Technology & Engineering - General

The Environmental Noise Directive (END) requires that a five-year updating of noise maps is carried out to check and report on the changes that have occurred during the reference period. The updating process is usually achieved using a standardized approach consisting of collecting and...

This book is a compilation of works covering applied mathematical methods and their applications in complex engineering problems. The methods covered in this book include modeling and simulation, computation, analysis, control, optimization, data science, and machine learning. The engineering application topics include but are...

The recovery of solid wastes for the preparation of innovative composite materials not only represents an economic advantage, but also offers an ecological opportunity for the utilization of by-products which would otherwise be landfilled. Specifically, the reuse and recycling of waste lead to important...

The plastic forming of metallic materials is the most efficient and an important manufacturing technology in today's industry. Lightweight materials, such as titanium alloys, aluminum alloys, and ultra-high-strength steels, are used extensively in the automotive, aerospace, transportation, and construction industries, leading to increased demand...

Based on five Special Issues in Coatings, this e-book contains a series of 15 articles demonstrating actual perspectives and new trends in advanced coatings in buildings. Innovative materials and multiperformance solutions provide a basis, contributing also to the better protection of buildings' surfaces during...

The direct conversion of sunlight into electricity (photovoltaic or PV for short) is evolving rapidly, and is a technology becoming a mainstream clean energy production method. However, to compete with conventional energy production methods using fossil fuels, the conversion efficiency needs to be increased,...

The open access journal Micromachines invites manuscript submissions for the Special Issue "Silicon Photonics Bloom". The past two decades have witnessed a tremendous growth of silicon photonics. Lab-scale research on simple passive component designs is now being expanded by on-chip hybrid systems architectures. With...

The Special Issue "Assessment and Nonlinear Modeling of Wave, Tidal, and Wind Energy Converters and Turbines" contributes original research to stimulate the continuing progress of the offshore renewable energy (ORE) field, with a focus on state-of-the-art numerical approaches developed for the design and analysis...

Monitoring oceans and coastal areas has a fundamental social impact, and this scenario is made still more challenging with the present and future issues related to climate change. In this context, radar systems have gained increasing interest, since they are remote sensing devices capable...

Significant progress has been made in nanophotonics and the use of nanostructured materials for optoelectronic devices, including light-emitting diodes (LEDs) and laser diodes, which have recently attracted considerable attention due to their unique geometry. Nanostructures in small dimensions, comprising nanowires, nanotubes, and nanoparticles, etc,...

Symmetry and complexity are studied by a selection of outstanding papers ranging from pure Mathematics and Physics to Computer Science and Engineering applications. In this Special Issue, the authors give a short but intensive description of the many applications of the basic structure of...

PV power plant integration into the grid has been a relevant topic of interest over the last years. Policies supported by governments, technology maturity, favorable incentives, and cost decreasing have significantly promoted the integration of PV power plants into power systems at the transmission...

Symmetry and complexity are the focus of a selection of outstanding papers, ranging from pure Mathematics and Physics to Computer Science and Engineering applications. This collection is based around fundamental problems arising from different fields, but all of them have the same task, i.e....

Plastic anisotropy is a common property of many metallic materials. This property affects the analysis and design of structures and metal forming processes. The present edited collection of papers concerns analytic and numerical methods of structural and metal forming analysis and design using material...

It is difficult to imagine a modern society without rotating electric machines. Their use has been increasing not only in the traditional fields of application but also in more contemporary fields, including renewable energy conversion systems, electric aircraft, aerospace, electric vehicles, unmanned propulsion systems,...

Coastal environments are dynamic ecosystems, where erosion is influenced by meteorological/climatic, geological, biological, and anthropic factors. Erosion has worrying effects on the environment, infrastructure, lifelines, and buildings. Furthermore, climate change is exacerbating an already fragile situation. We are witnessing a high-risk situation and are...

The analysis of power systems under various conditions represents one of the most important and complex tasks in electrical power engineering. Studies in this area are necessary to ensure that the reliability, efficiency, and stability of the power system is not adversely affected. This...

The impacts of climate change on water resource management, as well as increasingly severe natural disasters over the last decades, have caught global attention. Reliable and accurate hydrological forecasts are essential for efficient water resource management and the mitigation of natural disasters. While the...

Laser shock processing (LSP) is a continuously developing effective technology used to improve surface and mechanical properties for metallic alloys. LSP is in direct competition with other established technologies, such as shot peening, both in preventive manufacturing treatments and maintenance/repair operations. The level of...

Climate change is increasing due to the anthropogenic emission of greenhouse gases. The majority of these are due to the production and consumption of energy. According to the latest estimates, global energy demand could triple by 2050, and by then, 70% of the world's...

The paradigm in the design of all human activity that requires energy for its development must change from the past. We must change the processes of product manufacturing and functional services. This is necessary in order to mitigate the ecological footprint of man on...

The use of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) plays an important role in supporting human activities. Man is concentrating more and more on intellectual work, and trying to automate practical activities as much as possible in order to increase their efficiency. In this regard, the...

This book presents a sample of theoretical and practical advances in symmetry in multidisciplinary engineering applications. It covers several applications, such as mechanical analysis of tunnel lining, prediction methods for the ring damper used in gears, calibration methods for manipulators, design methods for wheel...

This Special Issue of Energies has emerged as a result of the 1st International Conference on Nanofluids (https: //icnf2019.com/), which was organized under the auspices of Nanouptake COST Action (Overcoming Barriers to Nanofluids Market Uptake, http: //www.nanouptake.eu/) in Castelló (Spain), in June 2019. The...

Sonic/phononic crystals termed acoustic/sonic band gap media are elastic analogues of photonic crystals and have also recently received renewed attention in many acoustic applications. Photonic crystals have a periodic dielectric modulation with a spatial scale on the order of the optical wavelength. The design...

Electric power transmission relies on AC and DC grids. The extensive integration of conventional and nonconventional energy sources and power converters into power grids has resulted in a demand for high voltage (HV), extra-high voltage (EHV), and ultra-high voltage (UHV) AC/DC transmission grids in...

This Special Issue offers a little taste of the immense variety of an intrinsically vast and interdisciplinary subject, namely, the applications of engineering to surgery. Some of these have been successfully applied or are still under development, while we have been offered a preview...

The study of the acoustic and vibrational characteristics of musical instruments in terms of their mechanical behavior, sound emission, and characteristics started thousands of years ago, and among the physicists and mathematicians that addressed this matter, we should at least recognize Leonardo da Vinci,...

Functional polymers show unique physical and chemical properties, which can manifest as dynamic responses to external stimuli such as radiation, temperature, chemical reaction, external force, and magnetic and electric fields. Recent advances in the fabrication techniques have enabled different types of polymer systems to...

Energy storage is one of the most important enablers for the transformation to a sustainable energy supply with greater mobility. For vehicles, but also for many stationary applications, the batteries used for energy storage are very flexible but also have a rather limited lifetime...

Flow-based optimization of products and devices is an immature field compared to the corresponding topology optimization based on solid mechanics. However, it is an essential part of component development with both internal and/or external flow.The aim of this book is two-fold: (i) to provide...

The pioneering work by Nobel Prize Laureates Heeger, MacDiarmid, and Shirakawa marked the birth of conductive polymers, a new family of revolutionary organic materials at the boundaries between classic plastics, metals, and semiconductors. Since then, a host of chemically diverse conducting polymeric structures has...

The use of concentrated solar technologies has grown significantly worldwide in the last decade but the research and development of this renewable energy technology still needs to be advanced to guarantee its competitiveness with other energy sources. Challenges remain with reducing costs, optimizing the...

This Special Issue "Recent Advances and Future Trends in Pavement Engineering" was proposed and organized to present recent developments in the field of innovative pavement materials and engineering. The 12 articles and state-of-the-art reviews highlighted in this editorial are related to different aspects of...

Biomass is the only renewable carbon source that can be converted into high value-added carbon products. This book presents a collection of studies on the conversion of catalytic biomass to renewable biofuels and biomaterials by chemical conversion, co-combustion technology, and biological conversion technology. The...

This book is a comprehensive set of articles reflecting on the application of symbolic and/or numerical computation in a range of scientific areas within the fields of engineering and science. These articles constitute extended versions of communications presented at the 4th International Conference on...

The development of porous materials has attracted the attention of the research community for years. Porosity characteristics have specific impacts on the material properties and materials that are applied in many areas, such as pollutant removal, CO2 capture, energy storage, catalytic oxidation and reduction...

Marine propulsors are key components of the many thousands of ships and boats operating in oceans, lakes, and rivers around the world. The performance of propulsors are important for the environmental impact of ships, underwater noise impact on aquatic fauna, and crew and passenger...

Since the great success of graphene, atomically thin-layered nanomaterials, called two dimensional (2D) materials, have attracted tremendous attention due to their extraordinary physical properties. Specifically, van der Waals heterostructured architectures based on a few 2D materials, named atomic-scale Lego, have been proposed as unprecedented...

Graphene is probably the most fascinating material discovered in this century. A group of 2D materials can be called graphene derivatives, and these have attracted tremendous interest. This includes materials that are one or a few atoms thick. They have outstanding optical/electrical properties, and,...

The reduction of greenhouse gas emissions-particularly from fossil fuel-powered vehicles and airplanes by means of weight savings and leaner fuel consumption, helps to restrain environmental impacts. In general, for a variety of industries, and specifically in the case of transport, where both weight savings...

Metal-based composites represent a unique way of tailoring the properties of metals, through the selection of type, size, and amount of reinforcement. In this way, the properties of metallic matrices can be adjusted depending on end applications. In view of the dynamic capabilities they...

The Internet of Things (IoT) and related technologies have the promise of realizing pervasive and smart applications which, in turn, have the potential of improving the quality of life of people living in a connected world. According to the IoT vision, all things can...

This Special Issue comprises selected papers from the proceedings of the 5th International Electronic Conference on Sensors and Applications, held on 15-30 November 2018, on sciforum.net, an online platform for hosting scholarly e-conferences and discussion groups. In this 5th edition of the electronic conference,...

This book disseminates the latest research achievements, findings, and ideas in the robotics field, with particular attention to the Italian scenario. Book coverage includes topics that are related to the theory, design, practice, and applications of robots, such as robot design and kinematics, dynamics...

This Special Issue of Metals was dedicated to recent advances in low-carbon and stainless steels. Although these types of steels are not new, they are still receiving considerable attention from both research and industry sectors due to their wide range of applications and their...

The 5th IEEE International Conference on Applied System Innovation 2019 (IEEE ICASI 2019, https: //2019.icasi-conf.net/), which was held in Fukuoka, Japan, on 11-15 April, 2019, provided a unified communication platform for a wide range of topics. This Special Issue entitled "Selected Papers from IEEE...

This Special Issue is devoted to recent developments in instrumentation and measurement techniques applied to the marine field. The sea is the medium that has allowed people to travel from one continent to another using vessels, even today despite the use of aircraft. It...

The mechanics of fracture and fatigue have produced a huge body of research work in relation to applications to metal materials and structures. However, a variety of non-metallic materials (e.g., concrete and cementitious composites, rocks, glass, ceramics, bituminous mixtures, composites, polymers, rubber and soft...

"skin-core-skin" structure; flow-induced crystallization; multiscale simulation; crystal morphology; additive manufacturing; fused filament fabrication; material extrusion; 3D-printing; highly-filled polymers; metals and ceramics; cellulose insulation pressboard; magnetron sputtering; polytetrafluoroethylene; nano structure; breakdown; hydrophobicity; replication; microfeature; nanofeature; injection molding; polylactic acid; mold temperature; epoxy; natural fiber composites;...