Search results for: intelligent transportation systems

Authors: John Ayisi, Gideon M. Kivengea, George A. Ombakho

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In this emerging era of knowledge economy, universities, as major centres of learning and research, are becoming increasingly important as sources of ideas, knowledge, skills, innovation and technological advances. These ideas can be turned into new products, processes and systems needed to drive their respective national economies, and thus placing universities at the centre of the national innovation systems. Thus, commercialization of research outputs from universities to industry has become an area of strong policy interest in African countries. To assess the level of commercialization of research outputs in Kenyan universities, a standardized questionnaire covering seven sub-sections, namely: University Commercialization Environment, Management of Commercialization Activities, Commercialization Office, Intellectual Property Rights (IPRs), Early Stage Financing and Venture Capital; Industrial Linkages; and Technology Parks and Incubators was administered among a few selected public and private universities. Results show that all the universities have a strategic plan; though not all have innovation and commercialization as part of it. Half the nineteen surveyed universities indicated they have created designated offices for fostering commercialization. Majority have guidelines on IPRs which advocate IP to be co-owned by researcher/university. University-industry linkages are weak. Most universities are taking precursory steps to incentivise and encourage entrepreneurial activities among their academic staff and students, even though the level of resources devoted to them is low. It is recommended that building capacity in entrepreneurship among staff and students and committing more resources to R&D activities hold potential to increased commercialization of university research outputs.

Keywords: commercialization, knowledge, R&D, university

Procedia PDF Downloads 423

Authors: Peng Hao Wang, Garam Kim, Ronald Sterkenburg

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The applications of composite materials within the aviation industry has been increasing at a rapid pace.  However, the growing applications of composite materials have also led to growing demand for more tooling to support its manufacturing processes. Tooling and tooling maintenance represents a large portion of the composite manufacturing process and cost. Therefore, the industry’s adaptability to new techniques for fabricating high quality tools quickly and inexpensively will play a crucial role in composite material’s growing popularity in the aviation industry. One popular tool fabrication technique currently being developed involves additive manufacturing such as 3D printing. Although additive manufacturing and 3D printing are not entirely new concepts, the technique has been gaining popularity due to its ability to quickly fabricate components, maintain low material waste, and low cost. In this study, a team of Purdue University School of Aviation and Transportation Technology (SATT) faculty and students investigated the effectiveness of a 3D printed composite compression mold. A 3D printed composite compression mold was fabricated by 3D scanning a steel valve cover of an aircraft reciprocating engine. The 3D printed composite compression mold was used to fabricate carbon fiber versions of the aircraft reciprocating engine valve cover. The 3D printed composite compression mold was evaluated for its performance, durability, and dimensional stability while the fabricated carbon fiber valve covers were evaluated for its accuracy and quality. The results and data gathered from this study will determine the effectiveness of the 3D printed composite compression mold in a mass production environment and provide valuable information for future understanding, improvements, and design considerations of 3D printed composite molds.

Keywords: additive manufacturing, carbon fiber, composite tooling, molds

Procedia PDF Downloads 188

Authors: Kang Huang, Wanting Zhou, Shiwei Yuan, Lei Li

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Since information technology develops rapidly, the security issue has become an increasingly critical for computer system. In particular, as cloud computing and the Internet of Things (IoT) continue to gain widespread adoption, computer systems need to new security threats and attacks. The Root of Trust (RoT) is the foundation for providing basic trusted computing, which is used to verify the security and trustworthiness of other components. Design a reliable Root of Trust and guarantee its own security are essential for improving the overall security and credibility of computer systems. In this paper, we discuss the implementation of self-security technology based on the RISC-V Root of Trust at the hardware level. To effectively safeguard the security of the Root of Trust, researches on security safeguard technology on the Root of Trust have been studied. At first, a lightweight and secure boot framework is proposed as a secure mechanism. Secondly, two kinds of memory protection mechanism are built to against memory attacks. Moreover, hardware implementation of proposed method has been also investigated. A series of experiments and tests have been carried on to verify to effectiveness of the proposed method. The experimental results demonstrated that the proposed approach is effective in verifying the integrity of the Root of Trust’s own boot rom, user instructions, and data, ensuring authenticity and enabling the secure boot of the Root of Trust’s own system. Additionally, our approach provides memory protection against certain types of memory attacks, such as cache leaks and tampering, and ensures the security of root-of-trust sensitive information, including keys.

Keywords: root of trust, secure boot, memory protection, hardware security

Procedia PDF Downloads 181

Authors: Cenk Aksit, Suleyman Kodal, Yusuf Ersoy Yildirim

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Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) is a widely used index in the world that provides reference information, such as the health status of the plant, and the density of the vegetation in a certain area, by making use of the electromagnetic radiation reflected from the plant surface. On the other hand, the chlorophyll index provides reference information about the chlorophyll density in the plant by making use of electromagnetic reflections at certain wavelengths. Chlorophyll concentration is higher in healthy plants and decreases as plant health decreases. This study, it was aimed to determine the changes in Normalize Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) and Normalize Difference Chlorophyll (NDCI) of silage corn irrigated with subsurface drip irrigation systems under different irrigation levels. In 5 days irrigation interval, the daily potential plant water consumption values were collected, and the calculated amount was applied to the full irrigation and 3 irrigation water levels as irrigation water. The changes in NDVI and NDCI of silage corn irrigated with subsurface drip irrigation systems under different irrigation levels were determined. NDVI values have changed according to the amount of irrigation water applied, and the highest NDVI value has been reached in the subject where the most water is applied. Likewise, it was observed that the chlorophyll value decreased in direct proportion to the amount of irrigation water as the plant approached the harvest.

Keywords: NDVI, NDCI, sub-surface drip irrigation, silage corn, deficit irrigation

Procedia PDF Downloads 79

Authors: Khaled Klib, Yousri Azzam, Ibrahim Maarouf

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Tourism is one of the most important and fastest growing economic activities in the world, which has a prominent role in the growth and development of countries and has become increasingly important as business and trade after the World War II. The tourism development is one of the most important aspects of urban development, which aims to plan and develop tourist attractions and improve the urban environment within cities. Tourism development has become a priority for the urban development policy of cities, particularly those which have many tourist potentials. Complementary services, such as infrastructure, roads’ networks, transportation, and communications are needed for these potentials to function properly. In order to achieve these functionalities, also a new planning for the new areas as an expansion is required, or developing and renovating the existing urban areas according to pre-prepared plans to avoid random expansion of the urban structure of the city. This paper aims to determine the tourist attractions of Al-Khomse city, by reviewing the most important tourist attractions such as the Roman city (Leptis Magna), the geographical location on the Mediterranean coast, the temperate climate and diversity of the natural environment. The paper also examines the reality of the infrastructure and tourist services in the city and its suitability to serve the tourism sector. The paper also includes a proposed for tourism development in the city as one of the city's urban expansion trends, which can guide the development strategy in the future. The paper concludes with a vision for the tourism development areas as one of the trends for urban expansion in the future. The paper also concludes tourism development will have an effective role in the growth and development of urban, economic and social, in addition to preserving the natural environment. The paper recommended the need to emphasize the role of tourism development as one of the pillars and trends for the development policy and expansion of Al-Khomse city, preservation of tourist attractions and natural resources and developing infrastructure and tourist services such as accommodation, entertainment, mobility, and accessibility.

Keywords: tourism, tourist attractions, tourism development, urban expansion

Procedia PDF Downloads 227

Authors: Young Jae Choung, Seoung Bum Kim

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Statistical Process Control (SPC) is a popular technique for process monitoring. A widely used tool in SPC is a control chart, which is used to detect the abnormal status of a process and maintain the controlled status of the process. Traditional control charts, such as Hotelling’s T2 control chart, are effective techniques to detect abnormal observations and monitor processes. However, many complicated manufacturing systems exhibit nonlinearity because of the different demands of the market. In this case, the unregulated use of a traditional linear modeling approach may not be effective. In reality, many industrial processes contain the nonlinear and time-varying properties because of the fluctuation of process raw materials, slowing shift of the set points, aging of the main process components, seasoning effects, and catalyst deactivation. The use of traditional SPC techniques with time-varying data will degrade the performance of the monitoring scheme. To address these issues, in the present study, we propose a parameterless self-organizing map (PLSOM)-based control chart. The PLSOM-based control chart not only can manage a situation where the distribution or parameter of the target observations changes, but also address the nonlinearity of modern manufacturing systems. The control limits of the proposed PLSOM chart are established by estimating the empirical level of significance on the percentile using a bootstrap method. Experimental results with simulated data and actual process data from a thin-film transistor-liquid crystal display process demonstrated the effectiveness and usefulness of the proposed chart.

Keywords: control chart, parameter-less self-organizing map, self-organizing map, time-varying property

Procedia PDF Downloads 257

Authors: Eugene Wong, Felix Chan, Linsey Chen, Joey Cheung

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The widespread use of technologies and cyber/digital means for complex maritime operations have led to a sharp rise in global cyber-attacks. They have generated an increasing number of liability disputes, insurance claims, and legal proceedings. An array of antiquated case law, regulations, international conventions, and obsolete contractual clauses drafted in the pre-technology era have become grossly inadequate in addressing the contemporary challenges. This paper offers a critique of the ambiguity of cybersecurity liabilities under the obligation of seaworthiness entailed in the Hague-Visby Rules, which apply either by law in a large number of jurisdictions or by express incorporation into the shipping documents. This paper also evaluates the legal and technological criteria for assessing whether a vessel is properly equipped with the latest offshore technologies for navigation and cargo delivery operations. Examples include computer applications, networks and servers, enterprise systems, global positioning systems, and data centers. A critical analysis of the carriers’ obligations to exercise due diligence in preventing or mitigating cyber-attacks is also conducted in this paper. It is hoped that the present study will offer original and crucial insights to policymakers, regulators, carriers, cargo interests, and insurance underwriters closely involved in dispute prevention and resolution arising from cybersecurity liabilities.

Keywords: seaworthiness, cybersecurity, liabilities, risks, maritime, transport

Procedia PDF Downloads 122

Authors: Gyeongbeom Yi

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The purpose of this study is to introduce the analytic solution for determining the optimal capacity (lot-size) of a multiproduct, multistage production and inventory system to meet the finished product demand. Reasonable decision-making about the capacity of processes and storage units is an important subject for industry. The industrial solution for this subject is to use the classical economic lot sizing method, EOQ/EPQ (Economic Order Quantity/Economic Production Quantity) model, incorporated with practical experience. However, the unrealistic material flow assumption of the EOQ/EPQ model is not suitable for chemical plant design with highly interlinked processes and storage units. This study overcomes the limitation of the classical lot sizing method developed on the basis of the single product and single stage assumption. The superstructure of the plant considered consists of a network of serially and/or parallelly interlinked processes and storage units. The processes involve chemical reactions with multiple feedstock materials and multiple products as well as mixing, splitting or transportation of materials. The objective function for optimization is minimizing the total cost composed of setup and inventory holding costs as well as the capital costs of constructing processes and storage units. A novel production and inventory analysis method, PSW (Periodic Square Wave) model, is applied. The advantage of the PSW model comes from the fact that the model provides a set of simple analytic solutions in spite of a realistic description of the material flow between processes and storage units. The resulting simple analytic solution can greatly enhance the proper and quick investment decision for plant design and operation problem confronted in diverse economic situations.

Keywords: analytic solution, optimal design, process-storage network

Procedia PDF Downloads 321

Authors: Ceylan Sozer, Ece Ceylan Baba

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The reforms and changes that began with industrialization in cities and continued with globalization in 1980’s, created many changes in urban environments. City centers which are desolated due to industrialization, began to get crowded with globalization and became the heart of technology, commerce and social activities. While the immediate and intense alterations are planned around rigorous visions in developed countries, several urban areas where the processes were underestimated and not taken precaution faced with irrevocable situations. When the effects of the globalization in the cities are examined, it is seen that there are some anticipatory system plans in the cities about the future problems. Several cities such as New York, London and Tokyo have planned to resolve probable future problems in a systematic scheme to decrease possible side effects during globalization. The decisions in urban planning and their applications are the main points in terms of sustainability and livability in such mega-cities. This article examines the effects of globalization on urban planning through 3 mega cities and the applications. When the applications of urban plannings of the three mega-cities are investigated, it is seen that the city plans are generated under light of past experiences and predictions of a certain future. In urban planning, past and present experiences of a city should have been examined and then future projections could be predicted together with current world dynamics by a systematic way. In this study, methods used in urban planning will be discussed and ‘Anticipatory System’ model will be explained and relations with global-urban planning will be discussed. The concept of ‘anticipation’ is a phenomenon that means creating foresights and predictions about the future by combining past, present and future within an action plan. The main distinctive feature that separates anticipatory systems from other systems is the combination of past, present and future and concluding with an act. Urban plans that consist of various parameters and interactions together are identified as ‘live’ and they have systematic integrities. Urban planning with an anticipatory system might be alive and can foresight some ‘side effects’ in design processes. After globalization, cities became more complex and should be designed within an anticipatory system model. These cities can be more livable and can have sustainable urban conditions for today and future.In this study, urban planning of Istanbul city is going to be analyzed with comparisons of New York, Tokyo and London city plans in terms of anticipatory system models. The lack of a system in İstanbul and its side effects will be discussed. When past and present actions in urban planning are approached through an anticipatory system, it can give more accurate and sustainable results in the future.

Keywords: globalization, urban planning, anticipatory system, New York, London, Tokyo, Istanbul

Procedia PDF Downloads 137

Authors: S. V. Patil, P. S. Dounde, S. S. Patil

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Emulgels have emerged as one of the most interesting topical delivery system as it has dual release control system that is gel and emulsion. The major objective behind this formulation is delivery of hydrophobic drugs to systemic circulation via skin. In fact presence of a gelling agent in water phase converts a classical emulsion in to emulgel. The emulgel for dermatological use has several favorable properties such as being thixotropic, greaseless, easily spreadable, easily removable, emollient, non-staining, water-soluble, longer shelf life, bio-friendly, transparent and pleasing appearance. Various penetration enhancers can potentiate the effect. So this can be used as better topical drug delivery systems over present conventional systems available in market. Piroxicam is a non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug that has major problems when administered orally; it is an insoluble drug and has irritant effect on gastro intestinal tract lead to ulceration and bleeding. The aim of this study was to overcoming these problems through preparation of topical emulgel of this drug. Emulgel of Piroxicam was prepared using Carbopol 940 along with mentha oil and clove oil as permeation enhancer. The prepared emulgel were evaluated for their physical appearance, pH determination, viscosity, spreadability, in vitro drug release, ex vivo permeation studies. All the prepared formulations showed acceptable physical properties, homogeneity, consistency, spreadability, viscosity and pH value. The emulgel was found to be stable with respect to physical appearance, pH, rheological properties and drug content at all temperature and conditions for three month.

Keywords: emulgel, piroxicam, menthe oil, clove oil

Procedia PDF Downloads 445

Authors: Paulina Clara Appiah, Kofi Issah, Timothy Letsa, Kennedy Nartey, Amanua Chinbuah, Adoma Dwomo-Fokuo, Jacqeline G. Asibey

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Background: The Every Newborn Action Plan provides evidence–based interventions to end preventable deaths in high burden countries. Brong Ahafo Region is one of ten regions in Ghana with less than half of its district hospitals having sick newborn units. Facility-based neonatal care is not prioritized and under-funded, and there is also inadequate knowledge and competence to manage the sick. The aim of this intervention was to make available in–patient care for sick newborns in all 19 district hospitals through the strengthening of facility-based systems. Methods: With the development and dissemination of the National Newborn Strategy and Action Plan 2014-2018, the country was able to attract PATH which provided the region with basic resuscitation equipment, supported hospital providers’ capacity building in Helping Babies Breathe, Essential Care of Every Baby, Infection Prevention and Management and held a symposia on managing the sick newborn. Newborn advocacy was promoted through newborn champions at the facility and community levels. Hospital management was then able to mobilize resources from communities, corporate organizations and from internally generated funds; created or expanded sick newborn care units and provided essential medicines and equipment. Kangaroo Mother Care was initiated in 6 hospitals. Pediatric specialist outreach services initiated comprised telephone consultations, teaching ward rounds and participating in perinatal death audits meetings. Newborn data capture and management was improved through the provision and training on the use of standard registers provided from the national level. Results: From February 2015 to November 2017, hospitals with sick newborn units increased from 7 to 19 (37%-100%). 180 pieces each of newborn ventilation bags and masks size 0, 1 and penguin suction bulbs were distributed to the hospitals, in addition to 20 newborn mannequin sets and 90 small clinical reminder posters. 802 providers (96.9%) were trained in resuscitation, of which 96% were successfully followed up in 6 weeks, 91% in 6 months and 80% in 12 months post-training. 53 clinicians (65%) were trained and mentored to manage sick newborns. 56 specialist teaching ward rounds were conducted. Data completeness improved from 92.6% - 99.9%. Availability of essential medicines improved from 11% to 100%. Number of hospital cots increased from 116 to 248 (214%). Cot occupancy rate increased from 57.4% to 92.5%. Hospitals with phototherapy equipment increased from 0 to 12 (63%). Hospitals with incubators increased from 1 to 12 (5%-63%). Newborn deaths among admissions reduced from 6.3% to 5.4%. Conclusion: Access to in-patient care increased significantly. Newborn advocacy successfully mobilized resources required for strengthening facility –based systems.

Keywords: facility-based systems, Ghana, in-patient care, newborn advocacy

Procedia PDF Downloads 216

Authors: Kyong-Ku Yun, Seung-Yeon Han, Kyeo-Re Lee

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Silica fume which is a super-fine byproduct of ferrosilicon or silicon metal has a filling effect on micro-air voids or a transition zone in a hardened cement paste by appropriate mixing, placement, and curing. It, also, has a Pozzolan reaction which enhances the interior density of the hydrated cement paste through a formation of calcium silicate hydroxide. When substituting cement with silica fume, it improves water tightness and durability by filling effect and Pozzolan reaction. However, it needs high range water reducer or super-plasticizer to distribute silica fume into a concrete because of its finesses and high specific surface area. In order to distribute into concrete evenly, cement manufacturers make a pre-blended cement of silica fume and provide to a market. However, a special mixing procedures and another transportation charge another cost and this result in a high price of pre-blended cement of silica fume. The purpose of this dissertation was to investigate the dispersion of silica fume by air slurry and its effect on the mechanical properties of at ready-mixed concrete. The results are as follows: A dispersion effect of silica fume was measured from an analysis of standard deviation for compressive strength test results. It showed that the standard deviation decreased as the air bubble content increased, which means that the dispersion became better as the air bubble content increased. The test result of rapid chloride permeability test showed that permeability resistance increased as the percentages of silica fume increased, but the permeability resistance decreased as the quantity of mixing air bubble increased. The image analysis showed that a spacing factor decreased and a specific surface area increased as the quantity of mixing air bubble increased.

Keywords: cellular sprayed concrete, silica fume, deviation, permeability

Procedia PDF Downloads 124

Authors: Erick C. Valverde, Wansu Lim

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Facial emotion recognition (FER) system has been recently developed for more advanced computer vision applications. The ability to identify human emotions would enable smart healthcare facility to diagnose mental health illnesses (e.g., depression and stress) as well as better human social interactions with smart technologies. The FER system involves two steps: 1) face detection task and 2) facial emotion recognition task. It classifies the human expression in various categories such as angry, disgust, fear, happy, sad, surprise, and neutral. This system requires intensive research to address issues with human diversity, various unique human expressions, and variety of human facial features due to age differences. These issues generally affect the ability of the FER system to detect human emotions with high accuracy. Early stage of FER systems used simple supervised classification task algorithms like K-nearest neighbors (KNN) and artificial neural networks (ANN). These conventional FER systems have issues with low accuracy due to its inefficiency to extract significant features of several human emotions. To increase the accuracy of FER systems, deep learning (DL)-based methods, like convolutional neural networks (CNN), are proposed. These methods can find more complex features in the human face by means of the deeper connections within its architectures. However, the inference speed and computational costs of a DL-based FER system is often disregarded in exchange for higher accuracy results. To cope with this drawback, an optimized DL-based FER system is proposed in this study.An extreme version of Inception V3, known as Xception model, is leveraged by applying different network optimization methods. Specifically, network pruning and quantization are used to enable lower computational costs and reduce memory usage, respectively. To support low resource requirements, a 68-landmark face detector from Dlib is used in the early step of the FER system.Furthermore, a DL compiler is utilized to incorporate advanced optimization techniques to the Xception model to improve the inference speed of the FER system. In comparison to VGG-Net and ResNet50, the proposed optimized DL-based FER system experimentally demonstrates the objectives of the network optimization methods used. As a result, the proposed approach can be used to create an efficient and real-time FER system.

Keywords: deep learning, face detection, facial emotion recognition, network optimization methods

Procedia PDF Downloads 110

Authors: Moustafa Osman Mohammed

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This paper is mapping air quality model to engineering the industrial system that ultimately utilized in extensive range of energy systems, distribution resources, and end-user technologies. The model is determining long-range transport patterns contribution as area source can either traced from 48 hrs backward trajectory model or remotely described from background measurements data in those days. The trajectory model will be run within stable conditions and quite constant parameters of the atmospheric pressure at the most time of the year. Air parcel trajectory is necessary for estimating the long-range transport of pollutants and other chemical species. It provides a better understanding of airflow patterns. Since a large amount of meteorological data and a great number of calculations are required to drive trajectory, it will be very useful to apply HYPSLIT model to locate areas and boundaries influence air quality at regional location of Windsor. 2–days backward trajectories model at high and low concentration measurements below and upward the benchmark which was areas influence air quality measurement levels. The benchmark level will be considered as 30 (μg/m3) as the moderate level for Ontario region. Thereby, air quality model is incorporating a midpoint concept between biotic and abiotic components to broaden the scope of quantification impact. The later outcomes’ theories of environmental obligation suggest either a recommendation or a decision of what is a legislative should be achieved in mitigation measures of air emission impact ultimately.

Keywords: air quality, management systems, environmental impact assessment, industrial ecology, climate change

Procedia PDF Downloads 231

Authors: Edwin Lerch, Dirk Audring, Cuong Nguyen Mau, Duc Ninh Nguyen, The Cuong Nguyen, The Van Nguyen

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The National Load Dispatch Centre of Electricity Vietnam (EVNNLDC) and Siemens PTI investigated the stability of the electrical 500/220 kV transportation system of Vietnam. The general scope of the investigations is improving the stability of the Vietnam power system and giving the EVNNLDC staff the capability to decide how to deal with expected stability challenges in the future, which are related to the very fast growth of the system. Rapid system growth leads to a very high demand of power transmission from North to South. This was investigated by stability studies of interconnected power system with neighboring countries. These investigations are performed in close cooperation and coordination with the EVNNLDC project team. This important project includes data collection, measurement, model validation and investigation of relevant stability phenomena as well as training of the EVNNLDC staff. Generally, the power system of Vietnam has good voltage and dynamic stability. The main problems are related to the longitudinal system with more power generation in the North and Center, especially hydro power, and load centers in the South of Vietnam. Faults on the power transmission system from North to South risks the stability of the entire system due to a high power transfer from North to South and high loading of the 500 kV backbone. An additional problem is the weak connection to Cambodia power system which leads to interarea oscillations mode. Therefore, strengthening the power transfer capability by new 500kV lines or HVDC connection and balancing the power generation across the country will solve many challenges. Other countermeasures, such as wide area load shedding, PSS tuning and correct SVC placement will improve and stabilize the power system as well. Primary frequency reserve should be increased.

Keywords: dynamic power transmission system studies, blackout prevention, power system interconnection, stability

Procedia PDF Downloads 339

Authors: Luis N. Pereira, Marco P. Carrasco

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Dynamic pricing is a revenue management strategy in which hotel suppliers define, over time, flexible and different prices for their services for different potential customers, considering the profile of e-consumers and the demand and market supply. This means that the fundamentals of dynamic pricing are based on economic theory (price elasticity of demand) and market segmentation. This study aims to define a dynamic pricing strategy and a contextualized offer to the e-consumers profile in order to improve the number of reservations of an online distribution channel. Segmentation methods (hierarchical and non-hierarchical) were used to identify and validate an optimal number of market segments. A profile of the market segments was studied, considering the characteristics of the e-consumers and the probability of reservation a room. In addition, the price elasticity of demand was estimated for each segment using econometric models. Finally, predictive models were used to define rules for classifying new e-consumers into pre-defined segments. The empirical study illustrates how it is possible to improve the intelligence of an online distribution channel system through an optimal dynamic pricing strategy and a contextualized offer to the profile of each new e-consumer. A database of 11 million e-consumers of an online distribution channel was used in this study. The results suggest that an appropriate policy of market segmentation in using of online reservation systems is benefit for the service suppliers because it brings high probability of reservation and generates more profit than fixed pricing.

Keywords: dynamic pricing, e-consumers segmentation, online reservation systems, predictive analytics

Procedia PDF Downloads 221

Authors: Szu-Hua Wang

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Urban areas contain abundant potential biochemical storages and renewable and non-renewable flows. Urban natural environments for breeding natural assets and urban economic development for maintaining urban functions can be analyzed form the concept of ecological economic system. Land use change and ecosystem services change are resulting from the interactions between human activities and environments factually. Land use change due to human activities is the major cause of climate change, leading to serious impacts on urban ecosystem services, including provisioning services, regulating services, cultural services and supporting services. However, it lacks discussion on the interactions among urban land use change, ecosystem services change, and extreme precipitation events. Energy synthesis can use the same measure standard unit, solar energy, for different energy resources (e.g. sunlight, water, fossil fuels, minerals, etc.) and analyze contributions of various natural environmental resources on human economic systems. Therefore, this research adopts the concept of ecological, economic systems and energy synthesis for analyzing dynamic spatial impacts of land use change on ecosystem services, using the Taipei area as a case study. The analysis results show that changes in land use in the Taipei area, especially the conversion of natural lands and agricultural lands to urban lands, affect the ecosystem services negatively. These negative effects become more significant during the extreme precipitation events.

Keywords: urban ecological economic system, extreme precipitation events, ecosystem services, energy

Procedia PDF Downloads 177

Authors: Akhtar Aman, Abida Raza, Shumaila Bashir, Mehboob Alam

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The development of efficient delivery systems remains a major concern in cancer chemotherapy as many efficacious anticancer drugs are hydrophobic and difficult to formulate. Nanomedicines based on drug-loaded amphiphilic glycol chitosan micelles offer potential advantages for the formulation of drugs such as etoposide that may improve the pharmacokinetics and reduce the formulation-related adverse effects observed with current formulations. Amphiphilic derivatives of glycol chitosan were synthesized by chemical grafting of palmitic acid N-hydroxysuccinimide and quaternization to glycol chitosan backbone. To this end, a 7.9 kDa glycol chitosan was modified by palmitoylation and quaternization, yielding a 13 kDa amphiphilic polymer. Micelles prepared from this amphiphilic polymer had a size of 162nm and were able to encapsulate up to 3 mg/ml etoposide. Pharmacokinetic results indicated that the GCPQ micelles transformed the biodistribution pattern and increased etoposide concentration in the brain significantly compared to free drugs after intravenous administration. AUC 0.5-24h showed statistically significant difference in ETP-GCPQ vs. Commercial preparation in liver (25 vs.70, p<0.001), spleen (27 vs.36, p<0.05), lungs (42 vs.136,p<0.001),kidneys(25 vs.70,p< 0.05),and brain(19 vs.9,p<0.001). ETP-GCPQ crossed the blood-brain barrier, and 4, 3.5, 2.6, 1.8, 1.7, 1.5, and 2.5 fold higher levels of etoposide were observed at 0.5, 1, 2, 4, 6, 12, and 24hrs; respectively suggesting these systems could deliver hydrophobic anticancer drugs such as etoposide to tumors but also increased their transport through the biological barriers, thus making it a good delivery system

Keywords: glycol chitosan, micelles, pharmacokinetics, tissue distribution

Procedia PDF Downloads 93

Authors: Tsui-Tsai Lin

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Cooperative orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) transmission, which possesses the advantages of better connectivity, expanded coverage, and resistance to frequency selective fading, has been a more powerful solution for the physical layer in wireless communications. However, such a hybrid scheme suffers from the carrier frequency offset (CFO) effects inherited from the OFDM-based systems, which lead to a significant degradation in performance. In addition, insertion of a cyclic prefix (CP) at each symbol block head for combating inter-symbol interference will lead to a reduction in spectral efficiency. The design on the CFO estimation for the cooperative OFDM system without CP is a suspended problem. This motivates us to develop a low complexity CFO estimator for the cooperative OFDM decode-and-forward (DF) communication system without CP over the multipath fading channel. Especially, using a block-type pilot, the CFO estimation is first derived in accordance with the least square criterion. A reliable performance can be obtained through an exhaustive two-dimensional (2D) search with a penalty of heavy computational complexity. As a remedy, an alternative solution realized with an iteration approach is proposed for the CFO estimation. In contrast to the 2D-search estimator, the iterative method enjoys the advantage of the substantially reduced implementation complexity without sacrificing the estimate performance. Computer simulations have been presented to demonstrate the efficacy of the proposed CFO estimation.

Keywords: cooperative transmission, orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM), carrier frequency offset, iteration

Procedia PDF Downloads 257

Authors: Alexander Street, Nina Wollersberger, Paul Fernie, Leonardo Muller, Ming Hung HSU, Helen Odell-Miller, Jorg Fachner, Patrizia Di Campli San Vito, Stephen Brewster, Hari Shaji, Satvik Venkatesh, Paolo Itaborai, Nicolas Farina, Alexis Kirke, Sube Banerjee, Eduardo Reck Miranda

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Escalating neuropsychiatric symptoms (NPS) in people with dementia may lead to earlier care home admission. Music listening has been reported to stimulate cognitive function, potentially reducing agitation in this population. We present a scoping review, reporting on current developments and discussing the potential for music listening with related technology in managing agitation in dementia care. Of two searches for music listening studies, one focused on older people or people living with dementia where music listening interventions, including technology, were delivered in participants’ homes or in institutions to address neuropsychiatric symptoms, quality of life and independence. The second included any population focusing on the use of music technology for health and wellbeing. In search one 70/251 full texts were included. The majority reported either statistical significance (6, 8.5%), significance (17, 24.2%) or improvements (26, 37.1%). Agitation was specifically reported in 36 (51.4%). The second search included 51/99 full texts, reporting improvement (28, 54.9%), significance (11, 21.5%), statistical significance (1, 1.9%) and no difference compared to the control (6, 11.7%). The majority in the first focused on mood and agitation, and the second on mood and psychophysiological responses. Five studies used AI or machine learning systems to select music, all involving healthy controls and reporting benefits. Most studies in both reviews were not conducted in a home environment (review 1 = 12; 17.1%; review 2 = 11; 21.5%). Preferred music listening may help manage NPS in the care home settings. Based on these and other data extracted in the review, a reasonable progression would be to co-design and test music listening systems and protocols for NPS in all settings, including people’s homes. Machine learning and automated technology for music selection and arousal adjustment, driven by live biodata, have not been explored in dementia care. Such approaches may help deliver the right music at the appropriate time in the required dosage, reducing the use of medication and improving quality of life.

Keywords: music listening, dementia, agitation, scoping review, technology

Procedia PDF Downloads 96

Authors: Bohuslava Juhasova, Martin Juhas, Renata Masarova, Zuzana Sutova

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The article deals with the tool in Matlab GUI form that is designed to analyse a mechatronic system sensitivity and tolerance. In the analysed mechatronic system, a torque is transferred from the drive to the load through a coupling containing flexible elements. Different methods of control system design are used. The classic form of the feedback control is proposed using Naslin method, modulus optimum criterion and inverse dynamics method. The cascade form of the control is proposed based on combination of modulus optimum criterion and symmetric optimum criterion. The sensitivity is analysed on the basis of absolute and relative sensitivity of system function to the change of chosen parameter value of the mechatronic system, as well as the control subsystem. The tolerance is analysed in the form of determining the range of allowed relative changes of selected system parameters in the field of system stability. The tool allows to analyse an influence of torsion stiffness, torsion damping, inertia moments of the motor and the load and controller(s) parameters. The sensitivity and tolerance are monitored in terms of the impact of parameter change on the response in the form of system step response and system frequency-response logarithmic characteristics. The Symbolic Math Toolbox for expression of the final shape of analysed system functions was used. The sensitivity and tolerance are graphically represented as 2D graph of sensitivity or tolerance of the system function and 3D/2D static/interactive graph of step/frequency response.

Keywords: mechatronic systems, Matlab GUI, sensitivity, tolerance

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Authors: A. Saha Chaudhuri, D. Sarkar

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In steel construction, there are two families of structural members. One is hot rolled steel and another is cold formed steel. Cold formed steel section includes steel sheet, strip, plate or flat bar. Cold formed steel section is manufactured in roll forming machine by press brake or bending operation. Cold formed steel (CFS), also known as Light Gauge Steel (LGS). As cold formed steel is a sustainable material, it is widely used in green building. Cold formed steel can be recycled and reused with no degradation in structural properties. Cold formed steel structures can earn credits for green building ratings such as LEED and similar programs. Cold formed steel construction satisfies international demand for better, more efficient and affordable buildings. Cold formed steel sections are used in building, car body, railway coach, various types of equipment, storage rack, grain bin, highway product, transmission tower, transmission pole, drainage facility, bridge construction etc. Various shapes of cold formed steel sections are available, such as C section, Z section, I section, T section, angle section, hat section, box section, square hollow section (SHS), rectangular hollow section (RHS), circular hollow section (CHS) etc. In building construction cold formed steel is used as eave strut, purlin, girt, stud, header, floor joist, brace, diaphragm and covering for roof, wall and floor. Cold formed steel has high strength to weight ratio and high stiffness. Cold formed steel is non shrinking and non creeping at ambient temperature, it is termite proof and rot proof. CFS is durable, dimensionally stable and non combustible material. CFS is economical in transportation and handling. At present days cold formed steel becomes a competitive building material. In this paper all these applications related present research work are described and how the CFS can be used as blast resistant structural system that is examined.

Keywords: cold form steel sections, applications, present research review, blast resistant design

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Authors: Yulin Rao, Zhixuan Li, Burra Venkata Durga Kumar

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Intrusion detection refers to monitoring the actions of internal and external intruders on the system and detecting the behaviours that violate security policies in real-time. In intrusion detection, there has been much discussion about the application of neural network technology and artificial immune system (AIS). However, many solutions use static methods (signature-based and stateful protocol analysis) or centralized intrusion detection systems (CIDS), which are unsuitable for real-time intrusion detection systems that need to process large amounts of data and detect unknown intrusions. This article proposes a framework for a distributed intrusion detection system (DIDS) with multi-agents based on the concept of AIS and neural network technology to detect anomalies and intrusions. In this framework, multiple agents are assigned to each host and work together, improving the system's detection efficiency and robustness. The trainer agent in the central server of the framework uses the artificial neural network (ANN) rather than the negative selection algorithm of AIS to generate mature detectors. Mature detectors can distinguish between self-files and non-self-files after learning. Our analyzer agents use genetic algorithms to generate memory cell detectors. This kind of detector will effectively reduce false positive and false negative errors and act quickly on known intrusions.

Keywords: artificial immune system, distributed artificial intelligence, multi-agent, intrusion detection system, neural network

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Authors: Hamsini Pulugurtha, V.S. Lakshmi Jagadmaba Paluri

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Distributed denial of service attack (DDoS) is one altogether the top-rated cyber threats presently. It runs down the victim server resources like a system of measurement and buffer size by obstructing the server to supply resources to legitimate shoppers. Throughout this text, we tend to tend to propose a mathematical model of DDoS attack; we discuss its relevancy to the choices like inter-arrival time or rate of arrival of the assault customers accessing the server. We tend to tend to further analyze the attack model in context to the exhausting system of measurement and buffer size of the victim server. The projected technique uses an associate in nursing unattended learning technique, self-organizing map, to make the clusters of identical choices. Lastly, the abstract applies mathematical correlation and so the standard likelihood distribution on the clusters and analyses their behaviors to look at a DDoS attack. These systems not exclusively interconnect very little devices exchanging personal data, but to boot essential infrastructures news standing of nuclear facilities. Although this interconnection brings many edges and blessings, it to boot creates new vulnerabilities and threats which might be conversant in mount attacks. In such sophisticated interconnected systems, the power to look at attacks as early as accomplishable is of paramount importance.

Keywords: application attack, bandwidth, buffer correlation, DDoS distribution flooding intrusion layer, normal prevention probability size

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Authors: Srinivasan Chandrasekaran, Thailammai Chithambaram, Shihas A. Khader

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The early-stage damage detection in offshore structures requires continuous structural health monitoring and for the large area the position of sensors will also plays an important role in the efficient damage detection. Determining the dynamic behavior of offshore structures requires dense deployment of sensors. The wired Structural Health Monitoring (SHM) systems are highly expensive and always needs larger installation space to deploy. Wireless sensor networks can enhance the SHM system by deployment of scalable sensor network, which consumes lesser space. This paper presents the results of wireless sensor network based Structural Health Monitoring method applied to a scaled experimental model of offshore structure that underwent wave loading. This method determines the serviceability of the offshore structure which is subjected to various environment loads. Wired and wireless sensors were installed in the model and the response of the scaled BLSRP model under wave loading was recorded. The wireless system discussed in this study is the Raspberry pi board with Arm V6 processor which is programmed to transmit the data acquired by the sensor to the server using Wi-Fi adapter, the data is then hosted in the webpage. The data acquired from the wireless and wired SHM systems were compared and the design of the wireless system is verified.

Keywords: condition assessment, damage detection, structural health monitoring, structural response, wireless sensor network

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Authors: Afshin Kadri

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Using Renewable Energy Resources (RES) as a type of DG unit is developing in distribution systems. The connection of these generation units to existing AC distribution systems changes the structure and some of the operational aspects of these grids. Most of the RES requires to power electronic-based interfaces for connection to AC systems. These interfaces consist of at least one DC/AC conversion unit. Nowadays, grid-connected inverters must have the required feature to support the grid under sag voltage conditions. There are two curves in these conditions that show the magnitude of the reactive component of current as a function of voltage drop value and the required minimum time value, which must be connected to the grid. This feature is named low voltage ride-through (LVRT). Implementing this feature causes problems in the operation of the inverter that increases the amplitude of high-frequency components of the injected current and working out of maximum power point in the photovoltaic panel connected inverters are some of them. The important phenomenon in these conditions is ripples in the DC bus voltage that affects the operation of the inverter directly and indirectly. The losses of DC bus capacitors which are electrolytic capacitors, cause increasing their temperature and decreasing its lifespan. In addition, if the inverter is connected to the photovoltaic panels directly and has the duty of maximum power point tracking, these ripples cause oscillations around the operating point and decrease the generating energy. Using a bidirectional converter in the DC bus, which works as a buck and boost converter and transfers the ripples to its DC bus, is the traditional method to eliminate these ripples. In spite of eliminating the ripples in the DC bus, this method cannot solve the problem of reliability because it uses an electrolytic capacitor in its DC bus. In this work, a control method is proposed which uses the bidirectional converter as the fourth leg of the inverter and eliminates the DC bus ripples using an injection of unbalanced currents into the grid. Moreover, the proposed method works based on constant power control. In this way, in addition, to supporting the amplitude of grid voltage, it stabilizes its frequency by injecting active power. Also, the proposed method can eliminate the DC bus ripples in deep voltage drops, which cause increasing the amplitude of the reference current more than the nominal current of the inverter. The amplitude of the injected current for the faulty phases in these conditions is kept at the nominal value and its phase, together with the phase and amplitude of the other phases, are adjusted, which at the end, the ripples in the DC bus are eliminated, however, the generated power decreases.

Keywords: renewable energy resources, voltage drop value, DC bus ripples, bidirectional converter

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Authors: Gela Gelashvili, David Gelenidze, Sulkhan Nanobashvili, Irakli Nanobashvili, George Tavkhelidze, Tsiuri Sitchinava

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Development of new highly efficient plasma arc combustion system of pulverized coal is presented. As it is well-known, coal is one of the main energy carriers by means of which electric and heat energy is produced in thermal power stations. The quality of the extracted coal decreases very rapidly. Therefore, the difficulties associated with its firing and complete combustion arise and thermo-chemical preparation of pulverized coal becomes necessary. Usually, other organic fuels (mazut-fuel oil or natural gas) are added to low-quality coal for this purpose. The fraction of additional organic fuels varies within 35-40% range. This decreases dramatically the economic efficiency of such systems. At the same time, emission of noxious substances in the environment increases. Because of all these, intense development of plasma combustion systems of pulverized coal takes place in whole world. These systems are equipped with Non-Transferred Plasma Arc Torches. They allow practically complete combustion of pulverized coal (without organic additives) in boilers, increase of energetic and financial efficiency. At the same time, emission of noxious substances in the environment decreases dramatically. But, the non-transferred plasma torches have numerous drawbacks, e.g. complicated construction, low service life (especially in the case of high power), instability of plasma arc and most important – up to 30% of energy loss due to anode cooling. Due to these reasons, intense development of new plasma technologies that are free from these shortcomings takes place. In our proposed system, pulverized coal-air mixture passes through plasma arc area that burns between to carbon electrodes directly in pulverized coal muffler burner. Consumption of the carbon electrodes is low and does not need a cooling system, but the main advantage of this method is that radiation of plasma arc directly impacts on coal-air mixture that accelerates the process of thermo-chemical preparation of coal to burn. To ensure the stability of the plasma arc in such difficult conditions, we have developed a power source that provides fixed current during fluctuations in the arc resistance automatically compensated by the voltage change as well as regulation of plasma arc length over a wide range. Our combustion system where plasma arc acts directly on pulverized coal-air mixture is simple. This should allow a significant improvement of pulverized coal combustion (especially low-quality coal) and its economic efficiency. Preliminary experiments demonstrated the successful functioning of the system.

Keywords: coal combustion, plasma arc, plasma torches, pulverized coal

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Authors: Jorge A. Cruz-Morales, Joel Vargas, Arlette A. Santiago, Mikhail A. Tlenkopatchev

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In industrial processes such as oil extraction and refining, products are handled or generated in the gas phase, which represents a challenge in terms of treatment and purification. During the past three decades, new scientific findings and technological advances in separation based on the use of membranes have led to simpler and more efficient gas separation processes, optimizing the use of energy and generating less pollution. This work reports the synthesis and ring-opening metathesis polymerization (ROMP) of new structural isomers based on norbornene dicarboximides bearing trifluoromethyl moieties, specifically N-2-trifluoromethylphenyl-exo,endo-norbornene-5,6-dicarboximide (2a) and N-3-trifluoromethylphenyl-exo,endo-norbornene-5,6-dicarboximide (2b), using tricyclohexylphosphine [1,3-bis(2,4,6-trimethylphenyl)-4,5-dihydroimidazol-2-ylidene][benzylidene] ruthenium dichloride (I), bis(tricyclohexylphosphine) benzylidene ruthenium (IV) dichloride (II), and bis(tricyclohexylphosphine) p-fluorophenylvinylidene ruthenium (II) dichloride (III). It was observed that the -CF3 moiety attached at the ortho position of the aromatic ring increases thermal and mechanical properties of the polymer, whereas meta substitution has the opposite effect. A comparative study of gas transportation in membranes, based on these fluorinated polynorbornenes, showed that -CF3 ortho substitution increases permeability of the polymer membrane as a consequence of the increase in both gas solubility and gas diffusion. In contrast, gas permeability coefficients of the meta-substituted polymer membrane are rather similar to those of that which is non-fluorinated; this can be attributed to a lower fractional free volume. The meta-substituted polymer membrane, besides showing the largest permselectivity coefficients of all the isomers studied here, was also found to have one of the largest permselectivity coefficients for separating H2/C3H6 into glassy polynorbornene dicarboximides.

Keywords: gas transport membranes, polynorbornene dicarboximide, ROMP, structural isomers

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Authors: Acha Mildred Endam

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Gentrification brings changes in socio-economic and environmental aspects in cities. This is a concern for local governments and urban residents, as rapid urbanization poses a challenge to SDGs 11 and 13. This paper aims to: (1) examine the dominant gentrification actions that counteract the drive towards green urbanism; (2) evaluate policy actions and institutions created to promote green urbanism; (3) explore the constraints that hinder development proponents from achieving the goal of green urbanism. A mixed research design (survey and exploratory) was used, along with snowball sampling techniques, to administer the questionnaire. Structured interviews and focus group discussions were also conducted to assess the efforts and success rate of planning and development proponents in achieving green urbanism. Secondary data provided the basis for a literature review on activities that promote brown cities, which hinder green urbanism. The results of the study revealed that gentrification in Bamenda is mainly focused on upgrading infrastructure within the city centre. This transition is accompanied by unsustainable architectural developments, sprawl into peri-urban ecosystems, and climate-incompatible developments. Efforts to achieve green urbanization in Bamenda are insignificant. Socio-economic and policy actions of residents do not reflect a move towards sustainable cities, which is a common theme in most development agendas. This undermines the ecology, health, and general well-being of its inhabitants, increasing vulnerability. The study suggests that there is a need to learn from the few green cities in Africa and adopt a holistic approach towards green urbanization. This approach should include green transportation, preservation of green spaces, and retrofitting brown buildings to green buildings, through synergies, motivation and subsidization through green governance.

Keywords: environmental sustainability, green urbanism, green governace, retrofitting

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Authors: Ya L. V., Benjamin Ong Wei Lin, Wanli Niu, Benjamin Seah Chin Tat

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This article introduces a methodology that improves reliability and cyclability of 2nd-life Li-ion battery system repurposed as an energy storage system (ESS). Most of the 2nd-life retired battery systems in the market have module/pack-level state-of-health (SOH) indicator, which is utilized for guiding appropriate depth-of-discharge (DOD) in the application of ESS. Due to the lack of cell-level SOH indication, the different degrading behaviors among various cells cannot be identified upon reaching retired status; in the end, considering end-of-life (EOL) loss and pack-level DOD, the repurposed ESS has to be oversized by > 1.5 times to complement the application requirement of reliability and cyclability. This proposed battery grading algorithm, using non-invasive methodology, is able to detect outlier cells based on historical voltage data and calculate cell-level historical maximum temperature data using semi-analytic methodology. In this way, the individual battery cell in the 2nd-life battery system can be graded in terms of SOH on basis of the historical voltage fluctuation and estimated historical maximum temperature variation. These grades will have corresponding DOD grades in the application of the repurposed ESS to enhance system reliability and cyclability. In all, this introduced battery grading algorithm is non-invasive, compatible with all kinds of retired Li-ion battery systems which lack of cell-level SOH indication, as well as potentially being embedded into battery management software for preventive maintenance and real-time cyclability optimization.

Keywords: battery grading algorithm, 2nd-life repurposing battery system, semi-analytic methodology, reliability and cyclability

Procedia PDF Downloads 189