Self-healing Protection Research Articles

Encapsulation of aliphatic amines into nanoparticles for self-healing corrosion protection of steel sheets

A noble approach based on the encapsulation of corrosion inhibitors has been presented, which are capable of improving the active corrosion protection without negatively influencing the barrier properties of the coating layers. Polymeric nanocapsules loaded with six types of amine corrosion inhibitors were synthesized by multi-stage emulsion polymerization. Depending on the basicity and water solubility of amines, different amounts of releasable corrosion inhibitors were encapsulated into the polymer capsules. Encapsulated organic amines were generally well released under alkaline conditions, and linear amines were more easily released from inside capsules than branched ones. The nanocapsules were incorporated into the coating resin and were coated on cold-rolled steel sheets to investigate corrosion protection efficiencies. The corrosion inhibitive efficiencies of the nanocapsule-containing coating layers were evaluated by electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) and scanning vibrating electrode technique (SVET). In this study, it was revealed that the intrinsic properties of the amines as well as their encapsulation/release behaviors determined the barrier property and self-healing protection capability of the coating layer.

Towards a Self-Healing Electric Grid With Superconducting Fault Current Controllers

Uncertainty and complexity due to expanded adoption of renewable energy resources, distributed energy resources as well as expanded electric transportation and dynamic demand response technologies in the power industry present significant challenges in grid operations. It is thus required to develop smart protection and control actions for ensuring highly reliable and healthy electric power infrastructure by increasing resiliency against component failures or natural disasters, i.e. self-healing ability. This paper, in particular focuses on the self-healing in the context of grid protection using smart superconducting fault current controller (Smart FCC). A systematic framework and technological requirements are presented for realizing the envisioned self-healing protection capability using Smart FCC while minimizing the electric loss near zero through superconducting coil. Illustrative examples, modeling and simulation studies demonstrate the validity and efficacy of the proposed framework and envisioned technology.

Surface chemistry: Self-healing protection

Surface chemistry: Self-healing protection

Demonstration and Analysis of Asynchronous and Survivable Optical CDMA Ring Networks

We propose an incoherent optical code-division multiple access (CDMA) ring network configured such that each node in the network includes all-optical add/drop multiplexers to provide truly asynchronous operation and a self-healing protection monitoring circuit to ensure service availability during link failure. We also analyze the performance of such a network considering the presence of multiple-access interference and noise from incomplete dropping of the desired data and accidental dropping of the undesired data. Furthermore, we experimentally demonstrate the proposed design with a two-node system operating at 2.5 Gbits/s. Error-free transmission is obtained and a 5.3 dB power penalty at a bit error rate of 10−9 is measured for the worst connection configuration. The complete optical CDMA ring network is successfully demonstrated in truly asynchronous operation.

Agent-Based Self-Healing Protection System

This paper proposes an agent-based paradigm for self-healing protection systems. Numerical relays implemented with intelligent electronic devices are designed as a relay agent to perform a protective relaying function in cooperation with other relay agents. A graph-theory-based expert system, which can be integrated with supervisory control and a data acquisition system, has been developed to divide the power grid into primary and backup protection zones online and all relay agents are assigned to specific zones according to system topological configuration. In order to facilitate a more robust, less vulnerable protection system, predictive and corrective self-healing strategies are implemented as guideline regulations of the relay agent, and the relay agents within the same protection zone communicate and cooperate to detect, locate, and trip fault precisely with primary and backup protection. Performance of the proposed protection system has been simulated with cascading fault, failures in communication and protection units, and compared with a coordinated directional overcurrent protection system.