Establishing erosion susceptibility: analytical hierarchical process and traditional approaches

This study evaluated alternatives for producing erosion susceptibility maps, considering different weight combinations for an environment's attributes, according to four different points of views. The attributes considered were landform, steepness, soils, rocks and land occupation. Considered alternatives were: (1) equal weights, more traditional approach, (2) different weights, according to a previous study in the area, (3) different weights, based on other works in the literature, and (4) different weights based on the analytical hierarchical process. The area studied included the Prosa Basin located in Campo Grande-Mato Grosso do Sul State, Brazil. The results showed that the assessed alternatives can be used together or in different stages of studies aiming at urban planning and decision-making on the interventions to be applied.

Reformulation and a Lagrangian heuristic for lot sizing problem on parallel machines

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (FAPESP)

Multikink solutions and deformed defects

Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (CNPq)

Nonlinear formulation based on FEM, Mazars damage criterion and Fick's law applied to failure assessment of reinforced concrete structures subjected to chloride ingress and reinforcements corrosion

Structural durability is an important design criterion, which must be assessed for every type of structure. In this regard, especial attention must be addressed to the durability of reinforced concrete (RC) structures. When RC structures are located in aggressive environments, its durability is strongly reduced by physical/chemical/mechanical processes that trigger the corrosion of reinforcements. Among these processes, the diffusion of chlorides is recognized as one of major responsible of corrosion phenomenon start. To accurate modelling the corrosion of reinforcements and to assess the durability of RC structures, a mechanical model that accounts realistically for both concrete and steel mechanical behaviour must be considered. In this context, this study presents a numerical nonlinear formulation based on the finite element method applied to structural analysis of RC structures subjected to chloride penetration and reinforcements corrosion. The physical nonlinearity of concrete is described by Mazars damage model whereas for reinforcements elastoplastic criteria are adopted. The steel loss along time due to corrosion is modelled using an empirical approach presented in literature and the chloride concentration growth along structural cover is represented by Fick's law. The proposed model is applied to analysis of bended structures. The results obtained by the proposed numerical approach are compared to responses available in literature in order to illustrate the evolution of structural resistant load after corrosion start. (C) 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Agricultural production and sustainable development in a Brazilian region (Southwest, Sao Paulo State): motivations and barriers to adopting sustainable and ecologically friendly practices

The objective of this study is to identify the adoption level of practices associated with more sustainable agriculture and environmentally friendly practices. Additionally, the motivations for and barriers to the adoption of these practices by farmers are investigated. Data were collected through closed questionnaires taken by a random sample of farmers in the Southwest, Sao Paulo, Brazil, during the second half of 2013. Overall, sustainable agricultural practices recommended in the literature and analysed in this study are being not fully adopted by farmers of the studied area. The results showed that financial motivation is associated with farmers adopting new, more sustainable technology, whereas the lack of information on and lack of technical support for these technologies are significant barriers. Other results, research implications, limitations and suggestions for future research are presented.