Search results for: global vs. local errors

Authors: Komal Fizza

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All around the world in every field professionals are taking great support from their computers. Computer assisted strategies not only increase the efficiency of the professionals but also in case of healthcare they help in life-saving interventions. The background of this current research is aimed towards two things; first to find out if computer assisted strategies are useful for Pharmacist for not and secondly how much these assist a Pharmacist to do quality interventions. Shifa International Hospital is a 500 bedded hospital, and it is running Antimicrobial Stewardship, during their stewardship rounds pharmacists observed that a lot of wrong doses of antibiotics were coming at times those were being overlooked by the other pharmacist even. So, with the help of MIS team the patients were categorized into adult and peads depending upon their age. Minimum and maximum dose of every single antibiotic present in the pharmacy that could be dispensed to the patient was developed. These were linked to the order entry window. So whenever pharmacist would type any order and the dose would be below or above the therapeutic limit this would give an alert to the pharmacist. Whenever this message pop-up this was recorded at the back end along with the antibiotic name, pharmacist ID, date, and time. From 14th of January 2015 and till 14th of March 2015 the software stopped different users 350 times. Out of this 300 were found to be major errors which if reached to the patient could have harmed them to the greater extent. While 50 were due to typing errors and minor deviations. The pilot study showed that computer assisted strategies can be of great help to the pharmacist. They can improve the efficacy and quality of interventions.

Keywords: antibiotics, computer assisted strategies, pharmacist, stewardship

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Authors: Renato Morbidelli, Carla Saltalippi, Alessia Flammini, Tommaso Picciafuoco, Corrado Corradini

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A considerable part of rainfall data to be used in the hydrological practice is available in aggregated form within constant time intervals. This can produce undesirable effects, like the underestimate of the annual maximum rainfall depth, Hd, associated with a given duration, d, that is the basic quantity in the development of rainfall depth-duration-frequency relationships and in determining if climate change is producing effects on extreme event intensities and frequencies. The errors in the evaluation of Hd from data characterized by a coarse temporal aggregation, ta, and a procedure to reduce the non-homogeneity of the Hd series are here investigated. Our results indicate that: 1) in the worst conditions, for d=ta, the estimation of a single Hd value can be affected by an underestimation error up to 50%, while the average underestimation error for a series with at least 15-20 Hd values, is less than or equal to 16.7%; 2) the underestimation error values follow an exponential probability density function; 3) each very long time series of Hd contains many underestimated values; 4) relationships between the non-dimensional ratio ta/d and the average underestimate of Hd, derived from continuous rainfall data observed in many stations of Central Italy, may overcome this issue; 5) these equations should allow to improve the Hd estimates and the associated depth-duration-frequency curves at least in areas with similar climatic conditions.

Keywords: central Italy, extreme events, rainfall data, underestimation errors

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Authors: Mohammed Sabri Ali Akresh

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The modern technologies and developments in computer and Global Positioning System (GPS) as well as Geographic Information System (GIS) and total station TS. This paper presents a new proposal for coordinates system by a harmonic equations “United projections”, which have five projections (Mercator, Lambert, Russell, Lagrange, and compound of projection) in one zone coordinate system width 14 degrees, also it has one degree for overlap between zones, as well as two standards parallels for zone from 10 S to 45 S. Also this paper presents two cases; first case is to compare distances between a new coordinate system and UTM, second case creating local coordinate system for the city of Sydney to measure the distances directly from rectangular coordinates using projection of Mercator, Lambert and UTM.

Keywords: harmonic equations, coordinate system, projections, algorithms, parallels

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Authors: Stephen L. Roberts

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This article offers a critical analysis of the rise of syndromic surveillance systems for the advanced detection of pandemic threats within contemporary global health security frameworks. The article traces the iterative evolution and ascendancy of three such novel syndromic surveillance systems for the strengthening of health security initiatives over the past two decades: 1) The Program for Monitoring Emerging Diseases (ProMED-mail); 2) The Global Public Health Intelligence Network (GPHIN); and 3) HealthMap. This article demonstrates how each newly introduced syndromic surveillance system has become increasingly oriented towards the integration of digital algorithms into core surveillance capacities to continually harness and forecast upon infinitely generating sets of digital, open-source data, potentially indicative of forthcoming pandemic threats. This article argues that the increased centrality of the algorithm within these next-generation syndromic surveillance systems produces a new and distinct form of infectious disease surveillance for the governing of emergent pathogenic contingencies. Conceptually, the article also shows how the rise of this algorithmic mode of infectious disease surveillance produces divergences in the governmental rationalities of global health security, leading to the rise of an algorithmic governmentality within contemporary contexts of Big Data and these surveillance systems. Empirically, this article demonstrates how this new form of algorithmic infectious disease surveillance has been rapidly integrated into diplomatic, legal, and political frameworks to strengthen the practice of global health security – producing subtle, yet distinct shifts in the outbreak notification and reporting transparency of states, increasingly scrutinized by the algorithmic gaze of syndromic surveillance.

Keywords: algorithms, global health, pandemic, surveillance

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Authors: Ferzat Anka

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Many types of problems can be solved using traditional analytical methods. However, these methods take a long time and cause inefficient use of resources. In particular, different approaches may be required in solving complex and global engineering problems that we frequently encounter in real life. The bigger and more complex a problem, the harder it is to solve. Such problems are called Nondeterministic Polynomial time (NP-hard) in the literature. The main reasons for recommending different metaheuristic algorithms for various problems are the use of simple concepts, the use of simple mathematical equations and structures, the use of non-derivative mechanisms, the avoidance of local optima, and their fast convergence. They are also flexible, as they can be applied to different problems without very specific modifications. Thanks to these features, it can be easily embedded even in many hardware devices. Accordingly, this approach can also be used in trend application areas such as IoT, big data, and parallel structures. Indeed, the metaheuristic approaches are algorithms that return near-optimal results for solving large-scale optimization problems. This study is focused on the new metaheuristic method that has been merged with the chaotic approach. It is based on the chaos theorem and helps relevant algorithms to improve the diversity of the population and fast convergence. This approach is based on Chimp Optimization Algorithm (ChOA), that is a recently introduced metaheuristic algorithm inspired by nature. This algorithm identified four types of chimpanzee groups: attacker, barrier, chaser, and driver, and proposed a suitable mathematical model for them based on the various intelligence and sexual motivations of chimpanzees. However, this algorithm is not more successful in the convergence rate and escaping of the local optimum trap in solving high-dimensional problems. Although it and some of its variants use some strategies to overcome these problems, it is observed that it is not sufficient. Therefore, in this study, a newly expanded variant is described. In the algorithm called Ex-ChOA, hybrid models are proposed for position updates of search agents, and a dynamic switching mechanism is provided for transition phases. This flexible structure solves the slow convergence problem of ChOA and improves its accuracy in multidimensional problems. Therefore, it tries to achieve success in solving global, complex, and constrained problems. The main contribution of this study is 1) It improves the accuracy and solves the slow convergence problem of the ChOA. 2) It proposes new hybrid movement strategy models for position updates of search agents. 3) It provides success in solving global, complex, and constrained problems. 4) It provides a dynamic switching mechanism between phases. The performance of the Ex-ChOA algorithm is analyzed on a total of 8 benchmark functions, as well as a total of 2 classical and constrained engineering problems. The proposed algorithm is compared with the ChoA, and several well-known variants (Weighted-ChoA, Enhanced-ChoA) are used. In addition, an Improved algorithm from the Grey Wolf Optimizer (I-GWO) method is chosen for comparison since the working model is similar. The obtained results depict that the proposed algorithm performs better or equivalently to the compared algorithms.

Keywords: optimization, metaheuristic, chimp optimization algorithm, engineering constrained problems

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Authors: Hyunjoo Park, Taehyun Kim, Taehyun Kim

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The government that declared 'de-nuclearization' pushes up renewable energy policies such as solar power and wind power as an alternative to nuclear power generation. However, local residents who are concerned about the development and natural disasters have been hit by opposition, and related businesses around the country are experiencing difficulties. There is also a voice saying that installing a large wind power generator will cause landslides, low frequencies and noise, which will have a bad influence. Renewal is only a harmful and disgusting facility for the residents. In this way, it is expected that extreme social conflicts will occur in the decision making process related to the locally unwanted land-use (LULU). The government's efforts to solve this problem have been steadily progressing, but the systematic methodology for bringing in active participation and opinion gathering of the residents has not yet been established except for the simple opinion poll or referendum. Therefore, it is time to identify the factors that concern the local residents about the wind power generation facilities, and to find ways to make policy decision-making possible. In this study, we analyze the perception of people about offshore and onshore wind power facilities through questionnaires or interviews, and examine quantitative and qualitative precedent studies to analyze them. In addition, the study evaluates what factors affect the local acceptance of wind power facilities. As a result of the factor analysis of the questionnaire items, factors affecting the residents' acceptance of the wind power facility were extracted from four factors such as environmental, economic, risk, social, and management factor. The study also found that the influence of the determinants of local acceptance on the regional acceptability differs according to the demographic characteristics such as gender and income level. This study will contribute to minimizing the conflict on the installation of wind power facilities through communication among the local residents.

Keywords: factor analysis, local acceptance, locally unwanted land-use, LULU, wind power generation facilities

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Authors: Prathibha Ganesan

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This paper discusses discontents of inhabitants in the landfills and its culmination into resistance against centralised waste disposal during the last three decades in Kerala. The study is based on a sample survey of 175 households located in the landfill sites and city limits of two Municipal Corporations viz. Thrissur and Cochin. The study found that waste is dumped in the periphery of the urban area where economically and socially vulnerable people are densely populated. Moreover, landfill sites are unscientifically managed to cause severe socio-economic and health issues to the local people, finally leading to their mobilisation and persistent struggle. The struggles often culminate in the closure of landfills or forced relocation or abandonment of the region by the community. The study concluded that persistent people’s struggles compel the local state to either find alternatives to centralised solid waste management system or use political power to subsume the local resistance. The persistence of the struggles determined the type waste governance adopted by the local governments.

Keywords: solid waste management, municipal corporation, resistance movements, urban, Kerala

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Authors: Sahar Rasoulikolamaki

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ISIS (also known as DAASH) is an Islamic fundamentalist group that has been known as a global threat to the whole world for their radicalizing approach and application of online platforms as a tool to portray their activities, to disseminate their ideology, and to commit recruiting activities. This study is an attempt to carry out a critical discourse analysis on the argumentative devices by which ISIS legitimizes or delegitimizes positive or negative constructions of social practices in Dabiq. It tries to shed light on how texts in Dabiq as linguistic elements in the micro level of analysis relate to ISIS’ ideology as the higher-up macro level and in other words, how local structures contributed to the construction and transference of a global structure or ideology and vice versa. Therefore, following the relevant analytical frameworks, the study focuses on both micro-level of analysis of arguments (topoi) and macro-structure of legitimation and delegitimation in Dabiq. This purpose is nailed using the analytical categories and tools provided by Wodak’s Discourse Historical Approach (DHA) such as argumentation strategies (topoi), by which the coded language of legitimation/delegitimation and persuasion as used in Dabiq are explored. The ensuing findings demonstrate that Dabiq rigorously relies on the positive representation of the in-group course of actions and justifying its violence and, at the same time, the negative representation of the out-group behavior through implementing various topoi to achieve its desired outcome, which is the ideological manipulation and powerful self-depiction, as well as the supporter recruitment.

Keywords: argumentation, discourse-historical approach, ideology, legitimation and delegitimation, topoi

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Authors: Lanyan Peng, Ling Chen

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Leishan Miao New-Year is one of the grandest festivals in the southeastern of Guizhou Province in China. It was officially listed in the National Intangible Cultural Heritage List in 2008, as a traditional folk cultural activity organized by the local Miao people. With the rise of cultural tourism, after 19 years of exploration, the local government has successfully built Miao New-Year into a cultural card that is well-known at home and abroad. During the Miao New-Year period, it has attracted 3.8 million tourists and achieves a win-win situation in the economy and culture. However, tourism development has changed the living environment and living state of the local people. And it is accompanied by changes in the form of the festival, the content of the festival, and the local people’s needs and attitudes to the festival. This paper uses the field investigation method to achieve 410 questionnaires and 35 interviews, exploring the process and the reasons for changes of Leishan Miao New-Year’s cultural function. Among all the functions, the economic function, identity function, and entertainment function have been enhanced, and the marriage and love function has been extended. In the meanwhile, sacrificial function has been weakened. There are some trends in functions. The function of commemorating ancestor and self-entertainment has been changed to entertaining people and economic pursuit.

Keywords: Miao New-Year, Miao nationality, festival function, changes

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Authors: Amleset Haile

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Non-timber forest products (NTFPs) are harvested for both subsistence and commercial use and play a key role in the livelihoods of millions of rural people. Non-timber forest products (NTFPs) are important in rural southwest Ethiopia, Kaffa as a source of household income. market players at various levels in marketing chains are interviewed to getther information on elements of marketing system–products, product differentiation, value addition, pricing, promotion, distribution, and marketing chains. The study, therefore, was conducted in Kaffa Biosphere reserve of southwest Ethiopia with the main objective of assessing and analyzing the contribution of NTFPs to rural livelihood and to the conservation of the biosphere reserve and to identify factors influencing in the marketing of the NTFP. Five villages were selected based on their proximity gradient from Bonga town and availability of NTFP. Formal survey was carried out on rural households selected using stratified random sampling. The results indicate that Local people practice diverse livelihood activities mainly crops cultivation (cereals and cash crops) and livestock husbandry, gather forest products and off-farm/off-forest activities for surviva. NTFP trade is not a common phenomenon in southwest Ethiopia. The greatest opportunity exists for local level marketing of spices and other non timber forest products. Very little local value addition takes place within the region,and as a result local market players have little control. Policy interventions arc required to enhance the returns to local collectors, which will also contribute to sustainable management of forest resources in Kaffa biosphere reserve.

Keywords: forest management, biosphere reserve, marketing, local people

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Authors: Fangzheng Li, Xiong Li

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Significant differences in urban greening have occurred in Chinese cities, which accompanied with China's rapid urbanization. However, few studies focused on the spatial differentiation of urban greening in China with large amounts of data. The spatial differentiation pattern, spatial correlation characteristics and the distribution shape of urban green space ratio, urban green coverage rate and public green area per capita were calculated and analyzed, using Global and Local Moran's I using data from 289 cities in 2014. We employed Spatial Lag Model and Spatial Error Model to assess the impacts of urbanization process on urban greening of China. Then we used Geographically Weighted Regression to estimate the spatial variations of the impacts. The results showed: 1. a significant spatial dependence and heterogeneity existed in urban greening values, and the differentiation patterns were featured by the administrative grade and the spatial agglomeration simultaneously; 2. it revealed that urbanization has a negative correlation with urban greening in Chinese cities. Among the indices, the the proportion of secondary industry, urbanization rate, population and the scale of urban land use has significant negative correlation with the urban greening of China. Automobile density and per capita Gross Domestic Product has no significant impact. The results of GWR modeling showed that the relationship between urbanization and urban greening was not constant in space. Further, the local parameter estimates suggested significant spatial variation in the impacts of various urbanization factors on urban greening.

Keywords: China’s urbanization, geographically weighted regression, spatial differentiation pattern, urban greening

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Authors: Audrey Hudson

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In 2020, educational field trips went virtual for all students. At the Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO) in Canada, our solution was to create a virtual school program that addressed three pillars of access—economic, geographic and cultural—with art at the center. Now, at the close of three years, we have reached 1.6 million students! Exponentially more than we have ever welcomed for onsite school visits. In 2022, we partnered with the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), the Hong Kong University Museum and the National Gallery of Singapore, which has pushed the boundaries of art education into the expanse of the global community. Looking forward to our fourth year of the program, we are using the platform of technology to expand our program of art, access and learning to a global platform. In 2023/24, we intend to connect across more borders to expand the pedagogical benefits of art education for a global community. We invite you to listen to how you can join this journey.

Keywords: technology, museums, art education, pedagogy

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Authors: Gupta Indu

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This paper aims to examine the relationship between foreign direct investment and globalization. Foreign direct investment plays an important role in globalization. It is dramatically increasing in the age of globalization. It has played an important role for economic growth in this global process. It can provide new markets and marketing channels, cheaper production facilities, access to new technology, products to a firm. FDI has come to play a major role in the internationalization of business. FDI has become even more important than trade. Growing liberalization of the national regulatory framework governing investment in enterprises and changes in capital markets profound changes have occurred in the size, scope and methods of FDI. New information technology systems, decline in global communication costs have made management of foreign investments far easier than in the past. FDI provide opportunities to host countries to enhance their economic development and opens new opportunities to home countries to optimize their earnings by employing their ideal resources. Smaller and weaker economies can drive out much local competition. For small and medium sized companies, FDI represents an opportunity to become more actively involved in international business activities. In the past decade, foreign direct investment has expanded its role by change in trade policy, investment policy, tariff liberalization, easing of restrictions on foreign investment and acquisition in many nations, and the deregulation and privatization of many industries. In present competitive scenario, FDI has become a prominent external source of finance for developing countries.

Keywords: foreign direct investment, globalization, economic development, information technology systems new opportunities

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Authors: Rachida Ouysse

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This paper proposes a constrained principal components (CnPC) estimator for efficient estimation of large-dimensional factor models when errors are cross sectionally correlated and the number of cross-sections (N) may be larger than the number of observations (T). Although principal components (PC) method is consistent for any path of the panel dimensions, it is inefficient as the errors are treated to be homoskedastic and uncorrelated. The new CnPC exploits the assumption of bounded cross-sectional dependence, which defines Chamberlain and Rothschild’s (1983) approximate factor structure, as an explicit constraint and solves a constrained PC problem. The CnPC method is computationally equivalent to the PC method applied to a regularized form of the data covariance matrix. Unlike maximum likelihood type methods, the CnPC method does not require inverting a large covariance matrix and thus is valid for panels with N ≥ T. The paper derives a convergence rate and an asymptotic normality result for the CnPC estimators of the common factors. We provide feasible estimators and show in a simulation study that they are more accurate than the PC estimator, especially for panels with N larger than T, and the generalized PC type estimators, especially for panels with N almost as large as T.

Keywords: high dimensionality, unknown factors, principal components, cross-sectional correlation, shrinkage regression, regularization, pseudo-out-of-sample forecasting

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Authors: Jurriaan Gillissen

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This work is concerned with stabilizing the numerical integration of the Navier-Stokes equation (NSE), backwards in time. Applications involve the detection of sources of, e.g., sound, heat, and pollutants. Stable reverse numerical integration of parabolic differential equations is also relevant for image de-blurring. While the literature addresses the reverse integration problem of the advection-diffusion equation, the problem of numerical reverse integration of the NSE has, to our knowledge, not yet been addressed. Owing to the presence of viscosity, the NSE is irreversible, i.e., when going backwards in time, the fluid behaves, as if it had a negative viscosity. As an effect, perturbations from the perfect solution, due to round off errors or discretization errors, grow exponentially in time, and reverse integration of the NSE is inherently unstable, regardless of using an implicit time integration scheme. Consequently, some sort of filtering is required, in order to achieve a stable, numerical, reversed integration. The challenge is to find a filter with a minimal adverse affect on the accuracy of the reversed integration. In the present work, we explore an adjoint gradient method (AGM) to achieve this goal, and we apply this technique to two-dimensional (2D), decaying turbulence. The AGM solves for the initial velocity field u0 at t = 0, that, when integrated forward in time, produces a final velocity field u1 at t = 1, that is as close as is feasibly possible to some specified target field v1. The initial field u0 defines a minimum of a cost-functional J, that measures the distance between u1 and v1. In the minimization procedure, the u0 is updated iteratively along the gradient of J w.r.t. u0, where the gradient is obtained by transporting J backwards in time from t = 1 to t = 0, using the adjoint NSE. The AGM thus effectively replaces the backward integration by multiple forward and backward adjoint integrations. Since the viscosity is negative in the adjoint NSE, each step of the AGM is numerically stable. Nevertheless, when applied to turbulence, the AGM develops instabilities, which limit the backward integration to small times. This is due to the exponential divergence of phase space trajectories in turbulent flow, which produces a multitude of local minima in J, when the integration time is large. As an effect, the AGM may select unphysical, noisy initial conditions. In order to improve this situation, we propose two remedies. First, we replace the integration by a sequence of smaller integrations, i.e., we divide the integration time into segments, where in each segment the target field v1 is taken as the initial field u0 from the previous segment. Second, we add an additional term (regularizer) to J, which is proportional to a high-order Laplacian of u0, and which dampens the gradients of u0. We show that suitable values for the segment size and for the regularizer, allow a stable reverse integration of 2D decaying turbulence, with accurate results for more then O(10) turbulent, integral time scales.

Keywords: time reversed integration, parabolic differential equations, adjoint gradient method, two dimensional turbulence

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Authors: Mme Hamani Née Guessas Ghaniya

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The transport is the base of the development of the exchanges and the business, being both a recognized determiner of the economic and social development. The development of the transport is in the center of the big challenges of development of countries, but it is also at the heart of big contradictions, since we integrate the environmental issues which are bound to him, in particular through the questions of energy. Indeed, the energy consumption by the sector of transport is one of bigger concerns, because it is increasing and it has a big impact on our environment. The main consequences are, the atmospheric pollution causing an increase of the greenhouse effect which causes a global warming. These global warming risks to engender a partial cast iron of polar caps so raising the level of seas, flooding the low coastal zones, certain islands and the deltas. Thus, the purpose of this communication is to present the impact of the energy consumption by the sector of transport on the air quality, showing its effect on the health and on the global warming.

Keywords: energy consumption, sector of transport, air quality, atmospheric pollution

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Authors: A. Seddiki, M. Djebbouri, D. Guerchi

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Medical imaging produces human body pictures in digital form. Since these imaging techniques produce prohibitive amounts of data, compression is necessary for storage and communication purposes. Many current compression schemes provide a very high compression rate but with considerable loss of quality. On the other hand, in some areas in medicine, it may be sufficient to maintain high image quality only in region of interest (ROI). This paper discusses a contribution to the lossless compression in the region of interest of Scintigraphic images based on SPIHT algorithm and global transform thresholding using Huffman coding.

Keywords: global thresholding transform, huffman coding, region of interest, SPIHT coding, scintigraphic images

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Authors: Muhammad Imran Ahmad, Ruzelita Ngadiran, Mohd Nazrin Md Isa, Nor Ashidi Mat Isa, Mohd ZaizuIlyas, Raja Abdullah Raja Ahmad, Said Amirul Anwar Ab Hamid, Muzammil Jusoh

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This paper presents two technique, local feature extraction using image spectrum and low frequency spectrum modelling using GMM to capture the underlying statistical information to improve the performance of face recognition system. Local spectrum features are extracted using overlap sub block window that are mapping on the face image. For each of this block, spatial domain is transformed to frequency domain using DFT. A low frequency coefficient is preserved by discarding high frequency coefficients by applying rectangular mask on the spectrum of the facial image. Low frequency information is non Gaussian in the feature space and by using combination of several Gaussian function that has different statistical properties, the best feature representation can be model using probability density function. The recognition process is performed using maximum likelihood value computed using pre-calculate GMM components. The method is tested using FERET data sets and is able to achieved 92% recognition rates.

Keywords: local features modelling, face recognition system, Gaussian mixture models, Feret

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Authors: Jang-Hwan Jo

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The supply management of ecosystem services of local forests is an essential issue as it is linked to the ecological welfare of local residents. This study aims to estimate the supply, trade-offs, and synergies of local forest regulating ecosystem services using a land cover classification map (LCCM) and a forest types map (FTM). Rigorous literature reviews and Expert Delphi analysis were conducted using the detailed variables of 1:5,000 LCCM and FTM. Land-use scoring method and Getis-Ord Gi* Analysis were utilized on detailed variables to propose a method for estimating supply, trade-offs, and synergies of the local forest regulating ecosystem services. The analysis revealed that the rank order (1st to 5th) of supply of regulating ecosystem services was Erosion prevention, Air quality regulation, Heat island mitigation, Water quality regulation, and Carbon storage. When analyzing the correlation between defined services of the entire city, almost all services showed a synergistic effect. However, when analyzing locally, trade-off effects (Heat island mitigation – Air quality regulation, Water quality regulation – Air quality regulation) appeared in the eastern and northwestern forest areas. This suggests the need to consider not only the synergy and trade-offs of the entire forest between specific ecosystem services but also the synergy and trade-offs of local areas in managing the regulating ecosystem services of local forests. The study result can provide primary data for the stakeholders to determine the initial conditions of the planning stage when discussing the establishment of policies related to the adjustment of the supply of regulating ecosystem services of the forests with limited access. Moreover, the study result can also help refine the estimation of the supply of the regulating ecosystem services with the availability of other forms of data.

Keywords: ecosystem service, getis ord gi* analysis, land use scoring method, regional forest, regulating service, synergies, trade-offs

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Authors: Salim Belouettar, Kodjo Attipou

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The thermal wrinkling behavior of thin membranes is investigated. The Fourier double scale series are used to deduce the macroscopic membrane wrinkling equations. The obtained equations account for the global and local wrinkling modes. Numerical examples are conducted to assess the validity of the approach developed. Compared to the finite element full model, the present model needs only few degrees of freedom to recover accurately the bifurcation curves and wrinkling paths. Different parameters such as membrane’s aspect ratio, wave number, pre-stressed membranes are discussed from a numerical point of view and the properties of the wrinkles (critical load, wavelength, size and location) are presented.

Keywords: wrinkling, thermal stresses, Fourier series, thin membranes

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Authors: Hyeon-Kyo Lim, Tong-il Jang, Yong-Hee Lee

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As for any nuclear power plant, human error is one of the most dreaded factors that may result in unexpected accidents. Thus, for accident prevention, it is quite indispensable to analyze and to manage the influence of any factor which may raise the possibility of human errors. Among lots factors, stress has been reported to have significant influence on human performance. Stress level of a person may fluctuate over time. To handle the possibility over time, robust stress management program is required, especially in nuclear power plants. Therefore, to overcome the possibility of human errors, this study aimed to develop a stress management program as a part of Fitness-for-Duty (FFD) Program for the workers in nuclear power plants. The meaning of FFD might be somewhat different by research objectives, appropriate definition of FFD was accomplished in this study with special reference to human error prevention, and diverse stress factors were elicited for management of human error susceptibility. In addition, with consideration of conventional FFD management programs, appropriate tests and interventions were introduced over the whole employment cycle including selection and screening of workers, job allocation, job rotation, and disemployment as well as Employee-Assistance-Program (EAP). The results showed that most tools mainly concentrated their weights on common organizational factors such as Demands, Supports, and Relationships in sequence, which were referred as major stress factors.

Keywords: human error, accident prevention, work performance, stress, fatigue

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Authors: Yrfet Shkreli

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Despite all the wide research and literature on the subject, changing and challenging times often present themselves with new objectives, fluid politics and everlasting point of views. Much is said about the subject and the trend nowadays is watching every EU intervention as a form of neo colonialism or a form of establishing new markets. The paper will try to establish a new perspective on EU influences, policies and impacts analyzed from multidimensional point of view, not limiting itself on a narrow external dimension, focusing on a broader understanding of it diverse contribution to global governance and peace keeping. Tending to be critical, this paper, tend to fall out of extremes, nether holding a Eurocentric position, nor falling for cheap critic to the whole failures and impact of EU policies. The ambition is to show EU as a contributing factor while keeping in mind its nature as a multi layered actor and with not necessarily coinciding interests among its member states.

Keywords: European Union, global governance, globalization, normative power

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Authors: Nguyen Duc An

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To the movement towards learning community, creating friendly, positive and appropriate learning environments which best suit the local features is the most salient and decisive factor of the development and success of that learning society. With the aim at building such an English language learning community for the inhabitants in Moc Chau - the national tourist zone, Tay Bac University has successfully designed and deployed the program ‘English in Tourism’ in the project ‘English for Community’. With the strong attachment to the local reality and close knit to the certain communicative situations, this program which was carefully designed and compiled with interesting and practical activities, has greatly helped the locals confidently introduce and popularize the natural beauty, unique culture and specific characteristics of Moc Chau to the foreign tourists; in addition, reinforce awareness of the native culture of the local people as well as improve the professional development in tourism and service.

Keywords: English for community, learning society, learning community, English in tourism

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Authors: Marcin Kruszewski, Barbara Sochanowicz, Sylwia Męczyńska-Wielgosz, Maria Wojewódzka, Lucyna Kapka-Skrzypczak

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Metallic NPs are widely used in a number of applications in industry, science and medicine. Among metallic NPs foreseen to be widely used in medicine are gold nanoparticles (AuNPs) due to their low toxicity, and silver NPs (AgNPs) due to their strong antimicrobial activity. In this study, we compared an effect of AgNPs and gold NPs (AuNPs) on the formation of DNA damage and global DNA methylation and in A2780 and 4T1 cell lines, widely used models of human ovarian carcinoma and murine mammary carcinoma, respectively. The cells were treated with AgNPs coated with citrate (AgNPs(cit) or PEG (AgNPs(PEG), or AuNPs. A global DNA methylation was investigated with ELISA, whereas the formation of DNA damage was investigated by a comet +/- FPG. AgNPs decreased global DNA methylation and increased the formation of DNA lesions in both cell lines. The effect was dependent on the type of NPs used, it's coating, and cell line used. In conclusion, the epigenetic and genotoxic effects of NPs strongly depends on NP nature and cellular context. Epigenetic changes observed upon the action of AgNPs may play a crucial role in NPs-induced changes in protein expression.

Keywords: DNA damage, gold nanoparticles, methylation, silver nanoparticles

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Authors: S. Jakšić, B. Žmuk

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The paper investigates the key factors of export dynamics for a set of Central and Southeast European (CSEE) countries in the context of current economic and financial crisis. In order to model the export dynamics a Global Vector Auto Regressive (GVAR) model is defined. As opposed to models which model each country separately, the GVAR combines all country models in a global model which enables obtaining important information on spill-over effects in the context of globalization and rising international linkages. The results of the study indicate that for most of the CSEE countries, exports are mainly driven by domestic shocks, both in the short run and in the long run. This study is the first application of the GVAR model to studying the export dynamics in the CSEE countries and therefore the results of the study present an important empirical contribution.

Keywords: export, GFEVD, global VAR, international trade, weak exogeneity

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Authors: Amalka Nawarathna, Nirodha Fernando, Zaid Alwan

Abstract:

Global carbon reduction is not merely a responsibility of environmentally advanced developed countries, but also a responsibility of developing countries regardless of their less impact on global carbon emissions. In recognition of that, Sri Lanka as a developing country has initiated promoting green building construction as one reduction strategy. However, notwithstanding the increasing attention on Embodied Carbon (EC) reduction in the global building sector, they still mostly focus on Operational Carbon (OC) reduction (through improving operational energy). An adequate attention has not yet been given on EC estimation and reduction. Therefore, this study aims to identify the reasons for the slow uptake of EC estimation in the Sri Lankan building sector. To achieve this aim, 16 numbers of global barriers to estimate EC were identified through existing literature. They were then subjected to a pilot survey to identify the significant reasons for the slow uptake of EC estimation in the Sri Lankan building sector. A questionnaire with a three-point Likert scale was used to this end. The collected data were analysed using descriptive statistics. The findings revealed that 11 out of 16 challenges/ barriers are highly relevant as reasons for the slow uptake in estimating EC in buildings in Sri Lanka while the other five challenges/ barriers remain as moderately relevant reasons. Further, the findings revealed that there are no low relevant reasons. Eventually, the paper concluded that all the known reasons are significant to the Sri Lankan building sector and it is necessary to address them in order to upturn the attention on EC reduction.

Keywords: embodied carbon emissions, embodied carbon estimation, global carbon reduction, Sri Lankan building sector

Procedia PDF Downloads 187

Authors: David Sudre

Abstract:

Today, the National Basketball Association (NBA) is the cultural model of reference for most of the French basketball community stakeholders (players, coaches, team and league managers). In addition to the strong impact it has on how this sport is played and perceived, the NBA also influences the ways professional basketball shows are organized in France (within the Jeep Elite league). The objective of this research is to see how and to what extent the NBA show, as a globalized cultural product, disrupts Jeep Elite's professional basketball cultural codes in the organization of its shows. The article will aim at questioning the intercultural phenomenon at stake in sports cultures in France through the prism of the basketball match. This angle will shed some light on the underlying relationships between local and global elements. The results of this research come from a one-year survey conducted in a small town in northern France, Le Portel, where the Etoile Sportive Saint Michel (ESSM), a Jeep Elite's club, operates. An ethnographic approach was favored. It entailed many participating observations and semi-directive interviews with supporters of the ESSM Le Portel. Through this ethnographic work with the team's fan groups (before the games, during the games and after the games), it was possible for the researchers to understand better all the cultural and identity issues that play out in the "Cauldron," the basketball arena of the ESSM Le Portel. The results demonstrate, at first glance, that many basketball events organized in France are copied from the American model. It seems difficult not to try to imitate the American reference that the NBA represents, whether it be at the French All-Star Game or a Jeep Elite Game at Le Portel. In this case, an acculturation process seems to occur, not only in the way people play but also in the creation of the show (cheerleaders, animations, etc.). However, this American culture of globalized basketball, although re-appropriated, is also being modified by the members of ESSM Le Portel within their locality. Indeed, they juggle between their culture of origin and their culture of reference to build their basketball show within their sociocultural environment. In this way, Le Portel managers and supporters introduce elements that are characteristic of their local culture into the show, such as carnival customs and celebrations, two ingredients that fully contribute to the creation of their identity. Ultimately, in this context of "glocalization," this research will ascertain, on the one hand, that the identity of French basketball becomes harder to outline, and, on the other hand, that the "Cauldron" turns out to be a place to preserve (fantasized) local identities, or even a place of (unconscious) resistance to the dominant model of American basketball culture.

Keywords: basketball, carnival, culture, globalization, identity, show, sport, supporters.

Procedia PDF Downloads 141

Authors: Mohamed Salah El-Din Mahmoud, Heba Radi Atta Allah

Abstract:

Background: Our study assesses the safety profile and efficacy of toric Implantable Collamer Lens (T-ICL) and toric implantable phakic contact lens (IPCL) for the correction of high myopia with astigmatism. Methods: A prospective interventional randomized comparative study included 60 myopic eyes divided into 2 groups, group A including 30 eyes that were implanted with T-ICL, and group B including 30 eyes that were implanted with toric IPCL. The refractive results, visual acuity, corneal endothelial cell count, and intraocular pressure (IOP) were evaluated at baseline and at 1, 6, and 9 months post-surgery. Any complications either during or after surgery were assessed. Results: A significant reduction in both spherical and cylindrical refractive errors with good predictability was reported in both groups compared with preoperative values. Regarding the predictability, In T-ICL group (A), the median spherical and cylindrical errors were significantly improved from (-10 D & -4.5 D) pre-operatively to (-0.25 D & - 0.3 D) at the end of 9 months follow up period. Similarly, in the toric IPCL group (B), the median spherical and cylindrical errors were significantly improved from (-11 D & -4.5 D) pre-operatively to (-0.25 D & - 0.3 D) at the end of 9 months follow up period. A statistically significant improvement of UCDVA at 9 months postoperatively was found in both groups, as median preoperative Log Mar UCDVA was 1.1 and 1.3 in groups A and B respectively, which was significantly improved to 0.2 in both groups at the end of follow-up period. Regarding IOP, no significant difference was found between both groups, either pre-operatively or during the postoperative period. Regarding the endothelial count, no significant differences were found during the pre-operative and postoperative follow-up periods between the two groups. Fortunately, no intra or postoperative complications as cataract, keratitis or lens decentration had occurred. Conclusions: Toric IPCL is a suitable alternative to T-ICL for the management of high myopia with astigmatism, especially in developing countries, as it is cheaper and easier for implantation than T-ICL. However, data over longer follow-up periods are needed to confirm its safety and stability.

Keywords: T-ICL, Toric IPCL, IOP, corneal endothelium

Procedia PDF Downloads 138

Authors: Xiaoheng Tan, Xianfang Li, Tan Guo, Yuchuan Liu, Zhijun Yang, Hongye Li, Kai Fu, Yufang Wu, Heling Gong

Abstract:

The image data collected in reality often have high dimensions, and it contains noise and redundant information. Therefore, it is necessary to extract the compact feature expression of the original perceived image. In this process, effective use of prior knowledge such as data structure distribution and sample label is the key to enhance image feature discrimination and robustness. Based on the above considerations, this paper proposes a local preserving discriminant feature learning model based on graph optimization. The model has the following characteristics: (1) Locality preserving constraint can effectively excavate and preserve the local structural relationship between data. (2) The flexibility of graph learning can be improved by constructing a new local geometric structure graph using label information and the nearest neighbor threshold. (3) The L₂,₁ norm is used to redefine LDA, and the diagonal matrix is introduced as the scale factor of LDA, and the samples are selected, which improves the robustness of feature learning. The validity and robustness of the proposed algorithm are verified by experiments in two public image datasets.

Keywords: feature extraction, graph optimization local preserving projection, linear discriminant analysis, L₂, ₁ norm

Procedia PDF Downloads 136

Authors: Ma. Manna Farrel B. Pinto

Abstract:

As global industrialization progresses, the environment remains to be at risk of disturbances brought by developments of cities and communities. Impacts of flourishing industries such as tourism require rapid growth of establishments and may threaten ecosystems and natural resources. Puerto Galera as a biosphere reserve and declared as the Center of the World’s Center of Marine Shorefish Biodiversity is on the brink of ecological deterioration as tourism further develops in its coastal areas. Apparently, attempts were initiated to establish a baseline for designation of protection in the economic and coastal marine zones of Puerto Galera but continuity of its implementation and coordination of concerned units remains deficient. Indications of eutrophication have been observed based on water quality analysis although parameter values still comply with the national standards for coastal waters. Water quality data, biodiversity and hydrodynamic information, gathered from studies, and local government units were analysed to assess the condition of the coast as well as acting policies implemented by the local authorities. Sources of contaminants were also located in its three main communities, and their shores wherein in recommendations for installing wastewater treatment facilities and further improvement of policies of waste discharge must be addressed. With a conceptual framework proposed in the study, a comprehensive data analysis and coordinated management are necessary to form an integrated coastal management for further protection and preservation of the sustainable coastal marine ecosystem of Puerto Galera.

Keywords: coastal management, environmental management, integrated resource management, Puerto Galera

Procedia PDF Downloads 254