc, increased the fruits maturation rate, decreased the incidence of green and rotten fruits. The higher water yield by the crop occurs under the water deficit, with 50% replacement of irrigation required. The irrigation suspension in advance of harvest reduced the incidence of green fruits and increased the occurrence of rotten fruits. The larger suspension period of irrigation result in lower crop yield. The levels and irrigation suspension before harvest did not influence the values of ºBrix, pH and firmness. However, the titratable acidity showed higher values as the irrigation levels in the crop increased. Tomato crop coefficients (kc) were estimated at about 0.65, 1.01, 1.23, 1.25 and 0.80 in 2015. While in 2016 the values of kc were influenced by the lower development and productivity of plants, which were affected by the virus influencing and compromising the kc values.
212

Identification of potential conservation practices and hydrologic modeling of the upper Iowa watershed

Rundhaug, Trevor Julian 01 August 2018 (has links)
In 2016 the Iowa Watershed Approach (IWA) was created to increase community resiliency against flooding, to develop hydrologic assessments that would identify strategies to reduce flooding, and to implement those strategies within nine identified watersheds that experienced flooding between 2011 and 2013. One of the nine watersheds was the Upper Iowa watershed located in northeast Iowa. This thesis focuses on the work that has been done to create a hydrologic assessment of the Upper Iowa watershed. The hydrologic assessment identifies potential conservation practices, creates a hydrologic model to assess the hydrologic cycle over the past ten years, and identifies strategies to reduce flooding within the watershed. Many potential agricultural conservation practices within the Upper Iowa watershed were identified and trends relating to the soil, land use, and topography were determined. In addition, a methodology to compare potential conservation practices with existing conservation practices actually in place was developed including a tool to estimate the size of grassed waterways to NRCS design guidelines. The comparison validated the methodologies used to identify potential practice placements, identified locations where potential practices could be implemented, and showed how stakeholder preferences influence conservation implementation. Additionally, a hydrologic model of the Upper Iowa watershed was developed, using the new Generic Hydrologic Overland-Subsurface Toolset model and calibrated to simulate the time period of 2007 through 2016. The model was evaluated against water balance ratios and performance statistics calculated from measured data. The model achieved Nash Sutcliffe Efficiency scores for streamflow above 0.7 and percent bias scores between ±12% for the three wettest years of 2008, 2013, and 2016. With the calibrated model, the benefits of continuous cover crop implementation were investigated under current conditions and under increased extreme precipitation intensity expected from climate change over the next half century. The results of this investigation determined that continuous cover crops increased evapotranspiration within the early half of the year creating more storage within the soil. Thus the flood risk from convective storms during the summer was lowered. In addition, the benefits from cover crops in terms of peak flow and volume reductions were cumulative increasing each consecutive year and were proportional to the percentage of cover cropped area. Lastly, a scenario using cover crops in a future extreme precipitation environment resulted in a reduction of peak discharge to current conditions. The results of this thesis will guide both future work within the Upper Iowa watershed and contribute to the knowledge of hydrologic planning and modeling within agricultural watersheds.
213

Etude expérimentale des phénomènes transitoires sismo-électromagnétiques: Mise en oeuvre au Laboratoire Souterrain de Rustrel, Pays d'Apt

Bordes, Clarisse 15 December 2005 (has links) (PDF)
La propagation d'ondes sismiques dans les milieux poreux contenant des fluides engendre des phénomènes<br />électromagnétiques dus à des couplages électrocinétiques à l'échelle des pores. Ces effets sont perçus comme une<br />nouvelle méthode de caractérisation des milieux poreux avec des applications potentiellement importantes en<br />géophysique de réservoir. Afin de mieux comprendre les mécanismes de conversion d'énergie sismique en<br />énergie électromagnétique, nous avons construit une expérience analogique dans le Laboratoire Souterrain à Bas<br />Bruit (LSBB, Rustrel). Le dispositif expérimental est constitué d'une colonne cylindrique (1 m de haut et 8 cm de<br />diamètre) remplie de sable de Fontainebleau et équipée d'accéléromètres piézoélectriques, d'électrodes non<br />polarisables et de magnétomètres à induction. La comparaison des réponses sismo-électromagnétiques en milieu<br />sec ou humide permet de confirmer l'origine électrocinétique des phénomènes observés. Les différences de<br />vitesse apparente des champs sismique et électrique (1250 m/s) d'une part, et magnétique (800 m/s) d'autre part,<br />montrent que le champ sismo-magnétique est couplé aux modes de propagation transverses. Cette étude<br />s'enrichit par ailleurs d'une série d'observations du champ sismo-électrique qui soulignent l'intérêt de telles<br />mesures sur le terrain. Ce travail montre également la nécessité de poursuivre le développement de la théorie des<br />effets électrocinétiques en milieu partiellement saturé.
214

Development of microwave and millimeter-wave integrated-circuit stepped-frequency radar sensors for surface and subsurface profiling

Park, Joongsuk 17 February 2005 (has links)
Two new stepped-frequency continuous wave (SFCW) radar sensor prototypes, based on a coherent super-heterodyne scheme, have been developed using Microwave Integrated Circuits (MICs) and Monolithic Millimeter-Wave Integrated Circuits (MMICs) for various surface and subsurface applications, such as profiling the surface and subsurface of pavements, detecting and localizing small buried Anti-Personnel (AP) mines and measuring the liquid level in a tank. These sensors meet the critical requirements for subsurface and surface measurements including small size, light weight, good accuracy, fine resolution and deep penetration. In addition, two novel wideband microstrip quasi-TEM horn antennae that are capable of integration with a seamless connection have also been designed. Finally, a simple signal processing algorithm, aimed to acquire the in-phase (I) and quadrature (Q) components and to compensate for the I/Q errors, was developed using LabView. The first of the two prototype sensors, named as the microwave SFCW radar sensor operating from 0.6-5.6-GHz, is primarily utilized for assessing the subsurface of pavements. The measured thicknesses of the asphalt and base layers of a pavement sample were very much in agreement with the actual data with less than 0.1-inch error. The measured results on the actual roads showed that the sensor accurately detects the 5-inch asphalt layer of the pavement with a minimal error of 0.25 inches. This sensor represents the first SFCW radar sensor operating from 0.6-5.6-GHz. The other sensor, named as the millimeter-wave SFCW radar sensor, operates in the 29.72-35.7-GHz range. Measurements were performed to verify its feasibility as a surface and sub-surface sensor. The measurement results showed that the sensor has a lateral resolution of 1 inch and a good accuracy in the vertical direction with less than  0.04-inch error. The sensor successfully detected and located AP mines of small sizes buried under the surface of sand with less than 0.75 and 0.08 inches of error in the lateral and vertical directions, respectively. In addition, it also verified that the vertical resolution is not greater than 0.75 inches. This sensor is claimed as the first Ka-band millimeter-wave SFCW radar sensor ever developed for surface and subsurface sensing applications.
215

PRISM, le Radar Géophysique de l'Aérostat Martien

Barbin, Yves 18 December 1996 (has links) (PDF)
La mission spatiale internationale Mars96 devait emporter vers la planète rouge un aérostat développé en France par le CNES. Le guiderope métallique de cet aérostat devait contenir un radar de sondage de la subsurface jusqu'au kilomètre de profondeur. La mission du ballon sur Mars96 a été reportée puis annulée. Ce mémoire présente et discute l'essentiel des développements de ce nouvel instrument radar, certaines parties spécifiques et originales sont détaillées. L'évaluation de performance, l'étude de la dynamique des signaux avec adaptation de l 'instrument, et l'évaluation de la quantité d'information disponible terminent ce mémoire.
216

Hydrological processes in volcanic ash soils : measuring, modelling and understanding runoff generation in an undisturbed catchment

Blume, Theresa January 2008 (has links)
Streamflow dynamics in mountainous environments are controlled by runoff generation processes in the basin upstream. Runoff generation processes are thus a major control of the terrestrial part of the water cycle, influencing both, water quality and water quantity as well as their dynamics. The understanding of these processes becomes especially important for the prediction of floods, erosion, and dangerous mass movements, in particular as hydrological systems often show threshold behavior. In case of extensive environmental changes, be it in climate or in landuse, the understanding of runoff generation processes will allow us to better anticipate the consequences and can thus lead to a more responsible management of resources as well as risks. In this study the runoff generation processes in a small undisturbed catchment in the Chilean Andes were investigated. The research area is characterized by steep hillslopes, volcanic ash soils, undisturbed old growth forest and high rainfall amounts. The investigation of runoff generation processes in this data scarce area is of special interest as a) little is known on the hydrological functioning of the young volcanic ash soils, which are characterized by extremely high porosities and hydraulic conductivities, b) no process studies have been carried out in this area at either slope or catchment scale, and c) understanding the hydrological processes in undisturbed catchments will provide a basis to improve our understanding of disturbed systems, the shift in processes that followed the disturbance and maybe also future process evolution necessary for the achievement of a new steady state. The here studied catchment has thus the potential to serve as a reference catchment for future investigations. As no long term data of rainfall and runoff exists, it was necessary to replace long time series of data with a multitude of experimental methods, using the so called "multi-method approach". These methods cover as many aspects of runoff generation as possible and include not only the measurement of time series such as discharge, rainfall, soil water dynamics and groundwater dynamics, but also various short term measurements and experiments such as determination of throughfall amounts and variability, water chemistry, soil physical parameters, soil mineralogy, geo-electrical soundings and tracer techniques. Assembling the results like pieces of a puzzle produces a maybe not complete but nevertheless useful picture of the dynamic ensemble of runoff generation processes in this catchment. The employed methods were then evaluated for their usefulness vs. expenditures (labour and financial costs). Finally, the hypotheses - the perceptual model of runoff generation generated from the experimental findings - were tested with the physically based model Catflow. Additionally the process-based model Wasim-ETH was used to investigate the influence of landuse on runoff generation at the catchment scale. An initial assessment of hydrologic response of the catchment was achieved with a linear statistical model for the prediction of event runoff coefficients. The parameters identified as best predictors give a first indication of important processes. Various results acquired with the "multi-method approach" show that response to rainfall is generally fast. Preferential vertical flow is of major importance and is reinforced by hydrophobicity during the summer months. Rapid lateral water transport is necessary to produce the fast response signal, however, while lateral subsurface flow was observed at several soil moisture profiles, the location and type of structures causing fast lateral flow on the hillslope scale is still not clear and needs to be investigated in more detail. Surface runoff has not been observed and is unlikely due to the high hydraulic conductivities of the volcanic ash soils. Additionally, a large subsurface storage retains most of the incident rainfall amount during events (>90%, often even >95%) and produces streamflow even after several weeks of drought. Several findings suggest a shift in processes from summer to winter causing changes in flow patterns, changes in response of stream chemistry to rainfall events and also in groundwater-surface water interactions. The results of the modelling study confirm the importance of rapid and preferential flow processes. However, due to the limited knowledge on subsurface structures the model still does not fully capture runoff response. Investigating the importance of landuse on runoff generation showed that while peak runoff generally increased with deforested area, the location of these areas also had an effect. Overall, the "multi-method approach" of replacing long time series with a multitude of experimental methods was successful in the identification of dominant hydrological processes and thus proved its applicability for data scarce catchments under the constraint of limited resources. / Die Abflussdynamik in Mittel- und Hochgebirgen wird durch die Abflussbildungsprozesse im Einzugsgebiet bestimmt. Diese Prozesse kontrollieren damit zu großen Teilen den terrestrischen Teil des Wasserkreislaufs und beeinflussen sowohl Wasserqualität als auch -quantität. Das Verständnis von Abflussbildungsprozessen ist besonders wichtig für die Vorhersage von Hochwasser, Erosion und Massenbewegungen (z.B. Erdrutsche) da hydrologische Systeme oft Schwellenwertverhalten aufweisen. Im Falle weit reichender Umweltveränderungen, wie z.B. Klima- oder Landnutzungsänderungen kann das Verständnis der Abflussbildungsprozesse ein verantwortungsvolleres Management sowohl der Ressourcen als auch der Risiken ermöglichen. In dieser Studie wurden die Abflussbildungsprozesse in einem kleinen, anthropogen unbeeinflussten Einzugsgebiet in den Chilenischen Anden untersucht. Das Untersuchungsgebiet ist durch steile Hänge, vulkanische Ascheböden, ungestörten Naturwald und hohe Niederschlagsmengen charakterisiert. Die Erforschung von Abflussbildungsprozessen ist hier von besonderem Interesse, da a) wenig über das hydrologische Verhalten der hochporösen und hochleitfähigen jungen Ascheböden bekannt ist, b) in dieser Region bisher keine Studien auf Hang- oder Einzugsgebietsskala durchgeführt wurden, und c) das Prozessverständnis in ungestörten Einzugsgebieten als Basis zum besseren Verständnis bereits anthropogen beeinflusster Gebiete dienen kann. Das hier untersuchte Gebiet hat daher das Potential zum Referenzgebiet für zukünftige Studien und Forschungsprojekte. Bedingt durch die Kürze der vorliegenden Abfluss- und Niederschlagszeitreihen war es nötig, den bestehenden Datenmangel durch eine Vielzahl von experimentellen Methoden und Ansätzen auszugleichen. Dieser Ansatz wird im Folgenden der "Multi-Methoden-Ansatz" genannt. Die ausgewählten Methoden sollten dabei so viele Aspekte der Abflussbildung abdecken wie möglich. Es wurden daher nicht nur Zeitreihen von Abfluss, Niederschlag, Bodenfeuchte- und Grundwasserdynamik gemessen, sondern auch eine große Zahl an Kurzzeitmessungen und Experimenten durchgeführt. Diese beinhalteten u.a. Messung des Bestandesniederschlags, Bestimmung der Wasserchemie, Bestimmung bodenphysikalischer Parameter und der Bodenmineralogie, sowie geophysikalische Messungen und Tracermethoden. Die Synthese der Resultate gleicht dem Zusammensetzen eines Puzzles. Das so entstandene Bild des dynamischen Prozess-Ensembles ist trotz möglicher fehlender Puzzlestücke hochinformativ. In einem nächsten Schritt wurden die ausgewählten Methoden im Hinblick auf Erkenntnisgewinn und Kosten (d.h. finanzielle Kosten und Arbeitszeit) evaluiert. Das durch die experimentellen Ergebnisse gewonnene Bild der Abflussbildung wurde anschließend mit Hilfe des physikalisch basierten Modells Catflow überprüft. Weiterhin wurde mit dem prozessbasierten Modell Wasim-ETH der Einfluss der Landnutzung auf die Abflussbildung auf Einzugsgebietsskala untersucht. Die Ergebnisse des "Multi-Methoden-Ansatzes" zeigen, dass die Abflussreaktion in diesem Gebiet sehr schnell erfolgt. Vertikales präferenzielles Fliessen ist hier von großer Bedeutung und wird in den Sommermonaten noch durch Hydrophobizitätseffekte verstärkt. Schneller lateraler Fluss im Untergrund ist eine weitere Vorraussetzung für die schnelle Reaktion des Abflusses (Oberflächenabfluss ist hier aufgrund der hohen hydraulischen Leitfähigkeiten unwahrscheinlich). Obwohl bei der Untersuchung der Bodenfeuchtedynamik in einigen Profilen laterale Fließmuster beobachtet wurden, ist die Art und Lage der Untergrundstrukturen, die auf der Hangskala schnellen lateralen Fluss verursachen, noch unklar und sollte genauer untersucht werden. Die Tatsache, dass bei Niederschlagsereignissen der Großteil der Niederschlagsmenge nicht zum Abfluss kommt (>90%, oft auch >95%), sowie der kontinuierliche Abfluss selbst nach Wochen der Trockenheit, lassen auf einen großen unterirdischen Speicher schließen. Der Wechsel von Winter (nass) zu Sommer (trocken) scheint Veränderungen im Prozess-Ensemble hervorzurufen, die sich in der Änderung von Fließmustern, von Grundwasser-Oberflächenwasser-Interaktionen, sowie veränderter Reaktion der Wasserchemie auf Niederschlagsereignisse beobachten ließ. Die Modellstudie bestätigte die Bedeutung der schnellen Fließwege. Als Folge von Informationsdefiziten über die Strukturen des Untergrunds ließ sich jedoch die Abflussbildung noch nicht vollständig reproduzieren. Die Untersuchung zur Bedeutung der Landnutzung für die Abflussbildung mit Hilfe eines Einzugsgebietsmodells zeigte die Zunahme der maximalen Abflüsse mit zunehmender Entwaldung. Weiterhin erwies sich auch die Lage der abgeholzten Flächen als ein wichtiger Faktor für die Abflussreaktion. Der "Multi-Methoden-Ansatz" lieferte wichtige Erkenntnisse zum Verständnis der Abflussbildungspozesse in den Anden Südchiles und zeigte sich als adäquates Mittel für hydrologische Prozess-Studien in datenarmen Gebieten.
217

Development of microwave and millimeter-wave integrated-circuit stepped-frequency radar sensors for surface and subsurface profiling

Park, Joongsuk 17 February 2005 (has links)
Two new stepped-frequency continuous wave (SFCW) radar sensor prototypes, based on a coherent super-heterodyne scheme, have been developed using Microwave Integrated Circuits (MICs) and Monolithic Millimeter-Wave Integrated Circuits (MMICs) for various surface and subsurface applications, such as profiling the surface and subsurface of pavements, detecting and localizing small buried Anti-Personnel (AP) mines and measuring the liquid level in a tank. These sensors meet the critical requirements for subsurface and surface measurements including small size, light weight, good accuracy, fine resolution and deep penetration. In addition, two novel wideband microstrip quasi-TEM horn antennae that are capable of integration with a seamless connection have also been designed. Finally, a simple signal processing algorithm, aimed to acquire the in-phase (I) and quadrature (Q) components and to compensate for the I/Q errors, was developed using LabView. The first of the two prototype sensors, named as the microwave SFCW radar sensor operating from 0.6-5.6-GHz, is primarily utilized for assessing the subsurface of pavements. The measured thicknesses of the asphalt and base layers of a pavement sample were very much in agreement with the actual data with less than &#61590;0.1-inch error. The measured results on the actual roads showed that the sensor accurately detects the 5-inch asphalt layer of the pavement with a minimal error of &#61590;0.25 inches. This sensor represents the first SFCW radar sensor operating from 0.6-5.6-GHz. The other sensor, named as the millimeter-wave SFCW radar sensor, operates in the 29.72-35.7-GHz range. Measurements were performed to verify its feasibility as a surface and sub-surface sensor. The measurement results showed that the sensor has a lateral resolution of 1 inch and a good accuracy in the vertical direction with less than &#61590; 0.04-inch error. The sensor successfully detected and located AP mines of small sizes buried under the surface of sand with less than 0.75 and 0.08 inches of error in the lateral and vertical directions, respectively. In addition, it also verified that the vertical resolution is not greater than 0.75 inches. This sensor is claimed as the first Ka-band millimeter-wave SFCW radar sensor ever developed for surface and subsurface sensing applications.
218

Quantitative imaging of subsurface structures and mechanical properties at nanoscale using atomic force microscope

Parlak, Zehra 15 November 2010 (has links)
This dissertation focuses on quantitative subsurface and mechanical properties imaging potential of AFM probes. Extensive modeling of AFM probes are presented for thorough understanding of capabilities and limitations of current techniques, these models are verified by various experiments, and different methods are developed by utilizing force-sensing integrated read-out active tip (FIRAT), which is an active AFM probe with broad bandwidth. For quantitative subsurface imaging, a 3-D FEA model of AFM tip-sample contact is developed and this model can simulate AFM tip scan on nanoscale-sized buried structures. FIRAT probe, which is active and broadband, is utilized for interaction forces imaging during intermittent contact mode and mechanical characterization capability of this probe is investigated. It is shown that probe dynamics, stiffness, stiffness ambiguity, assumed contact mechanics, and noise are important parameters for the accuracy of mechanical properties imaging. An active tip control mechanism is introduced to limit contact forces during intermittent contact mode. In addition to these, a combined ultrasonic AFM and interaction forces imaging method is developed and modeled to solve the reduced elasticity measurement sensitivity on composite materials. This method is capable of imaging a broader range of elasticity on combination samples such as metal nanoparticles in polymers at nanoscale.
219

Hessian-based response surface approximations for uncertainty quantification in large-scale statistical inverse problems, with applications to groundwater flow

Flath, Hannah Pearl 11 September 2013 (has links)
Subsurface flow phenomena characterize many important societal issues in energy and the environment. A key feature of these problems is that subsurface properties are uncertain, due to the sparsity of direct observations of the subsurface. The Bayesian formulation of this inverse problem provides a systematic framework for inferring uncertainty in the properties given uncertainties in the data, the forward model, and prior knowledge of the properties. We address the problem: given noisy measurements of the head, the pdf describing the noise, prior information in the form of a pdf of the hydraulic conductivity, and a groundwater flow model relating the head to the hydraulic conductivity, find the posterior probability density function (pdf) of the parameters describing the hydraulic conductivity field. Unfortunately, conventional sampling of this pdf to compute statistical moments is intractable for problems governed by large-scale forward models and high-dimensional parameter spaces. We construct a Gaussian process surrogate of the posterior pdf based on Bayesian interpolation between a set of "training" points. We employ a greedy algorithm to find the training points by solving a sequence of optimization problems where each new training point is placed at the maximizer of the error in the approximation. Scalable Newton optimization methods solve this "optimal" training point problem. We tailor the Gaussian process surrogate to the curvature of the underlying posterior pdf according to the Hessian of the log posterior at a subset of training points, made computationally tractable by a low-rank approximation of the data misfit Hessian. A Gaussian mixture approximation of the posterior is extracted from the Gaussian process surrogate, and used as a proposal in a Markov chain Monte Carlo method for sampling both the surrogate as well as the true posterior. The Gaussian process surrogate is used as a first stage approximation in a two-stage delayed acceptance MCMC method. We provide evidence for the viability of the low-rank approximation of the Hessian through numerical experiments on a large scale atmospheric contaminant transport problem and analysis of an infinite dimensional model problem. We provide similar results for our groundwater problem. We then present results from the proposed MCMC algorithms. / text
220

THREE DIMENSIONAL FINITE ELEMENT MODELING OF PAVEMENT SUBSURFACE DRAINAGE SYSTEMS

Liu, Yinhui 01 January 2005 (has links)
Pavement subsurface drainage systems (PSDS) are designed to drain the entrapped water out of pavement. To investigate the effects of various factors on the performance of PSDS, three dimensional models were developed using the finite element method to simulate the unsaturated drainage process in pavement. The finite element models were calibrated using the field information on outflow, peak flow, layer saturations, and time to drain. Through a series of parametric analyses, the factors that significantly influence the performance of PSDS were screened out, and a set of recommendations were made to improve our current drainage practices.The effects of pavement geometry on drainage were studied in this research. The analysis results indicate that edgedrain system can significantly improve the drainage efficiency of a pavement. The drainage performance of a pavement is mainly affected by the geometric factors that related to the edgedrain itself and the geometric factors related to the driving lanes have very limited effects.To investigate the influences of the properties of various pavement materials, some physical-empirical equations were developed in this research. These equations were used to predict the material hydraulic properties from their grain-size distributions and aggregate/asphalt contents. The analysis results of the models with various material properties indicate that the use of permeable base is effective in improving the drainage ability of a pavement. The performance of PSDS is not only affected by material permeability but also by their waterretention ability. The pavement works as an integrated hydraulic system and the hydraulic compatibility of materials must be considered in the PSDS design.The effects of climatic factors on pavement drainage were also studied in this research. A method was developed in this research to numerically describe the rainfall events. The analysis results of the models under various rainfall events indicate that rainfall duration is a more important parameter than the rainfall quantity in influencing the pavement drainage. Based on the analysis results, regression equations were developed for the estimation of pavement drainage. Finally, for design application purpose, a series of tables were included in this report to help with proper selected of pavement drainage options.

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