Specimens in the second phase were cured in a wet environment only.
Carbon Fiber Reinforced Polymers plates (CFRP) were used to strengthen the bottom portion of the specimens in the first method, and sheets containing carbon fibers were added to the bottom portion, left and right sides of the specimens, in the second method.
The structural repair and strengthening of specimens in the second phase was achieved by replacing the damaged infill plates with new infill plates of the same type, strengthening of the vertical steel frame elements with CFRP laminates and GFRP fabric.
By contrast, specimens in the second cluster group with members of this species from eastern Russia as well as several European countries (data not included in this paper).
All 120 tumor specimens in the second cohort were obtained in accordance with the Research Ethics Board at the Hospital for Sick Children (Toronto, Canada), as described, and the N. N. Burdenko Neurosurgical Institute (Moscow, Russia) [ 2].
The pre-publication history for this paper can be accessed here: http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2407/9/265/prepub Ti-Ba LLC, Rochester, NY provided the VivaScope 2000 reflectance confocal microscope used to image the specimens in the second compatibility study.
The first method included a shear specimen, a specimen with a central hole and a notched specimen while in the second approach the notched specimen is replaced by a V-bend test to calibrate for plane strain conditions.
Specimens in the third phase were also cured in a wet environment only.
Figure 13a, b shows the axial load axial deformation curves of the specimens in the first and second groups, respectively.
Out of these four strengthened specimens, in the first two specimens, CFRP-strips were externally bonded at 30° whereas in the other two CFRP-strips were attached at 90° with the longitudinal axis of the beam.
