Performances of hybrid Natural Fiber-Reinforced Composites (NFRCs) from E-glass, Nacha (Hibiscus macranthus Hochst. Ex-A. Rich.), and Sisal (Agave sisalana) fibers are investigated for wind turbine blades applications. The process of composite manufacturing was getting started with harvesting and extracting the fibers from undesired constituents. To improve the interfacial interaction between fibers, it was further treated with 5% of NaOH and remnants removal. The experiment was performed based on the Taguchi method, specifically with L₁₆ orthogonal array. Four levels of a natural fiber weight ratio (i.e. 5%, 10%, 15 %, and 20%) were considered during the composite preparations process while the weight of glass fiber was maintained at 5% and 10%. The composites are manufactured using the hand lay-up method, and the test specimens are as per American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM) standards. Then, tensile, compressive, and flexural tests were carried out using a universal testing machine (UTM). Analysis of variance (ANOVA) was employed to determine the factors which affect the experimental responses. Hence, in the main effect, it was confirmed that Nacha fiber (%wt of N) significantly contributes to tensile, compressive, and flexural strength at a 95% level of confidence. Furthermore, the optimal fiber compositions of composites are determined based on a higher signal-to-noise ratio (S/N) for the corresponding strengths.

In this article, a modified state-based peridynamic (PD) method is proposed to solve transient heat conduction problems in functionally gradient materials (FGMs) with extending insulated cracks. The PD formulation of transient heat conduction has been derived by using the time integration through the forward difference technique. Numerical simulations have been performed to verify the accuracy and effectiveness of the proposed method. The analytical solution and the finite element method results are used for comparison. In this work, the material properties of functionally graded materials are assumed to vary exponentially in z-direction. Our PD results show good agreement with analytical solutions and results from the finite element method. Hence the proposed PD method is suitable to deal with the transient heat conduction problem in FGMs with extending insulated cracks.

A work on the analysis of five kinetic models for predicting methane yield is presented. The selected five common models for predicting methane yield include Gompertz, logistic, first-order, Richards and transfert models. Anaerobic digestion of orange and banana peels was simulated using the selected models. A comparative analysis of the models was carried out to determine the best-fit model. When predicting the methane yield of banana peels, all models reached a maximum of 99.23% and the model which was most accurate was the Gompertz model with 76% cumulative deviation and the least accurate model was the transfert model with 274.7% cumulative deviation. The prediction of methane yield on orange peels was 99.49% accurate for all models having the most accurate model being the Gompertz and first-order kinetic model with a cumulative deviation of 20.67% and the least accurate model being the transfert model with a cumulative deviation of 112%. This work presents the simulation considerations and application for each model.

The study of heat conduction phenomena using peridynamic (PD) theory has a paramount significance on the development of computational heat transfer. This is because PD theory has got an interesting feature to deal with the inherent nonlocal nature of heat transfer processes. Since the revolutionary work on PD theory by Silling (2000), extensive investigations have been devoted to PD theory. This paper provides a survey on the recent developments of PD theory mainly focusing on diffusion based peridynamic (PD) formulation. Both the bond-based and state-based PD formulations are revisited, and numerical examples of two-dimensional problems are presented.