Crack Width Evaluation of Cracked Mortar Specimen Using Gas Diffusion Characteristics.

Several methods have been proposed currently for evaluating the crack width of a mortar specimen. Among these, the water permeability test is widely used to estimate crack width because water permeability is directly related to the average crack width of a specimen through which water passes. However, the viscosity of water makes precise crack width measurement challenging. The possible inflow (outflow) of foreign (healing) substances could affect the test results. To circumvent this limitation, this study proposes a gas diffusion test using oxygen rather than water as the medium. The proposed method includes a process that could compensate for gas diffusion from specimen parts other than the crack, allowing for a more precise estimation of crack width. The crack width can indeed be estimated with an error of 4% or less.

Self-Healing Performance Evaluation of Concrete Incorporating Inorganic Materials Based on a Water Permeability Test.

Research activities that have focused on the development and understanding of self-healing concrete have proposed various technologies intended to enhance self-healing capacity. The self-healing performance cannot be identified sufficiently with either a single test or a specific parameter because there are a number of factors that influence the performance of self-healing. Thus, it has become necessary to provide standardized test methods that make it possible to verify and compare the performance of self-healing materials. In this paper, self-healing mortars based on inorganic admixtures, which are developed for sealing 0.3 mm cracks with a healing index of 90%, are produced and used to validate the water permeability test and to propose protocols for the evaluation of self-healing performance. The healing performances of three self-healing mortars and a plain mortar as a reference are evaluated with a comparative study. The equivalent crack width, which can be estimated from the water flow rate, is suggested as a rational evaluation index. Finally, a self-healing performance chart is proposed to comprehensively show the healing performance of cement-based materials.

Crack Width Estimation of Mortar Specimen Using Gas Diffusion Experiment.

Maintenance of structures using self-healing concrete technologies has recently been actively studied. However, unlike the technological development of self-healing concrete, research focused on evaluating the self-healing performance is insufficient. Although water permeability experiments are widely used, the reliability of the test results may be reduced due to the viscosity of water and the possibility of elution of material inside the specimen. In this study, we propose a gas diffusion test for estimating the crack width and eventually for application to evaluation of the self-healing performance. The results verified that the proposed method can be effectively applied to the estimation of crack width.

Decreasing Effect of Lidocaine·HCl on the Thickness of the Neuronal and Model Membrane.

This study examined the mechanism of action of a local anesthetic, lidocaine·HCl. Energy transfer between the surface fluorescent probe, 1-anilinonaphthalene-8-sulfonic acid, and the hydrophobic fluorescent probe, 1,3-di(1-pyrenyl) propane, was used to determine the effect of lidocaine·HCl on the thickness (D) of the synaptosomal plasma membrane vesicles (SPMV) isolated from the bovine cerebral cortex, and liposomes of the total lipids (SPMVTL) and phospholipids (SPMVPL) extracted from the SPMV. The thickness (D) of the intact SPMV, SPMVTL and SPMVPL were 1.044±0.008, 0.914±0.005 and 0.890±0.003 (arbitrary units, n=5) at 37℃ (pH 7.4), respectively. Lidocaine·HCl decreased the thickness of the neuronal and model membrane lipid bilayers in a dose-dependent manner with a significant decrease in the thickness, even at 0.1 mM. The decreasing effect of lidocaine·HCl on the membrane thickness might be responsible for some, but not all of its anesthetic action.