Day 31

As you know for the past few days, I've been vehemently trying to fix some errors that MATLAB is giving me. There was no difference today until EUREKA!!! I FIXED MY ERROR...by completely scrapping what I was doing. I searched and searched and found a different way to solve differential equations. So the reason why I didn't not blog a second time yesterday is because I couldn't fix my errors BUT I did fix them today!!! 


Case in point I can now move ahead with the other differential/integration equations! SO HAPPY! Therefore, I will get back to it and I hope everyone has a FANTASTIC weekend!!!


"While with an eye made quiet bu the power of harmony, and the deep power of joy, We see into the life of things."~Wordsworth

Day 29 & 30

For the past 2 days I've been trying to fix the errors I am receiving when running my code. So far, I haven't fixed them, which is a real drag. I've tried using the inline command, creating a function and using the dsolve command to solve the integration symbolically but nothing has worked yet.


Right now, I am trying to fix the error I receive from using a function. I have deceased the number of errors to just one, which is good, but I do not know how to fix it. Therefore I must search online to see if I can dig something up.


I will return later today....

Day 28

As I stated yesterday I would be looking into the ode solvers that MATLAB employs. I've begun to utilize the ode solver and inline command in my program. I've come up with a few ERROR lines:

??? Error using ==> inline.feval at 26

Too many inputs to inline function.

Error in ==> odearguments at 110

f0 = feval(ode,t0,y0,args{:});   % ODE15I sets args{1} to yp0.

Error in ==> ode15s at 228

[neq, tspan, ntspan, next, t0, tfinal, tdir, y0, f0, odeArgs, odeFcn, ...

I've been spending my time looking up how to fix these errors and testing the solutions out on my own code. I receive similar errors; therefore, more digging on how to fix these errors is necessary. Also I will ask Prof. Graham for a little help too.


"Research is the process of going up alleys to see if they are blind."~ Marston Bates

Day 26 and 27

I'm back from my birthday celebration/vacation and back to business. I met with Prof. Graham.  I told him I am solving the equations using the symbolic solver. He stated there is an easier way. For the nucleation and growth section under homogeneous precipitation I can use the cumsum command, which I implemented. So that is one section changed. 


Next for the growth and coarsening part under homogeneous precipitation he stated I use the ode solver, which I have never used before. I'm using The Intro to MATLAB for Engineers to help me with the ode solver. I've started to input that into the code and so far so good. I'm not sure if I need to separate variables to use the ode, but Prof.Graham stated that I need to; therefore, I am trying to separate the variables of the equations first. I'm having a bit of difficulty, but I'm sure that's from not using my brain for the past 2 months.


Lastly, I am getting the computer I use in the lab updated, so new windows, MATLAB (which is essential), FEMAP etc. I'm really excited because everyone in the lab either got new computers or got it updated and mine never got updated. I decided to get it done before school starts, which I think is a good idea. Especially if other students may need it. 


Anyway, I will be returning tomorrow morning to continue this work. 


"Being a scientist means living on the borderline between your competence and your incompetence. If you always feel competent, you aren't doing your job." --- Carlos Bustamante

Day 23, 24, 25

OK so all diff and int commands were established in the first 3rd of the program. I'm still trying to figure out this iteration loop until time converges. Prof. Graham is now back in town, so we are trying to work out a good meet time. 


I think the program is coming together (very) slowly but surely :) I'm off to enjoy the rest of my birthday week!! Until later.... 


"To know the history of science is to recognize the mortality of any claim to universal truth."  ~Evelyn Fox Keller

Day 22

I realized that my blog titles (you know the day #'s) is not accurate haha. But it doesn't matter that much I'm guess as long as I blog...right Prof Satchi?

Today I started implementing syms and diff commands. I ran the code, which worked, but I noticed one of the derivations returned a  zero, which isn't supposed to happen. The equation is:

This is how all the equations are in the Growth & Coarsening section of the paper.Thanks to a colleague of mine he helped me realize the simplest thing I overlooked. And it's called an INTEGRAL!! Wow. Duh Gabi. I've got to take the integral. That was the LARGEST BRAIN FART OF MY LIFE!! 


So now I'm going to use the int command and iterate t until convergence. 


See you tomorrow!


"Science has made us gods even before we are worthy of being men." ~Jean Rostand

Day 21

There is good good news and possibly good news. I'll divulge the good good news first.


Out of the 7 new articles I've found that referenced Deschamps only one paper clearly contains similar equations. Modeling of whole process of ageing precipitation and strengthening in Al-Cu-Mg-Ag alloys with high Cu-to-Mg mass ratio  by the Hou et al group.  The similarity of equations seems to be traced back to the Kampmann and Wagner group. This information is GREAT because now I know where Deschamps is getting their equations. Also the Hou paper gives FULL REFERENCES! As in includes titles of the articles, which is fabulous considering the last Kampmann paper I received was in GERMAN!! That's right...German. And the paper is 91 pages long. So, thank God I found it in English thanks to Hou. THANK YOU HOU!!

I've asked for the paper through Inter-library Loan, which I hope to receive by next week. The Hou paper is exactly what I am doing except with a different alloy.  Hou is Al-Cu-Mg-Ag, while I am working with Al-Zn-Mg-Cu. The group stated that the results from their model in comparison to experimental data is in "good agreement", and they included the numbers! I am taking this as good news, because that may mean that once I get this program running the model will hopefully agree with Al7075 numbers.

Now for the possibly good news. 

I know for a fact that I can use the syms, diff and subs commands, because a colleague of mine did the same with a code of his. I don't think I can do the entire code like this but I feel good knowing I can do some of the code like this. The difficulty I am coming up with is the iteration loop over time until it converges. I'm not sure when it converges (obviously), and I'm having difficulty writing the loop! There is something I am missing, but I'm not sure what it is. So, now is the time to get out my MATLAB for Dummies book. That's what I am going to do now.

I got a hold of Prof. Graham :) BUT he is in the Netherlands :/ I'm jealous not going to lie, but I digress. Even though he is in the Netherlands; he stated that he would be back next week. So, I will be trying my best to figure out this iteration/subs loop business until he returns to town.

I hope everyone has a wonderful Friday evening and a GREAT weekend!!!

"The scientist, by the very nature of his commitment, creates more and more questions, never fewer.  Indeed the measure of our intellectual maturity, one philosopher suggests, is our capacity to feel less and less satisfied with our answers to better problems." ~G.W. Allport