Influence of Macro-pores on DNAPL Migration in Double-Porosity Soil Using Light Transmission Visualization Method

Double porosity is a substantial microstructure characteristic in a wide range of geomaterials. It is a natural phenomenon that can be found in many types of soil, and it can result from biological, chemical or mechanical damage. In this paper, the influence of macro-pores on dense non-aqueous phase liquid (DNAPL) migration in double-porosity medium was investigated using light transmission visualization technique. Three experiments were carried out in two-dimensional flow chambers filled with a double-porosity medium composed of a mixture of local sand and sintered kaolin clay spheres arranged in a periodic manner. In each experiment, a different volumetric fraction of macro-pores and micropores was used. Tetrachloroethylene (PCE) was used to simulate DNAPL, and it was dyed using Oil-Red-O for better visualization. A predetermined amount of PCE was injected into the flow chambers and this amount was re-calculated using image analysis. A very strong correlation was found between the PCE amount injected and the amount calculated from image analysis in each experiment. The experiment was repeated by filling the flow chamber with silica sand to represent single-porosity medium. The results show that the macro-pores have a considerable effect on the PCE migration in double-porosity soil as the PCE movement was the fastest in the third experiment which contained the largest macro-pores volume. The accuracy of the method was validated using statistical analysis. The results show a slight difference between the means of the three experiments, indicating that the method is viable for monitoring NAPL migration in double-porosity medium under different volumetric fractions of macro-pores and micropores.     

弹体侵彻混凝土靶体的尺寸效应分析

由于混凝土靶体抗刚性弹侵彻实验大多基于缩比弹体展开，侵彻深度相似律是否成立显得尤为重要。在侵彻相似模型基础上，综合分析已有侵彻实验数据及经验公式，发现侵彻深度在通常情况下存在尺寸效应，且无量纲侵彻深度随弹体尺寸变大而增大。但如果模型以及原型实验中弹体与混凝土靶体（包括粗骨料）严格等比例设计，侵彻深度相似律是成立的。不变的骨料特征（粗骨料未随弹体尺寸缩放）是引起侵彻实验以及侵彻经验公式中尺寸效应的主要原因。为研究由粗骨料引起的侵彻尺寸效应，开发了混凝土二维细观有限元建模程序，细观数值实验成功地反映出了侵彻尺寸效应，考虑模拟尺寸效应后的侵彻公式能较好地预测不同尺寸侵彻实验。     

Spin-polarized current and tunnel magnetoresistance in heterogeneous single-barrier magnetic tunnel junctions

Current in heterogeneous tunnel junctions is studied in the framework of the parabolic conduction-band model. The developed model of the electron tunneling takes explicitly into account the difference of effective masses between ferromagnetic and insulating layers and between conduction subbands. Calculations for Fe/MgO/Fe-like structures have shown the essential impact of effective mass differences in regions (constituents) of the structure on the tunnel magnetoresistance of the junction.     

Estimating ellipticity of a fiber core using two types of interferometry

In the present work two types of low-coherence interferometry are used to estimate the ellipticity of the core of an optical fiber in the cross section. Using the time-domain low-coherence interferometry the group-index difference between the degenerate high-order modes is measured. Because of the usage of a short fiber sample the group-index difference between the degenerate fundamental modes is too small to measure. Secondly, a frequency-domain low-coherence interferometry is presented in details. Since it is an all-fiber setup, longer fiber is allowed to be used. The high-order modes are filtered. The group-index difference between the degenerate fundamental modes is obtained. For each of the methods the experimental results are used to estimate the ellipticity of the fiber core in numerical simulations.     

Isotopes and hydrochemistry of Daihai Lake recharging sources,Northern China

Daihai Lake has faced severe shrinkage in recent years due to over-exploitation. Stable isotopes (D and ¹⁸O) and hydrochemistry are employed to investigate the source of lake water to better understand its recharge dynamics. Results show that, in additional to local rainfall, groundwater is also an important water supply to the lake and accounts for a greater proportion. The groundwater is not recharged by local rainfall, but originates from other sources with significantly depleted isotope values. Combined with springs and artesian wells in the basin, it is consistent with the recent discover of external groundwater recharging in Northern China.     

Progress in the synthesis and applications of hierarchical flower-like TiO2 nanostructures

Flower-like TiO₂ materials, with their advantages of high specific surface area, developed pore structure, and high photocatalytic activity, have been widely used in environmental management and air purification, sterilization, and surface self-cleaning, among other areas. This paper summarizes several methods used to fabricate the flower-like TiO₂ nanostructures, such as the hydrothermal, solvothermal, microemulsion, sol–gel, hydrolysis, and electrodeposition oxidation methods. In addition, the morphologies, properties, and performance of different flower-like TiO₂ structures are discussed. Meanwhile, the application progresses of different flower-like TiO₂ structures are also analyzed.     

Higher integrability for nonlinear elliptic equations with variable growth and discontinuous coefficients

In this paper, based on the theory of variable exponent spaces, we study the higher integrability for a class of nonlinear elliptic equations with variable growth and discontinuous coefficients. Under suitable assumptions, we obtain a local gradient estimate in Orlicz space for weak solution.     

An interpolating element-free Galerkin scaled boundary method applied to structural dynamic analysis

An efficient semi-analytical method, namely the interpolating element-free Galerkin scaled boundary method (IEFG-SBM) is developed for structural dynamic analysis in this paper, which is based on boundary scattered nodes with no need of element connectivity. Since the shape functions of the improved interpolating moving least-squares (IIMLS) method satisfy the delta function property, the essential boundary conditions, as a result, can be enforced accurately without any additional efforts. Based on the improved continued fraction, the dynamic properties of a bounded domain are expressed by the high order static stiffness and mass matrices. This continued fraction solution is computationally more robust and the transient response can be obtained directly in the time domain using standard procedures in structural dynamics. It is testified from the computational results that the present method for structural dynamic analysis is quite easy to be implemented with high accuracy.     

Phase segregation of metastable quenched liquid mixtures and the effect of the quenching rate

The effect of the quenching rate on the phase separation of partially miscible liquid mixtures is studied, showing that it may influence the growth rate of single-phase domains. In particular, the phase separation of metastable binary mixtures in the presence of strong emulsifiers appears to be heavily retarded. These effects constitute an important limitation to the phase transition extraction process introduced by the authors in previous works, which is based on the fact that phase separation of unstable mixtures is rapid, even in the presence of surface active compounds.