Search results for: Local Binary Pattern Histogram

Authors: Mina Henneb, Rafik Belabbas, Safia Zenia

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The objective of this study was to determine the prevalence and to identify the risk factors of Eimeria spp. and Giardia spp. infection in rabbits from the local population of four localities in northern Algeria. Dung samples were collected from 16 farms, totalling 111 rabbits, and were analysed by the flotation method. Additional, data regarding the farms and management practices were obtained by means of a questionnaire used in the surveys and interviews. The results revealed that the prevalence of Eimerias pp. contamination was 68.75% (11/16) for farms and 58.56% (65/111) for rabbits, respectively. The prevalence of Giardia spp. was respectively 56.25% (9/16) for farms and 11.7% (13/111) for rabbits. The analyses showed that the prevalence of Eimeria spp. was significantly higher in the farms that did not comply with hygiene and non-conventional feeding and watering. However, the prevalence of Giardia spp. was significant in rabbits kept in poor conditions of rearing. In conclusion, this study showed that the prevalence of these two parasites in rabbits from the local population is relevant and may have important implications for the rabbit industry and public health, especially in rural areas.

Keywords: Algeria, digestive parasites, prevalence, rabbits, risk factors

Procedia PDF Downloads 149

Authors: I Dewa Gede Arya Putra

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Principal Component Analysis (PCA) is a mathematical procedure that uses orthogonal transformation techniques to change a set of data with components that may be related become components that are not related to each other. This can have an impact on clustering wind speed characteristics in Indonesia. This study uses data daily wind speed observations of the Site Meteorological Station network for 30 years. Multicollinearity tests were also performed on all of these data before doing clustering with PCA. The results show that the four main components have a total diversity of above 80% which will be used for clusters. Division of clusters using Ward's method obtained 3 types of clusters. Cluster 1 covers the central part of Sumatra Island, northern Kalimantan, northern Sulawesi, and northern Maluku with the climatological pattern of wind speed that does not have an annual cycle and a weak speed throughout the year with a low-speed ranging from 0 to 1,5 m/s². Cluster 2 covers the northern part of Sumatra Island, South Sulawesi, Bali, northern Papua with the climatological pattern conditions of wind speed that have annual cycle variations with low speeds ranging from 1 to 3 m/s². Cluster 3 covers the eastern part of Java Island, the Southeast Nusa Islands, and the southern Maluku Islands with the climatological pattern of wind speed conditions that have annual cycle variations with high speeds ranging from 1 to 4.5 m/s².

Keywords: PCA, cluster, Ward's method, wind speed

Procedia PDF Downloads 178

Authors: Wei-Hsuan Hsu, Yi-Xuan Huang

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Nanoimprint lithography (NIL) possesses the advantages of sub-10-nm feature and low cost. NIL patterns the resist with physical deformation using a mold, which can easily reproduce the required nano-scale pattern. However, the variation of process parameters and environmental conditions seriously affect reproduction quality. How to ensure the quality of imprinted pattern is essential for industry. In this study, the authors used the electrowetting technology to assist mold filling in the NIL process. A special mold structure was designed to cause electrowetting. During the imprinting process, when a voltage was applied between the mold and substrate, the hydrophilicity/hydrophobicity of the surface of the mold can be converted. Both simulation and experiment confirmed that the electrowetting technology can assist mold filling and avoid incomplete filling rate. The proposed method can also reduce the crack formation during the de-molding process. Therefore, electrowetting technology can improve the process quality of NIL.

Keywords: electrowetting, mold filling, nano-imprint, surface modification

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Authors: Bing-Shun Huang, Hung-Ju Chiu, Wen-Kai Hsieh, Hsiu-Chuan Lin, Ming-Lung Hung

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Taiwan's solar photovoltaic target in 2025 is 20 GW, of which the fish-electricity symbiosis target is 4 GW. In the future, many solar photovoltaic installations may cause local environmental or social impacts. Therefore, the Taiwan government inspects the fish-electricity symbiosis to reduce the impact of solar photovoltaics on the local environment or society. This stuy takes the symbiosis of fishery and electricity in Kaohsiung City as an example to explore Taiwan's environmental and social inspection practices. It mainly analyzes the two aspects of environmental ecology and social economy. The results show that the environmental inspection is mainly through site surveys, ecological information mapping, on-site interviews, and public consultation meetings. Social inspection mainly includes document analysis, on-site interviews, site surveys, expert discussions, and public consultations to identify possible local problems. Although the government had recognized the local issues, the future status may also change. It is recommended that future photoelectric companies should reconfirm the current situation of development sites when applying for the installation and propose countermeasures to solve the problem.

Keywords: taiwan, fish-electricity symbiosis, environment, society, inspection

Procedia PDF Downloads 183

Authors: Hassam Hassan Elborombaly

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The pollution generated from transportation modes, congestion and traffic heritage has led to the deterioration of historic buildings and the urban heritage in historic cities. Accordingly, this paper attempts to diagnose the transport and traffic problems in historic cities. In general and in Heritage Cities, and to investigate methods for conserving the urban heritage from negative effects of traffic congestion and of the traditional red modes of transportation. It also attempts to explore possible areas for intervention to mitigate transportation and traffic problems in the light of the principles of the sustainable transportation framework. It aims to draw conclusion and propose recommendation that would increase the efficiency and effectiveness of transportation plans in historic Cairo and consequently achieve sustainable transportation. Problems In historic cities public paths compose an irregular network enclosing large residential plots (defined as super blocks quarters or hettas). The blocks represent the basic morphology units in historic Cities. Each super block incorporates several uses (i.e. residential, non-residential, service uses and others). Local paths reach the interior of the super blocks in an organized inter core, which deals mainly with residential functions mixed with handicraft activities and is composed of several local path units; (b) the other core, which is bound by the public paths and contains a combination of residential, commercial and social activities. Objectives: 1- To provide amenity convenience and comfort for visitors and people who live and work in the area. Pedestrianizing, accessibility and safety are to be reinforced while respecting the organic urban pattern. 2- To enhance street life, vitality and activity, in order to attract people and increase economic prosperity. Research Contents • Relation between residential areas and transportation in the inner core • Analytical studies for historic areas in heritage cities • Sustainable transportation planning in heritage cities • Dynamic and flexible methodology for achieving sustainable transportation network for the Heritage Cities • Result and Recommendation

Keywords: irregular network, public paths, sustainable transportation, urban heritage

Procedia PDF Downloads 511

Authors: Beema Akbar, Varun P. Gopi, V. Suresh Babu

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Colon cancer causes the deaths of about half a million people every year. The common method of its detection is histopathological tissue analysis, it leads to tiredness and workload to the pathologist. A novel method is proposed that combines both structural and statistical pattern recognition used for the detection of colon cancer. This paper presents a comparison among the different classifiers such as Multilayer Perception (MLP), Sequential Minimal Optimization (SMO), Bayesian Logistic Regression (BLR) and k-star by using classification accuracy and error rate based on the percentage split method. The result shows that the best algorithm in WEKA is MLP classifier with an accuracy of 83.333% and kappa statistics is 0.625. The MLP classifier which has a lower error rate, will be preferred as more powerful classification capability.

Keywords: colon cancer, histopathological image, structural and statistical pattern recognition, multilayer perception

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Authors: Lea Stein, Sabine Rösner, Alessandra Lo Giudice, Beate Ditzen, Tewes Wischmann

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For many couples bearing children is a consistent life goal; however, it cannot always be fulfilled. Undergoing infertility treatment does not guarantee pregnancies and live births. Couples have to deal with miscarriages and sometimes even discontinue infertility treatment. Significant medical predictors for the outcome of infertility treatment have yet to be fully identified. To further our understanding, a cross-sectional five-year follow-up survey was undertaken, in which 95 women and 82 men that have been treated at the Women’s Hospital of Heidelberg University participated. Binary logistic regressions, parametric and non-parametric methods were used for our sample to determine the relevance of biological (infertility diagnoses, maternal and paternal age) and lifestyle factors (smoking, drinking, over- and underweight) on the outcome of infertility treatment (clinical pregnancy, live birth, miscarriage, dropout rate). During infertility treatment, 72.6% of couples became pregnant and 69.5% were able to give birth. Suffering from miscarriages 27.5% of couples and 20.5% decided to discontinue an unsuccessful fertility treatment. The binary logistic regression models for clinical pregnancies, live births and dropouts were statistically significant for the maternal age, whereas the paternal age in addition to maternal and paternal BMI, smoking, infertility diagnoses and infections, showed no significant predicting effect on any of the outcome variables. The results confirm an effect of maternal age on infertility treatment, whereas the relevance of other medical predictors remains unclear. Further investigations should be considered to increase our knowledge of medical predictors.

Keywords: advanced maternal age, assisted reproductive technology, female factor, male factor, medical predictors, infertility treatment, reproductive medicine

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Authors: Komal V. Aher, Sanjay B. Waykar

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Nowadays every individual having mobile device with them. In both computer vision and information retrieval Image search is currently hot topic with many applications. The proposed intelligent image search system is fully utilizing multimodal and multi-touch functionalities of smart phones which allows search with Image, Voice, and Text on mobile phones. The system will be more useful for users who already have pictures in their minds but have no proper descriptions or names to address them. The paper gives system with ability to form composite visual query to express user’s intention more clearly which helps to give more precise or appropriate results to user. The proposed algorithm will considerably get better in different aspects. System also uses Context based Image retrieval scheme to give significant outcomes. So system is able to achieve gain in terms of search performance, accuracy and user satisfaction.

Keywords: color space, histogram, mobile device, mobile visual search, multimodal search

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Authors: Shankaran Sitarama

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New Product Development (NPD) is invariably a team effort and involves effective teamwork. NPD team has members from different disciplines coming together and working through the different phases all the way from conceptual design phase till the production and product roll out. Creativity and Innovation are some of the key factors of successful NPD. Team members going through the different phases of NPD interact and work closely yet challenge each other during the design phases to brainstorm on ideas and later converge to work together. These two traits require the teams to have a divergent and a convergent thinking simultaneously. There needs to be a good balance. The team dynamics invariably result in conflicts among team members. While some amount of conflict (ideational conflict) is desirable in NPD teams to be creative as a group, relational conflicts (or discords among members) could be detrimental to teamwork. Team communication truly reflect these tensions and team dynamics. In this research, team communication (emails) between the members of the NPD teams is considered for analysis. The email communication is processed through a semantic analysis algorithm (LSA) to analyze the content of communication and a semantic similarity analysis to arrive at a social network graph that depicts the communication amongst team members based on the content of communication. The amount of communication (content and not frequency of communication) defines the interaction strength between the members. Social network adjacency matrix is thus obtained for the team. Standard social network analysis techniques based on the Adjacency Matrix (AM) and Dichotomized Adjacency Matrix (DAM) based on network density yield network graphs and network metrics like centrality. The social network graphs are then rendered for visual representation using a Metric Multi-Dimensional Scaling (MMDS) algorithm for node placements and arcs connecting the nodes (representing team members) are drawn. The distance of the nodes in the placement represents the tie-strength between the members. Stronger tie-strengths render nodes closer. Overall visual representation of the social network graph provides a clear picture of the team’s interactions. This research reveals four distinct patterns of team interaction that are clearly identifiable in the visual representation of the social network graph and have a clearly defined computational scheme. The four computational patterns of team interaction defined are Central Member Pattern (CMP), Subgroup and Aloof member Pattern (SAP), Isolate Member Pattern (IMP), and Pendant Member Pattern (PMP). Each of these patterns has a team dynamics implication in terms of the conflict level in the team. For instance, Isolate member pattern, clearly points to a near break-down in communication with the member and hence a possible high conflict level, whereas the subgroup or aloof member pattern points to a non-uniform information flow in the team and some moderate level of conflict. These pattern classifications of teams are then compared and correlated to the real level of conflict in the teams as indicated by the team members through an elaborate self-evaluation, team reflection, feedback form and results show a good correlation.

Keywords: team dynamics, team communication, team interactions, social network analysis, sna, new product development, latent semantic analysis, LSA, NPD teams

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Authors: Pornnapat Berndt

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The purpose of this research is to study the tourism routes in Bangnoi Floating Market, Bangkhontee District, Samut Songkhram province, Thailand in order to create type and form of interpretation to promote cultural tourism based on local community and visitor requirement. To accomplish the goals and objectives, qualitative research will be applied. The research instruments used are observation, questionnaires, basic interviews, in-depth interviews, focus group, interviewed of key local informants including site visitors. The study also uses both primary data and secondary data. A Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) was used to analyze the data. Descriptive and inferential statistics such as tables, percentage, mean and standard deviation were used for data analysis and summary. From research result, it is revealed that the local community requirement on types of interpretation conforms to visitors require which need guide post, guide book, etc. with up to date and informally content to present Bangnoi Floating Market which got the most demand score (3.78) considered as most wanted demand.

Keywords: interpretation, cultural tourism, tourism route, local community, stakeholders participated

Procedia PDF Downloads 280

Authors: Nemat Mohammadi, Yuki Nakayama

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After occurring Great East Japan earthquake and as a consequence the invasion of an extremely large Tsunami to the city, obligated many local governments to take into account certainly these kinds of issues. Poor preparation of local governments to deal with such kinds of disasters at that time and consequently lack of assistance delivery for local residents caused thousands of civilian casualties as well as billion dollars of economic damages. Those local governments who are responsible for governing such coastal areas, have to consider some countermeasures to deal with these natural disasters, prepare a comprehensive evacuation plan and contrive some feasible emergency plans for the purpose of victims’ reduction as much as possible. Under this evacuation plan, the local government should contemplate more about the traffic congestion during wide-area evacuation operation and estimate the minimum essential time to evacuate the whole city completely. This challenge will become more complicated for the government when the people who are affected by disasters are not only limited to the normal informed citizens but also some pregnant women, physically handicapped persons, old age citizens and foreigners or tourists who are not familiar with that conditions as well as local language are involved. The important issue to deal with this challenge is that how to inform these people to take a proper action right away noticing the Tsunami is coming. After overcoming this problem, next significant challenge is even more considerable. Next challenge is to evacuate the whole residents in a short period of time from the threated area to the safer shelters. In fact, most of the citizens will use their own vehicles to evacuate to the designed shelters and some of them will use the shuttle buses which are provided by local governments. The problem will arise when all residents want to escape from the threated area simultaneously and consequently creating a traffic jam on evacuation routes which will cause to prolong the evacuation time. Hence, this research mostly aims to calculate the minimum essential time to evacuate each region inside the threated area and find the evacuation start point for each region separately. This result will help the local government to visualize the situations and conditions during disasters and assist them to reduce the possible traffic jam on evacuation routes and consequently suggesting a comprehensive wide-area evacuation plan during natural disasters.

Keywords: BPR formula, disaster scenarios, evacuation completion time, wide-area evacuation

Procedia PDF Downloads 196

Authors: A. N. Roslen, S. A. Syed-Sahil, A. Musavir

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In Malaysia, there are only few fashion designers who are inspired by the work of artists when creating their collections. The researchers confirmed this statement by interviewing fashion experts in Malaysia. The objectives of this study are to: 1. Investigate the acceptance of fashion inspired by the work of art among consumers. 2. Encourage more designers to use work of art as their inspirations. 3. Promote Malaysian Artists through fashion. Thus, the researchers interviewed Malaysian fashion designers, image consultants, and one famous Malaysian Artist (Awang Damit). All of them had agreed that the fashion inspired by the work of art in Malaysia has a long way to go. Therefore, the researchers’ aim is to attract more fashion designers to use the work of local artists in their creations. The researchers had used interview, survey and experimentation as methods of this study. In the experimentation procedure, paintings of local artist, Awang Damit was used as a source of inspiration in creating a design Line. The result of this study had shown that fashion inspired by work of art is acknowledged and accepted by the designers and consumers.

Keywords: art, fashion, inspiration, local artist

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Authors: Anna Jeon, Seung-Ho Han, Je-Hun Lee

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The aim of this study was to determine the location and distribution pattern of neurovascular structures superior and inferior to the clavicle by detailed dissection. Fifteen adult non-embalmed cadavers with a mean age of 71.5 years were studied. For measurements, the most prominent point of the sternal end of the clavicle (SEC) on anterior view and the most prominent point of the acromial end of the clavicle (AEC) were identified before dissection. A line connecting the SEC and AEC was used as a reference line. The surrounding neurovascular structures were investigated. The supraclavicular nerve was densely distributed at 71.73% on the reference line. Branches of the thoracoacromial artery were located at 76.92%. Branches of subclavian vein were evenly distributed at all sections. The subclavian vein and artery and brachial plexus were located from 31.3% to 57.5%. That area needs caution because major neurovascular structures run underneath the clavicle.

Keywords: clavicle, ORIF, neurovascular structure, anatomical study

Procedia PDF Downloads 145

Authors: Y. Roumila, D. Meziani, R. Bagtache, K. Abdmeziem, M. Trari

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Heterogeneous photocatalysis over semiconductors has proved its effectiveness in the treatment of wastewaters since it works under soft conditions. It has emerged as a promising technique, giving rise to less toxic effluents and offering the opportunity of using sunlight as a sustainable and renewable source of energy. Many compounds have been used as photocatalysts. Though synthesized ones are intensively used, they remain expensive, and their synthesis involves special conditions. We thus thought of implementing a natural material, a phosphate ore, due to its low cost and great availability. Our work is devoted to the removal of hazardous organic pollutants, which cause several environmental problems and health risks. Among them, dye pollutants occupy a large place. This work relates to the study of the photodegradation of methyl violet (MV) and rhodamine B (RhB), in single and binary systems, under UV light and sunlight irradiation. Methyl violet is a triarylmethane dye, while RhB is a heteropolyaromatic dye belonging to the Xanthene family. In the first part of this work, the natural compound was characterized using several physicochemical and photo-electrochemical (PEC) techniques: X-Ray diffraction, chemical, and thermal analyses scanning electron microscopy, UV-Vis diffuse reflectance measurements, and FTIR spectroscopy. The electrochemical and photoelectrochemical studies were performed with a Voltalab PGZ 301 potentiostat/galvanostat at room temperature. The structure of the phosphate material was well characterized. The photo-electrochemical (PEC) properties are crucial for drawing the energy band diagram, in order to suggest the formation of radicals and the reactions involved in the dyes photo-oxidation mechanism. The PEC characterization of the natural phosphate was investigated in neutral solution (Na₂SO₄, 0.5 M). The study revealed the semiconducting behavior of the phosphate rock. Indeed, the thermal evolution of the electrical conductivity was well fitted by an exponential type law, and the electrical conductivity increases with raising the temperature. The Mott–Schottky plot and current-potential J(V) curves recorded in the dark and under illumination clearly indicate n-type behavior. From the results of photocatalysis, in single solutions, the changes in MV and RhB absorbance in the function of time show that practically all of the MV was removed after 240 mn irradiation. For RhB, the complete degradation was achieved after 330 mn. This is due to its complex and resistant structure. In binary systems, it is only after 120 mn that RhB begins to be slowly removed, while about 60% of MV is already degraded. Once nearly all of the content of MV in the solution has disappeared (after about 250 mn), the remaining RhB is degraded rapidly. This behaviour is different from that observed in single solutions where both dyes are degraded since the first minutes of irradiation.

Keywords: environment, organic pollutant, phosphate ore, photodegradation

Procedia PDF Downloads 118

Authors: Anshu Gupta, Charu Gupta

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Background: Punjab, a border state in India has achieved notoriety world over for its drug abuse problem. People right from school kids to elderly are hooked to drugs. This pattern of substance abuse is prevalent in both cities and villages alike. Excess of younger population in India has further aggravated the situation. It is feared that the benefits of India’s economic growth may well be negated by the rising substance abuse especially in this part of the country. It is quite evident that the pattern of substance abuse tends to change over time which is an impediment in the formulation of effective strategies to tackle this issue. Aim: Purpose of the study was to ascertain the change in the pattern of drug abuse for two consecutive years in the out patient department (OPD) population. Method: The study population comprised of all the patients reporting for deaddiction to the psychiatry outpatient department over a period of twelve months for two consecutive years. All the patients were evaluated by the International Classification of Diseases; 10 criteria for substance abuse/dependence. Results: A considerably high prevalence of substance abuse was present in the Indian population. In general, there was an increase in prevalence from first to the second year, especially among the female population. Increase in prevalence of substance abuse appeared to be more prominent among the younger age group of both the sexes. A significant increase in intravenous drug abuse was observed. Peer pressure and parental imitation were the major factors fueling substance abuse. Precipitation or fear of withdrawal symptoms was the major factor preventing abstinence. Substance abuse had a significant effect on the health and interpersonal relations of these patients. Summary/Conclusion: Drug abuse and addiction are on the rise throughout India. Changing cultural values, increasing economic stress and dwindling supportive bonds appear to be leading to initiation of substance abuse. Need of the hour is to formulate a comprehensive strategy to bring about an overall reduction in the use of drugs.

Keywords: deaddiction, peer pressure, parental imitation, substance abuse/dependance

Procedia PDF Downloads 183

Authors: Levente Varga, Dávid Deritei, Mária Ercsey-Ravasz, Răzvan Florian, Zsolt I. Lázár, István Papp, Ferenc Járai-Szabó

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One of the major shortcomings of widely used scientometric indicators is that different disciplines cannot be compared with each other. The issue of cross-disciplinary normalization has been long discussed, but even the classification of publications into scientific domains poses problems. Structural properties of citation networks offer new possibilities, however, the large size and constant growth of these networks asks for precaution. Here we present a new tool that in order to perform cross-field normalization of scientometric indicators of individual publications relays on the structural properties of citation networks. Due to the large size of the networks, a systematic procedure for identifying scientific domains based on a local community detection algorithm is proposed. The algorithm is tested with different benchmark and real-world networks. Then, by the use of this algorithm, the mechanism of the scientometric indicator normalization process is shown for a few indicators like the citation number, P-index and a local version of the PageRank indicator. The fat-tail trend of the article indicator distribution enables us to successfully perform the indicator normalization process.

Keywords: citation networks, cross-field normalization, local cluster detection, scientometric indicators

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Authors: Mohammad Hadi Mahmoodi, Soroor Zekrati

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The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between hemispheric dominance and intonation learning of Iranian EFL students. In order to gain this goal, 52 female students from three levels of beginner, elementary and intermediate in Paradise Institute, and 18 male university students at Bu-Ali Sina University constituted the sample. In order to assist students learn the correct way of applying intonation to their everyday speech, the study proposed an interactive approach and provided students with visual aid through which they were able to see the intonation pattern on computer screen using 'Speech Analyzer' software. This software was also used to record subjects’ voice and compare them with the original intonation pattern. Edinburg Handedness Questionnaire (EHD), which ranges from –100 for strong left-handedness to +100 for strong right-handedness was used to indicate the hemispheric dominance of each student. The result of an independent sample t-test indicated that girls learned intonation pattern better than boys, and that right brained students significantly outperformed the left brained ones. Using one-way ANOVA, a significant difference between three proficiency levels was also found. The posthoc Scheffer test showed that the exact difference was between intermediate and elementary, and intermediate and beginner levels, but no significant difference was observed between elementary and beginner levels. The findings of the study might provide researchers with some helpful implications and useful directions for future investigation into the domain of the relationship between mind and second language learning.

Keywords: intonation, hemispheric dominance, visual aid, language learning, second language learning

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Authors: Lilian Kishimbo

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This study aims to examine Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) practices of local large firms of East Africa region. In this study CSR is defined as all actions that go beyond obeying minimum legal requirements as espoused by other authors. Despite the increase of CSR literature empirical evidence clearly demonstrate an imbalance of CSR studies in the developing countries . Moreover, it is evident that most of the research on CSR in developing economies emerges from large fast-growing economies or BRICS members (i.e. Brazil, India, China and South Africa), and Indonesia and Malaysia and a further call for more research in Africa is particularly advocated. Taking Africa as an example, there are scanty researches on CSR practices, and the few available studies are mainly from Nigeria and South Africa leaving other parts of Africa for example East Africa underrepresented. Furthermore, in the face of globalization, experience shows that literature has focused mostly on multinational companies (MNCs) operating in either North-North or North-South and less on South-South indigenous local firms. Thus the existing literature in Africa shows more studies of MNCs and little is known about CSR of local indigenous firms operating in the South particularly in the East Africa region. Accordingly, this paper explores CSR practices of indigenous local large firms of East Africa region particularly Kenya and Tanzania with the aim of testing the hypothesis that do local firms of East Africa region engage in similar CSR practices as firms in other parts of the world?. To answer this question only listed local large firms were considered based on the assumption that they are large enough to engage. Newspapers were the main source of data and information collected was supplemented by business Annual Reports for the period 2010-2012. The research finding revealed that local firms of East Africa engage in CSR practices. However, there are some differences in the set of activities these firms prefers to engage in compared to findings from previous studies. As such some CSR that were given priority by firms in East Africa were less prioritized in the other part of the world including Indonesia. This paper will add knowledge to the body of CSR and experience of CSR practices of South-South indigenous firms where is evidenced to have a relative dearth of literature on CSR. Finally, the paper concludes that local firms of East Africa region engage in similar activities like other firms globally. But firms give more priority to some activities such education and health related activities. Finally, the study intends to assist policy makers at firm’s levels to plan for long lasting projects related to CSR for their stakeholders.

Keywords: Africa, corporate social responsibility, developing countries, indigenous firms, Kenya, Tanzania

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Authors: Luedech Girdwichai, Witthaya Mekhum

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This research analyses the factors affecting the success and develops a guideline for self- reliance planning of the entrepreneurs for effective implementation. Samples in this study included 42 awarded winners from the 2nd Sufficiency Economics Philosophy (SEP) National Contest arranged by Office of the Royal Development Projects Board. The results revealed 4 main factors affecting the success as follows: 1) there is a need to encourage unity and cooperation in the enterprise in conducting development plan. 2) The entrepreneur must be a knowledge seeker and lead by example on SEP life. 3) The entrepreneur must be able to apply traditional local wisdom with his present experience and knowledge in defining product identity. 4) The entrepreneur should provide career training for the staffs to develop their competencies. The guideline for self-reliance planning consisted of 4 aspects: 1) Human resource development: the enterprise should develop its staffs especially on integrity, honesty, and public minded. 2) Local community development: there should be a clear target for the local community development. 3) Local community economic development: by encouraging additional incomes through experience sharing. 4) Enterprise development planning: by arranging monthly meeting to conduct the development plan including analysing problems and synthesizing data.

Keywords: potential development, SME entrepreneurs, sufficiency economics philosophy, finance, management

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Authors: Beulah Rani Inbanathan

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In the present era, it is vivid from the numerous outcomes that data privacy is being compromised in various ways. Machine learning is one technology that uses the centralized server, and then data is given as input which is being analyzed by the algorithms present on this mentioned server, and hence outputs are predicted. However, each time the data must be sent by the user as the algorithm will analyze the input data in order to predict the output, which is prone to threats. The solution to overcome this issue is federated learning, where the models alone get updated while the data resides on the local machine and does not get exchanged with the other local models. Nevertheless, even on these local models, there are chances of data poisoning, and it is crystal clear from various experiments done by many people. This paper delves into many ways where data poisoning occurs and the many methods through which it is prevalent that data poisoning still exists. It includes the poisoning attacks on IoT devices, Edge devices, Autoregressive model, and also, on Industrial IoT systems and also, few points on how these could be evadible in order to protect our data which is personal, or sensitive, or harmful when exposed.

Keywords: data poisoning, federated learning, Internet of Things, edge computing

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Authors: Nisar Ahmed Memon

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A new medical image watermarking scheme delivering high embedding capacity is presented in this paper. Integer Wavelet Transform (IWT), Companding technique and adaptive thresholding are used in this scheme. The proposed scheme implants, recovers the hidden information and restores the input image to its pristine state at the receiving end. Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) images are used for experimental purposes. The scheme first segment the MRI medical image into non-overlapping blocks and then inserts watermark into wavelet coefficients having a high frequency of each block. The scheme uses block-based watermarking adopting iterative optimization of threshold for companding in order to avoid the histogram pre and post processing. Results show that proposed scheme performs better than other reversible medical image watermarking schemes available in literature for MRI medical images.

Keywords: adaptive thresholding, companding technique, data authentication, reversible watermarking

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Authors: Oktia Woro Kasmini Handayani, Bambang Budi Raharjo, Efa Nugroho, Bertakalswa Hermawati

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Obesity prevalence and severe malnutrition in Indonesia has increased from 2007 to 2013. The utilization of local resources in nutritional program planning can be used to program efficiency and to reach the goal. The aim of this research is to plan a nutrition program based on local resources for urban fringe areas in a developing country. This research used a qualitative approach, with a focus on local resources including social capital, social system, cultural system. The study was conducted in Mijen, Central Java, as one of the urban fringe areas in Indonesia. Purposive and snowball sampling techniques are used to determine participants. A total of 16 participants took part in the study. Observation, interviews, focus group discussion, SWOT analysis, brainstorming and Miles and Huberman models were used to analyze the data. We have identified several local resources, such as the contributions from nutrition cadres, social organizations, social financial resources, as well as the cultural system and social system. The outstanding contribution of nutrition cadres is the participation and creativity to improve nutritional status. In addition, social organizations, like the role of the integrated health center for children (Pos Pelayanan Terpadu), can be engaged in the nutrition program planning. This center is supported by House of Nutrition to assist in nutrition program planning, and provide social support to families, neighbors and communities as social capitals. The study also reported that cultural systems that show appreciation for well-nourished children are a better way to improve the problem of balanced nutrition. Social systems such as teamwork and mutual cooperation can also be a potential resource to support nutritional programs and overcome associated problems. The impact of development in urban areas such as the introduction of more green areas which improve the perceived status of local people, as well as new health services facilitated by people and companies, can also be resources to support nutrition programs. Local resources in urban fringe areas can be used in the planning of nutrition programs. The expansion of partnership with all stakeholders, empowering the community through optimizing the roles of nutrition care centers for children as our recommendation with regard to nutrition program planning.

Keywords: developing country, local resources, nutrition program, urban fringe

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Authors: Ines Elouedi, Atef Hammouda

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This paper presents a new fast version of the generalized Multi-Directional Radon Transform method. The new method uses the inverse Fast Fourier Transform to lead to a faster Generalized Radon projections. We prove in this paper that the fast algorithm leads to almost the same results of the eldest one but with a considerable lower time computation cost. The projection end result of the fast method is a parameterized Radon space where a high valued pixel allows the detection of a curve from the original image. The proposed fast inversion algorithm leads to an exact reconstruction of the initial image from the Radon space. We show examples of the impact of this algorithm on the pattern recognition domain.

Keywords: fast generalized multi-directional Radon transform, curve, exact reconstruction, pattern recognition

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Authors: Kedar Nath Nepal, Tek Bahadur Thapa, David Guerena;

Abstract:

The community participation is central to the in-situ project objectives, as farming communities are key stakeholders in the on-farm conservation of agricultural bio- diversity. Besides technical means to adding benefits, the complimentary strategy includes creating market-based value adding measures by increasing users’ awareness of the value of traditional foods and nutritional values; exhibitions and improved processing; and policy incentives. This paper presents various participatory activities carried out in Nepal as options for enhancing benefits to local communities by increased utilization of local crop diversity on -the farm through non-breeding discussed, and outcomes are documented using farmers’ perception data and secondary information. The paper focuses on three major areas of public awareness, market incentives and non-market incentives that may enhance on -farm conservation and use of biodiversity.

Keywords: biodiversity, in-situ, market-based, non-market

Procedia PDF Downloads 93

Authors: Hebatullah Ali Abdel-Aleem Abdel-Hamid, Camellia Mousa Mohamed Elzean

Abstract:

Knitted garments recently became a key component in wardrobes of the Egyptian woman. Many Egyptian women depend on garments made of knitted fabrics in their outer appearance because of its specific properties including flexibility. Through observation and application, it was noticed that knitwear blocks that used for knitted fabrics somehow does not fit the figures of the Egyptian women. Moreover, the pattern makers are usually confused and unable to choose the suitable blocks for different knitting fabrics taking into consideration its physical and mechanical properties. This study seeks to develop mathematical relationships for evaluation of the amount of added- or subtracted ease to Aldrich’s basic fitting blocks for some weft knitting fabrics and its fitting to the upper part of Egyptian women's bodies. To achieve this goal, 12 samples were used to evaluate fitting of Aldrich’s Basic Fitting Block to the upper part of Egyptian women's bodies. The samples were evaluated before and after alterations, through wear trials on the standard mannequins of size 48 and 56, and judged by experienced assessors using fit evaluation scale. The data obtained were statistically analyzed to identify the efficiency of the adjustments. The Aldrich’s Basic Fitting Block was selected because his method is known internationally and easy to use.

Keywords: Aldrich basic fitting block, clothing industry, knitted fabrics, pattern construction

Procedia PDF Downloads 253

Authors: Moch Agus Choiron

Abstract:

Crash box design has been developed to obtain optimum energy absorption. In this study, two-segment crash box design with holes is investigated under oblique load. The deformation behavior and crash energy absorption are observed. The analysis was performed using finite element method. The crash test components were impactor, crash box, and fixed rigid base. Impactor and the fixed base material are modelled as a rigid, and crash box material as bilinear isotropic hardening. The models consist of 2 and 4 holes laid within ¼, ½ and ¾ from first segment length. 100 mm aluminum crash box and frontal crash velocity of 16 km/jam were selected. Based on simulation results, it can be concluded that 2 holes located at ¾ has the largest crash energy absorption. This behavior associated with deformation pattern, which produces higher number of folding than other models.

Keywords: crash Box, two-segments, holes configuration, oblique load, deformation pattern

Procedia PDF Downloads 345

Authors: Michael A. Kraus, Navid Pourmoghaddam, Martin Botz, Jens Schneider, Geralt Siebert

Abstract:

Fragmentation analysis of tempered glass gives insight into the quality of the tempering process and defines a certain degree of safety as well. Different standard such as the European EN 12150-1 or the American ASTM C 1048/CPSC 16 CFR 1201 define a minimum number of fragments required for soda-lime safety glass on the basis of fragmentation test results for classification. This work presents an approach for the glass breakage pattern prediction using a Voronoi Tesselation over Random Fields. The random Voronoi tessellation is trained with and validated against data from several breakage patterns. The fragments in observation areas of 50 mm x 50 mm were used for training and validation. All glass specimen used in this study were commercially available soda-lime glasses at three different thicknesses levels of 4 mm, 8 mm and 12 mm. The results of this work form a Bayesian framework for the training and prediction of breakage patterns of tempered soda-lime glass using a Voronoi Random Field Tesselation. Uncertainties occurring in this process can be well quantified, and several statistical measures of the pattern can be preservation with this method. Within this work it was found, that different Random Fields as basis for the Voronoi Tesselation lead to differently well fitted statistical properties of the glass breakage patterns. As the methodology is derived and kept general, the framework could be also applied to other random tesselations and crack pattern modelling purposes.

Keywords: glass breakage predicition, Voronoi Random Field Tessellation, fragmentation analysis, Bayesian parameter identification

Procedia PDF Downloads 148

Authors: Basant Kumar Singh, S. Subhachandhar, Vineet Ranjan Tripathi, Amit Kumar Singh, Uttam Singh, Santosh Kumar Lal

Abstract:

Productivity of Blast Furnace is largely impacted by fuel efficiency and controlling heat loss is one of the enabling parameters for achieving lower fuel rate. 'I' Blast Furnace is the latest and largest Blast Furnace of Tata Steel Jamshedpur with working volume of 3230 m³ and with rated capacity of 3.055 million tons per annum. Optimizing heat losses in Belly and Bosh zone remained major challenge for blast furnace operators after its commissioning. 'I' Blast has installed Cast Iron & Copper Staves cooling members where copper staves are installed in Belly, Bosh & Lower Stack whereas cast iron staves are installed in upper stack area. Stave cooled Blast Furnaces are prone to higher heat losses in Belly and Bosh region with an increase in coal injection rate as Bosh gas volume increases. Under these conditions, managing gas flow pattern through proper burden distribution, casting techniques & by maintaining desired raw material qualities are of utmost importance for sustaining high injection rates. This study details, the burden distribution control by Ore & Coke ratio adjustment at wall and center of Blast Furnace as the coal injection rates increased from 140 kg/thm to 210 kg/thm. Control of blowing parameters, casting philosophy, specification for raw materials & devising operational practice for controlling heat losses is also elaborated with the model that is used to visualize heat loss pattern in different zones of Blast Furnace.

Keywords: blast furnace, staves, gas flow pattern, belly/bosh heat losses, ore/coke ratio, blowing parameters, casting, operation practice

Procedia PDF Downloads 339

Authors: Hyeon-Seung Kim, Young-Hwan Kim, Sang-Mi Park, Min-Seo Kim, Jong-Myeung Shin, Leen-Seok Kang

Abstract:

The project budget at the planned stage might be changed by the insufficient government budget or the design change. There are many cases more especially in the case of a project performed for a long period of time. If the actual construction budget is insufficient comparing with the planned budget, the construction schedule should also be changed to match the changed budget. In that case, most project managers change the planned construction schedule by a heuristic approach without a reasonable consideration on the work priority. This study suggests an optimized methodology to modify the construction schedule according to the changed budget. The genetic algorithm was used to optimize the modified construction schedule within the changed budget. And a simulation system of construction cost histogram in accordance with the construction schedule was developed in the BIM (Building Information Modeling) environment.

Keywords: 5D, BIM, GA, cost optimization

Procedia PDF Downloads 578

Authors: Constanza Monterrubio-Solis, Jose Tomas Ibarra

Abstract:

The fertile interdependence of social-ecological systems reveals itself in the interactions between native forests and seeds, home gardens, kitchens, foraging activities, local knowledge, and food practices, creating particular flavors and food meanings as part of cultural identities within territories. Resilience in local-food systems, from a relational perspective, can be understood as the balance between persistence and adaptability to change. Food growing, preparation, and consumption are constantly changing and adapting as expressions of agency of female and male indigenous peoples and peasants. This paper explores local food systems’ expressions of resilience in the la Araucanía region of Chile, namely: diversity, redundancy, buffer capacity, modularity, self-organization, governance, learning, equity, and decision-making. Applying ethnographic research methods (participant observation, focus groups, and semi-structured interviews), this work reflects on the experience developed through work with Mapuche women cultivating home gardens in the region since 2012; it looks to material and symbolic elements of resilience in the local indigenous food systems. Local food systems show indeed indicators of social-ecological resilience. The biocultural memory is expressed in affection to particular flavors and recipes, the cultural importance of seeds and reciprocity networks, as well as an accurate knowledge about the indicators of the seasons and weather, which have allowed local food systems to thrive with a strong cultural foundation. Furthermore, these elements turn into biocultural resistance in the face of the current institutional pressures for rural specialization, processes of cultural assimilation such as agroecosystems and diet homogenization, as well as structural threats towards the diversity and freedom of native seeds. Thus, the resilience-resistance dynamic shown by the social-ecological systems of the southern Andes is daily expressed in the local food systems and flavors and is key for diverse and culturally sound social-ecological health.

Keywords: biocultural heritage, indigenous food systems, social-ecological resilience, southern Andes

Procedia PDF Downloads 121