Effect of S-2304 wire-mesh angle in hemp/flax composite on mechanical and twist drilling surface response analysis

Natural fiber-based composite materials have found wide applications in Automotive, Aerospace, and Marine Industries. The current study presents the composite preparation, mechanical characterization, and machining behavior of hybrid composite. The fabricated hybrid composite consists of natural fibers (hemp and flax), resin (epoxy and hardener), and S-2304 wire mesh of different orientations (45° and 90°). The mechanical characterization was performed through tensile, flexural, impact, and hardness with ASTM samples. The FRW45 hybrid composite had shown an excellent tensile strength of 43 MPa and 31.57% higher than that of FRW90. Moreover, the FRW45 (82 MPa) flexural strength has shown better results than the HRW45 (76 MPa) composite. The machining performance was studied by drilling experiments, designed by the central composite design (CCD) to study the significant input parameters such as type of composite, speed, and feed rate. The obtained results revealed that torque reduces with the enhancement in feed rate for all types of composites. It was also noticed that at 500 rpm spindle speed, the delamination factor was comparatively 35.03% lower in HRW45 and 58% in HRW90 compared to HR composite. The fiber fracture voids and delamination failures were observed through fractography analysis.

Surface-Response Analysis for the Optimization of a Carbon Dioxide Absorption Process Using [hmim][Tf2N]

The [hmim][Tf2N] ionic liquid is considered in this work to develop a model in Aspen Plus® capturing carbon dioxide from shifted flue gas through physical absorption. Ionic liquids are innovative and promising green solvents for the capture of carbon dioxide. As an important aspect of this research, optimization is carried out for the carbon capture system through a central composite design: simulation and statistical analysis are combined together. This leads to important results such as the identification of significant factors and their combinations. Surface plots and mathematical models are developed for capital costs, operating costs and removal of carbon dioxide. These models can be used to find optimal operating conditions maximizing the amount of captured carbon dioxide and minimizing total costs: the percentage of carbon dioxide removal is 93.7%, operating costs are 0.66 million €/tonCO2 captured (due to the high costs of ionic liquid), and capital costs are 52.2 €/tonCO2 captured.

Utilization of the co-product of jaboticaba (Myrciaria jaboticaba Berg.) for pectin extraction

Pectin is a polysaccharide that can be applied to various food industry products to modify the viscosity of food. The objective of this work was to optimize the extraction of pectin of jabuticaba peel by modificating the yield, galacturonic acid content (AUA), esterification content (DE), pectin content (P), and neutral sugars (N). The experiment was performed using the technique of factorial planning of complete experiments and surface response analysis. The extraction can be reported through factorial planning with coefficients of determination (R²) of 0.92, 0.91, 0.89, 0.88 and 0.90 for the yield extraction, AUA, DE, P, and N, respectively. The content of AUA ranged from 22.82 to 65.35%, the DE varied from 26.72 to 77.50%, the percentage of P found in the extraction 25.50 to 66.12%. The best performance was verified utilizing the following parameters: extraction time less than 75 min, temperature of 70°C, and citric acid concentration of 0.75 mol.L-1.

Characterization and optimization of production process of alcoholic fermentation of pineapple

Fruits are natural sources of vitamins, minerals, carbohydrates and other nutrients. Tropical fruits are consumed and appreciated all over the world due to the taste and flavour. This work aims to evaluate the physicochemical composition of fermented pineapple beverages, study associated fermentation kinetics and optimize fermentation conditions through the use of multiple linear regression and surface response analysis. Pineapple juice was characterized physiochemically using measures of soluble solids (brix), acidity, density and pH. It was determined that a fermentation temperature of 25 °C, pH between 3.0 and 4.0, and inoculum quantity of 4–5 g·L-1 resulted in a high-quality fermented beverage with 8.1% (v/v) ethanol content. A kinetic study was performed on the alcoholic fermentation process, monitoring the following variables: Brix, acidity, density, and alcohol content. The results showed that higher concentrations of yeast results in higher productivity and was possible to optimize the processes to maximize the results. This process is technically viable and can yield a value-added product that can generate revenue as well as other significant economic benefits for the beverage market.

Optimization of Furfural Production from Xylose by RSM Using Chromium Sulfate as Catalyst

Optimization of chromium sulfate catalyzed conversion conditions of xylose into furfural was studied by response surfacemethodology (RSM). A central composite design (CCD) was used to determine the effects of independent variables, including temperature (120-160°C), time (30-150min), catalyst loading (1-5mmol) and moles of xylose (2.5-12.5mmol) on furfural yield, xylose conversion and solid residue. The surface response analysis revealed that temperature, time, catalyst loading and moles of xylose had a strong influence on the furfural yield, whereas moles of xylose was found to be notsignificant for xylose conversion. The solid residue was affected by temperature, time and moles of xylose. The maximumpredicted furfural yield was 45.07% at temperature of 150°C, time of 12min, catalyst loading of 2 mmol and moles of xylose of 10mmol. Under this condition, xylose conversion could be reached 100%.