Search results for: chemical process control systems

Authors: Maria Jose Granero Paris, Ana Isabel Jimenez Zarco, Agustin Pablo Alvarez Herranz

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In the industrial sector collaboration with suppliers is key to the development of innovations in the field of processes. Access to resources and expertise that are not available in the business, obtaining a cost advantage, or the reduction of the time needed to carry out innovation are some of the benefits associated with the process. However, the success of this collaborative process is compromised, when from the beginning not clearly rules have been established that govern the relationship. Abundant studies developed in the field of innovation emphasize the strategic importance of the concept of “Governance”. Despite this, there have been few papers that have analyzed how the governance process of the relationship must be designed and managed to ensure the success of the collaboration process. The lack of literature in this area responds to the wide diversity of contexts where collaborative processes to innovate take place. Thus, in sectors such as the car industry there is a strong collaborative tradition between manufacturers and suppliers being part of the value chain. In this case, it is common to establish mechanisms and procedures that fix formal and clear objectives to regulate the relationship, and establishes the rights and obligations of each of the parties involved. By contrast, in other sectors, collaborative relationships to innovate are not a common way of working, particularly when their aim is the development of process improvements. It is in this case, it is when the lack of mechanisms to establish and regulate the behavior of those involved, can give rise to conflicts, and the failure of the cooperative relationship. Because of this the present paper analyzes the similarities and differences in the processes of governance in collaboration with suppliers in the European aerospace industry With these ideas in mind, we present research is twofold: Understand the importance of governance as a key element of the success of the collaboration in the development of product and process innovations, Establish the mechanisms and procedures to ensure the proper management of the processes of collaboration. Following the methodology of the case study, we analyze the way in which manufacturers and suppliers cooperate in the development of new products and processes in two industries with different levels of technological intensity and collaborative tradition: the automotive and aerospace. The identification of those elements playing a key role to establish a successful governance and relationship management and the compression of the mechanisms of regulation and control in place at the automotive sector can be use to propose solutions to some of the conflicts that currently arise in aerospace industry. The paper concludes by analyzing the strategic implications for the aerospace industry entails the adoption of some of the practices traditionally used in other industrial sectors. Finally, it is important to highlight that in this paper are presented the first results of a research project currently in progress describing a model of governance that explains the way to manage outsourced services to suppliers in the European aerospace industry, through the analysis of companies in the sector located in Germany, France and Spain.

Keywords: supplier collaboration, supplier relationship governance, innovation management, product innovation, process innovation

Procedia PDF Downloads 447

Authors: Neeley Current, Fatih Demir, Kenneth Haggerty, Blake Naughton, Isa Jahnke

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Educational systems seek reform using data-intensive continuous improvement processes known as strategic improvement plans (SIPs). Schools turn to digital systems to monitor, analyze and report SIPs. One technical challenge of these digital systems focuses on integrating a highly diverse set of data sources. Another challenge is to create a learnable sociotechnical system to help administrators, principals and teachers add, manipulate and interpret data. This study explores to what extent one particular system is usable and useful for strategic planning activities and whether intended users see the benefit of the system achieve the goal of improving workflow related to strategic planning in schools. In a three-phase study, researchers used sociotechnical design methods to understand the current workflow, technology use, and processes of teachers and principals surrounding their strategic improvement planning. Additionally, design review and task analysis usability methods were used to evaluate task completion, usability, and user satisfaction of the system. The resulting socio-technical models illustrate the existing work processes and indicate how and at which places in the workflow the newly developed system could have an impact. The results point to the potential of the system but also indicate that it was initially too complicated for use. However, the diverse users see the potential benefits, especially to overcome the diverse set of data sources, and that the system could fill a gap for schools in planning and conducting strategic improvement plans.

Keywords: continuous improvement process, education reform, strategic improvement planning, sociotechnical design, software development, usability

Procedia PDF Downloads 293

Authors: Gui Yewei, Du Yanxia, Xiao Guangming, Liu Lei, Wei Dong, Yang Xiaofeng

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A phase change material (PCM) is a substance which absorbs a large amount of energy when undergoing a change of solid-liquid phase. The good physical and chemical properties of C or SiC foam reveal the possibility of using them as a thermal conductivity enhancer for the PCM. C or SiC foam composite PCM has a high effective conductivity and becomes one of the most interesting thermal storage techniques due to its advantage of simplicity and reliability. The paper developed a numerical method to simulate the heat transfer of SiC and C foam composite PCM, a finite volume technique was used to discretize the heat diffusion equation while the phase change process was modeled using the equivalent specific heat method. The effects of the porosity were investigated based on the numerical method, and the effects of the geometric model of the microstructure on the equivalent thermal conductivity was studies.

Keywords: SiC foam, composite, phase change material, heat transfer

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Authors: Yuichi Kida, Takuro Kida

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In a new smart society supported by the recent development of 5G and 6G Communication systems, the im- portance of wireless power transmission is increasing. These systems contain discrete sampling systems in the middle of the transmission path and equivalent circuit representation of lossless or lossy power transmission through these systems is an important issue in circuit theory. In this paper, for the given weight function, we show that a lossless power transmission system with the given weight is expressed by an equivalent circuit representation of the Kida’s optimal signal prediction system followed by a reactance multi-port circuit behind it. Further, it is shown that, when the system is lossy, the system has an equivalent circuit in the form of connecting a multi-port positive-real circuit behind the Kida’s optimal signal prediction system. Also, for the convenience of the reader, in this paper, the equivalent circuit expression of the reactance multi-port circuit and the positive- real multi-port circuit by Cauer and Ohno, whose information is currently being lost even in the world of the Internet.

Keywords: signal prediction, pseudo inverse matrix, artificial intelligence, power transmission

Procedia PDF Downloads 117

Authors: Mark Andrew

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Geopolitical tensions are at a thirty-year high, and the pace of technological innovation is driving asymmetry in force capabilities between nation states and between non-state actors. Technology futures are a vital component of defence capability growth, and investments in technology futures need to be informed by accurate and reliable forecasts of the options for ‘systems of systems’ innovation, development, and deployment. This paper describes a method for forecasting technology futures developed through an analysis of four key systems’ development stages, namely: technology domain categorisation, scanning results examining novel systems’ signals and signs, potential system-of systems’ implications in warfare theatres, and political ramifications in terms of funding and development priorities. The method has been applied to several technology domains, including physical systems (e.g., nano weapons, loitering munitions, inflight charging, and hypersonic missiles), biological systems (e.g., molecular virus weaponry, genetic engineering, brain-computer interfaces, and trans-human augmentation), and information systems (e.g., sensor technologies supporting situation awareness, cyber-driven social attacks, and goal-specification challenges to proliferation and alliance testing). Although the current application of the method has been team-centred using paper-based rapid prototyping and iteration, the application of autonomous language models (such as GPT-3) is anticipated as a next-stage operating platform. The importance of forecasting accuracy and reliability is considered a vital element in guiding technology development to afford stronger contingencies as ideological changes are forecast to expand threats to ecology and earth systems, possibly eclipsing the traditional vulnerabilities of nation states. The early results from the method will be subjected to ground truthing using longitudinal investigation.

Keywords: forecasting, technology futures, uncertainty, complexity

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Authors: Lawong Damian Bernsah

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Neglected Tropical Diseases (NTDs) are most predominant among the poor and rural populations and are endemic in 149 countries. These diseases are the most prevalent and responsible for infecting 1.4 billion people worldwide. There are 17 neglected tropical diseases recognized by WHO that constitute the fourth largest disease health and economic burden of all communicable diseases. Five of these 17 diseases are considered for the cost analysis of this paper: lymphatic filariasis, onchocerciasis, trachoma, schistosomiasis, and soil transmitted helminth infections. WHO has proposed a roadmap for eradication and elimination by 2020 and treatments have been donated through the London Declaration by pharmaceutical manufacturers. The paper estimates the cost of NTD control programme and elimination for each NTD disease and total in Nigeria. This is necessary as it forms the bases upon which programme budget and expenditure could be based. Again, given the opportunity cost the resources for NTD face it is necessary to estimate the cost so as to provide bases for comparison. Cost of NTDs control and elimination programme is estimated using the population at risk for each NTD diseases and for the total. The population at risk is gotten from the national master plan for the 2015 - 2020, while the cost per person was gotten for similar studies conducted in similar settings and ranges from US$0.1 to US$0.5 for Mass Administration of Medicine (MAM) and between US$1 to US$1.5 for each NTD disease. The combined cost for all the NTDs was estimated to be US$634.88 million for the period 2015-2020 and US$1.9 billion for each NTD disease for the same period. For the purpose of sensitivity analysis and for robustness of the analysis the cost per person was varied and all were still high. Given that health expenditure for Nigeria (% of GDP) averages 3.5% for the period 1995-2014, it is very clear that efforts have to be made to improve allocation to the health sector in general which is hoped could trickle to NTDs control and elimination. Thus, the government and the donor partners would need to step-up budgetary allocation and also to be aware of the costs of NTD control and elimination programme since they have alternative uses. Key Words: Neglected Tropical Disease, Cost Analysis, NTD Programme Control and Elimination, Cost per Person

Keywords: Neglected Tropical Disease, Cost Analysis, Neglected Tropical Disease Programme Control and Elimination, Cost per Person

Procedia PDF Downloads 263

Authors: Anubhav Shrivastava Shivarudraswamy, Bhat Lakshya

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Distributed generation has indeed become a major area of interest in recent years. Distributed generation can address a large number of loads in a power line and hence has better efficiency over the conventional methods. However, there are certain drawbacks associated with it, an increase in voltage being the major one. This paper addresses the voltage control at the buses for an IEEE 30 bus system by regulating reactive power. For carrying out the analysis, the suitable location for placing distributed generators (DG) is identified through load flow analysis and seeing where the voltage profile is dipping. MATLAB programming is used to regulate the voltage at all buses within +/- 5% of the base value even after the introduction of DGs. Three methods for regulation of voltage are discussed. A sensitivity based analysis is then carried out to determine the priority among the various methods listed in the paper.

Keywords: distributed generators, distributed system, reactive power, voltage control, sensitivity analysis

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Authors: Filip Ščerba, Veronika Pochylá

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Performing of the acts within criminal proceedings usually takes too long and thus this phenomenon can be regarded as one of the most burning problems which have plagued the criminal justice not only in the Czech Republic but at least all over Europe for the last few decades. This problem obviously has to be dealt with and thus the need to tackle this issue has resulted in the trend which is sometimes called Criminal Justice Rationalization, i.e. introducing and enforcing methods supporting the increase in efficiency of the criminal justice in order to make the criminal proceedings shorter and administrative procedure easier. This resulted in the introduction of institutes such as e.g. diversions in criminal proceedings or other forms of shortened pre-trial proceedings, which may be used primarily for dealing with less serious crimes. But also the institute, which was originally mentioned in connection with the system of criminal law in the countries belonging to the Anglo-Saxon legal order where it is frequently called of plea bargaining, has been introduced into the criminal law of many European countries, and it may be applied also in cases of serious crimes. All these special and shortened forms of criminal proceedings are connected with limited extent of process of evidence; in fact, some of these specific forms of criminal proceedings are designed for the purpose to simplify the process of evidence. That is also the reason, why some of these procedures are conditioned with the defendant’s confession. Main hypothesis: Limited process of evidence represents also a potential conflict with certain fundamental principles upon which the criminal proceeding in the Continental legal system is based. (A conflict with principle of material truth may be considered as the most important problem. This principle states that the bodies in criminal proceedings must clarify the facts of the case beyond reasonable doubt to such extent that a decision can be made; the defendant’s confession does not mean that these bodies are freed from the duty to review all the circumstances and facts of the case. Such principle is typical for criminal law in Central European region.) Basic methodologies: The paper is going to analyze such a problem of weakening of the principle of material truth in modern criminal law. Such analysis will be provided primarily on the base of the Czech criminal law, but also other legal regulations will be taken into consideration, and its result may have some relevance for all legal regulations belonging to the Continental legal system, so the paper offers also a comparison with legal systems of other Central European countries.

Keywords: burden of proof, central European countries, criminal justice rationalization, criminal proceeding, Czech legislation, Czech republic, defendant, diversions, evidence, fundamental principles, plea bargaining, pre-trial proceedings, principle of material truth, process of evidence, process of evidence

Procedia PDF Downloads 281

Authors: Qian Chen, Lin Xu, Ping Ju, Zhuoran Li, Yiping Yu, Yuqing Jin

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The operation of power grid is becoming more and more complex and difficult due to its rapid development towards high voltage, long distance, and large capacity. For instance, many large-scale wind farms have connected to power grid, where their fluctuation and randomness is very likely to affect the stability and safety of the grid. Fortunately, many new-type equipments based on power electronics have been applied to power grid, such as UPFC (Unified Power Flow Controller), TCSC (Thyristor Controlled Series Compensation), STATCOM (Static Synchronous Compensator) and so on, which can help to deal with the problem above. Compared with traditional equipment such as generator, new-type controllable devices, represented by the FACTS (Flexible AC Transmission System), have more accurate control ability and respond faster. But they are too expensive to use widely. Therefore, on the basis of the comparison and analysis of the controlling characteristics between traditional control equipment and new-type controllable equipment in both time and space scale, a coordinated optimizing control method within mutil-time-space frame is proposed in this paper to bring both kinds of advantages into play, which can better both control ability and economical efficiency. Firstly, the coordination of different space sizes of grid is studied focused on the fluctuation caused by large-scale wind farms connected to power grid. With generator, FSC (Fixed Series Compensation) and TCSC, the coordination method on two-layer regional power grid vs. its sub grid is studied in detail. The coordination control model is built, the corresponding scheme is promoted, and the conclusion is verified by simulation. By analysis, interface power flow can be controlled by generator and the specific line power flow between two-layer regions can be adjusted by FSC and TCSC. The smaller the interface power flow adjusted by generator, the bigger the control margin of TCSC, instead, the total consumption of generator is much higher. Secondly, the coordination of different time sizes is studied to further the amount of the total consumption of generator and the control margin of TCSC, where the minimum control cost can be acquired. The coordination method on two-layer ultra short-term correction vs. AGC (Automatic Generation Control) is studied with generator, FSC and TCSC. The optimal control model is founded, genetic algorithm is selected to solve the problem, and the conclusion is verified by simulation. Finally, the aforementioned method within multi-time-space scale is analyzed with practical cases, and simulated on PSASP (Power System Analysis Software Package) platform. The correctness and effectiveness are verified by the simulation result. Moreover, this coordinated optimizing control method can contribute to the decrease of control cost and will provide reference to the following studies in this field.

Keywords: FACTS, multi-space-time frame, optimal control, TCSC

Procedia PDF Downloads 259

Authors: Vinay P., Srinivas K. S.

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Low Light Image Enhancement is of utmost impor- tance in computer vision based tasks. Applications include vision systems for autonomous driving, night vision devices for defence systems, low light object detection tasks. Many of the existing deep learning methods are resource intensive during the inference step and take considerable time for processing. The algorithm should take considerably less than 41 milliseconds in order to process a real-time video feed with 24 frames per second and should be even less for a video with 30 or 60 frames per second. The paper presents a fast and efficient solution which has two main advantages, it has the potential to be used for a real-time video feed, and it can be used in low compute environments because of the lightweight nature. The proposed solution is a pipeline of three steps, the first one is the use of a simple function to map input RGB values to output RGB values, the second is to balance the colors and the final step is to adjust the contrast of the image. Hence a custom dataset is carefully prepared using images taken in low and bright lighting conditions. The preparation of the dataset, the proposed model, the processing time are discussed in detail and the quality of the enhanced images using different methods is shown.

Keywords: low light image enhancement, real-time video, computer vision, machine learning

Procedia PDF Downloads 189

Authors: Markéta Gregušová, Vladimíra Schindlerová, Ivana Šajdlerová, Petr Mohyla, Jan Kedroň

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Company managers are always looking for more and more opportunities to succeed in today's fiercely competitive market. To maintain your place among the successful companies on the market today or to come up with a revolutionary business idea is much more difficult than before. Each new or improved method, tool, or approach that can improve the functioning of business processes or even of the entire system is worth checking and verification. The use of simulation in the design of manufacturing systems and their management in practice is one of the ways without increased risk, which makes it possible to find the optimal parameters of manufacturing processes and systems. The paper presents an example of use of simulation for solution of the bottleneck problem in the concrete company.

Keywords: practical applications, business processes, systems, simulation

Procedia PDF Downloads 539

Authors: Aigul Manapova

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We consider an optimal control problem in the higher coefficient of nonlinear equations with a divergent elliptic operator and unbounded nonlinearity, and the Dirichlet boundary condition. The conditions imposed on the coefficients of the state equation are assumed to hold only in a small neighborhood of the exact solution to the original problem. This assumption suggests that the state equation involves nonlinearities of unlimited growth and considerably expands the class of admissible functions as solutions of the state equation. We obtain formulas for the first partial derivatives of the objective functional with respect to the control functions. To calculate the gradients the numerical solutions of the state and adjoint problems are used. We also prove that the gradient of the cost function is Lipchitz continuous.

Keywords: cost functional, differentiability, divergent elliptic operator, optimal control, unbounded nonlinearity

Procedia PDF Downloads 165

Authors: Priya Tomar, Pallavi Mittal

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As industrialization is inevitable and progress with rapid acceleration, the need for innovative ways to get rid of waste has increased. Recent advancement in bioresource technology paves novel ideas for recycling of factory waste that has been polluting the agro-industry, soil and water bodies. Paper industries in India are in a considerable number, where molasses and impure alcohol are still being used as raw materials for manufacturing of paper. Paper mills based on nonconventional agro residues are being encouraged due to increased demand of paper and acute shortage of forest-based raw materials. The colouring body present in the wastewater from pulp and paper mill is organic in nature and is comprised of wood extractives, tannin, resins, synthetic dyes, lignin and its degradation products formed by the action of chlorine on lignin which imparts an offensive colour to the water. These mills use different chemical process for paper manufacturing due to which lignified chemicals are released into the environment. Therefore, the chemical oxygen demand (COD) of the emanating stream is quite high. This paper presents some new techniques that were developed for the efficiency of bioremediation on paper industry. A short introduction to paper industry and a variety of presently available methods of bioremediation on paper industry and different strategies are also discussed here. For solving the above problem, two bacterial strains (Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Bacillus subtilis) and their consortia (Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Bacillus subtilis) were utilized for the pulp and paper mill effluent. Pseudomonas aeruginosa and Bacillus subtilis named as T–1, T–2, T–3, T–4, T–5, T–6, for the decolourisation of paper industry effluent. The results indicated that a maximum colour reduction is (60.5%) achieved by Pseudomonas aeruginosa and COD reduction is (88.8%) achieved by Bacillus subtilis, maximum pH changes is (4.23) achieved by Pseudomonas aeruginosa, TSS reduction is (2.09 %) achieved by Bacillus subtilis, and TDS reduction is (0.95 %) achieved by Bacillus subtilis. When the wastewater was supplemented with carbon (glucose) and nitrogen (yeast extract) source and data revealed the efficiency of Bacillus subtilis, having more with glucose than Pseudomonas aeruginosa.

Keywords: bioremediation, paper and pulp mill effluent, treated effluent, lignin

Procedia PDF Downloads 243

Authors: Wieland Hoppe, Nadine Wachter, Stefan Bringezu

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Carbon dioxide (CO2) utilization might be a promising way to substitute fossil raw materials like coal, oil or natural gas as carbon source of chemical production. While first life cycle assessments indicate a positive environmental performance of CO2-based process routes, a commercialization of CO2 is limited by several economic obstacles up to now. We, therefore, analyzed the economic performance of the three CO2-based chemicals methane and methanol as basic chemicals and polyoxymethylene as polymer on a cradle-to-gate basis. Our approach is oriented towards life cycle costing. The focus lies on the cost drivers of CO2-based technologies and options to stimulate a CO2-based economy by changing regulative factors. In this way, we analyze various modes of operation and give an outlook for the potentially cost-effective development in the next decades. Biogas, waste gases of a cement plant, and flue gases of a waste incineration plant are considered as CO2-sources. The energy needed to convert CO2 into hydrocarbons via electrolysis is assumed to be supplied by wind power, which is increasingly available in Germany. Economic data originates from both industrial processes and process simulations. The results indicate that CO2-based production technologies are not competitive with conventional production methods under present conditions. This is mainly due to high electricity generation costs and regulative factors like the German Renewable Energy Act (EEG). While the decrease in production costs of CO2-based chemicals might be limited in the next decades, a modification of relevant regulative factors could potentially promote an earlier commercialization.

Keywords: carbon capture and utilization (CCU), economic assessment, life cycle costing (LCC), power-to-X

Procedia PDF Downloads 282

Authors: M. M. Alhaji, M. Alhassan, A. M. Yahaya

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Soil engineers pay very little or no attention to variation in the mineralogical and consequently, the geotechnical properties of overburden with depth on basement complexes, a situation which can lead to sudden failure of civil engineering structures. Soil samples collected at depths ranging from 0.5m to 4.0m at 0.5m intervals, from a trial pit dogged manually to depth of 4.0m on an overburden over gneiss basement complex, was evaluated for physico-chemical, mineralogical and physical properties. This is to determine the variation of these properties with depth within the profile of the strata. Results showed that sodium amphibolite and feldspar, which are both primary minerals dominate the overall profile of the overburden. Carbon which dominates the lower profile of the strata was observed to alter to gregorite at upper section of the profile. Organic matter contents and cation exchange capacity reduces with increase in depth while lost on ignition and pH were relatively constant with depth. The index properties, as well as natural moisture contents, increases from 0.5m to between 1.0m to 1.5m depth after which the values reduced to constant values at 3.0m depth. The grain size analysis shows high composition of sand sized particles with silts of low to non-plasticity. The maximum dry density (MDD) values are generally relatively high and increases from 2.262g/cm³ at 0.5m depth to 2.410g/cm³ at 4.0m depth while the optimum moisture content (OMC) reduced from 9.8% at 0.5m depth to 6.7% at 4.0m depth.

Keywords: Gneiss basement complex, mineralogical properties, North Central Nigeria, physico-chemical properties, physical properties, overburden soil

Procedia PDF Downloads 142

Authors: Ya-Mei Chang

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This research is intended to apply spatio-temporal point process methods to the dengue fever data in Tainan. The spatio-temporal intensity function of the dataset is assumed to be separable. The kernel estimation is a widely used approach to estimate intensity functions. The intensity function is very helpful to study the relation of the spatio-temporal point process and some covariates. The covariate effects might be nonlinear. An nonparametric smoothing estimator is used to detect the nonlinearity of the covariate effects. A fitted parametric model could describe the influence of the covariates to the dengue fever. The correlation between the data points is detected by the K-function. The result of this research could provide useful information to help the government or the stakeholders making decisions.

Keywords: dengue fever, spatial point process, kernel estimation, covariate effect

Procedia PDF Downloads 342

Authors: Nino Pailodze, Malkhaz Sulashvili, Vladimer Kekenadze, Tea Khutsishvili, Irma Makharashvili, Aleksandre Kekenadze

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In the nearest future among the important problems which Georgia has solve the most important is economic stability, that bases on fiscal policy and the proper definition of the its directions. The main source of the Budget revenue is the national income. The State uses taxes, loans and emission in order to create national income, were the principal weapon are taxes. As well as fiscal function of the fulfillment of the budget, tax systems successfully implement economic and social development and the regulatory functions of foreign economic relations. A tax is a mandatory, unconditional monetary payment to the budget made by a taxpayer in accordance with this Code, based on the necessary, nonequivalent and gratuitous character of the payment. Taxes shall be national and local. National taxes shall be the taxes provided for under this Code, the payment of which is mandatory across the whole territory of Georgia. Local taxes shall be the taxes provided for under this Code, introduced by normative acts of local self-government representative authorities (within marginal rates), the payment of which is mandatory within the territory of the relevant self-governing unit. National taxes have the leading role in tax systems, but also the local taxes have an importance role in tax systems. Exactly in the means of local taxes, the most part of the budget is formatted. National taxes shall be: income tax, profit tax, value added tax (VAT), excise tax, import duty, property tax shall be a local tax The property tax is one of the significant taxes in Georgia. The paper deals with the taxation mechanism that has been operated in Georgia. The above mention has the great influence in financial accounting. While comparing foreign legislation towards Georgian legislation we discuss the opportunity of using their experience. Also, we suggested recommendations in order to improve the tax system in financial accounting. In addition to accounting, which is regulated according the International Accounting Standards we have tax accounting, which is regulated by the Tax Code, various legal orders / regulations of the Minister of Finance. The rules are controlled by the tax authority, Revenue Service. The tax burden from the tax values are directly related to expenditures of the state from the emergence of the first day. Fiscal policy of the state is as well as expenditure of the state and decisions of taxation. In order to get the best and the most effective mobilization of funds, Government’s primary task is to decide the kind of taxation rules. Tax function is to reveal the substance of the act. Taxes have the following functions: distribution or the fiscal function; Control and regulatory functions. Foreign tax systems evolved in the different economic, political and social conditions influence. The tax systems differ greatly from each other: taxes, their structure, typing means, rates, the different levels of fiscal authority, the tax base, the tax sphere of action, the tax breaks.

Keywords: international accounting standards, financial accounting, tax systems, financial obligations

Procedia PDF Downloads 233

Authors: Takashi Mitsuishi

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Fuzzy logic has gained acceptance in the recent years in the fields of social sciences and humanities such as psychology and linguistics because it can manage the fuzziness of words and human subjectivity in a logical manner. However, the major field of application of the fuzzy logic is control engineering as it is a part of the set theory and mathematical logic. Mamdani method, which is the most popular technique for approximate reasoning in the field of fuzzy control, is one of the ways to numerically represent the control afforded by human language and sensitivity and has been applied in various practical control plants. Fuzzy logic has been gradually developing as an artificial intelligence in different applications such as neural networks, expert systems, and operations research. The objects of inference vary for different application fields. Some of these include time, angle, color, symptom and medical condition whose fuzzy membership function is a periodic function. In the defuzzification stage, the domain of the membership function should be unique to obtain uniqueness its defuzzified value. However, if the domain of the periodic membership function is determined as unique, an unintuitive defuzzified value may be obtained as the inference result using the center of gravity method. Therefore, the authors propose a method of circular-polar-coordinates transformation and defuzzification of the periodic membership functions in this study. The transformation to circular polar coordinates simplifies the domain of the periodic membership function. Defuzzified value in circular polar coordinates is an argument. Furthermore, it is required that the argument is calculated from a closed plane figure which is a periodic membership function on the circular polar coordinates. If the closed plane figure is continuous with the continuity of the membership function, a significant amount of computation is required. Therefore, to simplify the practice example and significantly reduce the computational complexity, we have discretized the continuous interval and the membership function in this study. In this study, the following three methods are proposed to decide the argument from the discrete polygon which the continuous plane figure is transformed into. The first method provides an argument of a straight line passing through the origin and through the coordinate of the arithmetic mean of each coordinate of the polygon (physical center of gravity). The second one provides an argument of a straight line passing through the origin and the coordinate of the geometric center of gravity of the polygon. The third one provides an argument of a straight line passing through the origin bisecting the perimeter of the polygon (or the closed continuous plane figure).

Keywords: defuzzification, fuzzy membership function, periodic function, polar coordinates transformation

Procedia PDF Downloads 355

Authors: W. Widhiada, D. N. K. P. Negara, P. A. Suryawan

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The technological advances in the field of health to be very important, especially on the safety of the baby. In this case a lot of premature infants death caused by poorly managed health facilities. Mostly the death of premature baby caused by bacteria since the temperature around the baby is not normal. Related to this, the incubator equipment needs to be important, especially in how to control the temperature in incubator. On/Off controls is used to regulate the temperature distribution in the incubator so that the desired temperature is 36 °C to stay awake and stable. The authors have been observed and analyzed the data to determine the temperature distribution in the incubator using program of MATLAB/Simulink. The output temperature distribution is obtained at 36 °C in 400 seconds using an Arduino AT 2560. This incubator is able to maintain an ambient temperature and maintain the baby's body temperature within normal limits and keep the moisture in the air in accordance with the limit values required in infant incubator.

Keywords: on/off control, distribution temperature, Arduino AT 2560, baby incubator

Procedia PDF Downloads 486

Authors: Meral Huri, Sedef Şahin

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Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is characterized by psychiatric symptoms and triggered by a terrifying experience which may immediately effect cognitive, affective, behavioral and social skills of the individual. One of the most common noncutaneous cancer among men is prostate cancer. The incidence of psychological stress is quite common in men with prostate cancer. The aim of the study was to explore the PTSD frequency among prostate cancer and define the relationship between occupational participation, coping skills and level of perceived social support among patients with prostate cancer. Forty patients diagnosed with prostate cancer were included in the study. After dividing the patients into two groups ( study/ control) according to type of tumor, we recorded their characteristics and evaluations differences. We evaluated the demographic information form, Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-IV (SCID- I)- Clinical Version for PTSD, Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Support, Styles of Coping Inventory and Canadian Occupational Performance Measure (COPM) before and after 1 month from surgery. The mean age of the study group (n:18) was 65.85.6 years (range: 61-79 years). The mean age of the control group (n: 22) was a little bit higher than the study group with mean age 71.3±6.9 years (range: 60-85 years). There was no statistically significant difference between the groups for age and the other characteristics. According to the results of the study, statistically significant difference was found between the level of PTSD of study and the control group. 22% of study group showed PTSD while 13% of the control group showed PTSD (r: 0.02, p<0.001). The scores of study group and control group showed statistically significant difference in five sub-categories of Styles of Coping Inventory. Patients with prostate cancer showed decreased scores in optimistic, seeking social supports and self-confident approach, while increased scores in helpless and submissive sub-categories than the control group (p<0.001). The scores of Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Supports of study group and control group showed statistically significant difference. The total perceived social supports score of the study group was 71.34 ± 0.75 while it was 75.34 ± 0.64 for the control group. Total and the sub-category scores of study group were statistically significant lower than the control group. According to COPM, mean scores of occupational participation of study group for occupational performance were 4.32±2.24 and 7.01±1.52 for the control group, respectively). Mean Satisfaction scores were 3,22±2.31 and 7.45±1.74 for the study and control group, respectively. The patients with prostate cancer and benign prostate hyperplasia (BPH) did not show any statistically difference in activity performance (r:0.87) while patients with prostate cancer showed statistically lower scores than the patients with BPH in activity satisfaction (r:0.02, p<0.001).Psycho-social occupational therapy interventions might help to decrease the prevalence of PTSD by increasing associated factors such as the social support perception, using coping skills and activity participation of patients with prostate cancer.

Keywords: activity performance, occupational therapy, posttraumatic stress disorder, prostate cancer

Procedia PDF Downloads 139

Authors: Ekrem Canli, Thomas Glade

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The precise prediction of rainfall in space and time is a key element to most landslide early warning systems. Unfortunately, the spatial variability of rainfall in many early warning applications is often disregarded. A common simplification is to use uniformly distributed rainfall to characterize aerial rainfall intensity. With spatially differentiated rainfall information, real-time comparison with rainfall thresholds or the implementation in process-based approaches might form the basis for improved landslide warnings. This study suggests an automated workflow from the hourly, web-based collection of rain gauge data to the generation of spatially differentiated rainfall predictions based on kriging. Because the application of kriging is usually a labor intensive task, a simplified and consequently automated variogram modeling procedure was applied to up-to-date rainfall data. The entire workflow was carried out purely with open source technology. Validation results, albeit promising, pointed out the challenges that are involved in pure distance based, automated geostatistical interpolation techniques for ever-changing environmental phenomena over short temporal and spatial extent.

Keywords: kriging, landslide early warning system, spatial rainfall prediction, variogram modelling, web scraping

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Authors: Farah Ali, Tehreem Fayyaz, Musadiq Idris

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The present work was undertaken to investigate effects of various extracts of W. somniferafor anti-diabetic activity in alloxan induced diabetic rabbits. Rabbits were acclimatized for a week to standard laboratory temperature. Animals were fed according to a strict schedule (8 am, 3 pm and 10 pm) with green fodder (Medicago sativa) and tap water ad libitum. Animals were divided into nine groups of six rabbits each in a random manner. Body weights and physical activities of all rabbits were recorded before start of experiments. The animals of group 1 and 2 were given lactose (250 mg/kg,p.o) and Withaniasomniferaroot powder (100 mg/kg, p.o) respectively daily from day 1-20. Animals of group 3 were given alloxan (100 mg/kg,i.v) as a single dose on day 1. Powdered root of Withaniasomnifera in the doses of 100, 150, 200 mg/kg and its aqueous and ethanol extracts (equivalent to 200 mg/kg of crude drug) were given to the treated animals (groups 4-8), respectively by oral route for three weeks (day 1-20o.d), along with alloxan (100 mg/kg, i.v) as a single dose on day 1. Group 9 was treated with metformin (200 mg/kg, p.o) daily from day 1-20, along with a single dose of alloxan (100 mg/ kg, i.v) on day 1. Fasting serum glucose concentration in groups 3-9 was increased significantly (p<0.05) on day 3, with a maximum increase (215.3 mg/dl) in animals of toxic control (TC) group (3) on day 21 of the experiment as compared to normal control (NC) group (1). Effects of different doses (100, 150, 200 mg/kg, p.o) of W. somnifera root powder (WS) decreased the fasting serum glucose concentration as compared to toxic control group, with a maximum decrease (88.3 mg/dl) in group 2 (treated control) on day 21 of the experiment. Metformin (200 mg/kg, p.o) (reference control), aqueous extract (AWS) and ethanol extract (EWS) of W. somnifera (equivalent to 100 mg/kg W.somnifera root, p.o) antagonized the effects of alloxan as compared to toxic control group. These results indicate that the W. somnifera possess significant anti –diabetic activity.

Keywords: diabetes, serum, glucose, blood, sugar, rabbits

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Authors: Saeed Poormoaied

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Perishability and developing an intelligent control policy for perishable items are the major concerns of marketing managers in a supply chain. In this study, we address a two-echelon supply chain problem for perishable items with a single vendor and a single buyer. The buyer adopts an aged-based continuous review policy which works by taking both the stock level and the aging process of items into account. The vendor works under the warehouse framework, where its lot size is determined with respect to the batch size of the buyer. The model holds for a positive and fixed lead time for the buyer, and zero lead time for the vendor. The demand follows a Poisson process and any unmet demand is lost. We provide exact analytic expressions for the operational characteristics of the system by using the renewal reward theorem. Items have a fixed lifetime after which they become unusable and are disposed of from the buyer's system. The age of items starts when they are unpacked and ready for the consumption at the buyer. When items are held by the vendor, there is no aging process which results in no perishing at the vendor's site. The model is developed under the centralized framework, which takes the expected profit of both vendor and buyer into consideration. The goal is to determine the optimal policy parameters under the service level constraint at the retailer's site. A sensitivity analysis is performed to investigate the effect of the key input parameters on the expected profit and order quantity in the supply chain. The efficiency of the proposed age-based policy is also evaluated through a numerical study. Our results show that when the unit perishing cost is negligible, a significant cost saving is achieved.

Keywords: two-echelon supply chain, perishable items, age-based policy, renewal reward theorem

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Authors: Alena Sicakova, Adriana Estokova

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Although properly made concrete is inherently a durable material, there are many physical and chemical forces in the environment which can contribute to its deterioration. This paper deals with two aspects of concrete durability in chemical aggressive environment: degradation effect of particular aggressive exposure and role of particular mineral additives. Results of the study of leaching and acid corrosion processes in samples prepared with specific dosage of microsilica and zeolite are given in the paper. Corrosion progress after 60-day exposition is manifested by increasing rate of both Ca and Si release, what is identified by XRF method. Kind and dosage of additions used in experiment was found to be helpful for stabilization of concrete microstructure. The lowest concentration of mean elements in leachates was observed for mixture V1 (microsilica only) unlike the V2 (microsilica + zeolite). It is surprising in the terms of recommendations of zeolite application for acid exposure. Using microsilica only seems to be more effective.

Keywords: sustainability, durability, concrete, acid corrosion, leaching

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Authors: L. Steponavičiūtė, L. Steponavičienė

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Despite the rapid nanotechnology progress and recognition, its potential impact in ecosystems and health of humans is still not fully known. In this paper, the study of ecotoxicological dangers of nanomaterials is presented. By chemical reduction method, silver (AgNPs) and gold (AuNPs) nanoparticles were synthesized, characterized and used in experiments to examine their impact on microorganisms (Escherichia coli, Staphylococcus aureus and Candida albicans) and terrestrial flora (Phaseolus vulgaris and Lepidium sativum). The results collected during experiments with terrestrial flora show tendentious growth stimulations caused by gold nanoparticles. In contrast to these results, silver nanoparticle solutions inhibited growth of beans and garden cress, compared to control samples. The results obtained from experiments with microorganisms show similarities with ones collected from experiments with terrestrial plants. Samples treated with AuNPs of size 13 nm showed stimulation in the growth of the colonies compared with 3,5 nm size nanoparticles.

Keywords: nanomaterials, ecotoxicology, nanoparticles, ecosystems

Procedia PDF Downloads 299

Authors: Joel Y. Y. Loh, Geoffrey A. Ozin, Charles A. Mims, Nazir P. Kherani

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A major goal in the emerging field of solar fuels is to realize an ‘artificial leaf’ – a material that converts light energy in the form of solar photons into chemical energy – using CO2 as a feedstock to generate useful chemical species. Enabling this technology will allow the greenhouse gas, CO2, emitted from energy and manufacturing production exhaust streams to be converted into valuable solar fuels or chemical products. Indium Oxide (In2O3) with surface hydroxyl (OH) groups have been shown to reduce CO2 in the presence of H2 to CO with a reaction rate of 15 μmol gcat−1 h−1. The likely mechanism is via a Frustrated Lewis Pair sites heterolytically splitting H2 to be absorbed and form protonic and hydric sites that can dissociate CO2. In this study, we investigate the dependence of oxygen composition of In2O3 on the CO2 reduction rate. In2O3-x films on quartz fiber paper were DC sputtered with an Indium target and varying O2/Ar plasma mixture. OH surface groups were then introduced by immersing the In2O3-x samples in KOH. We show that hydroxylated In2O3-x reduces more CO2 than non-hydroxylated groups and that a hydroxylated and higher O2/Ar ratio sputtered In2O3-x has a higher reaction rate of 45 μmol gcat-1 h-1. We show by electrical resistivity-temperature curves that H2 is adsorbed onto the surface of In2O3 whereas CO2 itself does not affect the indium oxide surface. We also present activation and ionization energy levels of the hydroxylated In2O3-x under vacuum, CO2 and H2 atmosphere conditions.

Keywords: solar fuels, photocatalysis, indium oxide nanoparticles, carbon dioxide

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Authors: S. Yaman, S. Rostami

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In this study, a black box modeling of the coupled-tank system is obtained by using fuzzy sets. The derived model is tested via adaptive neuro fuzzy inference system (ANFIS). In order to achieve a better control performance, the parameters of three different controller types, classical proportional integral controller (PID), fuzzy PID and function tuner method, are tuned by one of the evolutionary computation method, genetic algorithm. All tuned controllers are applied to the fuzzy model of the coupled-tank experimental setup and analyzed under the different reference input values. According to the results, it is seen that function tuner method demonstrates better robust control performance and guarantees the closed loop stability.

Keywords: function tuner method (FTM), fuzzy modeling, fuzzy PID controller, genetic algorithm (GA)

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Authors: Raana Babadi Fathipour

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Researchers are now focusing on sustainable advancements in active packaging systems to meet the growing consumer demand for high-quality food with Eco-friendly packaging. One significant advancement in this area is the inclusion of antimicrobial agents in bio-polymer-based edible films, which effectively inhibit or kill pathogenic/spoilage microbes that can contaminate food. This technology also helps reduce undesirable flavors caused by active compounds directly incorporated into the food. To further enhance the efficiency of antimicrobial bio-based packaging systems, Nano technological concepts such as bio-nano composites and Nano encapsulation systems have been applied. This review examines the current state and applications of antimicrobial biodegradable films in the food packaging industry, while also highlighting ongoing research on the use of nanotechnology to develop innovative bio-based packaging systems.

Keywords: active packaging, antimicrobial edible films, bioactive agents, biopolymers, bio-nanocomposites

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Authors: Laref Nabil

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Ecology is at the center of many debates and international regulations. It therefore becomes a necessity and a privileged axis in many countries policy. The rise of environmental problems, the particularism of the hospital as an actor Public Health must lead by example in hygiene, prevention of risks to man and his environment. In this, it seemed interesting to make a poster on hospital liquid effluents in order to know not only the regulatory aspects but also their degree of pollution and their management in health institutions. Materials and methods: Samples taken at several looks, analysis performed at STEP Reghaia Algiers. Discussion and / or findings: In general, central gaze analysis results of water we can conclude that the contents of the various physico-chemical parameters greatly exceed the standards. Although the hypothesis of assimilating hospital liquid effluents domestic waters is confirmed, the liquid effluent from the University Hospital of Beni Messous and dumped in the natural environment still represent ecotoxicological risk.

Keywords: health, hospital, liquid effluents, water

Procedia PDF Downloads 441

Authors: Kimberley Kennedy

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The major findings of this study discuss the importance of understanding and applying Systems thinking concepts to ensure an effective Project-Based Learning environment. A pilot project study of a major pedagogical change was conducted over a five year period with the goal to give students real world, hands-on learning experiences and the opportunity to apply what they had learned over the past two years of their business program. The first two weeks of the fifteen week semester utilized teaching methods of lectures, guest speakers and design thinking workshops to prepare students for the project work. For the remaining thirteen weeks of the semester, the students worked with actual business owners and clients on projects and challenges. The first three years of the five year study focused on student feedback to ensure a quality learning experience and continuous improvement process was developed. The final two years of the study, examined the conceptual understanding and perception of learning and teaching by faculty using Project-Based Learning pedagogy as compared to lectures and more traditional teaching methods was performed. Relevant literature was reviewed and data collected from program faculty participants who completed pre-and post-semester interviews and surveys over a two year period. Systems thinking concepts were applied to better understand the challenges for faculty using Project-Based Learning pedagogy as compared to more traditional teaching methods. Factors such as instructor and student fatigue, motivation, quality of work and enthusiasm were explored to better understand how to provide faculty with effective support and resources when using Project-Based Learning pedagogy as the main teaching method. This study provides value by presenting generalizable, foundational knowledge by offering suggestions for practical solutions to assure student and teacher engagement in Project-Based Learning courses.

Keywords: continuous improvement, project-based learning, systems thinking, teacher engagement

Procedia PDF Downloads 115