Search results for: stochastic local search

Authors: Jong-Bae Lee, Seongsoo Lee

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Local interconnect network (LIN) is a communication protocol that combines sensors, actuators, and processors to a functional module in automotive applications. In this paper, a LIN ver. 2.2A controller was designed in Verilog hardware description language (Verilog HDL) and implemented in field-programmable gate array (FPGA). Its operation was verified by making full-scale LIN network with the presented FPGA-implemented LIN controller, commercial LIN transceivers, and commercial processors. When described in Verilog HDL and synthesized in 0.18 μm technology, its gate size was about 2,300 gates.

Keywords: local interconnect network, controller, transceiver, processor

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Authors: Shao-Tzu Huang, Chen-Chien Hsu, Wei-Yen Wang

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Matching high dimensional features between images is computationally expensive for exhaustive search approaches in computer vision. Although the dimension of the feature can be degraded by simplifying the prior knowledge of homography, matching accuracy may degrade as a tradeoff. In this paper, we present a feature matching method based on k-means algorithm that reduces the matching cost and matches the features between images instead of using a simplified geometric assumption. Experimental results show that the proposed method outperforms the previous linear exhaustive search approaches in terms of the inlier ratio of matched pairs.

Keywords: feature matching, k-means clustering, SIFT, RANSAC

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Authors: Jiangyong Liu, Xiangxiang Xu, Bote Luo, Xiaoxue Luo, Jiang Zhu, Lingzhi Yi

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To address the problems of non-linearity and high randomness of the original power load sequence causing the degradation of power load forecasting accuracy, a short-term load forecasting method is proposed. The method is based on the Least Square Support Vector Machine optimized by an Improved Sparrow Search Algorithm combined with the Variational Mode Decomposition proposed in this paper. The application of the variational mode decomposition technique decomposes the raw power load data into a series of Intrinsic Mode Functions components, which can reduce the complexity and instability of the raw data while overcoming modal confounding; the proposed improved sparrow search algorithm can solve the problem of difficult selection of learning parameters in the least Square Support Vector Machine. Finally, through comparison experiments, the results show that the method can effectively improve prediction accuracy.

Keywords: load forecasting, variational mode decomposition, improved sparrow search algorithm, least square support vector machine

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Authors: Samaneh Yavari, Christiane Pferrer, Elisabeth Engelke, Alexander Starke, Juergen Rehage

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Background: Three nociceptive thresholds of thermal, electrical, and mechanical thresholds commonly use to evaluate the local anesthesia in many species, for instance, cow, horse, cat, dog, rabbit, and so on. Due to the lack of investigations to evaluate and/or validate such those nociceptive thresholds, our plan was the comparison of two-foot local anesthesia methods of Intravenous Regional Anesthesia (IVRA) and our modified four-point Nerve Block Anesthesia (NBA). Materials and Methods: Eight healthy nonpregnant nondairy Holstein Frisian cows in a cross-over study design were selected for this study. All cows divided into two different groups to receive two local anesthesia techniques of IVRA and our modified four-point NBA. Three thermal, electrical, and mechanical force and pinpricks were applied to evaluate the quality of local anesthesia methods before and after local anesthesia application. Results: The statistical evaluation demonstrated that our four-point NBA has a qualification to select as a standard foot local anesthesia. However, the recorded results of our study revealed no significant difference between two groups of local anesthesia techniques of IVRA and modified four-point NBA related to quality and duration of anesthesia stimulated by electrical, mechanical and thermal nociceptive stimuli. Conclusion and discussion: All three nociceptive threshold stimuli of electrical, mechanical and heat nociceptive thresholds can be applied to measure and evaluate the efficacy of foot local anesthesia of dairy cows. However, our study revealed no superiority of those three nociceptive methods to evaluate the duration and quality of bovine foot local anesthesia methods. Veterinarians to investigate the duration and quality of their selected anesthesia method can use any of those heat, mechanical, and electrical methods.

Keywords: mechanical, thermal, electrical threshold, IVRA, NBA, hind limb, dairy cow

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Authors: Shuxin Li, Peihao Song, Haixiao Hu, Dongfeng Cao

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The interactive deformation and failure mechanisms, including local bucking/delamination propagation and global bucking, are investigated in this paper with numerical simulation and validation with experimental results. Three dimensional numerical models using ABAQUS brick elements combined with cohesive elements and contact elements are developed to simulate the deformation and failure characteristics of composite laminates with and without delamination under compressive loading. The zero-thickness cohesive elements are inserted on the possible path of delamination propagation, and the inter-laminate behavior is characterized by the mixed-mode traction-separation law. The numerical simulations identified the complex feature of interaction among local buckling and/or delamination propagation and final global bucking for composite laminates with delamination under compressive loading. Firstly there is an interaction between the local buckling and delamination propagation, i.e., local buckling induces delamination propagation, and then delamination growth further enhances the local buckling. Secondly, the interaction between the out-plan deformation caused by local buckling and the global bucking deformation results in final failure of the composite laminates. The simulation results are validated by the good agreement with the experimental results published in the literature. The numerical simulation validated with experimental results revealed that the degradation of the load capacity, in particular of the compressive strength of composite structures with delamination, is mainly attributed to the combined local buckling/delamination propagation effects. Consequently, a simple field-bolt repair approach that can hinder the local buckling and prevent delamination growth is explored. The analysis and simulation results demonstrated field-bolt repair could effectively restore compressive strength of composite laminates with delamination.

Keywords: cohesive elements, composite laminates, delamination, local and global bucking, field-bolt repair

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Authors: Akpobome Harrison

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Community radio serves as a potent vehicle for amplifying local voices and driving community progress worldwide. It facilitates grassroots communication, empowers residents, and significantly contributes to social, cultural, and economic development. This study investigates the pivotal roles of community radio in elevating local voices and advancing development within Emuoha, Obio-Akpor, and Ikwerre Local Government Areas in Rivers State. Employing a quantitative methodology, the research involved random sampling of respondents via questionnaires. The findings underscore the transformative power of community radio in promoting local voices and fostering development, particularly within Rivers State. Moreover, community radio platforms empower marginalized populations, providing them with a voice and an opportunity to actively participate in the media landscape, share their stories, and express their concerns. This empowerment holds the potential to enhance civic engagement and communal harmony. Community radio stations often prioritize local news, events, and subjects that may not receive adequate coverage in mainstream media, thus facilitating the dissemination of vital community information, including local news, weather updates, and emergency alerts. In light of these observations, this paper advocates for the encouragement of community radio by both the state government and private media entities to facilitate seamless information dissemination. Additionally, the paper highlights the significant role played by the use of Pidgin English as a communication tool, particularly in providing understanding and a voice to marginalized individuals in rural communities.

Keywords: community radio, local voices, marginalized populations, information dissemination, pidgin english, grassroots communication

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Authors: Christiana Jonut

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The study addresses tagal as an ecotourism product that is uniquely for Sabah. It is a community based tourism venture that is influenced by the Dusun ethic’s traditional law. The traditional principle of tagal is focused primarily on individual exploitation of riverine resources and it was transformed into a community participation in the riverine conservation to foster the growth or survival of ecotourism. It manages a river into a sustainable manner. A smart partnership system between the community and the authority particularly the Department of Fisheries Sabah, tagal has successfully become an instrument to protect, revive and manage the river fish resources. In 2015, Sabah Fisheries Department added 536 tagal sites. Most tagal sites were turned into a community based tourism venture. They generate income through jobs creation for the purpose of uplifting the local’s economic level. Tagal ecotourism sites also increase environmental awareness of the local people to love their culture, tradition and environment. This venture also promotes the sustainability of the eco-tourism. The objective of this study is to explore the issues and contexts of empowerment of the local people in managing a successful tagal ecotourism. This study further explains how community capacity building is the major influence of empowerment of the local community. The methodology approach used is qualitative where interview is chosen as the data collection method. This is a literature review of exploring empowerment of the local community through various community capacity building initiatives that would motivate the local people to be actively involved in the tagal.

Keywords: capacity building, Tagal, ecotourism, empowerment, Sabah

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Authors: Sandip Mitra

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Studies on Governance and Accountability has often stressed the need to release Data in public domain to increase transparency ,which otherwise act as an evidence of performance. However, inefficient handling, lack of capacity and the dynamics of transfers (especially fund transfers) are important issues which need appropriate attention. E-Governance alone can not serve as a measure of transparency as long as a comprehensive planning is instituted. Studies on Governance and public exposure has often triggered public opinion in favour or against any government. The root of the problem (especially in local governments) lies in the management of the governance. The participation of the people in the local government functioning, the networks within and outside the locality, synergy with various layers of Government are crucial in understanding the activities of any government. Unfortunately, data on such issues are not released in the public domain .If they are at all released , the extraction of information is often hindered for complicated designs. A Study has been undertaken with a few local Governments in India. The data has been analysed to substantiate the views.

Keywords: accountability, e-governance, transparency, local government

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Authors: Sai Hung Cheung, Zhe Shao

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Recent earthquake-induced tsunamis in Padang, 2004 and Tohoku, 2011 brought huge losses of lives and properties. Maintaining vertical evacuation systems is the most crucial strategy to effectively reduce casualty during the tsunami event. Thus, it is of our great interest to quantify the risk to structural dynamic systems due to earthquake-induced tsunamis. Despite continuous advancement in computational simulation of the tsunami and wave-structure interaction modeling, it still remains computationally challenging to evaluate the reliability (or its complement failure probability) of a structural dynamic system when uncertainties related to the system and its modeling are taken into account. The failure of the structure in a tsunami-wave-structural system is defined as any response quantities of the system exceeding specified thresholds during the time when the structure is subjected to dynamic wave impact due to earthquake-induced tsunamis. In this paper, an approach based on a novel integration of the Subset Simulation algorithm and a recently proposed moving least squares response surface approach for stochastic sampling is proposed. The effectiveness of the proposed approach is discussed by comparing its results with those obtained from the Subset Simulation algorithm without using the response surface approach.

Keywords: response surface model, subset simulation, structural reliability, Tsunami risk

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Authors: Mei-Yi Wu, Shang-Ming Huang

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The online shoppers nowadays often search the product information on the Internet using some keywords of products. To use this kind of information searching model, shoppers should have a preliminary understanding about their interesting products and choose the correct keywords. However, if the products are first contact (for example, the worn clothes or backpack of passengers which you do not have any idea about the brands), these products cannot be retrieved due to insufficient information. In this paper, we discuss and study the applications in E-commerce using image retrieval and text mining techniques. We design a reasonable E-commerce application system containing three layers in the architecture to provide users product information. The system can automatically search and retrieval similar images and corresponding web pages on Internet according to the target pictures which taken by users. Then text mining techniques are applied to extract important keywords from these retrieval web pages and search the prices on different online shopping stores with these keywords using a web crawler. Finally, the users can obtain the product information including photos and prices of their favorite products. The experiments shows the efficiency of proposed system.

Keywords: mobile image retrieval, text mining, product information service system, online marketing

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Authors: Sujoy Das, M. M. Ghosh

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The thermal conductivity of a fluid can be significantly enhanced by dispersing nano-sized particles in it, and the resultant fluid is termed as "nanofluid". A theoretical model for estimating the thermal conductivity of a nanofluid has been proposed here. It is based on the mechanism that evenly dispersed nanoparticles within a nanofluid undergo Brownian motion in course of which the nanoparticles repeatedly collide with the heat source. During each collision a rapid heat transfer occurs owing to the solid-solid contact. Molecular dynamics (MD) simulation of the collision of nanoparticles with the heat source has shown that there is a pulse-like pick up of heat by the nanoparticles within 20-100 ps, the extent of which depends not only on thermal conductivity of the nanoparticles, but also on the elastic and other physical properties of the nanoparticle. After the collision the nanoparticles undergo Brownian motion in the base fluid and release the excess heat to the surrounding base fluid within 2-10 ms. The Brownian motion and associated temperature variation of the nanoparticles have been modeled by stochastic analysis. Repeated occurrence of these events by the suspended nanoparticles significantly contributes to the characteristic thermal conductivity of the nanofluids, which has been estimated by the present model for a ethylene glycol based nanofluid containing Cu-nanoparticles of size ranging from 8 to 20 nm, with Gaussian size distribution. The prediction of the present model has shown a reasonable agreement with the experimental data available in literature.

Keywords: brownian dynamics, molecular dynamics, nanofluid, thermal conductivity

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Authors: Bereket Amare Mulu

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Ethiopia is one of the countries that consists of a huge variety of botanical resources as compared to the world. The agroclimatic is suitable for a variety of plants to grow effectively throughout the year. Sources of food plants are basic items for people in the world. Production of food items is a prior activity and needs more resources and attention to produce a huge amount of production. The local food is rich in nutrition and healthful foods. The local food is fresh and not exposed to infections easily. The community can easily get the food items in their surroundings. The local food sources are not expensive when it is compared to the other proceed food items, and it is affordable to the community purchasing power. The food is very tasty and palatable capacity by the whole community categories. The basic problems in Ethiopia are the community experiences some of the common food source items. On the contrary, inefficient food production, low economic growth, and climate variability affected food production. This leads to serious food shortages and acute health problems. The objective of the study is to identify local food sources and analyze the advantage and benefits of local food sources. Casava is one of the root crop plants in Ethiopia and easily adapts to any type of agroecology in every place in the country. 50 community members have been identified to prepare casava in different forms of food items. They have prepared in the forms of Bread, Injera, Porridge, Boiled casava, fried chips Casava, and Cocktails. The prepared food items have been exposed to the community as a food festival to eat and taste how much interesting Even though there is a cultural barrier to eating the food items, the community had the food and tasted it the food. The result showed that community awareness is still not addressed the benefits of local food sources yet. The local food has high nutritional value and healthful foods. The local food sources are fresh and easily produced in every place of the country.

Keywords: bread, cassava, injera, nutrition

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Authors: Chipo Mugova, Zuko Mjobo

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The aim of this study was to evaluate the cost of quality (COQ) at a local foundry business to identify the contribution of its units and processes to quality costs within the foundry’s operations. The foundry selected for detailed case study is one of major businesses that have been targeted by the government to produce components for building and re-furbishing wagons and trains. The study aimed at identifying areas in the foundry’s processes in which investment needs to be made to reduce quality costs. This is in alignment with government’s vision of promoting local business to support local markets leading to creation of jobs, and hence reduction of unemployment rate in South Africa. The methodology adopted used cost of quality models. Results from the study indicated that internal failure costs were significantly higher than all other cost of quality categories, taking more than 60% of the business’s income.

Keywords: appraisal costs, cost of quality, failure costs, local content, prevention costs

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Authors: Abdulah Fajar

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Electronic Procurement System has been implemented at government institution in Indonesia. This system has been developed centrally at Institution of National Procurement Policy (LKPP) and implemented autonomously at either local or national government institution. The lack of competency at many institution on Information Technology Management arise several major problems. The main concern of LKPP to local administrator is assured that the system is running normally and always be able to serve the needs of its users. Monitoring system has been identified as the one of solution to prevent the problems appeared. Monitoring system is developed using Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) and implemented at LKPP. There are two modules; Main Dashboard and Local Agent. Main Dashboard is intended for LKPP and Local Agent is intended to implement at local autonomous e-procurement system (LPSE). There are several resources that must be monitored such as computation, memory and network traffic. Agile paradigm is applied to this project to assure user and system requirement is met. The length of project is the one of reason why agile paradigm has been chosen. The system has been successfully delivered to LKPP.

Keywords: procurement system, SNMP, LKPP, LPSE

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Authors: Haifeng Zhou, Tsungyang Liow, Xiaoguang Tu, Eujin Lim, Chao Li, Junfeng Song, Xianshu Luo, Ying Huang, Lianxi Jia, Lianwee Luo, Qing Fang, Mingbin Yu, Guoqiang Lo

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With the development of technology, countries gradually allocated more and more frequency spectrums for civilization and commercial usage, especially those high radio frequency bands indicating high information capacity. The field effect becomes more and more prominent in microwave components as frequency increases, which invalidates the transmission line theory and complicate the design of microwave components. Here a modeling approach based on numerical search algorithm is proposed to design various building blocks for microwave circuits to avoid complicated impedance matching and equivalent electrical circuit approximation. Concretely, a microwave component is discretized to a set of segments along the microwave propagation path. Each of the segment is initialized with random dimensions, which constructs a multiple-dimension parameter space. Then numerical searching algorithms (e.g. Pattern search algorithm) are used to find out the ideal geometrical parameters. The optimal parameter set is achieved by evaluating the fitness of S parameters after a number of iterations. We had adopted this approach in our current projects and designed many microwave components including sharp bends, T-branches, Y-branches, microstrip-to-stripline converters and etc. For example, a stripline 90° bend was designed in 2.54 mm x 2.54 mm space for dual-band operation (Ka band and Ku band) with < 0.18 dB insertion loss and < -55 dB reflection. We expect that this approach can enrich the tool kits for microwave designers.

Keywords: microwave component, microstrip and stripline, bend, power division, the numerical search algorithm.

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Authors: Nezha Alaoui

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The early 1950s French colonial context in Morocco provided an opportunity for architects to question the modernist established order by building dwellings for the local population. The dwellings were originally designed to encourage Muslims to adopt an urban lifestyle based on local customs. However, the inhabitants transformed their dwelling into a hybrid habitation. This paper aims to prove the relevance of the design process in accordance with the local colonial context by analyzing the dwellers' appropriation process and the modification of their habitat.

Keywords: colonial heritage, appropriation process, islamic spatial habit, housing experiment, modernist mass housing

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Authors: Amin Karimi, Lele Zhang, Mark Fackrell

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Rural-to-urban population migrations are a global phenomenon, with projections indicating that by 2050, 68% of the world's population will inhabit densely populated urban centers. Concurrently, the popularity of e-commerce shopping has surged, evidenced by a 51% increase in total e-commerce sales from 2017 to 2021. Consequently, distribution and logistics systems, integral to effective supply chain management, confront escalating hurdles in efficiently delivering and distributing products within bustling urban environments. Additionally, events like environmental challenges and the COVID-19 pandemic have indicated that decision-makers are facing numerous sources of uncertainty. Therefore, to design an efficient and reliable logistics system, uncertainty must be considered. In this study, it examine fleet sizing and routing while considering uncertainty in demand rate. Fleet sizing is typically a strategic-level decision, while routing is an operational-level one. In this study, a carrier must make two types of decisions: strategic-level decisions regarding the number and types of drones to be purchased, and operational-level decisions regarding planning routes based on available fleet and realized demand. If the available fleets are insufficient to serve some customers, the carrier must outsource that delivery at a relatively high cost, calculated per order. With this hierarchy of decisions, it can model the problem using two-stage stochastic programming. The first-stage decisions involve planning the number and type of drones to be purchased, while the second-stage decisions involve planning routes. To solve this model, it employ logic-based benders decomposition, which decomposes the problem into a master problem and a set of sub-problems. The master problem becomes a mixed integer programming model to find the best fleet sizing decisions, and the sub-problems become capacitated vehicle routing problems considering battery status. Additionally, it assume a heterogeneous fleet based on load and battery capacity, and it consider that battery health deteriorates over time as it plan for multiple periods.

Keywords: drone-delivery, stochastic demand, VRP, fleet sizing

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Authors: Catherine Thompson, Maryam Jalali, Peter Hills

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The allocation of visual attention is critical when driving and anything that limits attention will have a detrimental impact on safety. Engaging in a secondary task reduces the amount of attention directed to the road because drivers allocate resources towards this task, leaving fewer resources to process driving-relevant information. Yet the dangers associated with a secondary task do not end when the driver returns their attention to the road. Instead, the attentional settings adopted to complete a secondary task may persist to the road, affecting attention, and therefore affecting driver performance. This 'attentional inertia' effect was investigated in the current work. Forty drivers searched for hazards in driving video clips while their eye-movements were recorded. At varying intervals they were instructed to attend to a secondary task displayed on a tablet situated to their left-hand side. The secondary task consisted of three separate computer games that induced horizontal, vertical, and random eye movements. Visual search and hazard detection in the driving clips were compared across the three conditions of the secondary task. Results showed that the layout of information in the secondary task, and therefore the allocation of attention in this task, had an impact on subsequent search in the driving clips. Vertically presented information reduced the wide horizontal spread of search usually associated with accurate driving and had a negative influence on the detection of hazards. The findings show the additional dangers of engaging in a secondary task while driving. The attentional inertia effect has significant implications for semi-autonomous and autonomous vehicles in which drivers have greater opportunity to direct their attention away from the driving task.

Keywords: attention, eye-movements, hazard perception, visual search

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Authors: Sani M. Lawal, Idris Musa, Aliyu D. Usman

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The Pareto approach of optimal solutions in a search space that evolved in multi-objective optimization problems is adopted in this paper, which stands for a set of solutions in the search space. This paper aims at presenting an optimal placement of Distributed Generation (DG) in radial distribution networks with an optimal size for minimization of power loss and voltage deviation as well as maximizing voltage profile of the networks. And these problems are formulated using particle swarm optimization (PSO) as a constraint nonlinear optimization problem with both locations and sizes of DG being continuous. The objective functions adopted are the total active power loss function and voltage deviation function. The multiple nature of the problem, made it necessary to form a multi-objective function in search of the solution that consists of both the DG location and size. The proposed PSO algorithm is used to determine optimal placement and size of DG in a distribution network. The output indicates that PSO algorithm technique shows an edge over other types of search methods due to its effectiveness and computational efficiency. The proposed method is tested on the standard IEEE 34-bus and validated with 33-bus test systems distribution networks. Results indicate that the sizing and location of DG are system dependent and should be optimally selected before installing the distributed generators in the system and also an improvement in the voltage profile and power loss reduction have been achieved.

Keywords: distributed generation, pareto, particle swarm optimization, power loss, voltage deviation

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Authors: Nejah Ben Mabrouk, Bassem Jarboui, Habib Chabchoub

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Production and distribution planning is the most important part in supply chain management. In this paper, a NP-hard production-distribution problem for one product over a multi-period horizon is investigated. The aim is to minimize the sum of costs of three items: production setups, inventories and distribution, while determining, for each period, the amount produced, the inventory levels and the delivery trips. To solve this difficult problem, we propose a bi-phase approach based on a Variable Neighbourhood Search (VNS). This heuristic is tested on 90 randomly generated instances from the literature, with 20 periods and 50, 100, 200 customers. Computational results show that our approach outperforms existing solution procedures available in the literature

Keywords: logistic, production, distribution, variable neighbourhood search

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Authors: Charles Kwaku Oppong

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This study examined the effects of the agricultural land grabbed for the Bui Dam project on the livelihoods assets of the affected people and its implication on food production. Both quantitative and qualitative data were collected through the use of focus group discussions, questionnaire administration, interview guide, and observations. It was found that the land grabbing incident in the study communities as a result of the Bui Dam construction has resulted in the improvements in the physical assets of the affected people. The findings also indicated that local food crop production and the quantity of fish catch have dwindled after the land grabs. Contrary to this, the local people’s access to the natural capital, particularly the local land for agricultural activities has been worsened. The study recommends alternative sustainable livelihood for the affected people by the local government.

Keywords: land grabbing, livelihood, asset, food production

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Authors: Haidy Weliam Megaly Gouda

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Dermatology is often a neglected specialty in low-resource settings despite the high morbidity associated with skin disease. This becomes even more significant when associated with HIV infection, as dermatological conditions are more common and aggressive in HIV-positive patients. African countries have the highest HIV infection rates, and skin conditions are frequently misdiagnosed and mismanaged because of a lack of dermatological training and educational material. The frequent lack of diagnostic tests in the African setting renders basic clinical skills all the more vital. This project aimed to improve the diagnosis and treatment of skin disease in the HIV population in a district hospital in Malawi. A basic dermatological clinical tool was developed and produced in collaboration with local staff and based on available literature and data collected from clinics. The aim was to improve diagnostic accuracy and provide guidance for the treatment of skin disease in HIV-positive patients. A literature search within Embassy, Medline and Google Scholar was performed and supplemented through data obtained from attending 5 Antiretroviral clinics. From the literature, conditions were selected for inclusion in the resource if they were described as specific, more prevalent, or extensive in the HIV population or have more adverse outcomes if they develop in HIV patients. Resource-appropriate treatment options were decided using Malawian Ministry of Health guidelines and textbooks specific to African dermatology. After the collection of data and discussion with local clinical and pharmacy staff, a list of 15 skin conditions was included, and a booklet was created using the simple layout of a picture, a diagnostic description of the disease and treatment options. Clinical photographs were collected from local clinics (with full consent of the patient) or from the book ‘Common Skin Diseases in Africa’ (permission granted if fully acknowledged and used in a not-for-profit capacity). This tool was evaluated by the local staff alongside an educational teaching session on skin disease. This project aimed to reduce uncertainty in diagnosis and provide guidance for appropriate treatment in HIV patients by gathering information into one practical and manageable resource. To further this project, we hope to review the effectiveness of the tool in practice.

Keywords: prevalence and pattern of skin diseases, impact on quality of life, rural Nepal, interventions, quality switched ruby laser, skin color river blindness, clinical signs, circularity index, grey level run length matrix, grey level co-occurrence matrix, local binary pattern, object detection, ring detection, shape identification

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Authors: Xin Wang, Chaoqun Ma, Zheng Yao

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Although green technology innovation faces new opportunities and challenges in the digital era, its theoretical research remains limited. Drawing on the attention-based view, this study employs the spatial Durbin model to investigate the impact of local government digital attention and digital industrial agglomeration on green technology innovation across 30 Chinese provinces from 2011 to 2021, as well as the spatial spillover effects present. The results suggest that both government digital attention and digital industrial agglomeration positively influence green technology innovation in local and neighboring provinces, with digital industrial agglomeration exhibiting a positive moderating effect on this direct local and indirect spatial spillover relationship. The findings of this study provide a new theoretical perspective for green technology innovation research and hold valuable implications for the advancement of the attention-based view and green technology innovation.

Keywords: local government digital attention, digital industrial agglomeration, green technology innovation, attention-based view

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Authors: Akiko Kondo, Akio Kondo

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We are facing serious problems related to a long-term depopulation and an aging society with a falling birth rate in Japan. In this situation, we are suffering from a shortfall in human resources as well as a shortage of workforce in rural regions. In addition, we are struggling with a protracted economic slump and excess concentration of population in the Tokyo Metropolitan area. It is an urgent national issue to consider how to live in this country and what kind of structure of society and administration policy is needed. It is necessary to clarify people’s desire for their way of living and social assistance to be provided. The aim of this study is to clarify the characteristics of regional issues and the degree of their seriousness in local municipalities of Japan. We conducted a questionnaire survey about regional agenda in all local municipalities in Japan. We obtained responses concerning the degree of seriousness of regional issues and degree of importance of policies. Based on the data gathered from the survey, it is apparent that many local municipalities are facing an aging population and declining population. We constructed a model to analyze factors for declining population. Using the model, it was clarified that a population’s age structure, job opportunities, and income level affect the decline of population. In addition, we showed the way of the evaluation of the state of a local municipality.

Keywords: evaluation, local municipality, regional analysis, regional issue

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Authors: T. Holecki, J. Wozniak-Holecka, K. Sobczyk

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Development, implementation, and evaluation of the effects of health policy programs, resulting from the identified health needs and health status of residents, is the own task of all local government units in Poland. This is due to the obligation to provide access to healthcare services to all residents and the implementation of tasks in the field of health promotion based on specific legal acts. Until the end of 2016 local governments financed health policy programs only with their own funds. Currently, there are additional resources available from the public health insurance subsidising up to 80% of health policy programs costs in cities with a population under 5 thousand people and up to 40% in bigger cities. Changes in legal provisions do not translate automatically to increased involvement of local government units in the implementation of public health tasks. The main objective of the study was to assess the actual impact of the new legal regulation on financing local health policy programs on the engagement of local administration in this area of public health activity. To achieve this aim, we analyzed difference in the number of local governments developing and implementing health policy programs before and after the new law came into force. The aim of the study was also to estimate the level of expenditures incurred by self-government units and the National Health Fund to cover the costs of health policy programs. In the first stage of the project, legal acts concerning the subject of research and financial data published by the National Health Fund were analyzed. The material for the second, main stage of the study was the detailed financial data obtained from the National Health Fund and data obtained from local government units. The results present the situation in Poland in territorial terms, divided into 16 voivodships.

Keywords: health care system, health policy programs, local self-governments, public health

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Authors: Maria Khan

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Framing good core Human Resource Management (HRM) functions like recruitment, selection, training and development, which if executed effectively, can become a strategic advantage for a company. HRM policies related to mid-level managers can depend on the type of top management. This may be due to the difference in perception of effective HRM policies of an expatriate and local leadership. This comparative case study assesses how local mid-level managers are managed in leading multinational telecom companies in Pakistan. Core HRM functions related to managers were analysed through field research based on semi-structured interviews with relevant Human Resource Managers. Results suggest that recruitment and selection practices are not too different and are in compliance with best HRM practices. However, there is a difference in the effective implementation of Training and Development policies. Changing global management trends and skill development dictate that MNCs continuously develop the local talent effectively for local and international success.

Keywords: recruitment, selection, training, development, core HRM, human resource management, subsidiary, international staffing, managers, MNC, expatriate

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Authors: Rui Du

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This paper attempts to assess the impact of a major sporting event —the Super Bowl on the local economies. The identification strategy is to compare the winning and losing cities at the National Football League (NFL) conference finals under the assumption of similar pre-treatment trends. The stock market performances of companies headquartered in these cities are used to capture the sudden changes in local economic activities during a short time span. The exogenous variations in the football game outcome allow a straightforward difference-in-differences approach to identify the effect. This study finds that the post-event trends in winning and losing cities diverge despite the fact that both cities have economically and statistically similar pre-event trends. Empirical analysis provides suggestive evidence of a positive, significant local economic impact of conference final wins, possibly through city image enhancement. Further empirical evidence shows the presence of heterogeneous effects across industrial sectors, suggesting that city image enhancing the effect of the Super Bowl participation is empirically relevant for the changes in the composition of local industries. Also, this study also adopts a similar strategy to examine the local economic impact of Super Bowl successes, however, finds no statistically significant effect.

Keywords: Super Bowl Participation, local economies, city image enhancement, difference-in-differences, industrial sectors

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Authors: N. Ouslimani, N. Hakimi, H. Aksas

Abstract:

The reduction of oil reserves in the world makes that many countries are directed towards the study and the use of local and renewable energies. For this purpose, wood energy represents the material of choice. The energy production is primarily thermal and corresponds to a heating of comfort, auxiliary or principal. Wood is generally conditioned in the form of logs, of pellets, even of plates. In Algeria, this way of energy saving could contribute to the safeguarding of the environment, as to the recovery of under wood products (branches, barks and various wastes on the various transformation steps). This work is placed within the framework general of the search for new sources of energy starting from the recovery of the lignocellulosic matter. In this direction, we proposed various sources of products (biomass, under product and by-products) relating to the ‘Eucalyptus species’ being able to be developed, of which we carried out a preliminary physicochemical study, necessary to the development of the densified products with high calorific value.

Keywords: biomass, calorific value, combustion, energy recovery

Procedia PDF Downloads 261

Authors: Mosab kh. A. A. Bashir, E. Mohamed-Ahmed

Abstract:

The aim of the study is to compare the results of the external exposure and the range of the dose spread by the patients, hospitalized in two different groups of 3-5 d receiving radioiodine therapy because of thyroid cancer, and one of group were giving the local diuretic plant (barley) as local juice. The control group was 28 patients they were isolated as international precautions after taken I-131 capsule 100 mCi, and their external exposure was recorded day by day after first 24 hrs. and the distance for external measurement was 1 m at the abdominal level. The mean of external exposure values of patients at fourth day were 30.24±12.92 µSv h−1. The second group after taking I-131 capsule 100 mCi we were given barley juice (250 mL) after every meal three times on day and their external exposure was recorded day by day after first 24 hrs. The mean of external exposure values of patients of this group at third day was 26.92±9.89 (14-55) µSv h−1. It was observed that the external exposure from the second group clearly decreased to low levels which contributed to the decrease in patient dose and also to the decrease in the exposure from the patient to his/her family.

Keywords: local diuretic juice, therapy, radiation medicine, diuretic plant

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Authors: Landry Tchambou Tchouongsi, Appolinaire Derbetini Vondou

Abstract:

This study describes the local Hadley circulation (HC) during the December-February (DJF) and June-August (JJA) seasons, respectively, in Central Africa (CA) from the divergent component of the mean meridional wind and also from a new method called the variation of the ψ vector. Historical data from the ERA5 reanalysis for the period 1983 to 2013 were used. The results show that the maximum of the upward branch of the local Hadley circulation in the DJF and JJA seasons is located under the Congo Basin (CB). However, seasonal and horizontal variations in the mean temperature gradient and thermodynamic properties are largely associated with the distribution of convection and large-scale upward motion. Thus, temperatures beneath the CB show a slight variation between the DJF and JJA seasons. Moreover, energy transport of the moist static energy (MSE) adequately captures the mean flow component of the HC over the tropics. By the way, the divergence under the CB is enhanced by the presence of the low pressure of western Cameroon and the contribution of the warm and dry air currents coming from the Sahara.

Keywords: Circulation, reanalysis, thermodynamic, local Hadley.

Procedia PDF Downloads 70