Search results for: infrastructure design

Authors: Hui Fang Huang Su, Leanne Lai, Pei-Fen Li, Mei-Hwei Ho, Yu-Wen Chiu

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This study aimed to provide a practical, systematic, and comprehensive intervention for children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). A pilot study of quasi-experimental pre-post intervention with control group design was conducted to evaluate if the mathematical intervention (Project MIND - Math Is Not Difficult) increases the math comprehension of children with ASD Children with ASD in the primary grades (K-1, 2) participated in math interventions to enhance their math comprehension and cognitive ability. The Bracken basic concept scale was used to evaluate subjects’ language skills, cognitive development, and school readiness. The study found that our systemic interventions of Project MIND significantly improved the mathematical and cognitive abilities in children with autism. The results of this study may lead to a major change in effective and adequate health care services for children with ASD and their families. All statistical analyses were performed with the IBM SPSS Statistics Version 25 for Windows. The significant level was set at 0.05 P-value.

Keywords: autism, mathematics, technology, family

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Authors: Xiuying Wang, Changliang Li, Bo Xu

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A fixed-length feature vector is required for many machine learning algorithms in NLP field. Word embeddings have been very successful at learning lexical information. However, they cannot capture the compositional meaning of sentences, which prevents them from a deeper understanding of language. In this paper, we introduce a novel hierarchical tree long short-term memory (HTLSTM) model that learns vector representations for sentences of arbitrary syntactic type and length. We propose to split one sentence into three hierarchies: short phrase, long phrase and full sentence level. The HTLSTM model gives our algorithm the potential to fully consider the hierarchical information and long-term dependencies of language. We design the experiments on both English and Chinese corpus to evaluate our model on sentiment analysis task. And the results show that our model outperforms several existing state of the art approaches significantly.

Keywords: deep learning, hierarchical tree long short-term memory, sentence representation, sentiment analysis

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Authors: Natàlia Garcia Soler, Timothy Moss

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Despite the multiple benefits of sustainable urban drainage, as demonstrated in numerous case studies across the world, urban rainwater harvesting techniques are generally restricted to isolated model projects. The leap from niche to mainstream has, in most cities, proved an elusive goal. Why policies promoting rainwater harvesting are limited in their widespread implementation has seldom been subjected to systematic analysis. Much of the literature on the policy, planning and institutional contexts of these techniques focus either on their potential benefits or on project design, but very rarely on a critical-constructive analysis of past experiences of implementation. Moreover, the vast majority of these contributions are restricted to single-case studies. There is a dearth of knowledge with respect to, firstly, policy implementation processes and, secondly, multi-case analysis. Insights from both, the authors argue, are essential to inform more effective rainwater harvesting in cities in the future. This paper presents preliminary findings from a research project on rainwater harvesting in cities from a social science perspective that is funded by the Swedish Research Foundation (Formas). This project – UrbanRain – is examining the challenges and opportunities of mainstreaming rainwater harvesting in three European cities. The paper addresses two research questions: firstly, what lessons can be learned on suitable policy incentives and planning instruments for rainwater harvesting from a meta-analysis of the relevant international literature and, secondly, how far these lessons are reflected in a study of past and ongoing rainwater harvesting projects in a European forerunner city. This two-tier approach frames the structure of the paper. We present, first, the results of the literature analysis on policy and planning issues of urban rainwater harvesting. Here, we analyze quantitatively and qualitatively the literature of the past 15 years on this topic in terms of thematic focus, issues addressed and key findings and draw conclusions on research gaps, highlighting the need for more studies on implementation factors, actor interests, institutional adaptation and multi-level governance. In a second step we focus in on the experiences of rainwater harvesting in Berlin and present the results of a mapping exercise on a wide variety of projects implemented there over the last 30 years. Here, we develop a typology to characterize the rainwater harvesting projects in terms of policy issues (what problems and goals are targeted), project design (which kind of solutions are envisaged), project implementation (how and when they were implemented), location (whether they are in new or existing urban developments) and actors (which stakeholders are involved and how), paying particular attention to the shifting institutional framework in Berlin. Mapping and categorizing these projects is based on a combination of document analysis and expert interviews. The paper concludes by synthesizing the findings, identifying how far the goals, governance structures and instruments applied in the Berlin projects studied reflect the findings emerging from the meta-analysis of the international literature on policy and planning issues of rainwater harvesting and what implications these findings have for mainstreaming such techniques in future practice.

Keywords: institutional framework, planning, policy, project implementation, urban rainwater management

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Authors: Wei-Hwa Chiang, Yu-Ching Cheng, Pei-Hsien Kao, Yu-Chi Lai

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A smart sustainable university campus is multi-dimensional. The success requires intensive inter-disciplinary coordination among all users and the expert group and long-term optimization. This paper reported the design and realization process of the dense and campus NTUST campus where space sharing is essential. Two-phase web-based interviews with students were conducted regarding where they study between classes as well as how they move within the campus. Efficient and active utilization of public and semi-public spaces, in particular, the ones near the ground, were progressively designed and realized where lobbies, corridors, reading rooms, and classrooms not in use were considered. Most of the spaces were equipped with smart monitoring and controls in terms of access, lighting, ceiling fans, air condition, and energy use. Mobile device apps were developed regarding the management of the spaces while information about energy use, environmental quality, and the smart sustainable campus project itself were provided to stimulate the awareness of sustainability and active participation in optimizing the campus.

Keywords: smart, sustainability, campus, space utilization

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Authors: Young Min Kim, Dong Gil Shin, Assmelash Assefa Negash

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This study describes the application of a single loop organic Rankine cycle (ORC) for recovering waste heat from an excavator. In the case of waste heat recovery of the excavator, the heat of hydraulic oil can be used in the ORC system together with the other waste heat sources including the exhaust gas and engine coolant. The performances of four different cases of single loop ORC systems were studied at the main operating condition, and critical design factors are studied to get the maximum power output from the given waste heat sources. The energy and exergy analysis of the cycles are performed concerning the available heat source to determine the best fluid and system configuration. The analysis demonstrates that the ORC in the excavator increases 14% of the net power output at the main operating condition with a simpler system configuration at a lower expander inlet temperature than in a conventional vehicle engine without the heat of the hydraulic oil.

Keywords: engine, excavator, hydraulic oil, organic Rankine cycle (ORC), waste heat recovery

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Authors: Priyanka Jain, Ashish K. Sharma, Esha Shukla, K. J. Mukherjee

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We propose a paradigm shift in our approach to design improved platforms for recombinant protein production, by addressing system level issues rather than the individual steps associated with recombinant protein synthesis like transcription, translation, etc. We demonstrate that by controlling and modulating the cellular stress response (CSR), which is responsible for feedback control of protein synthesis, we can generate hyper-producing strains. We did transcriptomic profiling of post-induction cultures, expressing different types of protein, to analyze the nature of this cellular stress response. We found significant down-regulation of substrate utilization, translation, and energy metabolism genes due to generation CSR inside the host cell. However, transcription profiling has also shown that many genes are up-regulated post induction and their role in modulating the CSR is unclear. We hypothesized that these up-regulated genes trigger signaling pathways, generating the CSR and concomitantly reduce the recombinant protein yield. To test this hypothesis, we knocked out the up-regulated genes, which did not have any downstream regulatees, and analyzed their impact on cellular health and recombinant protein expression. Two model proteins i.e., GFP and L-Asparaginase were chosen for this analysis. We observed a significant improvement in expression levels, with some knock-outs showing more than 7-fold higher expression compared to control. The 10 best single knock-outs were chosen to make 45 combinations of all possible double knock-outs. A further increase in expression was observed in some of these double knock- outs with GFP levels being highest in a double knock-out ΔyhbC + ΔelaA. However, for L-Asparaginase which is a secretory protein, the best results were obtained using a combination of ΔelaA+ΔcysW knock-outs. We then tested all the knock outs for their ability to enhance the expression of a 'difficult-to-express' protein. The Rubella virus E1 protein was chosen and tagged with sfGFP at the C-terminal using a linker peptide for easy online monitoring of expression of this fusion protein. Interestingly, the highest increase in Rubella-sGFP levels was obtained in the same double knock-out ΔelaA + ΔcysW (5.6 fold increase in expression yield compared to the control) which gave the highest expression for L-Asparaginase. However, for sfGFP alone, the ΔyhbC+ΔmarR knock-out gave the highest level of expression. These results indicate that there is a fair degree of commonality in the nature of the CSR generated by the induction of different proteins. Transcriptomic profiling of the double knock out showed that many genes associated with the translational machinery and energy biosynthesis did not get down-regulated post induction, unlike the control where these genes were significantly down-regulated. This confirmed our hypothesis of these genes playing an important role in the generation of the CSR and allowed us to design a strategy for making better expression hosts by simply knocking out key genes. This strategy is radically superior to the previous approach of individually up-regulating critical genes since it blocks the mounting of the CSR thus preventing the down-regulation of a very large number of genes responsible for sustaining the flux through the recombinant protein production pathway.

Keywords: cellular stress response, GFP, knock-outs, up-regulated genes

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Authors: Wahyu Widodo, Imbang Dwi Rahayu, Adi Sutanto

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The purpose of this research was to analyze the effect of the fermented organic feed to dry matter, ash, organic matter, protein, fat and crude fiber contents of kampong chicken meat. The research had conducted at January until June, 2016. One hundreds chickens were used in this research. Experimental method and completely randomized design were used to support this research. We had 4 treatment namely P0: organic feed without fermentation, P1: Organic feed with fermented rice bran, P2: Organic feed with fermented corn, P3: Organic feed with fermented rice bran and corn with 5 replication. The conclusion was the treatment had not a significant effect in the dry matter, ash, organic matter and protein contents of chicken meat. On the other hand, it had a significant effect in the fat and crude fiber contents of chicken meat.

Keywords: corn, fermented organic feed, nutritive contents, rice bran

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Authors: Inba Blesso P., Senthil Kumar P.

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The main consideration of any tire manufacturing process is wear resistance. One of the factors that cause tire wear is improper removal of vent and flash from the tire surface. The contact point between tyre surface and vent is highly supposed to wear. When the vehicle running at higher speed with heavy load, the tire vent and flash is wearing initially and it makes few of the tire surface material to wear along with it. Hence, provision must be given to efficient removal vent and flash thereby tire wear. Human efforts in trimming of tire vent results in time consuming and inaccurate output. Hence, this lead to the reduction in production rate and profit. Thus, the development of automated system can helps to attain minimum time consumption and provide a possible way to get the profitable production. Semi-automated system that employs Pneumatic actuators and sequencing circuits are focused in this study. By implementing this, one can achieve the accurate results with reduction in time and profitable output.

Keywords: tire manufacturing, pneumatic system, vent and flash removal, engineering and technology

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Authors: Dong Wook Lee

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This paper presents a method to analyze the stiffness of the expansion joint with structural support using a hybrid method combining computational and analytical methods. Many expansion joints found in tubes and ducts of mechanical structures are designed to absorb thermal expansion mismatch between their structural members and deal with misalignments introduced from the assembly/manufacturing processes. One of the important design perspectives is the system’s vibrational characteristics. We calculate the stiffness as a characterization parameter for structural joint systems using a combined Finite Element Analysis (FEA) and an analytical method. We apply the methods to two sample applications: external configurations of aircraft engines and nuclear power plant structures.

Keywords: expansion joint, expansion joint stiffness, finite element analysis, nuclear power plants, aircraft engine external configurations

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Authors: Misrak Assefa

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The Amharic language is the second most widely spoken Semitic language in the world. There are several new overloaded on the web. Searching some useful documents from the web on a specific topic, which is written in the Amharic language, is a challenging task. Hence, document categorization is required for managing and filtering important information. In the classification of Amharic text news, there is still a gap in the domain of information that needs to be launch. This study attempts to design an automatic Amharic news classification using a supervised learning mechanism on four un-touch classes. To achieve this research, 4,182 news articles were used. Naive Bayes (NB) and Decision tree (j48) algorithms were used to classify the given Amharic dataset. In this paper, k-fold cross-validation is used to estimate the accuracy of the classifier. As a result, it shows those algorithms can be applicable in Amharic news categorization. The best average accuracy result is achieved by j48 decision tree and naïve Bayes is 95.2345 %, and 94.6245 % respectively using three categories. This research indicated that a typical decision tree algorithm is more applicable to Amharic news categorization.

Keywords: text categorization, supervised machine learning, naive Bayes, decision tree

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Authors: Abdelhamid Louliej, Younes Jabrane

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Satellites are becoming indispensable assets to fifth-generation (5G) new radio architecture, complementing wireless and terrestrial communication links. The combination of satellites and 5G architecture allows consumers to access all next-generation services anytime, anywhere, including scenarios, like traveling to remote areas (without coverage). Nevertheless, this solution faces several challenges, such as a significant propagation delay, Doppler frequency shift, and high Peak-to-Average Power Ratio (PAPR), causing signal distortion due to the non-linear saturation of the High-Power Amplifier (HPA). To compensate for HPA non-linearity in 5G satellite transmission, an efficient pre-distorter scheme using Neural Networks (NN) is proposed. To assess the proposed NN pre-distorter, two types of HPA were investigated: Travelling Wave Tube Amplifier (TWTA) and Solid-State Power Amplifier (SSPA). The results show that the NN pre-distorter design presents EVM improvement by 95.26%. NMSE and ACPR were reduced by -43,66 dB and 24.56 dBm, respectively. Moreover, the system suffers no degradation of the Bit Error Rate (BER) for TWTA and SSPA amplifiers.

Keywords: satellites, 5G, neural networks, HPA, TWTA, SSPA, EVM, NMSE, ACPR

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Authors: Ángel O. Aldape, José M. Bustos, José G. Guízar

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Building companies providing public housing in Mexico, such as INFONAVIT, Casas GEO, Casas ARA, among others, provide low-interest home loans for thousands of Mexican families and individuals to buy a home. However, once this goal is achieved, these companies are not responsible for the care and maintenance of green areas and waste collection services because, technically, it is the local municipalities’ responsibility to provide these services to the community. However, this does not always occur with local municipalities. To study this problem, the San Buenaventura public housing complex was selected. This housing complex is located in the municipality of Ixtapaluca, State of Mexico (Estado de Mexico), Mexico. To our best knowledge, there are currently no formal studies about San Buenaventura that can offer effective options and/or better ways of sorting and disposing households’ wastes, as well as improving local green areas (community gardens and parks). Only a few web-blogs and periodical reports have addressed these serious problems that directly affect the social and psychological well-being of residents. The main goal of this research project aims to improve our understanding towards the existing ontological elements that emerge from residents’ discourses (in the form of informal talks and gossip) and discover the socio-physical elements that they use to assign moral positions onto others or onto themselves. The theoretical framework used in this study is based on two constructionist theories: positioning theory and site ontology. The first theory offered the opportunity to explore the rights, duties, and obligations assigned to a social role (or moral position) of the participants. The second theory provided a constructionist philosophical base that includes various socio-physical elements that are considered to assign personal or community meanings to particular contexts. Both theories contributed to defining personal dispositions and/or attitudes to carry out concrete social action or practice. The theoretical framework was guided by a relativistic ontology that allowed the researcher to better interpret the reality of the participants of this study. A descriptive-interpretative methodology was used, and two qualitative methods were arranged based on the theoretical framework proposed as follows: a semi-structured focus group interview, and direct observations. The semi-structured focus group was carried out with four residents of San Buenaventura and covert observations of public spaces and houses were carried out. These were analysed and interpreted by the researcher and assisted by NVivo software. The results suggest that the participants assigned moral traits of responsibility to other residents regarding the problem of the neglect of the green areas and waste pollution. The results suggest that all participants agreed to assign moral traits to other residents making them liable for the environmental degradation and the decay of green areas. They neither assigned any moral duty nor responsible moral traits onto themselves towards environmental protection or destruction. Overall, the participants in this study pointed out that external ontological elements such as the local government, infrastructure or cleaning services were not main cause of these environmental problems but rather the general lack of moral duty and disposition of other residents.

Keywords: conversation, environment, housing, moral, ontology, position, public, site, talks

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Authors: Nasser Ghassembaglou, Abdullah Bolek, Oktay Yilmaz, Ertan Oznergiz, Hikmet Kocabas, Safak Yilmaz

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High quality air filters production using nanofibers, as a functional material, has frequently been investigated. As it is more environmentally friendly, melting method has been selected to produce nanofibers. Spun-bond production systems consist of extruder, spin-pump, nozzle package and attenuators. Spin-pump makes molten polymer steady, which flows through extruder. Fibers are formed by regular melts passing through nuzzle holes under high pressure. Attenuator prolongs fibers to micron size to be collected on a conveyor. Different designs of attenuator systems have been studied in this research; new analysis have been done on existed designs considering fibers effect on air flow; it was comprehended that, at fibers presence, there is an air flow which agglomerates fibers as a negative effect. So some new representations have been designed and CFD analysis have been done on them. Afterwards, one of these representations selected as the most optimum and effective design which is brought in this paper.

Keywords: attenuator, CFD, nanofiber, spun-bond

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Authors: Bryan Jenkins

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Introduction: The expansion of irrigation in the Canterbury region has led to the sustainability limits being reached for water availability and the cumulative effects of land use intensification. The institutional framework under New Zealand’s Resource Management Act was found to be an inadequate basis for managing water at sustainability limits. An alternative paradigm for water management was developed based on collaborative governance and nested adaptive systems. This led to the formulation and implementation of the Canterbury Water Management Strategy. Methods: The nested adaptive system approach was adopted. Sustainability issues were identified at multiple spatial and time scales and defined potential failure pathways for the water resource system. These included biophysical and socio-economic issues such as water availability, cumulative effects on water quality due to land use intensification, projected changes in climate, public health, institutional arrangements, economic outcomes and externalities, and, social effects of changing technology. This led to the derivation of sustainability strategies to address these failure pathways. The collaborative governance approach involved stakeholder participation and community engagement to decide on a regional strategy; regional and zone committees of community and rūnanga (Māori groups) members to develop implementation programmes for the strategy; and, farmer collectives for operational management. Findings: The strategy identified improvements in the efficiency of use of water already allocated was more effective in improving water availability than a reliance on increased storage alone. New forms of storage with less adverse impacts were introduced, such as managed aquifer recharge and off-river storage. Reductions of nutrients from land use intensification by improving management practices has been a priority. Solutions packages for addressing the degradation of vulnerable lakes and rivers have been prepared. Biodiversity enhancement projects have been initiated. Greater involvement of Māori has led to the incorporation of kaitiakitanga (resource stewardship) into implementation programmes. Emerging issues are the need for improved integration of surface water and groundwater interactions, increased use of modelling of water and financial outcomes to guide decision making, and, equity in allocation among existing users as well as between existing and future users. Conclusions: However, sustainability analysis indicates that the proposed levels of management interventions are not sufficient to achieve community targets for water management. There is a need for more proactive recovery and rehabilitation measures. Managing to environmental limits is not sufficient, rather managing adaptive cycles is needed. Better measurement and management of water use efficiency is required. Proposed implementation packages are not sufficient to deliver desired water quality outcomes. Greater attention to targets important to environmental and recreational interests is needed to maintain trust in the collaborative process. Implementation programmes don’t adequately address climate change adaptations and greenhouse gas mitigation. Affordability is a constraint on adaptive capacity of farmers and communities. More funding mechanisms are required to implement proactive measures. The legislative and institutional framework needs to be changed to incorporate water framework legislation, regional sustainability strategies and water infrastructure coordination.

Keywords: collaborative governance, irrigation management, nested adaptive systems, sustainable water management

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Authors: Rob Schindler

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Industry-standard methods of mitigating erosion of seabed sediments rely on ‘hard engineering’ approaches which have numerous environmental shortcomings: (1) direct loss of habitat by smothering of benthic species, (2) disruption of sediment transport processes, damaging geomorphic and ecosystem functionality (3) generation of secondary erosion problems, (4) introduction of material that may propagate non-local species, and (5) provision of pathways for the spread of invasive species. Recent studies have also revealed the importance of biological cohesion, the result of naturally occurring extra-cellular polymeric substances (EPS), in stabilizing natural sediments. Mimicking the strong bonding kinetics through the deliberate addition of EPS to sediments – henceforth termed ‘biostabilisation’ - offers a means in which to mitigate against erosion induced by structures or episodic increases in hydrodynamic forcing (e.g. storms and floods) whilst avoiding, or reducing, hard engineering. Here we present unique experiments that systematically examine how biostabilisation reduces scour around a monopile in a current, a first step to realizing the potential of this new method of scouring reduction for a wide range of engineering purposes in aquatic substrates. Experiments were performed in Plymouth University’s recirculating sediment flume which includes a recessed scour pit. The model monopile was 0.048 m in diameter, D. Assuming a prototype monopile diameter of 2.0 m yields a geometric ratio of 41.67. When applied to a 10 m prototype water depth this yields a model depth, d, of 0.24 m. The sediment pit containing the monopile was filled with different biostabilised substrata prepared using a mixture of fine sand (D50 = 230 μm) and EPS (Xanthan gum). Nine sand-EPS mixtures were examined spanning EPS contents of 0.0% < b0 < 0.50%. Scour development was measured using a laser point gauge along a 530 mm centreline at 10 mm increments at regular periods over 5 h. Maximum scour depth and excavated area were determined at different time steps and plotted against time to yield equilibrium values. After 5 hours the current was stopped and a detailed scan of the final scour morphology was taken. Results show that increasing EPS content causes a progressive reduction in the equilibrium depth and lateral extent of scour, and hence excavated material. Very small amounts equating to natural communities (< 0.1% by mass) reduce scour rate, depth and extent of scour around monopiles. Furthermore, the strong linear relationships between EPS content, equilibrium scour depth, excavation area and timescales of scouring offer a simple index on which to modify existing scour prediction methods. We conclude that the biostabilisation of sediments with EPS may offer a simple, cost-effective and ecologically sensitive means of reducing scour in a range of contexts including OWFs, bridge piers, pipeline installation, and void filling in rock armour. Biostabilisation may also reduce economic costs through (1) Use of existing site sediments, or waste dredged sediments (2) Reduced fabrication of materials, (3) Lower transport costs, (4) Less dependence on specialist vessels and precise sub-sea assembly. Further, its potential environmental credentials may allow sensitive use of the seabed in marine protection zones across the globe.

Keywords: biostabilisation, EPS, marine, scour

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Authors: Yiyang Su, Jörg Neumann, Jan Wetzlich, Florian Thiel

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Smart grid is a term used to describe the next generation power grid. New challenges such as integration of renewable and decentralized energy sources, the requirement for continuous grid estimation and optimization, as well as the use of two-way flows of energy have been brought to the power gird. In order to achieve efficient, reliable, sustainable, as well as secure delivery of electric power more and more information and communication technologies are used for the monitoring and the control of power grids. Consequently, the need for cybersecurity is dramatically increased and has converged into several standards which will be presented here. These standards for the smart grid must be designed to satisfy both performance and reliability requirements. An in depth investigation of the effect of retrospectively embedded security in existing grids on it’s dynamic behavior is required. Therefore, a retrofitting plan for existing meters is offered, and it’s performance in a test low voltage microgrid is investigated. As a result of this, integration of security measures into measurement architectures of smart grids at the design phase is strongly recommended.

Keywords: cyber security, performance, protocols, security standards, smart grid

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Authors: Richardo Y. E. Sihotang, Atang Sutandi, Joshua Ginting

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The expansion of marginal soil such as acid sulphate soils for the development of staple crops, including rice was unavoidable. However, acid sulphate soils were less suitable for rice field due to the low fertility and the threats of pyrite oxidation. An experiment using Randomized Complete Block Design was designed to investigate the effect of slag in stabilizing soil reaction (pH), improving soil fertility and rice yield. Experiments were conducted in two locations with different pyrite depth. The results showed that slag application was able to decrease the exchangeable Al and available iron (Fe) as well as increase the soil pH, available-P, soil exchangeable Ca2+, Mg2+, and K+. Furthermore, the slag application increased the plant nutrient uptakes, particularly N, P, K, followed by the increasing of rice yield significantly. Nutrients availability, nutrient uptake, and rice yield were higher in the shallow pyrite soil instead of the deep pyrite soil. In addition, slag application was economically feasible due to the ability to reduce standard fertilizer requirements.

Keywords: acid sulphate soils, available nutrients, pyrite, slag

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Authors: Víctor Cecilio, Roberto Gómez, J. Alberto Escobar, Héctor Guerrero

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The study of the structural behavior of a support/pier of an elevated viaduct in Mexico City is presented. Detection of foundation piles with uncertain integrity prompted the review of possible situations that could jeopardy the structural safety of the pier. The objective of this paper is to evaluate the structural conditions of the support, taking into account the type of anomaly reported and the depth at which it is located, the position of the pile with uncertain integrity in the foundation system, the stratigraphy of the surrounding soil and the geometry and structural characteristics of the pier. To carry out the above, dynamic analysis, spectral modal, and step-by-step, with elastic and inelastic material models, were performed. Results were evaluated in accordance with the standards used for the design of the original structural project and with the Construction Regulations for Mexico’s Federal District (RCDF-2017, 2017). Comments on the response of the analyzed models are issued, and the conclusions are presented from a structural point of view.

Keywords: dynamic analysis, inelastic models, dubious foundation, bridge pier

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Authors: Hefzollah Mohammadian, Ensieh Hajeb, Mohamad Baqer Heidari

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In this paper, for the protection and safety of tanks gases (flammable materials) and also due to the considerable economic value of the reservoir, the new system for the protection, the conservation and fire fighting has been cloned. The system consists of several parts: the Sensors to detect heat and fire with Nanotechnology (nano sensor), Barrier for isolation and protection from a range of two electronic zones, analyzer for detection and locating point of fire accurately, Main electronic board to announce fire, Fault diagnosis in different locations, such as relevant alarms and activate different devices for fire distinguish and announcement. An important feature of this system, high speed and capability of fire detection system in a way that is able to detect the value of the ambient temperature that can be adjusted. Another advantage of this system is autonomous and does not require human operator in place. Using nanotechnology, in addition to speeding up the work, reduces the cost of construction of the sensor and also the notification system and fire extinguish.

Keywords: analyser, barrier, heat resistance, general fault, general alarm, nano sensor

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Authors: Tahereh Yavari, Sara Norozi Far

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The aim of this study was to compare psychological well-being, hope, and health concerns in leukemia patients before and after receiving stem cells. The statistical population of the present study was made up of leukemia patients in Tehran, and the research sample was among the patients referred to the Bone Marrow Transplant Center of Shariati Hospital in Tehran, and they were placed in two experimental and control groups (15 people in each group), which were selected by purposive sampling method. In order to collect the data for the research, three psychological well-being questionnaires were used by Riff (2002), Schneider's Hope Scale (SHS), and Schneider's Health Concern Questionnaire (HCQ). In order to analyze the data in this research, according to the "pre-test-post-test design with a control group," covariance analysis was used. Based on the research findings, it was concluded that receiving stem cells increases hope and psychological well-being in leukemia patients and significantly reduces health concerns.

Keywords: psychological well-being, hope, health concerns, blood cancer, stem cells

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Authors: Keivan Saeb, Azade Kakouei, Razieh Jafari Hajati, Khalil Pourshamsian, Babak Babakhani

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Urtica Diocia L. from the Urticaceae family is a plant of herbal value and of a noticeable distribution in the north of Iran. The growth of different plants in various natural environments and ecosystems seems to be affected by factors such as the height (from sea surface).To investigate the effect of height on Urtica Diocia L. medicine compounds in its natural environment, three areas with the height of zero, 800 and 1800m were selected.The samples were randomly gathered three times and were dried; also, their compounds was extracted using the Clivenger with the water-distilling method. To determine the medicine compounds, the GC-MS as well as the GC machines were used. The analysis of variance was done in the form of the random-full-block design. The results indicated that there was a significant difference between the percent of EOs in the selected heights; however, such difference was not significant within each height. From among the eight flavors of the study, the phytol compound was more in terms of percentage. By increasing the height the percent of EOs would decrease. lower heights could be considered most appropriate for producing the studied effective materials despite of the moistened climate and soil there.

Keywords: Urtica diocia L., height, EOs, medicine

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Authors: Chaudhary Archana, Dhingra Poshika

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The architecture of the world is at a crossroads with the advent of new technology. The issues of energy efficiency and global warming are getting important with the coming times. New technologies are making their mark. For the architecture profession, nanotechnology will greatly impact construction materials and their properties. Nanotechnology, the understanding and control of matter at a scale of one to one hundred billions of a meter, is bringing incredible changes to the materials and processes of buildings. Materials will behave in many different ways as we are able to more precisely control their properties at the nanoscale. It is precisely called the next industrial revolution. We live in an age where scientific progress continues to transform human lifestyle. This is evermore true when it comes to the progress being made in the field of nanotechnology. This science stands to change and advance the practice of design in a multitude of ways – where architectural progress is being made at the molecular level. The nanotechnology has already been adopted in various buildings across the world. What an impact it shall have on the futuristic architecture in Chandigarh, India shall be discussed in the paper. But before we hurtle off toward a nano-utopia, we need to step back and ask ourselves whether this is a direction in which we really want to go.

Keywords: building materials, energy efficiency, nanotechnology, sustainability

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Authors: Xiaoxu Liu, Yuwen Chen

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In this study, we investigated ethnic minority students’ perception of the implementation of preferential policies in China. Using a mixed methods design, we surveyed 320 students from an institute of education for ethnic minorities and conducted further in-depth interviews with seven respondents. Although interviewees were from 30 ethnic groups, most of them were from mainstream high schools. We found that minority students from preparatory classes have an overall positive attitude towards preferential policies and preparatory class but lack sense of belonging to the university for various reasons. Findings indicate that although preparatory class is regarded as being helpful for minority students’ academic development, there are differences of attitude mainly depending on the high schools they graduated from and their ethnic identities. Our analyses suggest that ethnicity, high school graduated from, hometown and family income are more important than gender, religion, and political affiliation when accounting for their perceptions of the implementation of preferential policies in China.

Keywords: Chinese minority education, higher education, preferential policies, survey analysis

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Authors: Eser Yarar, Fahri Vatansever, A. Tamer Erturk, Sedat Karabay

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In this study, drilling behavior of multi-layer orthotropic polyester composites reinforced with woven polyester fiber and PTFE particle was investigated. Conventional drilling methods have low cost and ease of use. Therefore, it is one of the most preferred machining methods. The increasing range of use of composite materials in many areas has led to the investigation of the machinability performance of these materials. The drilling capability of the synthetic polymer composite material was investigated by measuring the cutting forces using different tool diameters, feed rate and high cutting speed parameters. Cutting forces were measured using a dynamometer in the experiments. In order to evaluate the results of the experiment, the Taguchi experimental design method was used. According to the results, the optimum cutting parameters were obtained for 0.1 mm/rev, 1070 rpm and 2 mm diameter drill bit. Verification tests were performed for the optimum cutting parameters obtained according to the model. Verification experiments showed the success of the established model.

Keywords: cutting force, drilling, polimer composite, Taguchi

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Authors: Hope Amba Neji

Abstract:

The study adopted a quasi-experimental design. Two schools were used for the experimental study, while one school was used for the control. The experimental groups were subjected to treatment for four weeks with chemistry museum artifacts and a visit as made to the museum so that learners would have real-life learning experiences with museum resources, while the control group was taught with the conventional method. The instrument for the study was a 20-item Chemistry Memory Test (CMT) and a 10-item Chemistry Interest Questionnaire (CIQ). The reliability was ascertained using (KR-20) and alpha reliability coefficient, which yielded a reliability coefficient of .83 and .81, respectively. Data obtained was analyzed using Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA) and Analysis of variance (ANOVA) at 0.05 level of significance. Findings revealed that museum artifacts have a significant effect on students’ memory enhancement and interest in chemistry. It was recommended chemistry learning should be enhanced, motivating and real with museum artifacts, which significantly aid memory enhancement and interest in chemistry.

Keywords: museum artifacts, memory, chemistry, atitude

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Authors: Narayanakumar Somasundaram, Venkat Nihit Chirivella, Venkata Dilip Kumar Pasupuleti

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Ajakool, India, has a multi-span bridge that is constructed for rail transport with a maximum operating speed of 100 km/hr. It is a standard RDSO design of a PSC box girder carrying a single railway track. The Structural Health Monitoring System (SHM) is designed and installed to compare and analyze the vibrations and displacements on the bridge due to different live loads from moving trains. The study is conducted for three different spans of the same bridge to understand the health of the elastomeric bearings. Also, to validate the same, a three-dimensional finite element model is developed, and modal analysis is carried out. The proposed methodology can help in detecting deteriorated elastomeric bearings using only wireless tri-accelerometer sensors. Detailed analysis and results are presented in terms of mode shapes, accelerations, displacements, and their importance to each other. This can be implemented with a lot of ease and can be more accurate.

Keywords: dynamic effects, vibration analysis, accelerometer sensors, finite element analysis, structural health monitoring, elastomeric bearing

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Authors: Abdul Rashid Ahmadi, Samiullah Paracha, Hamidullah Sokout, Mohammad Hanif Gharana

Abstract:

Conventional educational practices, do not offer all the required skills for teachers to successfully survive in today’s workplace. Due to poor professional training, a big gap exists across the curriculum plan and the teacher practices in the classroom. As such, raising the quality of teaching through ICT-enabled training and professional development of teachers should be an urgent priority. ‘Mobile Learning’, in that vein, is an increasingly growing field of educational research and practice across schools and work places. In this paper, we propose a novel Mobile learning system that allows the users to learn through an intelligent mobile learning in cooperatively every-time and every-where. The system will reduce the training cost and increase consistency, efficiency, and data reliability. To establish that our system will display neither functional nor performance failure, the evaluation strategy is based on formal observation of users interacting with system followed by questionnaires and structured interviews.

Keywords: computer assisted learning, intelligent tutoring system, learner centered design, mobile mediated learning and teacher education

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Authors: Subal Kar, Madhuja Ghosh, Amitesh Kumar, Arijit Majumder

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Complementary split-ring resonator (CSRR) loaded microstrip square patch antenna has been optimally designed with the help of high frequency structure simulator (HFSS). The antenna has been fabricated on the basis of the simulation design data and experimentally tested in anechoic chamber to evaluate its gain, bandwidth, efficiency and polarization characteristics. The CSRR loaded microstrip patch antenna has been found to realize significant size miniaturization (to the extent of 24%) compared to the conventional-type microstrip patch antenna both operating at the same frequency (5.2 GHz). The fabricated antenna could realize a maximum gain of 4.17 dB, 10 dB impedance bandwidth of 34 MHz, efficiency 50.73% and with maximum cross-pol of 10.56 dB down at the operating frequency. This practically designed antenna with its miniaturized size is expected to be useful for airborne and space borne applications at microwave frequency.

Keywords: split ring resonator, metamaterial, CSRR loaded patch antenna, microstrip patch antenna, LC resonator

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Authors: Serhat Tüzün, Tufan Demirel

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Decision Support Systems (DSS) have been investigated by researchers and technologists for more than 35 years. This paper analyses the developments in the architecture and software of these systems, provides a systematic analysis for different Web-based DSS approaches and Intelligent Decision-making Technologies (IDT), with the suggestion for future studies. Decision Support Systems literature begins with building model-oriented DSS in the late 1960s, theory developments in the 1970s, and the implementation of financial planning systems and Group DSS in the early and mid-80s. Then it documents the origins of Executive Information Systems, online analytic processing (OLAP) and Business Intelligence. The implementation of Web-based DSS occurred in the mid-1990s. With the beginning of the new millennia, intelligence is the main focus on DSS studies. Web-based technologies are having a major impact on design, development and implementation processes for all types of DSS. Web technologies are being utilized for the development of DSS tools by leading developers of decision support technologies. Major companies are encouraging its customers to port their DSS applications, such as data mining, customer relationship management (CRM) and OLAP systems, to a web-based environment. Similarly, real-time data fed from manufacturing plants are now helping floor managers make decisions regarding production adjustment to ensure that high-quality products are produced and delivered. Web-based DSS are being employed by organizations as decision aids for employees as well as customers. A common usage of Web-based DSS has been to assist customers configure product and service according to their needs. These systems allow individual customers to design their own products by choosing from a menu of attributes, components, prices and delivery options. The Intelligent Decision-making Technologies (IDT) domain is a fast growing area of research that integrates various aspects of computer science and information systems. This includes intelligent systems, intelligent technology, intelligent agents, artificial intelligence, fuzzy logic, neural networks, machine learning, knowledge discovery, computational intelligence, data science, big data analytics, inference engines, recommender systems or engines, and a variety of related disciplines. Innovative applications that emerge using IDT often have a significant impact on decision-making processes in government, industry, business, and academia in general. This is particularly pronounced in finance, accounting, healthcare, computer networks, real-time safety monitoring and crisis response systems. Similarly, IDT is commonly used in military decision-making systems, security, marketing, stock market prediction, and robotics. Even though lots of research studies have been conducted on Decision Support Systems, a systematic analysis on the subject is still missing. Because of this necessity, this paper has been prepared to search recent articles about the DSS. The literature has been deeply reviewed and by classifying previous studies according to their preferences, taxonomy for DSS has been prepared. With the aid of the taxonomic review and the recent developments over the subject, this study aims to analyze the future trends in decision support systems.

Keywords: decision support systems, intelligent decision-making, systematic analysis, taxonomic review

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Authors: Nursyafiqah Abdul Kahar, Niraku Rosmawati Ahmad, Hisham Mohamad, Siti Nuruljannah Mohd Marzuki

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Assessment of geotechnical properties of the subsoil is necessary for generating relevant input for the design and construction of a foundation. It is significant for the future development in the area. The focus of this research is to investigate the preliminary geotechnical properties of the uncemented sandstone from Kati formation at Puncak Iskandar, Seri Iskandar. A series of basic soil tests, oedometer and direct shear box tests were carried out to obtain the soil parameters. The uncemented sandstone of Kati Formation was found to have well-graded and poorly graded sand distribution, depending on the location where the samples were obtained. The sand grains distribution was in a range of 82%-100% while, the specific gravity of the uncemented sandstone is in the range 2.65-2.86. The preconsolidation pressure for USB3 was 990 kPa indicating that the sandstone at USB3 sample had undergone 990 kPa of overburden pressure. The angle of friction for uncemented sandstone was ranging between 23.34°-32.92°.

Keywords: geotechnical properties, Kati formation, uncemented sandstone, oedometer test; shear box test

Procedia PDF Downloads 141