No description available.

Corrosion in reinforced concrete bridge decks has always been a concern amongst engineers. However, as structures continue to increase in size and in the amount of reinforcement present, consideration must be given to parameters such as the clear spacing arrangements between bars, the presence and absence of stay-in-place (SIP) forms, and differences in the cathode bar to anode bar ratios. Limited research has been performed to determine the effects of the parameters (Shiessel, P. 1986). Research has been conducted on the effects of macrocell corrosion compared to microcell corrosion. Previous studies have shown that the measured microcell corrosion is not augmented greatly by the macrocell current (Andrade et al. 1991). In this study, twenty-seven specimens were cast with reinforcing steel to represent reinforcing mats at the top and bottom of each specimen. Top and bottom spacing arrangements were approximately 51, 76, 102 mm (2, 3, and 4-inches), cathode-to-anode bar (C/A) ratios were 2 and 1, and the presence and absence of SIP were considered. Macrocell currents, resistivity measurements, half-cell potential measurements, and corrosion current densities were recorded over a 273 day time period to compare the differences that existed amongst the three different parameters. Based upon the data that was collected, no significant differences were recorded when comparisons were made between the spacing arrangements, the absence and presence of SIP, and differences in C/A ratios. The formation of the passive layer was confirmed by the corrosion current densities and half-cell potentials. The rate of the formation of the passive layer occurred in two distinct periods, a rapid rate from casting to about 105 days and a significantly slower rate beyond 105 days after casting. There was no detected influence of the macrocell activity on the formation of the passive layer throughout the 273 day study period. / Master of Science

Chloride induced corrosion of steel in concrete is one of the major forms of deterioration mechanisms found in reinforced concrete bridges. Early age corrosion damage reduces the lifespan of the bridges, which results in heavy economic losses. Research has been conducted to identify economic solutions for significantly delaying and/or preventing corrosion damage. Considering the amount of steel reinforcement used in bridge decks, the influence of as constructed parameters including clear spacing between top and bottom reinforcement bars, ratio of cathode to anode areas, and presence of stay-in-place forms on corrosion activity needs to be evaluated. The influence of the as constructed parameters have been studied using different corrosion assessment methods including resistivity, half-cell potential, linear polarization, chloride content, moisture content, and visual inspection. This study included the clear spacing distances between the anode and cathode of 51, 76, and 102 mm (2, 3, and 4-inch), number of cathodes as 1 and 2, and the presence and absence of stay-in-place forms. Data up to 15 months were taken from a previous study by Smolinski and integrated into the current study period of 35 to 45 months. A trend line may be established to illustrate the changes which took place over the missing time period, from approximately 15 to 35 months, since the specimens were maintained in controlled environment. Analysis of the data showed that there is a significant difference between the spacing values (2, 3, and 4-inch) through all forms of evaluations. Regarding the other parameters, no significant difference was identified. Variations in resistivity with increasing spacing, even when the water-cement ratio was kept at 0.50, maybe the result of the difference in unit consolidation between the clear spacing specimens. Thus, the corrosion mechanism observed in this study may be resistivity-controlled. Also, autopsy showed that corrosion on the top bars was in general agreement with the measured corrosion activity. The bottom bars had no visible corrosion and the chloride had not penetrated to the bottom bars, regardless of the separation distance between the top and bottom bars. For this laboratory study, the measurements showed that macrocell corrosion influence on the total corrosion was insignificant. / Master of Science

Corrosion initiates in reinforced concrete structures exposed to marine environments when the chloride ion concentration at the surface of an embedded steel reinforcing bar exceeds the chloride corrosion threshold (CT) value. The value of CT is generally assumed to have a conservative fixed value ranging from 0.2% to - 0.5 % of chloride ions by weight of cement. However, extensive experimental investigations confirmed that CT is not a fixed value and that the value of CT depends on many variables. Among those, the potential of passive steel embedded in concrete is a key influential factor on the value of CT and has received little attention in the literature. The phenomenon of a potential-dependent threshold (PDT) permits accounting for corrosion macrocell coupling between active and passive steel assembly components in corrosion forecast models, avoiding overly conservative long-term damage projections and leading to more efficient design. The objectives of this investigation was to 1) expand by a systematic experimental assessment the knowledge and data base on how dependent the chloride threshold is on the potential of the steel embedded in concrete and 2) introduce the chloride threshold dependence on steel potential as an integral part of corrosion-related service life prediction of reinforced concrete structures. Experimental assessments on PDT were found in the literature but for a limited set of conditions. Therefore, experiments were conducted with mortar and concrete specimens and exposed to conditions more representative of the field than those previously available. The experimental results confirmed the presence of the PDT effect and provided supporting information to use a value of -550 mV per decade of Cl- for the cathodic prevention slope βCT, a critical quantitative input for implementation in a practical model. A refinement of a previous corrosion initiation-propagation model that incorporated PDT in a partially submerged reinforced concrete column in sea water was developed. Corrosion was assumed to start when the chloride corrosion threshold was reached in an active steel zone of a given size, followed by recalculating the potential distribution and update threshold values over the entire system at each time step. Notably, results of this work indicated that when PDT is ignored, as is the case in present forecasting model practice, the corrosion damage prediction can be overly conservative which could lead to structural overdesign or misguided future damage management planning. Implementation of PDT in next-generation models is therefore highly desirable. However, developing a mathematical model that forecasts the corrosion damage of an entire marine structure with a fully implemented PDT module can result in excessive computational complexity. Hence, a provisional simplified approach for incorporating the effect of PDT was developed. The approach uses a correction function to be applied to projections that have been computed using the traditional procedures.

This thesis studies cooperative techniques that rely on femtocell user diversity to improve the downlink communication quality of macrocell users. We analytically analyze and evaluate the achievable performance of these techniques in the downlink of Rayleigh fading channels. We provide an approximation of both the bit-error rate (BER) and the data throughput that macrocell users receive with femtocell user cooperation. Using simulations, we show that under reasonable SNR values, cooperative schemes enhance the performances of macrocells by improving the BER, outage probability, and data throughput of macrocell users significantly when compared with the traditional, non-cooperative schemes. / Graduation date: 2012

No description available.

A durabilidade das estruturas de concreto tem se tornado um assunto de interesse mundial nas últimas duas décadas. Os custos econômicos associados a reparos de estruturas de concreto são cada vez maiores, e tem crescido a incidência de insucessos nessas intervenções. No Brasil, a técnica de intervenção corretiva mais utilizada é a de reparos localizados com argamassas à base de cimento Portland, modificadas com polímeros. Uma das patologias mais comumente apresentadas, quando essa técnica é utilizada, é a volta da corrosão, porém localizada em área adjacente ao reparo, que antes estava protegida. Isto ocorre com maior freqüência em estruturas de concreto aparente ou naquelas com condições muito críticas de exposição dos elementos estruturais à umidade. Esse tipo de deterioração, conhecido na literatura como ânodo incipiente, decorre das mudanças nas características eletroquímicas do meio que envolve o aço na região do reparo, em relação ao concreto original, e pode levar a um desequilíbrio de potencial eletroquímico entre as regiões da barra de aço nesses meios, dando origem à corrosão por macrocélula. O presente trabalho consiste em uma discussão sobre os princípios eletroquímicos envolvidos na compatibilidade entre a argamassa de reparo e o concreto da estrutura, assim como sobre o mecanismo de deterioração de reparos, decorrente da incompatibilidade; desenvolve um estudo para o estabelecimento de um método de avaliação da compatibilidade eletroquímica entre as argamassas de reparo e o substrato; por fim, propõe uma escala para a interpretação dos efeitos da diferença de potencial, entre os trechos da barra de aço no reparo e no substrato, na intensidade de corrente de macrocélula entre essas áreas. / The durability of concrete structures has become a subject of worldwide interest in the last two decades. The economic costs associated with repair of concrete structures is increasing and has increased the incidence of failures in these operations. In Brazil, the technique of corrective intervention is the most widely used repair located with mortars based on Portland cement, modified with polymers. One of the diseases most commonly made when this technique is used, it is the turn of corrosion, but located in an area adjacent to the repair, before it was protected. This occurs more often in concrete structures or apparent in those conditions very critical structural elements of exposure to moisture. This type of deterioration, known in literature as incipient anode, follows the changes in the electrochemical characteristics of the environment surrounding the steel in the repair on the original concrete, and may lead to an imbalance in electrochemical potential between the regions of the bar steel in these environments, leading to corrosion by macrocélula. This work is a discussion of the principles involved in the electrochemical compatibility between the repair mortar and concrete structure as well as on the mechanism of deterioration of repairs due to incompatibility; develop a study to establish a method for assessing electrochemical compatibility between the repair mortar and the substrate, finally, proposes a scale for the interpretation of the effects of the difference in potential between the sections of steel bar in the repair and the substrate, the intensity of current of macrocélula between these areas.

A durabilidade das estruturas de concreto tem se tornado um assunto de interesse mundial nas últimas duas décadas. Os custos econômicos associados a reparos de estruturas de concreto são cada vez maiores, e tem crescido a incidência de insucessos nessas intervenções. No Brasil, a técnica de intervenção corretiva mais utilizada é a de reparos localizados com argamassas à base de cimento Portland, modificadas com polímeros. Uma das patologias mais comumente apresentadas, quando essa técnica é utilizada, é a volta da corrosão, porém localizada em área adjacente ao reparo, que antes estava protegida. Isto ocorre com maior freqüência em estruturas de concreto aparente ou naquelas com condições muito críticas de exposição dos elementos estruturais à umidade. Esse tipo de deterioração, conhecido na literatura como ânodo incipiente, decorre das mudanças nas características eletroquímicas do meio que envolve o aço na região do reparo, em relação ao concreto original, e pode levar a um desequilíbrio de potencial eletroquímico entre as regiões da barra de aço nesses meios, dando origem à corrosão por macrocélula. O presente trabalho consiste em uma discussão sobre os princípios eletroquímicos envolvidos na compatibilidade entre a argamassa de reparo e o concreto da estrutura, assim como sobre o mecanismo de deterioração de reparos, decorrente da incompatibilidade; desenvolve um estudo para o estabelecimento de um método de avaliação da compatibilidade eletroquímica entre as argamassas de reparo e o substrato; por fim, propõe uma escala para a interpretação dos efeitos da diferença de potencial, entre os trechos da barra de aço no reparo e no substrato, na intensidade de corrente de macrocélula entre essas áreas. / The durability of concrete structures has become a subject of worldwide interest in the last two decades. The economic costs associated with repair of concrete structures is increasing and has increased the incidence of failures in these operations. In Brazil, the technique of corrective intervention is the most widely used repair located with mortars based on Portland cement, modified with polymers. One of the diseases most commonly made when this technique is used, it is the turn of corrosion, but located in an area adjacent to the repair, before it was protected. This occurs more often in concrete structures or apparent in those conditions very critical structural elements of exposure to moisture. This type of deterioration, known in literature as incipient anode, follows the changes in the electrochemical characteristics of the environment surrounding the steel in the repair on the original concrete, and may lead to an imbalance in electrochemical potential between the regions of the bar steel in these environments, leading to corrosion by macrocélula. This work is a discussion of the principles involved in the electrochemical compatibility between the repair mortar and concrete structure as well as on the mechanism of deterioration of repairs due to incompatibility; develop a study to establish a method for assessing electrochemical compatibility between the repair mortar and the substrate, finally, proposes a scale for the interpretation of the effects of the difference in potential between the sections of steel bar in the repair and the substrate, the intensity of current of macrocélula between these areas.

The architecture of mobile networks has dramatically evolved in order to fulfill the growing demands on wireless services and data. The radio resources, which are used by the current mobile networks, are limited while the users demands are substantially increasing. In the future, tremendous Internet applications are expected to be served by mobile networks. Therefore, increasing the capacity of mobile networks has become a vital issue. Heterogeneous networks (HetNets) have been considered as a promising paradigm for future mobile networks. Accordingly, the concept of small cell has been introduced in order to increase the capacity of the mobile networks. A femtocell network is a kind of small cell networks. Femtocells are deployed within macrocells coverage. Femtocells cover small areas and operate with low transmission power while providing high capacity. Also, UEs can be offloaded from macrocells to femtocells. Thus, the capacity can be increased. However, this will introduce different technical challenges. The interference has become one of the key challenges for deploying femtocells within a certain macrocells coverage. Undesirable impact of the interference can degrade the performance of the mobile networks. Therefore, radio resource management mechanisms are needed in order to address key challenges of deploying femtocells. The objective of this work is to introduce radio resource control approaches, which are used to increase mobile networks' capacity and alleviate undesirable impact of the interference. In addition, proposed radio resource control approaches ensure the coexistence between macrocell and femtocells based on LTE-Advanced environment. Firstly, a novel mechanism is proposed in order to address the interference challenge. The proposed approach mitigates the impact of interference based on controlling radio sub-channels' assignment and dynamically adjusting the transmission power. Secondly, a dynamic strategy is proposed for the FFR mechanism. In the FFR mechanism, the whole spectrum is divided into four fixed sub-channels and each sub-channel is assigned for a different sub-area after splitting the macrocell coverage area into four sub-areas. The objective of the proposed scheme is to divide the spectrum dynamically based on the QoS indicators for each sub-area. Lastly, a novel packet scheduling scheme is proposed to improve the performance of femtocell networks. The proposed scheduling strategy assigns radio resources based on two objectives: increasing the network capacity and achieving better fairness among attached UEs.

Cache memories have been usually implemented with Static Random-Access Memory (SRAM) technology since it is the fastest electronic memory technology. However, this technology consumes a high amount of leakage currents, which is a major design concern because leakage energy consumption increases as the transistor size shrinks. Alternative technologies are being considered to reduce this consumption. Among them, embedded Dynamic RAM (eDRAM) technology provides minimal area and leakage by design but reads are destructive and it is not as fast as SRAM. In this thesis, both SRAM and eDRAM technologies are mingled to take the advantatges that each of them o¿ers. First, they are combined at cell level to implement an n-bit macrocell consisting of one SRAM cell and n-1 eDRAM cells. The macrocell is used to build n-way set-associative hybrid ¿rst-level (L1) data caches having one SRAM way and n-1 eDRAM ways. A single SRAM way is enough to achieve good performance given the high data locality of L1 caches. Architectural mechanisms such as way-prediction, swaps, and scrub operations are considered to avoid unnecessary eDRAM reads, to maintain the Most Recently Used (MRU) data in the fast SRAM way, and to completely avoid refresh logic. Experimental results show that, compared to a conventional SRAM cache, leakage and area are largely reduced with a scarce impact on performance. The study of the bene¿ts of hybrid caches has been also carried out in second-level (L2) caches acting as Last-Level Caches (LLCs). In this case, the technologies are combined at bank level and the optimal ratio of SRAM and eDRAM banks that achieves the best trade-o¿ among performance, energy, and area is identi¿ed. Like in L1 caches, the MRU blocks are kept in the SRAM banks and they are accessed ¿rst to avoid unnecessary destructive reads. Nevertheless, refresh logic is not removed since data locality widely di¿ers in this cache level. Experimental results show that a hybrid LLC with an eighth of its banks built with SRAM technology is enough to achieve the best target trade-o¿. This dissertation also deals with performance of replacement policies in heterogeneous LLCs mainly focusing on the energy overhead incurred by refresh operations. In this thesis it is de¿ned a new concept, namely MRU-Tour (MRUT), that helps estimate reuse information of cache blocks. Based on this concept, it is proposed a family of MRUTbased replacement algorithms that randomly select the victim block among those having a single MRUT. These policies are enhanced to leverage recency of information for a few blocks and to adapt to changes in the working set of the benchmarks. Results show that the proposed MRUT policies, with simpler hardware complexity, outperform the Least Recently Used (LRU) policy and a set of the most representative state-of-the-art replacement policies for LLCs. Refresh operations represent an important fraction of the overall dynamic energy consumption of eDRAM LLCs. This fraction increases with the cache capacity, since more blocks have to be refreshed for a given period of time. Prior works have attacked the refresh energy taking into account inter-cell feature variations. Unlike these works, this thesis proposes a selective refresh policy based on the MRUT concept. The devised policy takes into account the number of MRUTs of a block to select whether the block is refreshed. In this way, many refreshes done in a typical distributed refresh policy are skipped (i.e., in those blocks having a single MRUT). This refresh mechanism is applied in the hybrid LLC memory. Results show that refresh energy consumption is largely reduced with respect to a conventional eDRAM cache, while the performance degradation is minimal with respect to a conventional SRAM cache. / Valero Bresó, A. (2013). Hybrid caches: design and data management [Tesis doctoral]. Editorial Universitat Politècnica de València. https://doi.org/10.4995/Thesis/10251/32663 / Premios Extraordinarios de tesis doctorales