The North American Pacific coast, located within the Ring of Fire, is at risk of severe subduction tsunamis. This danger has pushed the United States to make a strong push in tsunami research. Recent advancement has resulted in the implementation of a new chapter in the ASCE 7-16 standards focusing on tsunami structural loads and effects. Within the scope of this new standard, the tsunami inundation hazard of the US West coast has been mapped. However, no such work has been completed in Canada, leaving the tsunami hazard and vulnerability for most of the Canadian West coast uncertain. The life safety vulnerability from the most hazardous source, the Cascadia Subduction Zone, is evaluated in terms of pedestrian evacuation capabilities. Using a static distance-only model, the ability of individuals to evacuate to safety in natural high grounds is computed for all communities in British Columbia and compared by Tsunami Notification Zone. A new variable – the available time – for tsunamis life safety vulnerability assessment is proposed. This variable considers both tsunami arrival time and time to safety, resulting in a life safety threshold value of 0. Zone E has the largest surface area and population within the hazard zone, even though it has the smallest probable run-up range because of the large number of communities in this zone and the low-laying areas of the Lower Mainland. All communities within Zones A, B, D, and E have low life safety vulnerability at the maximum probable run-up of their respective zone, suggesting that pedestrian evacuation should be possible. Zone C has the highest vulnerability of all zones, as it has the lowest available times. With a 9 m run-up and over 25% of its communities lying within the moderate- or high-vulnerability categories, it has an available time of below 30 min and 15 min, respectively. Zone C also has the highest percentage of its surface area inundated at its maximum probable run-up (39.7%). The most vulnerable communities are identified, including 45 First Nation and 5 non-indigenous communities: Tofino, Winter Harbour, Ucluelet, Port Renfrew, and Bamfield. The life-safety threshold is surpassed in Barlett Island 32, Grassy Island 17, Hesquiat 1, and Tofino. Delta and Richmond, in Zone E, also have a minimum available time below the life safety threshold at run-ups between 5 and 7 m, at or above the probable run-up of their zone, as they have large low-lying areas. As the tsunami arrival time is very large here, the merits of vehicle evacuation should be evaluated. Additionally, they are likely to be more vulnerable to landslide tsunamis, as the tsunami arrival time would be much shorter than one from a Cascadia tsunami. A more detailed vulnerability study using anisotropic path-distance modeling was performed in Tofino. This more complex model found lower available times than the distance-only model. Maximum differences ranging between 14.4 to 29.9 minutes were found for three pedestrian velocities. The minimum available time was found to be -29.0 minutes within the official municipality boundary and -40.1 minutes within one of the beaches. Two vertical evacuation structures are required to reduce the time to safety below the tsunami arrival time of 28.1 minutes for run-ups between 13 and 19 m. Run-ups above 19 m required three vertical evacuation structures. No configuration could be found to sufficiently reduce the time to safety on Frank Island.

No description available.

Organic-inorganic hybrid perovskites (OIHPs), which are promising materials for electronic and optoelectronic applications (1-10), have made into layered organic-inorganic hybrid perovskites (LOIHPs). These LOIHPs have been applied to thin-film transistors, solar cells and tunable wavelength phosphors (11-18). It is known that devices fabricated with single crystal exhibit the superior performance, which makes the growth of large-sized single crystals critical for future device applications (19-23). However, the difficulty in growing large-sized LOIHPs single crystal with superior electrical properties limits their practical applications. Here, we report a method to grow the centimeter-scaled LOIHP single crystal of [(HOC2H4NH3)2PbI4], demonstrating the potentials in mass production. After that, we reveal anisotropic electrical and optoelectronic properties which proved the carrier propagating along inorganic framework. The carrier mobility of in-inorganic-plane (in-plane) devices shows the average value of 45 cm2 V–1 s–1 which is about 100 times greater than the record of LOIHP devices (15), showing the importance of single crystal in device application. Moreover, the LOIHP single crystals show its ultra-short carrier lifetime of 42.7 ps and photoluminescence quantum efficiency (PLQE) of 25.4 %. We expect this report to be a start of LOIHPs for advanced applications in which the anisotropic properties are needed (24-25), and meets the demand of high-speed applications and fast-response applications.

This thesis deals with the use of non-metallic highly thermally conductive materials, more concrete-ly special plastic materials, enriched with highly thermally conductive additives, for the purpose of passive cooling of a given heat source. The thesis compares the effectivity of these heat sinks with the classically used materials, specifically aluminium. The thesis is divided into two main sections, theoretical and practical. The theoretical part deals with a constantly growing need of LED (Light Emitting Diode) chips cooling in automotive head-lamps, where the new materials could be put into effect, analyses possible replacement of classic aluminium heat sinks with different materials with a significantly lower thermal conductivity and introduces problems of such materials. The practical part applies the problematic described in the theoretical one on the actually produced heat sinks, which are compared among themselves, with regard to their method of production, as well as with aluminium counterpart in different conditions. Furthermore, the problematic of de-signing a heat sink made from material which is characteristic for its highly anisotropic thermal con-ductivity is dealt with. The end of the thesis shows the importance of heat dissipation via radiation, which can have a great significance in case of plastic heat sinks and in a specific applications.

This research study determines the potential to increase substantially the anisotropy of a coke from an aliphatic Waxy Oil produced by Sasol Synfuels at Secunda, South Africa. Experimental modifications included filtration, distillation and thermal treatment, followed by distillation with the aim of producing a carbonised product similar to needle coke. The substantial concentration of an iron oxide catalyst (up to 2%) in Waxy Oil is increased by an order of magnitude upon carbonisation and calcination due to low coke yield and reactivity factors. The catalyst also promotes oxidative polymerisation of the residue, acts as a barrier to mesophase formation and promotes multi-phase graphitisation. Filtration of Waxy Oil using a 0.5 ìm sintered metal filter reduces the ash content to 0.006% and increases the anisotropy of the carbonised product to 54% flow domains compared with 22% for the carbonised product of virgin Waxy Oil. Thermal treatment followed by distillation of Waxy Oil reduces the effect of organic reactivity promoters (mainly multi-alkylated aliphatics/aromatics and oxygenates), while increasing the concentration of thermally stable (C18 to C30) normal alkanes to 85% compared with 38% in the filtered Waxy Oil. Compared with the filtered Waxy Oil, thermally stabilised Waxy Oil reduces the amount of the pre-carbonisation residue (from 98.7 to 43.0%), while “static” carbonisation thereof increases the green coke yield (from 19.8 to 36.3%) and increases the anisotropicity (from 54 to 100% flow domains). The carbonisation mechanism of filtered and thermally treated Waxy Oil involves initial cracking of high molecular weight normal alkanes (C18 to C30), thus concentrating the molecular weight of normal alkanes (C18 to C22). This is followed by a slow cyclisation step involving both self condensation and cyclo addition reactions to form two- to six-ring cyclo-alkanes or hydro-aromatics. The hydro-aromatics are dehydrogenated rapidly to form methyl and di-methyl three- to six-ring substituted aromatics. Further thermal degradation dealkylates these molecules to form stable four- to six-ring “pre-mesogens”. The mesospheres are nucleated from the isotropic matrix and grow to more than 0.050 mm in diameter, with a volume of 2.61 x 10-3 mm3. Subsequent coalescence of the mesospheres produces mesospheres with diameters of over 0.200 mm and volumes of 41.82 x 10-3 mm3. The resultant microstructure of the solid carbon is composed of flow domains more than 400 ìm in length. Although needle cokes have historically been produced from aromatic residues, this research is the first to show that a coke with a similar microstructure can be produced from a totally aliphatic residue. The research thus provides potential for the development of a needle coke from a totally unique Waxy Oil residue with negligible sulphur (< 0.008%) and nitrogen (< 0.09%) contents. This is the first academic study of the chemistry of Waxy Oil. / Thesis (PhD)--University of Pretoria, 2011. / Chemical Engineering / unrestricted

This work involves synthesis and characterization of isotropic and anisotropic noble metal nanoparticles for applications ranging from antimicrobial uses to anticancer applications. These nanomaterials are stabilized in genuinely benign biomaterials ranging from polymers to cross linked proteins for targeted cancer treatments. The nanoparticles are found to have tunable optical properties.

First, I attempt to present a unified approach to the study of transport phenomena in multicoponent anisotropic space plasmas. In the limit of small temperature anisotropies this system of generalized transport equations reduces to Grad's 13-moment system of transport equations. In the collisionless limit, the generalized transport equations account for collisionless heat flow, cillisionless viscosity, and large temperature anisotropies. Also, I show that with the appropriate assumptions, the system of generalized transport equations reduces to all of the other major systems of transport equations for anisotropic plasmas that have been derived to date. Next, for application to aeronomy and space physics problems involving strongly magnetized plasma flows, I derive momentum and energy exchange collision terms for interpenetrating bi-Maxwellian gases. Collision terms are derived for Coulomb, Maxwell molecule, and constant collision cross section interaction potentials. The collision terms are valid for arbitrary flow velocity differences and temperature differences between the interacting gases as well as for arbitrary temperature anisotropies. The collision terms have to be evaluated numerically and the appropriate coefficients are presented in tables However, the collision terms are also fitted with simplified expressions, the accuracy of which depends on both the interaction potential and the temperature anisotropy. In addition, I derive the closed set of transport equations that are associated with the momentum and energy collision terms. Finally, I study the extent to which Maxwellian and bi-Maxwellian series expansions can describe plasma flows characterized by non-Maxwellian velocity distributions, with emphasis given to modeling the anisotropic character of the distribution function. The problem considered is the steady state flow of a weakly-ionized plasma subjected to homogeneous electric and magnetic fields, and different collision models are used. In the case of relaxation collision model, a closed form expression is found for the ion velocity distribution function, while for more regorous models (polarization and hard sphere) I have to use the Monte Carlo simulation. These provided a basis for determining the adequacy of a given series expansion. I find that, in general, the bi-Maxwellian-based expansions for the velocity distribution function is better suited to describing anisotropic plasmas than the Maxwellian-based expansions. (166 pages)

Objective: The objective of this work was to characterize the nonlinear anisotropic material constitutive response of the interspinous ligament (ISL). Methods: Cadaveric test samples of the interspinous ligament were tested using the anisotropic small punch test. The measured force-displacement response served as experimental input into a system identification optimization routine to determine the constitutive material parameters that replicated the measured material response. Results: The constitutive behavior of the ISL is notably different from that reported for knee, shoulder, and hip ligaments. Specifically, the high collagen fiber content and unique collagen architecture provided a stiffer material response. The results from the present work were compared with available data from the literature for the ISL and were found to be consistent with reported failure stress and strain to failure. Conclusion: The ISL has unique constitutive properties and architecture that provide mechanical and clinical stability to the lumbar spine during flexion. The characterization data obtained during accomplishment of this thesis provide valuable insights into these roles. The present work provides a first step to fully characterize and understand both physiological and pathological motion of the spine. Further research is necessary to clarify the contributions of spinal ligaments to spine stability and how damage to spinal ligaments may contribute to chronic lower back pain.

Ceramics have a number of applications as coating material due to their high hardness, wear and corrosion resistance, and the ability to withstand high temperatures. Critical to the success of these materials is the effective heat transfer through a material to allow for heat diffusion or effective cooling, which is often limited by the low thermal conductivity of many ceramic materials. To meet the challenge of improving the thermal conductivity of ceramics without lowering their performance envelope, carbon nanotubes were selected to improve the mechanical properties and thermal dispersion ability due to its excellent mechanical properties and high thermal conductivity in axial direction. However, the enhancements are far lower than expectation resulting from limited carbon nanotube content in ceramic matrix composites and the lack of alignment. These problems can be overcome if ceramic coatings are reinforced by carbon nanotubes with good dispersion and alignment. In this study, the well-dispersed and aligned carbon nanotubes preforms were achieved in the form of vertically aligned carbon nanotubes (VACNTs) and Buckypaper. Polymer derived ceramic (PDC) was selected as the matrix to fabricate carbon nanotube reinforced ceramic nanocomposites through resin curing and pyrolysis. The SEM images indicates the alignment of carbon nanotubes in the PDC nanocomposites. The mechanical and thermal properties of the PDC nanocomposites were characterized through Vickers hardness measurement and Thermogravimetric Analysis. The ideal anisotropic properties of nanocomposites were confirmed by estimating the electrical conductivity in two orthogonal directions.

Data acquisition systems for rotordynamic analysis and machine vibration were explored for the purpose of replacing the obsolete Bently Nevada ADRE 208 and ADRE for Windows system. These included the development of Matlab based custom data acquisition systems and a user interface. A model of an anisotropic rotor response undergoing transient speed was developed for the rapid prototyping and testing of data acquisition systems. Several methods for the measurement of amplitudes and phase in both the time domain and frequency domain were developed and compared. An alternate data acquisition method which is more inline with industry practices was created for the purpose of spectral analysis. Additionally, an optimized data acquisition strategy was developed for implementation within the Matlab app which included batch processing, state-based acquisition, and differentiated vector and waveform acquisition rates. A Bently Nevada 2300/20 vibration monitor was configured for use in the lab but found unsuitable for replacing the ADRE 208. Ultimately a Bently Nevada ADAPT 3701/44 Vibration Monitor was configured and found to be an adequate replacement for the ADRE 208 system for use in the Cal Poly Vibrations Lab.