• Applied Chemistry for Engineering
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• v.25 no.4
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• pp.401-408
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• 2014

In membrane bio-reactor (MBR), the aeration control is one of the important independent variables to decrease fouling and to save energy with shear stress change on the membrane surface. The paper was carried out for numerical simulation of 3-dimensional fluid flow phenomena of the cylindrical bioreactor with submerged flat membranes equipped in the center and supplied the air from the bottom by using the COMSOL program. The viscosity and temperature of solution were assumed to be constant, and the specific air demand based on permeate volume ($SAD_p$) defined as scouring air per permeate rates was used as a variable. The calculated CFD velocities were compared with those of the velocity meter measurement and video image analysis, respectively. The results were good agreement each other within 11% error. For fluid flow in the reactor the liquid velocity increased rapidly between the air diffuser and membrane module, but the velocity decreased during flowing of the membrane module. Also, the velocity increased as it was near from the reactor wall to the central axis. The calculated shear stress on the membrane surface showed the highest value at the center part of the module bottom side and increased as aeration rate increased. Especially, the wall shear stress increased dramatically as the aeration rate increased from 0.15 to 0.25 L/min.

• Korean Chemical Engineering Research
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• v.48 no.6
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• pp.791-794
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• 2010

This study presents channel design of a CDI stack to achieve high removal efficiency in a large scale by applying parallel flow structure with a concentrated stream. The flow pattern in the stack was simulated by COMSOL Multiphysics program. To prove the salt removal performance, a unit cell and 20 cell stacks were tested at a flow rate condition of 18 ml/min and 360 ml/min, respectively. The removal efficiencies of the unit cell and the 20 cell stacks were obtained as 70.8 % and 75.6 %, respectively, with 100 mg/L sodium chloride solution. During the operation of cell test, water pressures of unit cell and 20 cell pair stack maintained in the ranges of 1.1 psi and 1.3~1.5 psi, respectively. It was demonstrated that the parallel cell structure with two concentrated streams can be employed in a large scale CDI for salt removal.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Gas
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• v.21 no.2
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• pp.41-49
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• 2017

Recently, as the number of facilities using chemicals is increasing, the amount of handling is rapidly increasing. However, chemical spills are occurring steadily, and if large quantities of chemicals are leaked in time, they are likely to cause major damage. These industrial complexes use information obtained from a number of sensors to detect and monitor leaking areas, and are used in industrial fields by applying existing fixed sensors to robots and drones. Therefore, it is necessary to propose a sensor placement method at the interface for rapid detection and response based on various leaking scenarios reflecting leaking conditions and environmental conditions of the chemical handling process. In this study, COMSOL was used to analyze the actual accident scenarios by applying the medium parameter to the case of chemical leaks. Based on the accident scenarios, the objective function is selected so that the velocity of each robot is calculated by attaching importance to each item of sensor detection probability, sensing time and sensing scenario number. We also confirmed the feasibility of this method of reliability analysis for unexpected leak accidents. Based on the above results, it is expected that it will be helpful to trace back the leakage source based on the concentration data of the portable sensor to be applied later.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.527-535
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• 2017

Heat management is one of the most critical issues in Polymer Electrolyte Membrane Fuel Cells (PEMFCs) installed inside the fuel cell power pack of a fuel cell battery hybrid UPS. If the heat generated by the chemical reaction in the fuel cell is not rapidly removed, the durability and performance of the fuel cell may be affected, which may shorten its lifetime. Therefore, the objective of this study is to select and propose a proper cooling method for the fuel cells used in the fuel cell power pack of a UPS. In order to find the most appropriate cooling method, the various design factors affecting the cooling performance were studied. The numerical analysis was performed by a commercial program, i.e., COMSOL Multiphysics. Firstly, the surface temperature of the 1 kW class fuel cell stack with the cooling fans placed at the top was compared with the one with the cooling fans placed at the bottom. Various rotation speeds of the cooling fan, viz. 2,500, 3,000, 3,500, and 4,000 RPM, were tested to determine the proper cooling fan speed. In addition, the influence of the inhaled air flow rate was investigated by changing the porous area of the grille, which is the entrance of the air flowing from the outside to the inside of the power pack. As a result, it was found that for the operating conditions of the 1 kW class PEMFC to be acceptable, the cooling fan was required to have a minimum rotating speed of 3500 RPM to maintain the fuel cell surface temperature within an acceptable range. The results of this study can be effectively applied to the development of thermal management technology for the fuel cells inside the fuel cell power pack of a UPS.

• Geophysics and Geophysical Exploration
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.1-12
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• 2020

In the development of geodynamic structures such as subduction and rift zones, a weakening mechanism is essential for localized weak zone formation in the lithosphere. Shear heating, a weakening mechanism, generates short-wavelength temperature elevation in the lithosphere; the increased temperature can reduce lithospheric strength and promote its breakup. A two-dimensional elastoplastic extensional basin model was used to conduct benchmarking based on previous numerical simulation studies to quantitatively analyze shear heating. The amount of shear heating was investigated by controlling the yield strength, extensional velocity, and strain- and temperature-dependent weakening. In the absence of the weakening mechanism, the higher yield strength and extensional velocity led to more vigorous shear heating. The reference model with a 100-MPa yield strength and 2-cm/year extension showed a temperature increase of ~ 50 K when the bulk extension was 20 km (i.e., 0.025 strain). However, in the yield-strength weakening mechanism, depending on the plastic strain and temperature, more efficient weakening induced stronger shear heating, which indicates positive feedback between the weakening mechanism and the shear heating. The rate of shear heating rapidly increased at the initial stage of deformation, and the rate decreased by 80% as the lithosphere weakened. This suggests that shear heating with the weakening mechanism can significantly influence the strength of relatively undamaged lithosphere.

• Journal of Nuclear Fuel Cycle and Waste Technology(JNFCWT)
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• v.17 no.3
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• pp.313-319
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• 2019

The A-KRS (Advanced Korean Reference Disposal System) is the disposal concept for pyroprocessed waste, which has been developed by the Korea Atomic Energy Research Institute. In this disposal concept, the amount of high-level radioactive waste is minimized using pyrochemical process, called pyroprocessing. The produced pyroprocessed waste is then solidified in the form of monazite ceramic. The final product of ceramic wastes will be disposed of in a deep geological repository. By the way, the decay heat is generated due to the radioactive decay of fission products and raises the temperature of buffer materials in the near field of radioactive waste repository. However, the buffer temperature must be kept below $100^{\circ}C$ according to the safety regulation. Usually, the temperature can be controlled by variation of the canister interdistance. However, KAERI has modelled thermal analysis under the boundary condition, where the waste canisters are in direct contact with each other. Therefore, a reliable temperature analysis in the disposal system may fail because of unknown thermal resistence values caused by the spatial gap between waste canisters. In the present work, we have performed thermal analyses considering the gap between heating elements and canisters at the beginning of canister loading into the radioactive waste repository. All thermal analyses were performed using the COMSOL software package.

• Progress in Superconductivity and Cryogenics
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• v.25 no.4
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• pp.19-23
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• 2023

The Second-generation high-temperature superconducting (HTS) Rare-Earth Barium Copper Oxide (REBCO) wire is a composite laminate having a multi-layer structure (8 or more layers). HTS wires will undergo multiple loads including the bending-tension loads during winding, high current density, and high magnetic fields. In particular, the wires are subjected to bending stress and magnetic field stress because HTS wires are wound around a circular bobbin when making a high-field magnetic. Each of the different laminated wires inevitably exhibits damage and fracture behavior of wire due to stress deformation, mismatches in thermal, physical, electrical, and magnetic properties. Therefore, when manufacturing high-field magnets and other applications, it is necessary to calculate the stress-strain experienced by high-temperature superconducting wire to present stable operating conditions in the product's use environment. In this study, the finite element model (FEM) was used to simulate the strain-stress characteristics of the HTS wire under high current density and magnetic field, and bending loads. In addition, the result of obtaining the neutral axis of the wire and the simulation result was compared with the theoretical calculation value and reviewed. As a result of the simulation using COMSOL Multiphysics, when a current of 100 A was applied to the wire, the current value showed the difference of 10^-9. The stress received by the wire was 501.9 MPa, which showed a theoretically calculated value of 500 MPa and difference of 0.38% between simulation and theoretical method. In addition, the displacement resulted is 30.0012 ㎛, which is very similar to the theoretically calculated value of 30 ㎛. Later, the amount of bending stress by the circular mandrel was received for each layer and the difference with the theoretically obtained the neutral axis result was compared and reviewed. This result will be used as basic data for manufacturing high-field magnets because it can be expanded and analyzed even in the case of wire with magnetic flux pinning.

• The Journal of the Acoustical Society of Korea
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• v.43 no.1
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• pp.39-48
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• 2024

A car horn serves a crucial safety role as a means of communication between drivers and a part that alerts pedestrians in advance. While previous studies have utilized finite element method and electric circuit model to simulate and analyze characteristics of the car horns, there remains a lack of research on design methods of a trumpet horn. This paper presents a design approach that predicts the operating frequency based on the acoustic reactance at the throat of the horn, once the vibrating part is determined. We deal with a horn combining both an exponential horn and a waveguide in the acoustic section, and confirm that the acoustic reactance at the horn throat measured by impedance tube experiment agrees well compared with the numerical result obtained using the finite element method. The resonance frequency of the car horn is predicted using the COMSOL Multiphysics finite element numerical analysis model, and the proposed design method is validated by measuring the operating frequency of the designed horn in a sound pressure experiment. As a result, the resonance measured in a semi-anechoic chamber environment by applying a DC voltage of 12 [V] excluding the holder occurs accurately within a few [Hz] of the design operating frequency. This paper discuss the design method of a trumpet horn from the perspective of the horn's acoustic reactance, and is expected to be useful for designing horn systems.

• Applied Science and Convergence Technology
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• v.24 no.5
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• pp.196-202
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• 2015

Human blood consists of 55% of plasma and 45% of blood cells such as white blood cell (WBC) and red blood cell (RBC). In plasma, there are many kinds of promising biomarkers, which can be used for the diagnosis of various diseases and biological analysis. For diagnostic tools such as a lab-on-a-chip (LOC), blood plasma separation is a fundamental step for accomplishing a high performance in the detection of a disease. Highly efficient separators can increase the sensitivity and selectivity of biosensors and reduce diagnostic time. In order to achieve a higher yield in blood plasma separation, we propose a novel fluid wing structure that is optimized by COMSOL simulations by varying the fluidic channel width and the angle of the bifurcation. The fluid wing structure is inspired by the inertial particle separator system in helicopters where sand particles are prevented from following the air flow to an engine. The structure is ameliorated in order to satisfy biological and fluidic requirements at the micro scale to achieve high plasma yield and separation efficiency. In this study, we fabricated the fluid wing structure for the efficient microfluidic blood plasma separation. The high plasma yield of 67% is achieved with a channel width of $20{\mu}m$ in the fabricated fluidic chip and the result was not affected by the angle of the bifurcation.

• Transactions of the Society of Information Storage Systems
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• v.8 no.2
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• pp.39-43
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• 2012

In spite of many advantages, the practical application of the thin film solar cell is restricted due to its low efficiency compared with the bulk type solar cells. This study intends to adopt the surface plasmon effect using nano particles to solve the low efficiency problem in thin film solar cells. By inserting Ag nano-particles in the absorbing layer of a thin film solar cell, the poynting vector value of the absorbing layer is increased due to the strong energy field. Increasing the value may give thin film solar cells chance to absorb more energy from the incident beam so that the efficiency of the thin film solar cell can be improved. In this work, we have designed the optimal shape of Ag nano-particle in the absorbing laser of a basic type thin film solar cell using the finite element analysis commercial package COMSOL. Design parameters are set to the particle diameter and the distance between each Ag nano-particle and by changing those parameters using the full factorial design variable set-up, we can determine optimal design of Ag nano-particles for maximizing the poynting vector value in the absorbing layer.