Search results for: Tender S.U.R.E (Specifications for Urban Road Execution)

Authors: Awais Ahmed, Javed Iqbal

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Pakistan has been for many years facing extreme challenges in energy deficit due to the shortage of power generation compared to increasing demand. A part of this energy deficit is also contributed by the power lost in transmission and distribution network. Unfortunately, distribution companies are not equipped with modern technologies and methods to identify and eliminate these losses. According to estimate, total energy lost in early 2000 was between 20 to 26 percent. To address this issue the present research study was designed with the objectives of developing a standalone GIS application for distribution companies having the capability of loss calculation as well as identification of overloaded transformers. For this purpose, Hilal Road feeder in Faisalabad Electric Supply Company (FESCO) was selected as study area. An extensive GPS survey was conducted to identify each consumer, linking it to the secondary pole of the transformer, geo-referencing equipment and documenting conductor sizes. To identify overloaded transformer, accumulative kWH reading of consumer on transformer was compared with threshold kWH. Technical losses of 11kV and 220V lines were calculated using the data from substation and resistance of the network calculated from the geo-database. To automate the process a standalone GIS application was developed using ArcObjects with engineering analysis capabilities. The application uses GIS database developed for 11kV and 220V lines to display and query spatial data and present results in the form of graphs. The result shows that about 14% of the technical loss on both high tension (HT) and low tension (LT) network while about 4 out of 15 general duty transformers were found overloaded. The study shows that GIS can be a very effective tool for distribution companies in management and planning of their distribution network.

Keywords: geographical information system, GIS, power distribution, distribution transformers, technical losses, GPS, SDSS, spatial decision support system

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Authors: Arjun Goutham, Chaitanya Sridhar, Sunita Maheshwari, Robin Uthappa, Prasanna Gopinath

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In alignment with the growth in the sporting industry, a number of people playing and competing in sports are growing exponentially across the globe. However, the number of sports psychology experts are not growing at a similar rate, especially in the Asian and more so, Indian context. Hence, the access to actionable mental training solutions specific to individual athletes is limited. Also, the time constraint an athlete faces due to their intense training schedule makes one-on-one sessions difficult. One of the means to bridge that gap is through technology. Technology makes individualization possible. It allows for easy access to specific-qualitative content/information and provides a medium to place individualized assessments, analysis, solutions directly into an athlete's hands. This enables mental training awareness, education, and real-time actionable solutions possible for athletes in-spite of the limitation of available sports psychology experts in their region. Furthermore, many athletes are hesitant to seek support due to the stigma of appearing weak. Such individuals would prefer a more discreet way. Athletes who have strong mental performance tend to produce better results. The mobile application helps to equip athletes with assessing and developing their mental strategies directed towards improving performance on an ongoing basis. When an athlete understands their strengths and limitations in their mental application, they can focus specifically on applying the strategies that work and improve on zones of limitation. With reports, coaches get to understand the unique inner workings of an athlete and can utilize the data & analysis to coach them with better precision and use coaching styles & communication that suits better. Systematically capturing data and supporting athletes(with individual-specific solutions) or teams with assessment, planning, instructional content, actionable tools & strategies, reviewing mental performance and the achievement of objectives & goals facilitate for a consistent mental skills development at all levels of sporting stages of an athlete's career. The mobile application will help athletes recognize and align with their stable attributes such as their personalities, learning & execution modalities, challenges & requirements of their sport, etc and help develop dynamic attributes like states, beliefs, motivation levels, focus etc. with practice and training. It will provide measurable analysis on a regular basis and help them stay aligned to their objectives & goals. The solutions are based on researched areas of influence on sporting performance individually or in teams.

Keywords: athletes, mental training, mobile application, performance, sports

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Authors: Reihaneh Rafiemanzelt

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The need to protect our cultural heritage was stressed on revitalization of historical city centers in communities. The main goals the proses was to attract finance and activities to the historical city centers through the citizens and municipalities participation while cities expanded their boundaries toward suburban areas. Todays the main problems which facing to the most historical city centers, is loss of their centrality through effect of urbanization on any point of the cities which is the most important issue on neglect and abandonment of the historical central area by decentralizing living, commerce and public areas. This article evaluate the ways in which city center revitalization can be effect on vitality and viability of the central area in case of Naghshe Jahan square which situated at the center of Isfahan city, Iran. Constructed between 1598 and 1629, it is now an important historical site, and one of UNESCO's World Heritage Sites.

Keywords: urban development, revitalization, city centers, vitality and viability

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Authors: Francisco Vidal Vázquez, Pekka Simell, Christian Frilund, Matti Reinikainen, Ilkka Hiltunen, Tim Böltken, Benjamin Andris, Paolo Piermartini

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Carbon capture and utilization (CCU) are one of the key topics in mitigation of CO2 emissions. There are many different technologies that are applied for the production of diverse chemicals from CO2 such as synthetic natural gas, Fischer-Tropsch products, methanol and polymers. Power-to-Gas and Power-to-Liquids concepts arise as a synergetic solution for storing energy and producing value added products from the intermittent renewable energy sources and CCU. VTT is a research and technology development company having energy in transition as one of the key focus areas. VTT has extensive experience in piloting and upscaling of new energy and chemical processes. Recently, VTT has developed and commissioned a Mobile Synthesis Unit (MOBSU) in close collaboration with INERATEC, a spin-off company of Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT, Germany). The MOBSU is a multipurpose synthesis unit for CO2 upgrading to energy carriers and chemicals, which can be transported on-site where CO2 emission and renewable energy are available. The MOBSU is initially used for production of fuel compounds and chemical intermediates by combination of two consecutive processes: reverse Water-Gas Shift (rWGS) and Fischer-Tropsch synthesis (FT). First, CO2 is converted to CO by high-pressure rWGS and then, the CO and H2 rich effluent is used as feed for FT using an intensified reactor technology developed and designed by INERATEC. Chemical equilibrium of rWGS reaction is not affected by pressure. Nevertheless, compression would be required in between rWGS and FT in the case when rWGS is operated at atmospheric pressure. This would also require cooling of rWGS effluent, water removal and reheating. For that reason, rWGS is operated using precious metal catalyst in the MOBSU at similar pressure as FT to simplify the process. However, operating rWGS at high pressures has also some disadvantages such as methane and carbon formation, and more demanding specifications for materials. The main parts of FT module are an intensified reactor, a hot trap to condense the FT wax products, and a cold trap to condense the FT liquid products. The FT synthesis is performed using cobalt catalyst in a novel compact reactor technology with integrated highly-efficient water evaporation cooling cycle. The MOBSU started operation in November 2016. First, the FT module is tested using as feedstock H2 and CO. Subsequently, rWGS and FT modules are operated together using CO2 and H2 as feedstock of ca. 5 Nm3/hr total flowrate. On spring 2017, The MOBSU unit will be integrated together with a direct air capture (DAC) of CO2 unit, and a PEM electrolyser unit at Lappeenranta University of Technology (LUT) premises for demonstration of the SoletAir concept. This would be the first time when synthetic fuels are produced by combination of DAC unit and electrolyser unit which uses solar power for H2 production.

Keywords: CO2 utilization, demonstration, Fischer-Tropsch synthesis, intensified reactors, reverse water-gas shift

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Authors: Wang Shuai, Su Rong, K. J.Tseng, V. Viswanathan, S. Ramakrishna

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The More-Electric-Aircraft concept in aircraft industry levies an increasing demand on the embedded starter/generators (ESG). The high-speed and high-temperature environment within an engine poses great challenges to the operation of such machines. In view of such challenges, squirrel cage induction machines (SCIM) have shown advantages due to its simple rotor structure, absence of temperature-sensitive components as well as low torque ripples etc. The tight operation constraints arising from typical ESG applications together with the detailed operation principles of SCIMs have been exploited to derive the mathematical interpretation of the ESG-SCIM design process. The resultant non-linear mathematical treatment yielded unique solution to the SCIM design problem for each configuration of pole pair number p, slots/pole/phase q and conductors/slot zq, easily implemented via loop patterns. It was also found that not all configurations led to feasible solutions and corresponding observations have been elaborated. The developed mathematical procedures also proved an effective framework for optimization among electromagnetic, thermal and mechanical aspects by allocating corresponding degree-of-freedom variables. Detailed 3D FEM analysis has been conducted to validate the resultant machine performance against design specifications. To obtain higher power ratings, electrical machines often have to increase the slot areas for accommodating more windings. Since the available space for embedding such machines inside an engine is usually short in length, axial air gap arrangement appears more appealing compared to its radial gap counterpart. The aforementioned approach has been adopted in case studies of designing series of AFIMs and RFIMs respectively with increasing power ratings. Following observations have been obtained. Under the strict rotor diameter limitation AFIM extended axially for the increased slot areas while RFIM expanded radially with the same axial length. Beyond certain power ratings AFIM led to long cylinder geometry while RFIM topology resulted in the desired short disk shape. Besides the different dimension growth patterns, AFIMs and RFIMs also exhibited dissimilar performance degradations regarding power factor, torque ripples as well as rated slip along with increased power ratings. Parametric response curves were plotted to better illustrate the above influences from increased power ratings. The case studies may provide a basic guideline that could assist potential users in making decisions between AFIM and RFIM for relevant applications.

Keywords: axial flux induction machine, electrical starter/generator, finite element analysis, squirrel cage induction machine

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Authors: Nikolaos Vassilas, Theocharis Tsenoglou, Djamchid Ghazanfarpour

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In this work we explore the capability of the mean shift algorithm as a powerful preprocessing tool for improving the quality of spatial data, acquired from airborne scanners, from densely built urban areas. On one hand, high resolution image data corrupted by noise caused by lossy compression techniques are appropriately smoothed while at the same time preserving the optical edges and, on the other, low resolution LiDAR data in the form of normalized Digital Surface Map (nDSM) is upsampled through the joint mean shift algorithm. Experiments on both the edge-preserving smoothing and upsampling capabilities using synthetic RGB-z data show that the mean shift algorithm is superior to bilateral filtering as well as to other classical smoothing and upsampling algorithms. Application of the proposed methodology for 3D reconstruction of buildings of a pilot region of Athens, Greece results in a significant visual improvement of the 3D building block model.

Keywords: 3D buildings reconstruction, data fusion, data upsampling, mean shift

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Authors: Zhuo Feng, Ying Gao

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Public-private partnership (PPP), as an innovative way to provide infrastructures by the private sector, is being widely used throughout the world. Compared with the traditional mode, PPP emerges largely for merits of relieving public budget constraint and improving infrastructure supply efficiency by involving private funds. However, PPP projects are characterized by large scale, high investment, long payback period, and long concession period. These characteristics make PPP projects full of risks. One of the most important risks faced by the private sector is demand risk because many factors affect the real demand. If the real demand is far lower than the forecasting demand, the private sector will be got into big trouble because operating revenue is the main means for the private sector to recoup the investment and obtain profit. Therefore, it is important to study how the government compensates the private sector when the demand risk occurs in order to achieve Pareto-improvement. This research focuses on price compensation mechanism, an ex-post compensation mechanism, and analyzes, by mathematical modeling, the impact of price compensation mechanism on payoff of the private sector and consumer surplus for PPP toll road projects. This research first investigates whether or not price compensation mechanisms can obtain Pareto-improvement and, if so, then explores boundary conditions for this mechanism. The research results show that price compensation mechanism can realize Pareto-improvement under certain conditions. Especially, to make the price compensation mechanism accomplish Pareto-improvement, renegotiation costs of the government and the private sector should be lower than a certain threshold which is determined by marginal operating cost and distortionary cost of the tax. In addition, the compensation percentage should match with the price cut of the private investor when demand drops. This research aims to provide theoretical support for the government when determining compensation scope under the price compensation mechanism. Moreover, some policy implications can also be drawn from the analysis for better risk-sharing and sustainability of PPP projects.

Keywords: infrastructure, price compensation mechanism, public-private partnership, renegotiation

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Authors: Farideh Gheitasi, Zahra Mirzaei Pour

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Considering mutual interactions of industry and residence in an environmental point of view is essential in effective urban management and all the policies must be made based on the results of these interactions. So, District No 21 of Tehran Municipality (Iran) which is almost industrial combined with some residential area was selected to study the consequences of industrial and residential area neighborhood. In this paper the results of two observations conducted in two timescales in 2010 and 2015, according to completed questionnaires by residents of an industrial region in the study area, were analyzed. The questionnaires contain 19 different environmental parameters considering positive and negative effects of industry on human life. The results of this study show that 96% of the target group in 2010 believed if the companies regard the law, mutual coexistence of industry and residency is possible. While this number decreased to 21% in 2015, which indicates that the problem got worse and people became more unsatisfied with the situation.

Keywords: environment, industry, residence, pollution

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Authors: Almas Hamid, Ghazala Yaqub, Aqsa Riaz

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Qualitative validation was performed to detect the presence of persistent organic pollutants (POPs) in various wastewater samples collected from domestic sources (Askari XI housing society, Bedian road Lahore) industrial sources (PET bottles, pharmaceutical, textile) and a municipal drain (Hudiara drain) in Lahore. In addition wastewater analysis of the selected parameter was carried out. pH for wastewater samples from Askari XI, PET bottles, pharmaceutical, textile and Hudiara drain were 6.9, 6.7, 6.27, 7.18 and 7.9 respectively, within the NEQS Pakistan range that is 6-9. TSS for the respective samples was 194, 241, 254, 140 and 251 mg/L, in effluent for pet bottle industry, pharmaceutical and Hudiara drain and exceeded the NEQS Pakistan. Chemical oxygen demand (COD) for the wastewater samples was 896 mg/L, 166 mg/L, 419 mg/L, 812 mg/L and 610 mg/L respectively, all in excess of NEQS (150 mg/L). Similarly the biological oxygen demand (BOD) values (110.8, 170, 423, 355 and 560 mg/L respectively) were also above NEQS limits (80 mg/L). Chloride (Cl-) content, total dissolved solids (TDS) and temperature were found out to be within the prescribed standard limits. The POPs selected for analysis included five pesticides/insecticides (D. D, Karate, Commando, Finis insect killer, Bifenthrin) and three polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) (naphthalene, anthracene, phenanthrene). Peak values of standards were compared with that of wastewater samples. The results showed the presence of D.D in all wastewater samples, pesticide Karate was identified in Askari XI and textile industry sample. Pesticide Commando, Finis (insect killer) and Bifenthrin were detected in Askari XI and Hudiara drain wastewater samples. In case of PAHs; naphthalene was identified in all the five wastewater samples whereas anthracene and phenanthrene were detected in samples of Askari XI housing society, PET bottles industry, pharmaceutical industry and textile industry but totally absent in Hudiara drain wastewater. Practical recommendations have been put forth to avoid hazardous impacts of incurred samples.

Keywords: HPLC studies, lahore, physicochemical analysis, wastewater

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Authors: Luis Reynaldo Mota-Santiago, Angélica Lozano

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Determining appropriate measures to face earthquakesarea challenge for practitioners. In the literature, some analyses consider disaster scenarios, disregarding some important field characteristics. Sometimes, software that allows estimating the number of victims and infrastructure damages is used. Other times historical information of previous events is used, or the scenarios’informationis assumed to be available even if it isnot usual in practice. Humanitarian operations start immediately after an earthquake strikes, and the first hours in relief efforts are important; local efforts are critical to assess the situation and deliver relief supplies to the victims. A preparation action is prepositioning stockpiles, most of them at central warehouses placed away from damage-prone areas, which requires large size facilities and budget. Usually, decisions in the first 12 hours (standard relief time (SRT)) after the disaster are the location of temporary depots and the design of distribution paths. The motivation for this research was the delay in the reaction time of the early relief efforts generating the late arrival of aid to some areas after the Mexico City 7.1 magnitude earthquake in 2017. Hence, a preparation approach for planning the immediate response to earthquake disasters is proposed, intended for local governments, considering their capabilities for planning and for responding during the SRT, in order to reduce the start-up time of immediate response operations in urban areas. The first steps are the generation and analysis of disaster scenarios, which allow estimatethe relief demand before and in the early hours after an earthquake. The scenarios can be based on historical data and/or the seismic hazard analysis of an Atlas of Natural Hazards and Risk as a way to address the limited or null available information.The following steps include the decision processes for: a) locating local depots (places to prepositioning stockpiles)and aid-giving facilities at closer places as possible to risk areas; and b) designing the vehicle paths for aid distribution (from local depots to the aid-giving facilities), which can be used at the beginning of the response actions. This approach allows speeding up the delivery of aid in the early moments of the emergency, which could reduce the suffering of the victims allowing additional time to integrate a broader and more streamlined response (according to new information)from national and international organizations into these efforts. The proposed approachis applied to two case studies in Mexico City. These areas were affectedby the 2017’s earthquake, having limited aid response. The approach generates disaster scenarios in an easy way and plans a faster early response with a short quantity of stockpiles which can be managed in the early hours of the emergency by local governments. Considering long-term storage, the estimated quantities of stockpiles require a limited budget to maintain and a small storage space. These stockpiles are useful also to address a different kind of emergencies in the area.

Keywords: disaster logistics, early response, generation of disaster scenarios, preparation phase

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Authors: Z. Hamed, K. Sa'deya, E. Abdelrasheed, I. Mahamid

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The construction industry is one of the main sectors that play basic role in the urban and rural development of a society. It provides important ingredients for the development of an economy. However, many construction projects experience extensive cost overrun. This study was conducted to identify the causes of cost overrun in building construction contracts in Al Madinah, Saudi Arabia and test the importance of these causes from contractors' perspective. To achieve the study objectives, a questionnaire survey was conducted to identify and rank cost overrun causes from the perspective of contractors. The findings found that the top five cost overrun causes are: lack of experience in the line of work, lack of labor productivity, delay in payments, rework and material waste. It is hoped that the findings will guide efforts to improve the performance of construction industry in Saudi Arabia and other developing countries.

Keywords: building, contractor, cost increase, cost overrun

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Authors: Suegnet Smit

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Prior to 1994, special education in South Africa was marginalized and fragmented. Moving away from a Medical model approach to special education, the Government, after 1994, promoted an Inclusive approach, as a means to transform education in general, and special education in particular. This transformation, however, is moving at too a slow pace for learners with barriers to learning and development to benefit fully from their education. The goal of the Department of Basic Education is to minimize, remove, and prevent barriers to learning and development in the educational setting, by attending to the unique needs of the individual learner. However, the implementation of Inclusive education is problematic, and general education remains poor. This paper highlights the historical development of special education in South Africa, underpinned by a bio-ecological perspective. Problematic areas within the systemic levels of the education system are highlighted in order to indicate how the interactive processes within the systemic levels affect special needs learners on the personal dimension of the bio-ecological approach. As part of the methodology, thorough document analysis was conducted on information collected from a large body of research literature, which included academic articles, reports, policies, and policy reviews. Through a qualitative analysis, data were grouped and categorized according to the bio-ecological model systems, which revealed various successes and challenges within the education system. The challenges inhibit change, growth, and development for the child, who experience barriers to learning. From these findings, it is established that special education in South Africa has been, and still is, on a bumpy road. Sadly, the transformation process of change, envisaged by implementing Inclusive education, is still yet a dream, not fully realized. Special education seems to be stuck at what is, and the education system has not moved forward significantly enough to reach what special education should and could be. The gap that exists between a vision of Inclusive quality education for all, and the current reality, is still too wide. Problems encountered in all the education system levels, causes a funnel-effect downward to learners with special educational needs, with negative effects for the development of these learners.

Keywords: bio-ecological perspective, education systems, inclusive education, special education

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Authors: Ignatius Madu

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The study aims at assessing the environmental and socioeconomic determinants of climate change resilience in rural Nigeria. This is necessary because researches and development efforts on building climate change resilience of rural areas in developing countries are usually made without the knowledge of the impacts of the inherent rural characteristics that determine resilient capacities of the households. This has, in many cases, led to costly mistakes, delayed responses, inaccurate outcomes, and other difficulties. Consequently, this assessment becomes crucial not only to policymakers and people living in risk-prone environments in rural areas but also to fill the research gap. To achieve the aim, secondary data were obtained from the Annual Abstract of Statistics 2017, LSMS-Integrated Surveys on Agriculture and General Household Survey Panel 2015/2016, and National Agriculture Sample Survey (NASS), 2010/2011.Resilience was calculated by weighting and adding the adaptive, absorptive and anticipatory measures of households variables aggregated at state levels and then regressed against rural environmental and socioeconomic characteristics influencing it. From the regression, the coefficients of the variables were used to compute the impacts of the variables using the Stochastic Regression of Impacts on Population, Affluence and Technology (STIRPAT) Model. The results showed that the northern States are generally low in resilient indices and are impacted less by the development indicators. The major determining factors are percentage of non-poor, environmental protection, road transport development, landholding, agricultural input, population density, dependency ratio (inverse), household asserts, education and maternal care. The paper concludes that any effort to a successful resilient building in rural areas of the country should first address these key factors that enhance rural development and wellbeing since it is better to take action before shocks take place.

Keywords: climate change resilience; spatial impacts; STIRPAT model; Nigeria

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Authors: Xi Zuo

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Against the background of the aging population and changing family structure in China, community canteens have become an important vehicle for community-based home care services and a new space for social interaction. In this paper, we review past studies and the actual construction situation in China, firstly sort out the social interaction of the elderly and the types of places, and on this basis, we find that there is an obvious disconnection between the current construction and the academic research, and the contradiction between social benefit and cost-effectiveness, and therefore we put forward the relevant construction planning and thinking, in order to provide a disciplinary basis and academic support for the construction of community canteens and the construction of elderly-friendly cities. In order to provide disciplinary basis and academic support for the construction of community canteens and the construction of senior-friendly cities.

Keywords: urban and rural planning, community canteens, elderly people, senior-friendly

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Authors: Sara S. Fouad, Omneya Messallam

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Egypt has countless prestigious buildings and diversity of cultural heritage which are located in many cities. Most of the researchers, archaeologists, stakeholders and governmental bodies are paying more attention to the big cities such as Cairo and Alexandria, due to the country’s centralization nature. However, there are other historic cities that are grossly neglected and in need of emergency conservation. For instance, Port Said which is a former colonial city that was established in nineteenth century located at the edge of the northeast Egyptian coast between the Mediterranean Sea and the Suez Canal. This city is chosen because it presents one of the important Egyptian archaeological sites that archive Egyptian architecture of the 19^th and 20^th centuries. The historic urban fabric is divided into three main districts; the Arab, the European (Al-Afrang), and Port Fouad. The European district is selected to be the research case study as it has culture diversity, significant buildings, and includes the largest number of the listed heritage buildings in Port Said. Based on questionnaires and interviews, since 2003 several initiative trials have been taken by Alliance Francaise, the National Organization for Urban Harmony (NOUH), some Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs), and few number of community residents to highlight the important city legacy and protect it from being demolished. Unfortunately, the limitation of their participation in decision-making policies is considered a crucial threat facing sustainable heritage conservation. Therefore, encouraging the local community to participate in their architecture heritage conservation would create a self-confident one, capable of making decisions for the city’s future development. This paper aims to investigate the role of the local inhabitants in protecting their buildings heritage through listing the community level of participations twice (2012 and 2018) in preserving their heritage based on the ladder citizen participation approach. Also, it is to encourage community participation in order to promote city architecture conservation, heritage management, and sustainable development. The methodology followed in this empirical research involves using several data assembly methods such as structural observations, questionnaires, interviews, and mental mapping. The questionnaire was distributed among 92 local inhabitants aged 18-60 years. However, the outset of this research at the beginning demonstrated the majority negative attitude, motivation, and confidence of the local inhabitants’ role to safeguard their architectural heritage. Over time, there was a change in the negative attitudes. Therefore, raising public awareness and encouraging community participation by providing them with a real opportunity to take part in the decision-making. This may lead to a positive relationship between the community residents and the built heritage, which is essential for promoting its preservation and sustainable development.

Keywords: buildings preservation, community participation, heritage conservation, local inhabitant, ladder of citizen participation

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Authors: Ussawit Srisakrapikoop, Art-Ong Pradatsundarasar, Duangkhae Sitthicharoenchai

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Monomorium destructor or Singapore ant is one of the common household pests. It causes nuisance and damage to household. Due to the fact that there are many queens in one colony (polygyny), so this ant can quickly increase its population in a short time in the urban environment. This study has been conducted at Faculty of Science, Chulalongkorn University in the field condition. Ant food preference was conducted for 3 replicates per month by using six food choices including 20% sucrose solution, 20% sucrose agar, pork liver, smashed pork liver, pork fat and lard. The number of ants of each bait choice was counted and the orders of ant accessing baits were also recorded. The results showed that the 20% sucrose agar was the most attractive significantly following by pork liver and pork fat. The ants also most accessed to the pork liver bait choice in the first place. It can be suggested that the ant control by baiting should consist of mixture of carbohydrate, protein and lipid in solid form with suitable ratios.

Keywords: baits, food preference, monomorium destructor, Singapore ant

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Authors: Anahita Aris

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Geometry always plays a key role in natural structures, which can be a source of inspiration for architects and urban designers to create spaces. By understanding formative principles in nature, a variety of options can be provided that lead to freedom of formation. The main purpose of this paper is to analyze the geometrical order found in pomegranate to find formative principles explaining its complex structure. The point is how spherical arils of pomegranate pressed together inside the fruit and filled the space as they expand in the growing process, which made a self-organized system leads to the formation of each of the arils are unique in size, topology and shape. The main challenge of this paper would be using advanced architectural modeling techniques to discover these principles.

Keywords: advanced modeling techniques, architectural modeling, computational design, the geometry of natural formation, geometrical analysis, the natural order of pomegranate, voronoi diagrams

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Authors: Ehsan Sadie

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Despite the experience of heavy losses and damages of recent earthquakes such as 8 km E of Pāhala, Hawaii, 11 km W of Salvaleón de Higüey, Dominican Republic and 49 km SSE of Punta Cana, Dominican Republic earthquakes, the possibility of large earthquakes in most populated areas of any country and the serious need for quality control in the design and implementation of buildings, not enough attention has been paid to the proper construction. Steel structures constitute a significant part of construction in any metropolitan area. This article gives a brief overview of the implementation status of these buildings in urban areas and considers the weaknesses of performance that typically occur due to negligence or insufficient mastery of the building supervisor in the principles of operation of earthquake-resistant buildings, and provide appropriate and possible solutions to improve the construction.

Keywords: bracing member, concentrated load, diaphragm system, earthquake engineering, load-bearing system, shear force, seismic retrofitting, steel building, strip foundation, supervising engineer, vulnerability of building

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Authors: Sergio Saponara, Luca Fanucci, Riccardo Cassettari, Ruggero Piernicola, Marco Righetto

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The paper presents an innovative networked radar system for detection of obstacles in a railway level crossing scenario. This Monitoring System (MS) is able to detect moving or still obstacles within the railway level crossing area automatically, avoiding the need of human presence for surveillance. The MS is also connected to the National Railway Information and Signaling System to communicate in real-time the level crossing status. The architecture is compliant with the highest Safety Integrity Level (SIL4) of the CENELEC standard. The number of radar sensors used is configurable at set-up time and depends on how large the level crossing area can be. At least two sensors are expected and up four can be used for larger areas. The whole processing chain that elaborates the output sensor signals, as well as the communication interface, is fully-digital, was designed in VHDL code and implemented onto a Xilinx Virtex 6.

Keywords: radar for safe mobility, railroad crossing, railway, transport safety

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Authors: Hassan Noun, Christian Urban-Seelmann, Mohamed Abdelfattah, Guillaume Zeller, Rajesh G., Iryna Mozgova, Roland Lachmayer

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Several modules in automotive are usually modified and adapted for various project-specific applications. Due to a standardized safety concept, high reusability is accessible. A safety element out of context (SEooC) according to ISO 26262 can be a suitable approach. Based on the same safety concept and analysis, common modules can reach high usability. For developing according to a module out of context, an appropriate and detailed development approach is required. This paper shows how to derive these development processes for platform modules. Therefore, the detailed approach to the safety element out of context is derived. The aim is to create a detailed workflow for all phases of the development and integration of any kind of system modules. As an application example, an automotive project for an actuator control module is considered.

Keywords: functional safety, engineering processes, system engineering, electronic engineering

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Authors: Manoj Kumar, Preeti Goel

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National Capital Region of India is one of the most populous urban agglomerations in the world. This region has residents from all the parts of India, and their shopping behaviors are quite different. The region also has the substantial population of people from other countries. Due to high purchasing power of a large number of people, NCR is one the major markets for luxury fashion brands. Marketers of luxury fashion brands keep on adding innovative features to their products to attract the buyers. This research is an attempt to understand the major factors which impact the brand selection for these brands and other buying decisions like purchasing time and location. The research is based on primary data collected from potential buyers of luxury fashion brands and the people involved in the marketing of these brands in various roles. The research has tried to identify the relative strength of various factors on the shopping behavior for these brands.

Keywords: luxury brands, fashion, shopping, National Capital Region (NCR)

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Authors: D. Oulhaci, M. Zehah, S. Meguellati

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Collected by the sewerage network, the wastewater contains many polluting elements, coming from the population, commercial, industrial and agricultural activities. These waters are collected and discharged into the natural environment and pollute it. Hence the need to transport them before discharge to a treatment plant to undergo several treatment phases. The objective of this study is to highlight the purification performance of the "Sodom apple tree" which is a very common shrub in the region of Djanet and Illizi in Algeria. As material, we used small buckets filled with sand with a gravel substrate. We sowed seeds that we let grow a few weeks. The water supply is under a horizontal flow regime under-ground. The urban wastewater used is preceded by preliminary treatment. The water obtained after purification is collected using a tap in a container placed under the seal. The comparison between the inlet and the outlet waters showed that the presence of the Sodom apple tree contributes to reducing their pollutant parameters with significant rates: 81% for COD, 84%, for BOD , 95% for SM , 82% for NO⁻² , and 85% for NO⁻³ and can be released into the environment without risk of pollution

Keywords: arid zone, pollution, purification, re-use, wastewater.

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Authors: Sanjaya Humagain, Rajendra Koju

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Background: Rheumatic heart disease (RHD) is the most common cardiovascular disease in children and young adults. Though declined and almost non-existent in developed nations, RHD is still one of the leading cause for premature death and disability in developing countries. Prevalence of RHD is high in both rural as well as urban area of Nepal. Present study is designed to look at the pattern of valvular involvement and demographic features in RHD. Methods: 326 patients indicated for inj. Benzathine penicillin were selected and echocardiograph performed to see the pattern of vavular involvement. Data analysis was done using SPSS 17. Result: The most common type of lesion was mixed type with mitral valve involvement. MR was the most common isolated lesion. MS was more commonly seen in females whereas AS was more common in males. Secondary prophylaxis was more common than primary prophylaxis. Conclusion: RHD still being a major problem and a preventable disease so extensive screening program is required to identify them early and prevent the complication.

Keywords: acute rheumatic fever, RHD, MS, MR, AS, AR, Inj benzathine penicillin

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Authors: Seyed Mehrdad Gholami

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Nowadays, using rail transport system (Metro) is increased in most cities of The world, so the need for safe and economical way of building tunnels and subway stations is felt more and more. One of the most commonly used methods for constructing underground structures in urban areas is NATM (New Austrian tunneling method). In this method, there are some key parameters such as excavation steps and cross-sectional area that have a significant effect on the surface settlement. Settlement is a very important control factor related to safe excavation. In this paper, Finite Element Method is used by Abaqus. R6 station of Tehran Metro Line 6 is built by NATM and the construction of that is studied and analyzed. Considering the outcomes obtained from numerical modeling and comparison with the results of the instrumentation and monitoring of field, finally, the excavation step of 1 meter and longitudinal distance of 14 meters between side drifts is suggested to achieve safe tunneling with allowable settlement.

Keywords: excavation step, NATM, numerical modeling, settlement.

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Authors: J. H. Ahn, J. W. Moon, S. J. Noh, H. K. Kim

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Nowadays, as the ecology of Lake Shihwa has been restored significantly, the urban development is in progress around Lake Shihwa areas. Each development project includes a plan on utilizing waterfront areas, but there exist a difference on waterfront design criteria between experts and users. Therefore, it is significant to analyze preferences in design elements of existing waterfront parks around Lake Shihwa (Ansan Waterfront Park, Shihwa Reed Wetland Park, and T-Light Park) based on users’ perspectives and to reflect the result on upcoming waterfront developments. This study derives design elements on waterfront parks from literature reviews. The survey questionnaires are created based on these classified elements and the surveys are conducted to experts and users with in-depth interviews. For all three parks, several park facilities appear to be not recognized by users. Therefore, the circulation path should be introduced in guide maps and information activities and furthermore in disposition of park facilities.

Keywords: design elements, lake Shihwa, preference, waterfront park

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Authors: Safitri Nur Wulandari, M. Ivan Adi Perdana, Prathisto L. Panuntun Unggul, R. Dary Wira Mahadika

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In road construction on the soft soil, we need a soil improvement method to improve the soil bearing capacity of the land base so that the soil can withstand the traffic loads. Most of the land in Indonesia has a soft soil, where soft soil is a type of clay that has the consistency of very soft to medium stiff, undrained shear strength, Cu <0:25 kg/cm2, or the estimated value of NSPT <5 blows/ft. This study focuses on the analysis of the effect on preloading load (embarkment) to the amount of settlement ratio on the under of embarkment that will impact on the building cracks around of embarkment. The method used in this research is a superposition method for embarkment distribution on 27 locations with undisturbed soil samples at some borehole point in Java and Kalimantan, Indonesia. Then correlating the results of settlement plate monitoring on the field with Asaoka method. The results of settlement plate monitoring taken from an embarkment of Ahmad Yani airport in Semarang on 32 points. Where the value of Cc (index compressible) soil data based on some laboratory test results, while the value of Cc is not tested obtained from empirical formula Ardhana and Mochtar, 1999. From this research, the results of the field monitoring showed almost the same results with an empirical formulation with the standard deviation of 4% where the formulation of the empirical results of this analysis obtained by linear formula. Value empirical linear formula is to determine the effect of compression heap area as high as 4,25 m is 3,1209x + y = 0.0026 for the slope of the embankment 1: 8 for the same analysis with an initial height of embankment on the field. Provided that at the edge of the embankment settlement worth is not equal to 0 but at a quarter of embankment has a settlement ratio average 0.951 and at the edge of embankment has a settlement ratio 0,049. The influence areas around of embankment are approximately 1 meter for slope 1:8 and 7 meters for slope 1:2. So, it can cause the building cracks, to build in sustainable development.

Keywords: building cracks, influence area, settlement plate, soft soil, empirical formula, embankment

Procedia PDF Downloads 346

Authors: N. Uaphongsathorn, C. Worawong, S. Thaewpia

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Background and significance: The population is aging in Thai society, the elderly dependent is at great risk of various functional, psychological, and socio-economic problems as well as less access to health care. They may require long term care at home to maximize their functional abilities and activities of daily living and to improve their quality of life during their own age. Therefore, there is a need to develop a home-based long term care to meet the long term care needs of elders dependent. Methods: The research purpose was to develop long term care model among the elderly dependent in Chaiyaphum province in Northeast region of Thailand. Action Research which is composing of planning, action, observation, and reflection phases was used. Research was carried out for 12 months in all sub-districts of 6 districts in Chaiyaphum province. Participants (N = 1,010) participating in the processes of model development were comprised of 3 groups: a) a total of 110 health care professionals, b) a total of 600 health volunteers and family caregivers and c) a total of 300 the elderly dependent with chronically medical illnesses or disabilities. Descriptive statistics and content analysis were used to analyze data. Findings: Results have shown that the most common health problems among elders dependent with physical disabilities to function independently were cardiovascular disease, dementia, and traffic injuries. The development of home-based long term care model among elders dependent in Chaiyaphum province was composed of six key steps. They are: a) initiating policies supporting formal and informal caregivers for the elder dependent in all sub-districts, b) building network and multidisciplinary team, c) developing 3-day care manager training program and 3-day care provider training program d) training case managers and care providers for the elderly dependent through team and action learning, e) assessing, planning and providing care based on care individual’s needs of the elderly dependent, and f) sharing experiences for good practice and innovation for long term care at homes in district urban and rural areas. Among all care managers and care providers, the satisfaction level for training programs was high with a mean score of 3.98 out of 5. The elders dependent and family caregivers addressed that long term care at home could contribute to improving life’s daily activities, family relationship, health status, and quality of life. Family caregivers and volunteers have feeling a sense of personal satisfaction and experiencing providing meaningful care and support for elders dependent. Conclusion: In conclusion, a home-based long term care is important to Thai elders dependent. Care managers and care providers play a large role and responsibility to provide appropriate care to meet the elders’ needs in both urban and rural areas in Thai society. Further research could be rigorously studied with a larger group of populations in similar socio-economic and cultural contexts.

Keywords: elderly people, care manager, care provider, long term care

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Authors: Lana Burmistrova

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Introduction: The influence of visual impairments on several cognitive processes used in the music learning process is an increasingly important area in special education and cognitive musicology. Many children have several visual impairments due to the refractive errors and irreversible inhibitors. However, based on the compensatory neuroplasticity and functional reorganization, congenitally blind (CB) and early blind (EB) individuals use several areas of the occipital lobe to perceive and process auditory and tactile information. CB individuals have greater memory capacity, memory reliability, and less false memory mechanisms are used while executing several tasks, they have better working memory (WM) and short-term memory (STM). Blind individuals use several strategies while executing tactile and working memory n-back tasks: verbalization strategy (mental recall), tactile strategy (tactile recall) and combined strategies. Methods and design: The aim of the pilot study was to substantiate similar tendencies while executing attention, memory and combined auditory tasks in blind and sighted individuals constructed for this study, and to investigate attention, memory and combined mechanisms used in the music learning process. For this study eight (n=8) blind and eight (n=8) sighted individuals aged 13-20 were chosen. All respondents had more than five years music performance and music learning experience. In the attention task, all respondents had to identify pitch changes in tonal and randomized melodic pairs. The memory task was based on the mismatch negativity (MMN) proportion theory: 80 percent standard (not changed) and 20 percent deviant (changed) stimuli (sequences). Every sequence was named (na-na, ra-ra, za-za) and several items (pencil, spoon, tealight) were assigned for each sequence. Respondents had to recall the sequences, to associate them with the item and to detect possible changes. While executing the combined task, all respondents had to focus attention on the pitch changes and had to detect and describe these during the recall. Results and conclusion: The results support specific features in CB and EB, and similarities between late blind (LB) and sighted individuals. While executing attention and memory tasks, it was possible to observe the tendency in CB and EB by using more precise execution tactics and usage of more advanced periodic memory, while focusing on auditory and tactile stimuli. While executing memory and combined tasks, CB and EB individuals used passive working memory to recall standard sequences, active working memory to recall deviant sequences and combined strategies. Based on the observation results, assessment of blind respondents and recording specifics, following attention and memory correlations were identified: reflective attention and STM, reflective attention and periodic memory, auditory attention and WM, tactile attention and WM, auditory tactile attention and STM. The results and the summary of findings highlight the attention and memory features used in the music learning process in the context of blindness, and the tendency of the several attention and memory types correlated based on the task, strategy and individual features.

Keywords: attention, blindness, memory, music learning, strategy

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Authors: Marcel Schneider, Nils Nießen

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Microscopic simulation programs enable the description of the two processes of railway operation and the previous timetabling. Occupation conflicts are often solved based on defined train priorities on both process levels. These conflict resolutions produce knock-on delays for the involved trains. The sum of knock-on delays is commonly used to evaluate the quality of railway operations. It is either compared to an acceptable level-of-service or the delays are evaluated economically by linearly monetary functions. It is impossible to properly evaluate dispatching decisions without a well-founded objective function. This paper presents a new approach for evaluation of dispatching decisions. It uses models of choice of transport and considers the behaviour of the end-costumers. These models evaluate the knock-on delays in more detail than linearly monetary functions and consider other competing modes of transport. The new approach pursues the coupling of a microscopic model of railway operation with the macroscopic model of choice of transport. First it will be implemented for the railway operations process, but it can also be used for timetabling. The evaluation considers the possibility to change over to other transport modes by the end-costumers. The new approach first looks at the rail-mounted and road transport, but it can also be extended to air transport. The split of the end-costumers is described by the modal-split. The reactions by the end-costumers have an effect on the revenues of the railway undertakings. Various travel purposes has different pavement reserves and tolerances towards delays. Longer journey times affect besides revenue changes also additional costs. The costs depend either on time or track and arise from circulation of workers and vehicles. Only the variable values are summarised in the contribution margin, which is the base for the monetary evaluation of the delays. The contribution margin is calculated for different resolution decisions of the same conflict. The conflict resolution is improved until the monetary loss becomes minimised. The iterative process therefore determines an optimum conflict resolution by observing the change of the contribution margin. Furthermore, a monetary value of each dispatching decision can also be determined.

Keywords: choice of transport, knock-on delays, monetary evaluation, railway operations

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Authors: Shah Awan, Fahad Sultan, Shahid Jan Kakakhel

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Higher education in the 21st century has been faced with game-changing developments impacting teaching and learning and also strengthening the academia and industry relationship. The academia and industry relationship plays a key role in economic development in developed, developing and emerging economies. The partnership not only explores innovation but also provide a real time experience of the theoretical knowledge. For this purpose, the paper assessing the role of HEC in the Pakistan and discusses the way in academia and industry contribute their role in improving Pakistani economy. Successive studies have reported the importance of innovation and technology , research development initiatives in public sector universities, and the significance of role of higher education commission in strengthening the academia and industrial relationship to improve performance and minimize failure. The paper presents the results of interviews conducted, using semi-structured interviews amongst 26 staff members of two public sector universities, higher education commission and managers from corporate sector.The study shows public sector universities face the several barriers in developing economy like Pakistan, to establish the successful collaboration between universities and industry. Of the participants interviewed, HEC provides an insufficient road map to improve organisational capabilities in facilitating and enhance the performance. The results of this study have demonstrated that HEC has to embrace and internalize support to industry and public sector universities to compete in the era of globalization. Publication of this research paper will help higher education sector to further strengthen research sector through industry and university collaboration. The research findings corroborate the findings of Dooley and Kirk who highlights the features of university-industry collaboration. Enhanced communication has implications for the quality of the product and human resource. Crucial for developing economies, feasible organisational design and framework is essential for the university-industry relationship.

Keywords: higher education commission, role, academia and industry relationship, Pakistan

Procedia PDF Downloads 473