The present paper describes a cycle, which may be applied in sewage treatment plants as a system to convert biological waste into process heat and electricity. In sludge stabilization processes anaerobic fermentation acts as the source of methane, which can be used then to generate heat and electric current in gas turbines. Products of high-temperature oxidation can be utilized in organic Rankine cycles to generate electric power. Waste heat is used for heating the fermenting biomass. Energy balance equations mentioned in the thesis: organic Rankine cycle, regenerative gas turbine engine, anaerobic sludge stabilization system.

The thermodynamic properties, which are the important bulk properties for solids, have been investigated for ZrB2 under pressure through the quasi harmonic Debye model. The dependences of thermal expansion, Gruneisen parameter, Debye temperature and specific heat on pressure P are successfully obtained. The obtained results are in a good agreement with the available experimental and other theoretical data.

Experimental investigation of natural convection heat transfer in heated vertical tubes dissipating heat from the internal surface is presented. The test section is electrically heated and constant wall heat flux is maintained both circumferentially and axially. Four different test sections are taken having 45 mm internal diameter and 3.8 mm thickness. The length of the test sections are 450 mm, 550 mm, 700 mm and 850 mm. Ratios of length to diameter of the test sections are taken as 10, 12.22, 15.56, and 18.89. Wall heat fluxes are maintained at 250–3341 W/m2. Experiments are also conducted on channels with internal rings of rectangular section placed at various distances. Thickness of the rings are taken as 4 mm, 6 mm, and 8 mm. The step size of the rings varies from 75 mm to 283.3 mm. The nondimensional ring spacing, expressed as the ratios of step size to diameter, are taken from 1.67 to 6.29 and the non-dimensional ring thickness, expressed as the ratios of ring thickness to diameter are taken from 0.089 to 0.178. The ratios of ring spacing to its thickness are taken as 9.375 to 70.82. The effects of various parameters such as length to diameter ratio, wall heat flux, ring thickness and ring spacing on local steady-state heat transfer behavior are observed. From the experimental data a correlation is developed for average Nusselt number and modified Rayleigh number. Another correlation is also developed for modified Rayleigh number and modified Reynolds number. These correlations can predict the data accurately within ±10% error.

Heat and mass transfer stretched flow of an incompressible, electrically conducting Jeffrey fluid has been studied numerically. Nanoparticles are suspended in the base fluid and it has many applications such as cooling of engines, thermal absorption systems, lubricants fuel cell, nanodrug delivery system and so on. Temperature dependent variable thermal conductivity with Rosseland approximation is taken into account and suction effect is employed in the boundary conditions. The governing partial differential equations are first transformed into set of ordinary differential equations using selected similarity transformations, which are then solved numerically using Runge-Kutta-Felhberg fourth-fifth order method along with shooting technique. The flow, heat and mass transfer characteristics with local Nusselt number for various physical parameters are presented graphically and a detailed discussion regarding the effect of flow parameters on velocity and temperature profiles are provided. It is found that, increase of variable thermal conductivity, radiation, Brownian motion and thermophoresis parameter increases the rate of heat transfer. Local Nusselt number has been computed for various parameters and it is observed that, in the presence of variable thermal conductivity and Rosseland approximation, heat transfer characteristics are higher as compared to the constant thermal conductivity and linear thermal radiation.

Proposed is the analysis of steam condensation in the presence of inert gases in a power plant condenser. The presence of inert, noncondensable gases in a condenser is highly undesirable due to its negative effect on the efficiency of the entire cycle. In general, thermodynamics has not provided an explicit criterion for assessing the irreversible heat transfer process. The method presented here enables to evaluate precisely processes occurring in power plant condensers. This real process is of particular interest as it involves a number of thermal layers through which heat transfer is observed. The analysis was performed using a simple, known in the literature and well verified Berman’s model of steam condensation in the presence of non-condensable gases. Adapted to the geometry of the condenser, the model enables, for instance, to recognise places where non-condensable gases are concentrated. By describing with sufficient precision thermodynamic processes taking place in the vicinity of the heat transfer area segment, it is possible to determine the distributions of thermodynamic parameters on the boundaries between successive layers. The obtained results allow for the recognition of processes which contribute in varying degrees to irreversible energy degradation during steam condensation in various parts of the examined device.

The production of thermal energy from solar energy by flat collectors finds nowadays many applications due to their innumerable economic and environmental interests. Currently, conservation of energy resources has become a global priority. On the other hand, given the dizzying demand for energy, has led specialists to find new techniques, such as renewable energies (solar, wind and geothermal). The present work is a contribution, by numerical simulation, to the study of heat transfer in flat solar collectors. On the basis of some experimental data, several simulation calculations have been carried out in order to determine the influencing parameters allowing better performance of the sensors and ensuring a good homogeneity of the temperature distributions. Based on the observation that, due to the low thermophysical properties of the air used as heat transfer fluid, solar air collectors rather give poor yields. It has been found very useful to have ‘baffling’ obstacles of various shapes and forms in the solar collector duct. This increases the thermal transfer of a coolant, which clearly improves the thermal efficiency of the solar air collector. This article consists mainly of studying the effects on heat transfer of turbulent forced convection by baffles of zigzag shapes, placed in a rectangular channel, using the finite volume method. The pressure-velocity coupling has been processed by the SIMPLEC algorithm. The results are presented in terms of the average Nusselt number and temperature field for different positions.

The paper describes a fuel cell based system and its performance. The system is based on two fuel cell units, DC/DC converter, DC/AC inverter, microprocessor control unit, load unit, bottled hydrogen supply system and a set of measurement instruments. In the study presented in the paper a dynamic response of the proton exchange membrane (PEM) fuel cell system to unit step change load as well as to periodical load changing cycles in the form of semi-sinusoidal and trapezoidal signals was investigated. The load was provided with the aid of an in-house-developed electronic load unit, which was fully PC controlled. The apparatus was commissioned by testing the steady-state operation of the module. The obtained efficiency of the fuel cell shows that the test apparatus used in the study provides data in substantial agreement with the manufacturer’s data.

This article confronts the text of A Literary Prize, a comedy by Maria Pawlikowska-Jasnorzewska, with its contemporary reviews. Staged by the experimental theatre Reduta (directed by Zofia Modrzewska) in April 1937 at Teatr Nowy in Warsaw (under the directorship of Jerzy Leszczyński), it fell into complete oblivion which lasted until the recent discovery of the director’s copy buried at the Academy of Theatre Library in Warsaw.

While contemporary reviewers found A Literary Prize to be one of the weaker works of an outstanding poet, Maria Pawlikowska-Jasnorzewska in her letters contrasted the ‘violent attacks’ of the critics with a fairly warm reception of the general audience. The play was performed to capacity audiences until 19 May, and revived for a single occasion a year later in Poznań.

A Literary Prize juxtaposes two plots. One, with elements of comedy of manners, follows the fortunes of a young girl, Taida Serebrzycka, who tries to navigate between two men with literary ambitions, Klemens Niedzicki and Albin Niekawski, while the other explores the challenges faced by prospective writers, especially the role of prize-winning competitions in the discovery of talent and the building of reputation. This article is focused primarily on the character of Taida, who makes the impression of being somewhat scatterbrained and snobbish, but is in fact a strong-minded, independent young woman conscious of her sexuality. She wants an honest, equal relationship, and is ready to fi ght hard for her happiness, which does include sexual satisfaction. The analysis of the reception of Maria Pawlikowska-Jasnorzewska’s play, and especially the characterization of Taida, the female protagonist, is complemented with an examination of the mechanisms of the critical discourse.

Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery (1908) enjoys unprecedented popularity in Poland and has played a considerable role in the shaping of modern Polish culture. As many as fourteen different translations of the fi rst volume of the series have been published; moreover, there exists an active Polish fandom of Montgomery’s oeuvre. The authors of this article briefly discuss the cultural and social aspects of this phenomenon which was triggered off in 1911 by Rozalia Bernsteinowa’s Polish translation of Anne of Green Gables. Her translation, still regarded as the canonical text, greatly altered the realities of the original novel. As a result, in Poland Anne of Green Gables has the status of a children’s classic, whereas readers in the English-speaking world have always treated it as an example of the sub-genre of juvenile college (school) girls’ literature. The identity of the Polish translator of L.M. Montgomery’s book remains a mystery, and even the name on the cover may well be pen name (though, at any rate, it strongly suggests that she must have belonged to the Jewish intelligentsia of the early 20th century). What we do know about her for fact is that she was a translator of German, Danish, Swedish, Norwegian and English literature. Comparing Rozalia Bernsteinowa’s Polish text to its English original has been a subject of many Polish B.A. and M.A. theses. The argument of this article is that her key reference for was not the English text, but that of the fi rst Swedish translation by Karin Jensen named Anne på Grönkulla (1909).

This article questions the consensus view of The Invincible (Niezwyciężony) as one of Lem’s classical sci-fi fictions. The author contends that in this novel the familiar conventions (later rejected in His Master’s Voice) coexist with a structural design characteristic of his late novels. An analysis of two pieces of the world of The Invincible, usually disregarded by the critics because of their sketchiness, i.e. the story of the extinct Lyrans and the account of the ancient biosphere of Regis III, reveals that in either case Lem no longer cares for the realist credentials of his fiction and does not put the two planets on the astronomical map (which is no doubt deliberate choice). Moreover, in contrast to his earlier novels, his outline histories of the two biospheres contain hidden (but nonetheless unmistakable) parallels to the prehistory of the biosphere of the Earth (though he was no believer in evolutionary repeatability). As this article tries to demonstrate the two peripheral facets of the world depicted in the novel are clearly related and subordinated to the central story line (concerned with the ‘necrosphere’ and humanity). This structural dependence as well as the way in which key aspects of the world depicted in the novel seem to illustrate the theses articulated in Lem’s essays justifi es the conclusion that The Invincible should be treated as the first novel of his late phase, represented – on account of its form – by His Master’s Voice.

This article examines the relationship of disgust and perversion in Lovetown (Lubiewo bez cenzury) by Michał Witkowski. An overview of the reception of the book reveals that reviewers and critics have focused mainly on Witkowski’s portrayal of the LGBT community, the structure of the novel (dubbed the ‘queer Decameron’), and the textual (meta) creation of the writer’s voice, but it ignored his handling of disgust and perversion. Central to this reading of Lovetown, which draws on Sigmund Freud’s analyses of disgust and perversion, is the observation that the narrator interlards his lingo with neutral, ‘objective’ explanations of the main characters’ deviant behaviours. This glossary, written for the general reader, tends, in effect, to legitimize deviance. An in-depth analysis of the writer’s handling of the categories of the disgusting, the perverse and the sacred leads to the conclusion that Lovetown exemplifies a cathartic-therapeutic narrative in which disgust becomes a tool of self-fulfi llment.

The discovery of some hitherto unknown documents relating to Bolesław Leśmian’s family has made it possible to re-read his autobiographical poems as responses to circumstances and events from the poet’s real life. An analysis of his poems in the light of the information supplied by the newly-discovered source shows that they provide a thoroughly accurate record of events as they happened, especially deaths. Not only do the deaths of his mother, father and his siblings hurt him deeply and foreshadow the end of his own life, but also make him feel guilty for not being able to remember them properly: as his memory fails him, they are condemned to a ‘second death’.