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This paper discusses the flexural strengthening of continuously reinforced concrete (RC) beam constructions in hogging or sagging regions using near-surface mounted (NSM) technique. The main difficulties in strengthening RC continuous beams in hogging are the vertical middle column which prevents continuity of the NSM reinforcement bars and end anchorage of the NSM reinforcement. A test program consisted of seven two-span Tbeams was used; one control beam, which was used for comparison, four beams were strengthened at the hogging region, and two beams were strengthened at the sagging regions. Two types of strengthening material were adopted in this study, carbon fiber reinforced polymers (CFRP) rebars, and high tensile steel bars. An RC column loaded with a constant load (120 kN) was used as the middle support. The main test parameters were the type of the reinforcement bars, continuous NSM bars beside the middle column, or NSM bars anchored inside the middle column, as well as the strengthened region. Besides, the impact of using embedded through-section (ETS) end anchorage of NSM CFRP bars was investigated as well. The experimental results were evaluated for the effects of strengthening technique and materials on the load-carrying capacity of beams, deformation, ductility index, and moment redistribution. The experimental results showed that strengthening with NSM steel bars could improve the service load carrying capacity by 23–40%, whereas the NSM CFRP rebars improved the service loads by 33–36%. The ETS end anchorage at the hogging region and the NSM steel bars at the sagging region helped to achieve the flexural rigidity by a very significant amount relative to the other strengthened beams and control beam by 270%. The moment redistribution achieved after the beam cracking load until the failure load varies in accordance with the strengthening region and the strengthening material type.

This paper investigates experimentally the relation between tensile reinforcement of sagging and hogging region on the performance of the reinforced concrete continuous T-beams and their effect on the moment redistribution. Four two-span RC continuous beams were manufactured and tested up to failure, three of them were designed with a loaded central concrete column. This research provides an insightful and comprehensive description of the carrying capacity, deformation, ductility index, and moment redistribution of the continuous beam with the different steel reinforcement ratio at critical zones. The results show that the load-carrying capacity of continuous beams depends mainly on the longitudinal reinforcement at sagging region rather than that of the hogging region. The sagging reinforcement improves the ductility and the serviceability of the continuous beams at the allowable deflection and the permissible crack width. The moment redistribution ratio depends on the ratio between the sagging reinforcement and the hogging reinforcement areas, especially after the yielding loads. At the hogging and sagging regions with equal reinforcement areas, the moment redistribution values were reduced in comparison to the other tested beams.

This paper introduces the design and implementation of a wide dynamic range CMOS image sensor (CIS) with high sensitivity. The sensor is designed and implemented in a 130 nm CMOS technology. The pixel occupies an area of 3 µm x 3 µm and consists of six NMOS transistors with one capacitor. The readout circuit features an extremely low output noise of 19 µVrms with a 4 MHz bandwidth. Power dissipation of 11.2 µW was achieved at low voltage operation of 1.6 V. The sensor has a combination of low noise and a 97 dB wide dynamic range due to the diode connected load configuration.

Flexible manufacturing systems (FMSs) have widely expanded in industry sectors all over the world. Scheduling is one of the problems that face the life cycle of FMSs. This paper introduces the simultaneous scheduling problem of automated guided vehicles (AGVs) and machines in FMSs. The study is based on discrete event simulation (DES) to solve that problem using benchmark data used by previous studies. The objective of this study is to determine the starting and completion times of each job to minimise the makespan. The results validate the robustness of the simulation model, especially for large-scale problems. Furthermore, they are compared against the other approaches and show consistency.

This paper proposes a newly-formulated Perturb and Observe (P&O) method for Maximum Power Point Tracking (MPPT) in PV systems. The new formulation considers the effect of solar irradiation level on tracking the maximum power point (MPP). The formulated P&O method is tested under standard test condition (STC) to achieve tracking efficiency 99.98% against 98.4% for the conventional P&O method, 99.5% for the improved and 99.85 for the adaptive versions of the P&O method irrespective of the location of the initial operating point to the right or left of the MPP. The higher the tracking efficiency, the closer is the operation of the PV module to the MPP with a subsequent capture of maximum electric energy available in the incident solar radiation. At constant irradiation level, the tracking efficiency reaches 99.98% for the formulated method against 98.4% for the conventional P&O and 83.6–98.5% for the improved and adaptive versions. The amplitude of output power oscillations around the MPP is reduced to 0.05% of its average value for the formulated method against 1.02% for the conventional P&O, 0.5% for the improved and 0.8% for the adaptive versions. Also, the smaller the oscillations’ amplitude, the closer is the operating point to the MPP. The proposed formulation of P&O tracks successfully the MPP under various conditions including the Ropp irradiation profile, step and ramp changes of irradiation level. However, the conventional P&O method fails to track the MPP under Ropp and ramp changes of irradiation level.

Internet of Thins is a paradigm in which things (devices) communicate with each other and with a cloud platform to perform a set of tasks includes monitoring and controlling the device or the surrounding environment. In this paper, we introduce the basic architecture of AssIUT IoT a remotely accessible testbed designed for IoT applications. The testbed adopts Experiment as a Service (EaaS) model as it provides a suitable and easy way to remotely implement experiments related to IoT applications. We provide details about the testbed design and architecture from hardware and software point of views. Also, we provide some examples of the experiments which can be implemented using our testbed.

Post-quantum cryptography is an emerging solution to the expected security breach, introduced by quantum computers, to the currently used public key cryptosystems. This paper presents an experimental study on the effect of the overhead associated with the wireless transmission of some of the newly developed post quantum cryptography algorithms through the Internet of Things networks. Experimental results of this work include the energy and time measurements for wireless transmission of chosen sample messages of these new cryptographic algorithms. In addition, recommendations are given for appropriate modules configurations and choice of suitable security algorithm for the Internet of Things networks.

This paper presents a proposed design procedure of a Wireless Power Transfer (WPT) system based on high efficiency offset reflector antennas fed by conical horns. The system's performance evaluation is also demonstrated. The antennas in the transmitter and receiver sides of the proposed WPT system are symmetric. The performance of the system is optimized by calibrating the feeding horns and the offset reflector's dimensions to minimize the path and reflection losses of the proposed WPT system. The results show that correct line of sight alignment of the transmitter and receiver enhances the efficiency of the system. With an operating frequency of 6 GHz and 1 W of power transfer over a distance of 12 m between the transmitter and receiver, the system attains a total transfer efficiency of 62.9 %

This paper presents a proposed design procedure of a Wireless Power Transfer (WPT) system based on high efficiency offset reflector antennas fed by conical horns. The system's performance evaluation is also demonstrated. The antennas in the transmitter and receiver sides of the proposed WPT system are symmetric. The performance of the system is optimized by calibrating the feeding horns and the offset reflector's dimensions to minimize the path and reflection losses of the proposed WPT system. The results show that correct line of sight alignment of the transmitter and receiver enhances the efficiency of the system. With an operating frequency of 6 GHz and 1 W of power transfer over a distance of 12 m between the transmitter and receiver, the system attains a total transfer efficiency of 62.9 %