The Extended Posterior Circumferential Decompression Technique in the Management of Tubercular Spondylitis with and without Paraplegia

Barani Rathinavelu,Justin Arockiaraj,Venkatesh Krishnan,Rohit Amritanand,Gabriel David Sundararaj 대한척추외과학회 2014 Asian Spine Journal Vol.8 No.6

Study Design: Retrospective clinical series. Purpose: To study the clinical, functional and radiological results of patients with tuberculous spondylitis with and without paraplegia, treated surgically using the “Extended Posterior Circumferential Decompression (EPCD)” technique. Overview of Literature: With the increasing possibility of addressing all three columns by a single approach, posterior and posterolateral approaches are gaining acceptance. A single exposure for cases with neurological deficit and kyphotic deformity requiring circumferential decompression, anterior column reconstruction and posterior instrumentation is helpful. Methods: Forty-one patients with dorsal/dorsolumbar/lumbar tubercular spondylitis who were operated using the EPCD approach between 2006 to 2009 were included. Postoperatively, patients were started on nine-month anti-tuberculous treatment. They were serially followed up to thirty-six months and both clinical measures (including pain, neurological status and ambulatory status) and radiological measures (including kyphotic angle correction, loss of correction and healing status) were used for assessment. Results: Disease-healing with bony fusion (interbody fusion) was seen in 97.5% of cases. Average deformity (kyphosis) correction was 54.6% in dorsal spine and 207.3% in lumbar spine. Corresponding loss of correction was 3.6 degrees in dorsal spine and 1.9 degrees in the lumbar spine. Neurological recovery in Frankel B and C paraplegia was 85.7% and 62.5%, respectively. Conclusions: The EPCD approach permits all the advantages of a single or dual session anterior and posterior surgery, with significant benefits in terms of decreased operative time, reduced hospital stay and better kyphotic angle correction.

Investigation on Polyacrylonitrile/Cellulose Acetate Blends

Barani, Hossein,Bahranmi, Seyad Hajir The Polymer Society of Korea 2007 Macromolecular Research Vol.15 No.7

The molecular interactions of polyacrylonitrile (PAN) and cellulose acetate (CA) were investigated thoroughly via dilute solution viscometry in dimethylformamide (DMF) as a common solvent at $30^{\circ}C$. The intrinsic viscosities and viscometric interaction parameters were experimentally determined for both binary (polymer/dimethylformamide) and ternary (PAN/CA/dimethylformamide) systems. As all investigated PAN/CA ternaries evidenced negative viscometric interaction parameter values $({\Delta}b\;&{\Delta}k<0)$, the existence of repulsive intermolecular interactions was deduced, and PAN/CA blends were assigned as immiscible. Moreover, the results of microscopy photograph analysis indicated that pure PAN film evidences a homophasic structure, and the size of the phase domain increases gradually with increases in CA. In DSC analysis, it was determined that the glass transition temperature of the blend film increased slightly with increases in the CA content of the blend film.

Investigation on Polyacrylonitrile/Cellulose Acetate Blends

Hossein Barani,Seyad Hajir Bahrami 한국고분자학회 2007 Macromolecular Research Vol.15 No.7

Dyeing of Wool Yarn with Aqueous Extract of Opuntia ficus-indica Fruit Containing Betalain Colorant Employing Ascorbic Acid as a Bio-mordant Under Varied Circumstances of Dyeing

Hossein Barani,Farnoosh Rahm 한국섬유공학회 2023 Fibers and polymers Vol.24 No.8

Opuntia ficus-indica well adapts to extreme climate conditions and grows rapidly in low water and poor soil requirement. In this study, the Opuntia ficus-indica fruit was used for natural dyeing of wool yarn. The Opuntia ficus-indica fruit has a reddish-purple color, due to the presence of water-soluble betalain colorants. When using this fruit as a natural dye, it is possible to obtain various color shades, because its color changes depending on the dyeing conditions. However, it is difficult to control the dyeing environment to reproduce the original color of Opuntia ficus-indica fruits. The aim of this study is to examine the effect of various dyeing conditions on the color strength, and color shades of Opuntia ficus-indica fruit. Ascorbic acid as a bio-mordant was applied for enhancing the stability of the betalain colorants. For this purpose, the betalain dye was extracted from Opuntia ficus-indica fruit by an aqueous extraction and used for dyeing wool samples in the presence of ascorbic acid at different dyeing process conditions. The dyed wool samples presented a red, pale red, orange, pale brown, and brown color by varying the applied pH (3, 5.5, and 8) of the dye bath, and dyeing temperature (40, 65, and 90 °C). Applying ascorbic acid as an antioxidant enhanced the color strength (~ 110%), thermal stability (~ 22%), and color fastness values. In addition, the presence of ascorbic acid did not have any significant effect on the tensile properties of the dyed wool yarns.

A New Adaptive-Weighted Fusion Rule for Wavelet based PET/CT Fusion

R. Barani,M. Sumathi 보안공학연구지원센터 2016 International Journal of Signal Processing, Image Vol.9 No.11

In recent years the Wavelet Transform (WT) had an important role in various applications of signal and image processing. In Image Processing, WT is more useful in many domains like image denoising, feature segmentation, compression, restoration, image fusion, etc. In WT based image fusion, initially the source images are decomposed into approximation and detail coefficients and followed by combining the coefficients using the suitable fusion rules. The resultant fused image is reconstructed by applying inverse WT on the combined coefficients. This paper proposes a new adaptive fusion rule for combining the approximation coefficients of CT and PET images. The Excellency of the proposed fusion rule is stamped by measuring the image information metrics, EOG, SD and ENT on the decomposed approximation coefficients. On the other hand, the detail coefficients are combined using several existing fusion rules. The resultant fused images are quantitatively analyzed using the non-reference image quality, image fusion and error metrics. The analysis declares that the newly proposed fusion rule is more suitable for extracting the complementary information from CT and PET images and also produces the fused image which is rich in content with good contrast and sharpness.

Analysis of flow through dam foundation by FEM and ANN models Case study: Shahid Abbaspour Dam

Shahrbanouzadeh, Mehrdad,Barani, Gholam Abbas,Shojaee, Saeed Techno-Press 2015 Geomechanics & engineering Vol.9 No.4

Three-dimensional simulation of flow through dam foundation is performed using finite element (Seep3D model) and artificial neural network (ANN) models. The governing and discretized equation for seepage is obtained using the Galerkin method in heterogeneous and anisotropic porous media. The ANN is a feedforward four layer network employing the sigmoid function as an activator and the back-propagation algorithm for the network learning, using the water level elevations of the upstream and downstream of the dam, as input variables and the piezometric heads as the target outputs. The obtained results are compared with the piezometric data of Shahid Abbaspour's Dam. Both calculated data show a good agreement with available measurements that demonstrate the effectiveness and accuracy of purposed methods.

Assessment of three European fuel performance codes against the SUPERFACT-1 fast reactor irradiation experiment

Luzzi, L.,Barani, T.,Boer, B.,Cognini, L.,Nevo, A. Del,Lainet, M.,Lemehov, S.,Magni, A.,Marelle, V.,Michel, B.,Pizzocri, D.,Schubert, A.,Uffelen, P. Van,Bertolus, M. Korean Nuclear Society 2021 Nuclear Engineering and Technology Vol.53 No.10

The design phase and safety assessment of Generation IV liquid metal-cooled fast reactors calls for the improvement of fuel pin performance codes, in particular the enhancement of their predictive capabilities towards uranium-plutonium mixed oxide fuels and stainless-steel cladding under irradiation in fast reactor environments. To this end, the current capabilities of fuel performance codes must be critically assessed against experimental data from available irradiation experiments. This work is devoted to the assessment of three European fuel performance codes, namely GERMINAL, MACROS and TRANSURANUS, against the irradiation of two fuel pins selected from the SUPERFACT-1 experimental campaign. The pins are characterized by a low enrichment (~ 2 wt.%) of minor actinides (neptunium and americium) in the fuel, and by plutonium content and cladding material in line with design choices envisaged for liquid metal-cooled Generation IV reactor fuels. The predictions of the codes are compared to several experimental measurements, allowing the identification of the current code capabilities in predicting fuel restructuring, cladding deformation, redistribution of actinides and volatile fission products. The integral assessment against experimental data is complemented by a code-to-code benchmark focused on the evolution of quantities of engineering interest over time. The benchmark analysis points out the differences in the code predictions of fuel central temperature, fuel-cladding gap width, cladding outer radius, pin internal pressure and fission gas release and suggests potential modelling development paths towards an improved description of the fuel pin behaviour in fast reactor irradiation conditions.

Assessment of INSPYRE-extended fuel performance codes against the SUPERFACT-1 fast reactor irradiation experiment

L. Luzzi,T. Barani,B. Boer,A. Del Nevo,M. Lainet,S. Lemehov,A. Magni,V. Marelle,B. Michel,D. Pizzocri,A. Schubert,P. Van Uffelen,M. Bertolus 한국원자력학회 2023 Nuclear Engineering and Technology Vol.55 No.3

Design and safety assessment of fuel pins for application in innovative Generation IV fast reactors calls for a dedicated nuclear fuel modelling and for the extension of the fuel performance code capabilities to the envisaged materials and irradiation conditions. In the INSPYRE Project, comprehensive and physicsbased models for the thermal-mechanical properties of UePu mixed-oxide (MOX) fuels and for fission gas behaviour were developed and implemented in the European fuel performance codes GERMINAL, MACROS and TRANSURANUS. As a follow-up to the assessment of the reference code versions (“pre- INSPYRE”, NET 53 (2021) 3367e3378), this work presents the integral validation and benchmark of the code versions extended in INSPYRE (“post-INSPYRE”) against two pins from the SUPERFACT-1 fast reactor irradiation experiment. The post-INSPYRE simulation results are compared to the available integral and local data from post-irradiation examinations, and benchmarked on the evolution during irradiation of quantities of engineering interest (e.g., fuel central temperature, fission gas release). The comparison with the pre-INSPYRE results is reported to evaluate the impact of the novel models on the predicted pin performance. The outcome represents a step forward towards the description of fuel behaviour in fast reactor irradiation conditions, and allows the identification of the main remaining gaps.

Towards a physics-based description of intra-granular helium behaviour in oxide fuel for application in fuel performance codes

Cognini, L.,Cechet, A.,Barani, T.,Pizzocri, D.,Van Uffelen, P.,Luzzi, L. Korean Nuclear Society 2021 Nuclear Engineering and Technology Vol.53 No.2

In this work, we propose a new mechanistic model for the treatment of helium behaviour which includes the description of helium solubility in oxide fuel. The proposed model has been implemented in SCIANTIX and validated against annealing helium release experiments performed on small doped fuel samples. The overall agreement of the new model with the experimental data is satisfactory, and given the mechanistic formulation of the proposed model, it can be continuously and easily improved by directly including additional phenomena as related experimental data become available.

A new burn-up module for application in fuel performance calculations targeting the helium production rate in (U,Pu)O₂ for fast reactors

Cechet, A.,Altieri, S.,Barani, T.,Cognini, L.,Lorenzi, S.,Magni, A.,Pizzocri, D.,Luzzi, L. Korean Nuclear Society 2021 Nuclear Engineering and Technology Vol.53 No.6

In light of the importance of helium production in influencing the behaviour of fast reactor fuels, in this work we present a burn-up module with the objective to calculate the production of helium in both in-pile and out-of-pile conditions tracking the evolution of 23 alpha-decaying actinides. This burn-up module relies on average microscopic cross-section look-up tables generated via SERPENT high-fidelity calculations and involves the solution of the system of Bateman equations for the selected set of actinide nuclides. The results of the burn-up module are verified in terms of evolution of actinide and helium concentrations by comparing them with the high-fidelity ones from SERPENT, considering two representative test cases of (U,Pu)O₂ fuel in fast reactor conditions. In addition, a code-to-code comparison is made with the independent state-of-the-art module TUBRNP (implemented in the TRANSURANUS fuel performance code) for the same test cases. The herein presented burn-up module is available in the SCIANTIX code, designed for coupling with fuel performance codes.