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The purpose of this paper is to analyze the liquid sloshing behaviors in two-dimensional tanks with various porous baffles under the external excitation.

Adopting the finite element method (FEM) and control variable method to study the impacts of the height, length, number, location, shape, porous-effect parameter of the porous baffle, the external load frequency and the shape of the tank on the liquid sloshing response.

The amplitude of the free surface can be reduced effectively when the baffle opening is appropriate. The anti-sway ability of the system increases in pace with the baffle’s height growing. Under the same conditions, the shapes of the baffles have an important effect on improving the anti-sway ability of the system.

As there exist the differences of the velocity potential between each side of the porous baffle, which means that there are two different velocity potentials at a point on the porous baffle, the conventional finite element modeling technologies are not suitable to be applied here. To deal with this problem, the points on the porous baffle are regarded as two nodes with the same coordinate to model and calculate.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate different baffles on mitigating liquid sloshing in a rectangular tank due to a horizontal excitation and to find out the optimal selection of sloshing mitigation for practical applications.

The numerical study is conducted by using a proven improved smoothed particle hydrodynamics (SPH), which is convenient in tracking free surfaces and capable of obtaining smooth and correct pressure field.

Liquid sloshing effects in a rectangular tank with vertical middle baffles, horizontal baffles, T-shape baffles and porous baffles are investigated together with those without any baffles. It is found that the existence of baffles can mitigate sloshing effects and the mitigation performance depends on the shape, structure and location of the baffles. Considering the balance of sloshing mitigation performance and the complexity in structure and design, the I shaped and T shaped baffles can be good choices to mitigate sloshing effects.

The presented methodology and findings can be helpful in practical engineering applications, especially in ocean engineering and problems with large sloshing effects.

The SPH method is a meshfree, Lagrangian particle method, and therefore it is an attractive approach for modeling liquid sloshing with material interfaces, free surfaces and moving boundaries. In most previous literature, only simple baffles are investigated. In this paper, more complicated baffles are investigated, which can be helpful in practical applications and engineering designs.

The present work involves analytical and experimental investigation of sloshing in a two-dimensional rectangular tank including the effect of porous baffles to control and/or reduce the wave motion in the sloshing tank. The purpose of this study is to assess the analytical solutions of the drag coefficient effect on porous baffles performance to track free surface motion variation in the sloshing tank by comparison with experimental shake table tests under a range of sway excitation.

The linear second-order ordinary differential equations for liquid sloshing in the rectangular tank were solved using Newmark’s beta method and obtained the analytical solutions for liquid sloshing with dual vertical porous baffles of full submergence depths in a sway-oscillated rectangular tank following the methodology similar to Warnitchai and Pinkaew (1998) and Tait (2008).

The porous baffles significantly reduce wave elevation in the varying filled levels of the tank compared to the baffle-free tank under the range of excitation frequencies. It is observed that the Reynolds number-dependent drag coefficient for porous baffles in the tank can significantly reduce the sloshing elevations and is found to be effective to achieve higher damping compared to the porosity-dependent drag coefficient for porous baffles in the sloshing tank. The analytical model’s response to free surface elevation variations in the sloshing tank was compared with the experiment’s test results. The analytical results matched with shake table test results with a quantitative difference near the first resonant frequency.

The scope of the study is limited to porous baffles performance under range sway motion and three different filling levels in the tank. The porous baffle performance includes Reynolds number dependent drag coefficient to explore the damping effect in the sloshing tank.

The porous baffles with low-level porosities in the sloshing tank have many engineering applications where the first resonant mode of sloshing in the tank is more important. The porous baffle drag coefficient is an important parameter to study the baffle’s damping effect in sloshing tanks. Hence, obtained analytical solution for liquid sloshing in the rectangular tank with Reynolds number as well as porosity-dependent drag coefficient (model 1) and porosity-dependent drag coefficient porous baffles (model 2) performance is discussed. The model’s test results were validated using a series of shake table sloshing experiments for three fill levels in the tank with sway motion at various excitation frequencies covering the first four sloshing resonant modes.

The purpose of this paper is to contrast the behavior of a US homeowner exposed to hurricane risk with government policies designed to limit hurricane losses. Owners limit these losses by selecting structural improvements or mitigation and wind and flood insurance.

The paper uses mitigation costs, hurricane probabilities, and insurance premiums to frame rational cost‐minimizing choices for the homeowner.

First, even though nationwide hurricane damage costs are large, the cost‐minimizing response for an individual property owner may be to buy no mitigation or structural improvements, no flood insurance and minimal wind insurance, as probabilities of strong hurricanes striking particular locations are extremely low. Second, additional insurance is a less costly defense than structural improvement, even under much higher insurance premiums and hurricane strike probabilities. Third, federally subsidized flood insurance may reduce the effectiveness of government programs encouraging structural mitigation.

The last few years were underscored by the catastrophic damages of Hurricanes‐Katrina, Ike and Wilma. Enormous costs suffered by the public and private sectors could have been avoided with greater mitigation by homeowners. This paper examines the financial incentives for such mitigation. Those incentives are examined in a previously untested framework.

The purpose of this paper is to provide a comprehensive review of a non-contact full-field optical measurement technique known as digital image correlation (DIC).

The approach of this review paper is to introduce the research pertaining to DIC. It comprehensively covers crucial facets including its principles, historical development, core challenges, current research status and practical applications. Additionally, it delves into unresolved issues and outlines future research objectives.

The findings of this review encompass essential aspects of DIC, including core issues like the subpixel registration algorithm, camera calibration, measurement of surface deformation in 3D complex structures and applications in ultra-high-temperature settings. Additionally, the review presents the prevailing strategies for addressing these challenges, the most recent advancements in DIC applications across quasi-static, dynamic, ultra-high-temperature, large-scale and micro-scale engineering domains, along with key directions for future research endeavors.

This review holds a substantial value as it furnishes a comprehensive and in-depth introduction to DIC, while also spotlighting its prospective applications.

Global climate can be defined as the average of all the regional trends of weather over a long time period (National Science Foundation [NSF], 2009). The researchers all over the world have concluded that the Earth's climate is changing as a whole. There are basically two factors that have impacts on the climate, the natural (climatic and environmental variability) and the anthropogenic (infrastructure development and land use land cover change). The causes of past changes are believed to be related to changes in ocean currents, solar activity, volcanic eruptions, and other natural factors (ISDR, 2008). But in recent times, human activities have accelerated this rate of climate change (IPCC, 2007; Sperling & Szekely, 2005; ISDR, 2008). As the developmental activities increase, the amount of emission of greenhouse gasses and aerosols increases, which, in turn, leads to global warming and snow melting, thus increasing the sea level and the frequency and intensity of cyclones, floods, droughts, and many other disasters (IPCC, 2001).

For a state like Uttarakhand, which is located in the seismically active Himalayan region and in the vicinity of plate boundaries, estimation of seismic hazards and the preparation of a zoning map are an urgent necessity. This paper aims to focus on this hazard.

In total, 32 potential seismo‐tectonic source zones were identified in a very wide area in and around the state, on the basis of seismicity and tectonics, and the longer ones were segmented. The maximum magnitude that each seismo‐tectonic source zone can support was then estimated. The seismic hazard due to each seismo‐tectonic source zone was assessed at 180 sites, in terms of peak ground acceleration (PGA).

The maximum PGA at each site varied between 0.06g and 0.50g. The seismic hazard was highest around the main central thrust and the main boundary thrust, and five other thrusts between these two thrusts. This assessment was adapted to make a seismic zoning map of Uttarakhand, with five distinct zones.

If seismo‐tectonic source zones from the contiguous regions of Nepal and Tibet were included as part of this assessment, then a higher hazard would be expected in Uttarakhand.

Threat perceptions of a potential earthquake disaster can be assessed in this zoning map. Disaster mitigation strategies will vary geographically, with priorities defined by the zoning map presented here. The methodology evolved has the potential to be extended to other vulnerable states in the Himalayan arc.

The seismic hazard assessed has been adapted to formulate a seismic zoning map of Uttarakhand.

Seismic isolation, as an effective risk mitigation strategy of building/bridge structures, is incorporated into AP1000 nuclear power plants (NPPs) to alleviate the seismic damage that may occur to traditional structures of NPPs during their service. This is to promote the passive safety concept in the structural design of AP1000 NPPs against earthquakes.

In conjunction with seismic isolation, tuned-mass-damping (TMD) is integrated into the seismic resistance system of AP1000 NPPs to satisfy the multi-functional purposes. The proposed base-isolation-tuned-mass-damper (BIS-TMD) is studied by comparing the seismic performance of NPPs with four different design configurations (i.e. without BIS, BIS, BIS-TMD and TMD) with the design parameters of the TMD subsystem optimized.

Such a new seismic protection system (BIS-TMD) is proved to be promising because the advantages of BIS and TMD can be fully used. The benefits of the new structure include effective energy dissipation (i.e. wide vibration absorption band and a stable damping effect), which results in the high performance of NPPs subject to earthquakes with various intensity levels and spectra features.

Parametric studies are performed to demonstrate the seismic robustness (e.g. consistent performance against the changing mass of the water in the gravity liquid tank and mechanical properties) which further ensures that seismic safety requirements of NPPs can be satisfied through the use of BIS-TMD.

The purpose of this paper is to show how simulation of the flow of particulates and fluids using discrete element modelling (DEM) and smoothed particle dynamics (SPH) particle methods, offer opportunities for better understanding the dynamics of flow processes.

DEM and SPH methods are demonstrated in a broad range of computationally‐demanding applications including comminution, biomedical, geophysical extreme flow events (risk/disaster modelling), eating of food by humans and elite water‐based sports.

DEM is ideally suited to predicting industrial and geophysical applications where collisions between particles are the dominant physics. SPH is highly suited to multi‐physics fluid flow applications in industrial, biophysical and geophysical applications. The advantages and disadvantages of these particle methods are discussed.

Research results are limited by the numerical resolution that can currently be afforded.

The paper demonstrates the use of particle‐based computational methods in a series of high value applications. Enterprises that share interests in these applications will benefit in their product and service development by adopting these methods.

The ability to model disasters provides governments and companies with the opportunity and obligation to use these to render knowable disasters which were previously considered unknowable. The ability to predict the breakdown of food during eating opens up opportunities for the design of superior performing foods with lower salt, sugar and fat that can directly contribute to improved health outcomes and can influence government food regulatory policy.

The paper extends the scale and range of modelling of particle methods for demanding leading‐edge problems, of practical interest in engineering and applied sciences.

Consideration of the fast‐growing number of food hygiene prosecutions up and down the country, almost all of them of a most serious nature, shows that it is the food preparing room, the kitchen, which is indeed the hub of the matter. Most of the charges result from its condition and the practices carried on within its walls, all‐too‐often enclosing a cramped space, ill‐equipped and difficult to keep clean. Its state in many prosecutions clearly contrasts badly with the soft lights and alluring elegance of the dining rooms in hotels and catering establishments. Yet, who would say that the kitchen is not the most important room in the home, in the hotel and every food‐preparing place? It has been so from time immemorial. House design has suffered severely with the need to cut building costs and the kitchen has suffered most; in small houses, it seems little more than a cupboard, a box‐room, an alcove. Is it surprising, then, that age‐old kitchen arts have degenerated? In the farmhouse, the country homes of the affluent, the “downstairs” of the town house, the kitchen was among the largest rooms in the house, as befitted all the activity that went on there. In the USA, the modern, comfortable home even of relatively humble folk the kitchen is phenomenally large; room for everything and everyone.