The role of land use patterns in earthquake resilience: a case study of the Ahvaz Manba Ab neighborhood

Natural Hazards - Urban resilience to natural disasters has constantly been a challenge to sustainable development in human societies. Since Iran is always exposed to natural disasters such as...     

The efficiency of Penicillium commune for bioremoval of industrial oil

Among all environmental contaminations, industrial oil is one of the major pollutants of soil, water, and air. There are different chemical, physical, and biological methods to remove all types of oil pollutions. One of the common biological methods is to utilize the microorganisms like yeast, fungi or bacteria. Previous studies concerning the biodegradation of an aromatic compound in industrial waste water by Aspergillus niger have been reported. In this study, we tried to identify an oil-derived microorganism and evaluate its efficacy on self-removal of industrial oil. Firstly, the strain of isolated fungus from various bulks of used oil was defined via colonial identification and DNA sequencing. Secondly, bioremoval activity of defined fungus (Penicillium commune) was evaluated using gas chromatography–mass spectrometry. The optimum conditions in biological elimination of oil including the incubation time, pH level of culture, and amount of reagents were determined. In the best condition, a removal rate of 95.4 % was obtained.     

Experimental investigating on the reflected waves from the caisson-type vertical porous seawalls

The hydrodynamic efficiencies of caisson-type vertical porous seawalls used for protecting coastal areas were calculated in this study. Physical models were developed to compare the wave reflection from vertical plane, semi-porous, and porous seawalls caused by both regular and random waves. Tests were carried out for a wide range of wave heights, wave periods, and different water depths (d=0.165, 0.270 and 0.375 m). The performance regarding the reflected waves from porous and semi-porous seawalls showed improvement when compared with those from the plane seawall. The reflection coefficients of the porous and semi-porous seawalls were calculated as 0.6 and 0.75, respectively, while the coefficient for the fully reflecting plane vertical wall was significantly higher (0.9). It was also observed that the reflection coefficient decreases with increase in wave steepness and relative water depth. In addition, the reduction in the reflection coefficient of porous and semi-porous seawalls, as compared to that of a plane seawall, was observed for both regular and random waves. New equations were also proposed to calculate the reflection coefficient of different types of seawalls with the aid of laboratory experiments. By verifying the developed equations using some other experimental data, it was validated that the equations could be used for practical situations. The results of the present study can be applied to optimize the design of vertical seawalls and for coastal protecting schemes.