Search results for: likelihood estimation

Authors: Pui Yong Leo, Normy Maziah Mohd Said

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Change of global economy landscape and business environment has led to companies’ decision to go global and enter international markets. As the companies go beyond the comfort zone (i.e. investing in the home country), it is important to ensure a comprehensive risk assessment is carried out. This paper describes a standardized approach for international investment, ensuring identification of risk, risk appetite, risk rating, risk treatment and mitigation plans for respective international investment proposal. The standardized approach is divided into three (3) stages as follows: Stage 1 – Preliminary Risk profiling; with the objective to gauge exposure to countries and high level risk factors as first level assessment. Stage 2 – Risk Parameters; with the objective to define risk appetite for the international investment from the perspective of likelihood and impact. Stage 3 – Detailed Risk Assessments; with the objectives to assess in detail any triggered elements from Stage 1, and project specific risks. The final output will include the mitigation plans for the identified risks for the total investment. Example will be given in this paper to show how comprehensive risk assessment is carried out for an international investment in power energy sector.

Keywords: international investment, mitigation plans, risk appetite, risk assessment

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Authors: Mohd Naqiuddin Bin Husri, Siti Rahmah Abd Rahman, Dalilah Abu Bakar, Dayang Izawati Abang Masli, Meilina Ong Abdullah

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A serious shortage of prime agricultural land coupled with environmental concerns inland expansion has daunted efforts to increase the national yield average. To address this issue, maximising yield per unit hectare through quality planting material is of great importance. Breeding for improved planting materials has been a continuous effort since the early days of this industry, it is time-consuming, and the likelihood of segregation within the progenies further impedes progress in this area. Incorporation of the cloning technology in oil palm breeding programmes is therefore advantageous to expedite the development of commercial elite and high-yielding planting materials. After more than 22 years of research and development through this project, reliable protocols for liquid/suspension culture systems coupled with various innovative technologies which are effective at promoting proliferation and growth of oil palm culture have been established. Subsequently, clonal palms derived from the suspension culture system were extensively studied in the field, and the results have been encouraging. Clones such as CPS1, CPS2 and a few others recorded superior performance in comparison with D x P standard crosses.

Keywords: tissue culture, suspension culture, oil palm, Elaeis guineensis

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Authors: C. Romero, R. Ortega, P. Sánchez-Camacho, P. Aguilar, V. Segur, J. Ruiz, G. Gutiérrez

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Introduction: Breast cancer is a leading cause of death in CLM. (2.8% of all deaths in women and 13,8% of deaths from tumors in womens). It is the most tumor incidence in CLM region with 26.1% from all tumours, except nonmelanoma skin (Cancer Incidence in Five Continents, Volume X, IARC). Cancer registries are a good information source to estimate cancer incidence, however the data are usually available with a lag which makes difficult their use for health managers. By contrast, mortality and survival statistics have less delay. In order to serve for resource planning and responding to this problem, a method is presented to estimate the incidence of mortality and survival data. Objectives: To estimate the incidence of breast cancer by age group in CLM in the period 1991-2013. Comparing the data obtained from the model with current incidence data. Sources: Annual number of women by single ages (National Statistics Institute). Annual number of deaths by all causes and breast cancer. (Mortality Registry CLM). The Breast cancer relative survival probability. (EUROCARE, Spanish registries data). Methods: A Weibull Parametric survival model from EUROCARE data is obtained. From the model of survival, the population and population data, Mortality and Incidence Analysis MODel (MIAMOD) regression model is obtained to estimate the incidence of cancer by age (1991-2013). Results: The resulting model is: Ix,t = Logit [const + age1*x + age2*x2 + coh1*(t – x) + coh2*(t-x)2] Where: Ix,t is the incidence at age x in the period (year) t; the value of the parameter estimates is: const (constant term in the model) = -7.03; age1 = 3.31; age2 = -1.10; coh1 = 0.61 and coh2 = -0.12. It is estimated that in 1991 were diagnosed in CLM 662 cases of breast cancer (81.51 per 100,000 women). An estimated 1,152 cases (112.41 per 100,000 women) were diagnosed in 2013, representing an increase of 40.7% in gross incidence rate (1.9% per year). The annual average increases in incidence by age were: 2.07% in women aged 25-44 years, 1.01% (45-54 years), 1.11% (55-64 years) and 1.24% (65-74 years). Cancer registries in Spain that send data to IARC declared 2003-2007 the average annual incidence rate of 98.6 cases per 100,000 women. Our model can obtain an incidence of 100.7 cases per 100,000 women. Conclusions: A sharp and steady increase in the incidence of breast cancer in the period 1991-2013 is observed. The increase was seen in all age groups considered, although it seems more pronounced in young women (25-44 years). With this method you can get a good estimation of the incidence.

Keywords: breast cancer, incidence, cancer registries, castilla-la mancha

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Authors: Fouzia Qamar, Shahida Hasnain

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The objective of the present study was to evaluate the possible role of Agrobacterium tumefaciens as a possible insect biocontrol agent. Pests selected for the present challenge were adult males of Periplaneta americana and last instar larvae of Pieris brassicae and Spodoptera litura. Different ranges of bacterial doses were selected and tested to score the mortalities of the insects after 24 hours, for the lethal dose estimation studies. Mode of application for the inoculation of the bacteria, was the microinjection technique. The evaluation of the possible entomopathogenic carrying attribute of bacterial Ti plasmid, led to the conclusion that the loss of plasmid was associated with the loss of virulence against target insects.

Keywords: agrobacterium tumefaciens, toxicity assessment, biopesticidal attribute, entomopathogenic agent

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Authors: Fei Gao, Rodolfo C. Raga Jr.

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This research proposal will ascertain the major risk factors for diabetes and to design a predictive model for risk assessment. The project aims to improve diabetes early detection and management by utilizing data science techniques, which may improve patient outcomes and healthcare efficiency. The phase relation values of each attribute were used to analyze and choose the attributes that might influence the examiner's survival probability using Diabetes Health Indicators Dataset from Kaggle’s data as the research data. We compare and evaluate eight machine learning algorithms. Our investigation begins with comprehensive data preprocessing, including feature engineering and dimensionality reduction, aimed at enhancing data quality. The dataset, comprising health indicators and medical data, serves as a foundation for training and testing these algorithms. A rigorous cross-validation process is applied, and we assess their performance using five key metrics like accuracy, precision, recall, F1-score, and area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC-ROC). After analyzing the data characteristics, investigate their impact on the likelihood of diabetes and develop corresponding risk indicators.

Keywords: diabetes, risk factors, predictive model, risk assessment, data science techniques, early detection, data analysis, Kaggle

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Authors: Geeta Kumari, Prabu Vairakannu

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Underground coal gasification (UCG) technology is an efficient and an economic in-situ clean coal technology, which converts unmineable coals into calorific valuable gases. This technology avoids ash disposal, coal mining, and storage problems. CO₂ gas can be a potential gasifying medium for UCG. CO₂ is a greenhouse gas and, the liberation of this gas to the atmosphere from thermal power plant industries leads to global warming. Hence, the capture and reutilization of CO₂ gas are crucial for clean energy production. However, the reactivity of high ash Indian coals with CO₂ needs to be assessed. In the present study, two varieties of Indian coals (low ash and high ash) are used for thermogravimetric analyses (TGA). Two low ash north east Indian coals (LAC) and a typical high ash Indian coal (HAC) are procured from the coal mines of India. Low ash coal with 9% ash (LAC-1) and 4% ash (LAC-2) and high ash coal (HAC) with 42% ash are used for the study. TGA studies are carried out to evaluate the activation energy for pyrolysis and gasification of coal under N₂ and CO₂ atmosphere. Coats and Redfern method is used to estimate the activation energy of coal under different temperature regimes. Volumetric model is assumed for the estimation of the activation energy. The activation energy estimated under different temperature range. The inherent properties of coals play a major role in their reactivity. The results show that the activation energy decreases with the decrease in the inherent percentage of coal ash due to the ash layer hindrance. A reverse trend was observed with volatile matter. High volatile matter of coal leads to the estimation of low activation energy. It was observed that the activation energy under CO₂ atmosphere at 400-600°C is less as compared to N₂ inert atmosphere. At this temperature range, it is estimated that 15-23% reduction in the activation energy under CO₂ atmosphere. This shows the reactivity of CO₂ gas with higher hydrocarbons of the coal volatile matters. The reactivity of CO₂ with the volatile matter of coal might occur through dry reforming reaction in which CO₂ reacts with higher hydrocarbon, aromatics of the tar content. The observed trend of Ea in the temperature range of 150-200˚C and 400-600˚C is HAC > LAC-1 >LAC-2 in both N₂ and CO₂ atmosphere. At the temperature range of 850-1000˚C, higher activation energy is estimated when compared to those values in the temperature range of 400-600°C. Above 800°C, char gasification through Boudouard reaction progressed under CO₂ atmosphere. It was observed that 8-20 kJ/mol of activation energy is increased during char gasification above 800°C compared to volatile matter pyrolysis between the temperature ranges of 400-600°C. The overall activation energy of the coals in the temperature range of 30-1000˚C is higher in N₂ atmosphere than CO₂ atmosphere. It can be concluded that higher hydrocarbons such as tar effectively undergoes cracking and reforming reactions in presence of CO₂. Thus, CO₂ gas is beneficial for the production of high calorific value syngas using high ash Indian coals.

Keywords: clean coal technology, CO₂ gasification, activation energy, underground coal gasification

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Authors: Sanjay Saraf

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The oral cavity can be the site for early manifestations of mucocutaneous disorders (MD) or the only site for occurrence of these disorders. It can also exhibit oral lesions with simultaneous associated skin lesions. The MD involving the oral mucosa commonly presents with signs such as ulcers, vesicles and bullae. The unique environment of the oral cavity may modify these signs of the disease, thereby making the clinical diagnosis an arduous task. In addition to the unique environment of oral cavity, the overlapping of the signs of various mucocutaneous disorders, also makes the clinical diagnosis more intricate. The aim of this review is to present the oral signs of dermatological disorders having common oral involvement and emphasize their importance in early detection of the systemic disorders. The aim is also to highlight the necessity of oral examination by a dermatologist while examining the skin lesions. Prior to the oral examination, it must be imperative for the dermatologists and the dental clinicians to have the knowledge of oral anatomy. It is also important to know the impact of various diseases on oral mucosa, and the characteristic features of various oral mucocutaneous lesions. An initial clinical oral examination is may help in the early diagnosis of the MD. Failure to identify the oral manifestations may reduce the likelihood of early treatment and lead to more serious problems. This paper reviews the oral manifestations of immune mediated dermatological disorders with common oral manifestations.

Keywords: dermatological investigations, genodermatosis, histological features, oral examination

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Authors: Heba Abdelmotaal

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This paper explores the impact of the extent of a company's environmental, social, and governance (ESG) disclosure on credit rating and capital structure. The analysis is based on a sample of 202 firms from the 350 FTSE firms over the period of 2008-2013. ESG disclosure score is measured using Proprietary Bloomberg score based on the extent of a company's Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) disclosure. The credit rating is measured by The QuiScore, which is a measure of the likelihood that a company will become bankrupt in the twelve months following the date of calculation. The Capital Structure is measured by long term debt ratio. Two hypotheses are test using panel data regression. The results suggested that the higher degree of ESG disclosure leads to better credit rating. There is significant negative relationship between ESG disclosure and the long term debit percentage. The paper includes implications for the transparency which is resulting of the ESG disclosure could support the Monitoring Function. The monitoring role of disclosure is the increasing in the transparency of the credit rating agencies, also it could affect on managers’ actions. This study provides empirical evidence on the material of ESG disclosure on credit ratings changes and the firms’ capital decision making.

Keywords: capital structure, credit rating agencies, ESG disclosure, panel data regression

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Authors: Ting-Yu Hsu, Shyu-Yu Wu, Shieh-Kung Huang, Hung-Wei Chiang, Kung-Chun Lu, Pei-Yang Lin, Kuo-Liang Wen

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Regional earthquake early warning (EEW) systems are not suitable for Taiwan, as most destructive seismic hazards arise due to in-land earthquakes. These likely cause the lead-time provided by regional EEW systems before a destructive earthquake wave arrives to become null. On the other hand, an on-site EEW system can provide more lead-time at a region closer to an epicenter, since only seismic information of the target site is required. Instead of leveraging the information of several stations, the on-site system extracts some P-wave features from the first few seconds of vertical ground acceleration of a single station and performs a prediction of the oncoming earthquake intensity at the same station according to these features. Since seismometers could be triggered by non-earthquake events such as a passing of a truck or other human activities, to reduce the likelihood of false alarms, a seismometer was installed at three different locations on the same site and the performance of the EEW system for these three sensor locations were discussed. The results show that the location on the ground of the first floor of a school building maybe a good choice, since the false alarms could be reduced and the cost for installation and maintenance is the lowest.

Keywords: earthquake early warning, on-site, seismometer location, support vector machine

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Authors: Quiza Pearl Senilla, Hannah Mercado, Francis Angelo Erosa

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Underdog narratives not only provides viewers with models of determination and hard work but that inducing hope may increase the likelihood that viewers will pursue their own goals in life. Although it has been proven that underdog narratives not only create a positive motivational state to the viewers but can also induce hope, little attention has been given to know if this underdog narrative affect the health outcomes or the subjective well-being of the viewers and if their hopefulness mediates on it. To address this gap, using underdog narratives as a predictor and hope as mediator, this study determined the effect of underdog narratives to the subjective well-being of the respondents, the relationship of hope and subjective well-being and last is the mediating effect of hopefulness. This study is an experimental research that uses a between subject design. Purposeful random sampling was used wherein the respondents must meet the following criteria to be part of the study. One hundred and twenty (N=120) Local State University students were assigned to different treatment conditions— underdog narrative, comedy, nature scenes—and a no exposure control group. Results show that there is a minimal difference on the subjective well-being of the respondents when exposed to different treatment condition although it is not significant. A moderate positive correlation between hope and subjective well-being also reveals in this study. And last the result also shows that there is no mediating effect of hopefulness to the subjective well-being of the subjects through exposure to underdog narrative.

Keywords: hope, hope theory, subjective well-being, underdog narratives

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Authors: Ariful Islam, Showkat Ahmad Lone

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Statistical distributions have long been employed in the assessment of semiconductor devices and product reliability. The power function-distribution is one of the most important distributions in the modern reliability practice and can be frequently preferred over mathematically more complex distributions, such as the Weibull and the lognormal, because of its simplicity. Moreover, it may exhibit a better fit for failure data and provide more appropriate information about reliability and hazard rates in some circumstances. This study deals with estimating information about failure times of items under step-stress partially accelerated life tests for competing risk based on adoptive type-I progressive hybrid censoring criteria. The life data of the units under test is assumed to follow Mukherjee-Islam distribution. The point and interval maximum-likelihood estimations are obtained for distribution parameters and tampering coefficient. The performances of the resulting estimators of the developed model parameters are evaluated and investigated by using a simulation algorithm.

Keywords: adoptive progressive hybrid censoring, competing risk, mukherjee-islam distribution, partially accelerated life testing, simulation study

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Authors: J. Valach, S. Pospisil, S. Kuznecov

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The paper deals with experimental estimation of future environmental load on medieval mosaic of Last Judgement on entrance to St. Vitus cathedral on Prague castle. The mosaic suffers from seasonal changes of weather pattern, as well as rains, their acidity, deposition of dust and sooth particles from polluted air and also from freeze-thaw cycles. These phenomena influence state of the mosaic. The mosaic elements, tesserae are mostly made from glass prone to weathering. To estimate future procedure of the best maintenance, relation between various weather scenarios and their effect on the mosaic was investigated. At the same time local method for evaluation of protective coating was developed. Together both methods will contribute to better care for the mosaic and also visitors aesthetical experience.

Keywords: environmental load, cultural heritage, glass mosaic, protection

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Authors: Hee Soo Kim, Ha Young Kyung

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Happiness and pleasure are a result of dopamine, oxytocin, serotonin, and endorphin levels in the body. In order to increase the four neurochemical levels, it is important to associate daily activities with its corresponding neurochemical releases. This includes setting goals, maintaining social relationships, laughing frequently, and exercising regularly. The likelihood of experiencing happiness increases when all four neurochemicals are released at the optimal level. The achievement of happiness is important because it increases healthiness, productivity, and the ability to overcome adversity. To process emotions, electrical brain waves, brain structure, and neurochemicals must be analyzed. This research uses Chemcraft and Avogadro to determine the theoretical and chemical properties of the four neurochemical molecules. Each neurochemical molecule’s thermodynamic stability is calculated to observe the efficiency of the molecules. The study found that among dopamine, oxytocin, serotonin, alpha-, beta-, and gamma-endorphin, beta-endorphin has the lowest optimized energy of 388.510 kJ/mol. Beta-endorphin, a neurotransmitter involved in mitigating pain and stress, is the most thermodynamically stable and efficient molecule that is involved in the process of happiness. Through examining such properties of happiness neurotransmitters, the science of happiness is better understood.

Keywords: happiness, neurotransmitters, positive psychology, dopamine, oxytocin, serotonin, endorphins

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Authors: Sumit Roy, A. Uddin

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One of the significant reasons that increase the delay time in the intersections at heterogeneous traffic condition is a sudden reduction of the capacity of the roads. In this study, the delay for this sudden capacity reduction is estimated. Two intersections at Dhaka city were brought in to thestudy, i.e., Kakrail intersection, and SAARC Foara intersection. At Kakrail intersection, the sudden reduction of capacity in the roads is seen at three downstream legs of the intersection, which are because of slowing down or stopping of buses for loading and unloading of passengers. At SAARC Foara intersection, sudden reduction of capacity was seen at two downstream legs. At one leg, it was due to loading and unloading of buses, and at another leg, it was for both loading and unloading of buses and reduction of the number of lanes. With these considerations, the delay due to intentional stoppage or slowing down of buses and reduction of the number of lanes for these two intersections are estimated. Here the delay was calculated by two approaches. The first approach came from the concept of shock waves in traffic streams. Here the delay was calculated by determining the flow, density, and speed before and after the sudden capacity reduction. The second approach came from the deterministic analysis of queues. Here the delay is calculated by determining the volume, capacity and reduced capacity of the road. After determining the delay from these two approaches, the results were compared. For this study, the video of each of the two intersections was recorded for one hour at the evening peak. Necessary geometric data were also taken to determine speed, flow, and density, etc. parameters. The delay was calculated for one hour with one-hour data at both intersections. In case of Kakrail intersection, the per hour delay for Kakrail circle leg was 5.79, and 7.15 minutes, for Shantinagar cross intersection leg they were 13.02 and 15.65 minutes, and for Paltan T intersection leg, they were 3 and 1.3 minutes for 1st and 2nd approaches respectively. In the case of SAARC Foara intersection, the delay at Shahbag leg was only due to intentional stopping or slowing down of busses, which were 3.2 and 3 minutes respectively for both approaches. For the Karwan Bazar leg, the delays for buses by both approaches were 5 and 7.5 minutes respectively, and for reduction of the number of lanes, the delays for both approaches were 2 and 1.78 minutes respectively. Measuring the delay per hour for the Kakrail leg at Kakrail circle, it is seen that, with consideration of the first approach of delay estimation, the intentional stoppage and lowering of speed by buses contribute to 26.24% of total delay at Kakrail circle. If the loading and unloading of buses at intersection is made forbidden near intersection, and any other measures for loading and unloading of passengers are established far enough from the intersections, then the delay at intersections can be reduced at significant scale, and the performance of the intersections can be enhanced.

Keywords: delay, deterministic queue analysis, shock wave, passenger loading-unloading

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Authors: Zeinab Yazdanfar, Dilan Robert, Daniel Lester, S. Setunge

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Scour has been identified as the most common threat to bridge stability worldwide. Traditionally, scour around bridge piers is calculated using the empirical approaches that have considerable limitations and are difficult to generalize. The multi-physic nature of scouring which involves turbulent flow, soil mechanics and solid-fluid interactions cannot be captured by simple empirical equations developed based on limited laboratory data. These limitations can be overcome by direct numerical modeling of coupled hydro-mechanical scour process that provides a robust prediction of bridge scour and valuable insights into the scour process. Several numerical models have been proposed in the literature for bridge scour estimation including Eulerian flow models and coupled Euler-Lagrange models incorporating an empirical sediment transport description. However, the contact forces between particles and the flow-particle interaction haven’t been taken into consideration. Incorporating collisional and frictional forces between soil particles as well as the effect of flow-driven forces on particles will facilitate accurate modeling of the complex nature of scour. In this study, a coupled Computational Fluid Dynamics and Discrete Element Model (CFD-DEM) has been developed to simulate the scour process that directly models the hydro-mechanical interactions between the sediment particles and the flowing water. This approach obviates the need for an empirical description as the fundamental fluid-particle, and particle-particle interactions are fully resolved. The sediment bed is simulated as a dense pack of particles and the frictional and collisional forces between particles are calculated, whilst the turbulent fluid flow is modeled using a Reynolds Averaged Navier Stocks (RANS) approach. The CFD-DEM model is validated against experimental data in order to assess the reliability of the CFD-DEM model. The modeling results reveal the criticality of particle impact on the assessment of scour depth which, to the authors’ best knowledge, hasn’t been considered in previous studies. The results of this study open new perspectives to the scour depth and time assessment which is the key to manage the failure risk of bridge infrastructures.

Keywords: bridge scour, discrete element method, CFD-DEM model, multi-phase model

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Authors: Dang Thuy Binh, Truong Thi Oanh, Le Phan Khanh Hung, Luong thi Tuong Vy

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One of the greatest environmental challenges facing Asia is the management and conservation of the marine biodiversity threaten by fisheries overexploitation, pollution, habitat destruction, and climate change. To date, a few molecular taxonomical studies has been conducted on marine fauna in Vietnam. The purpose of this study was to clarify the phylogeny of economic and ecological reef fish species in Vietnam Reef fish species covering Labridae, Scaridae, Nemipteridae, Serranidae, Acanthuridae, Lutjanidae, Lethrinidae, Mullidae, Balistidae, Pseudochromidae, Pinguipedidae, Fistulariidae, Holocentridae, Synodontidae, and Pomacentridae representing 28 genera were collected from South and Center, Vietnam. Combine with Genbank sequences, a phylogenetic tree was constructed based on 16S gene of mitochondrial DNA using maximum parsimony, maximum likelihood, and Bayesian inference approaches. The phylogram showed the well-resolved clades at genus and family level. Perciformes is the major order of reef fish species in Vietnam. The monophyly of Perciformes is not strongly supported as it was clustered in the same clade with Tetraodontiformes syngnathiformes and Beryciformes. Continue sampling of commercial fish species and classification based on morphology and genetics to build DNA barcoding of fish species in Vietnam is really necessary.

Keywords: reef fish, 16s rDNA, Vietnam, phylogeny

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Authors: Mohammed Bakhit Kashoob, Mohammed Salim Al-Maashani, Ahmed Abdullah Al-Marhoon

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The use of Geographic Information System (GIS) tools in the analysis of traffic crash data can help to identify locations or hotspots with high instances or risk of traffic crashes. The identification of traffic crash hotspots can effectively improve road safety measures. Mapping of road traffic crash hotspots can help the concerned authorities to give priority and take targeted measures and improvements to the road structure at these locations to reduce traffic crashes and fatalities. In Oman, there are countless rural roads that have more risks for traveling vehicles compared to urban roads. The likelihood of traffic crashes as well as fatality rate may increase with the presence of risks that are associated with the rural type of community. In this paper, the traffic crash hotspots on rural roads in Oman are specified using spatial analysis methods in GIS and traffic crash data. These hotspots are ranked based on the frequency of traffic crash occurrence (i.e., number of traffic crashes) and the rate of fatalities. The result of this study presents a map visualization of locations on rural roads with high traffic crashes and high fatalities rates.

Keywords: road safety, rural roads, traffic crash, GIS tools

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Authors: Keven A. Prusak, William F. Christensen, Zack Beddoes

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Background: For more than a decade, the Sport Motivation Scale (SMS) has been used to measure contextual motivation across a variety of sporting and physical education (PE) settings but not without criticism as to its tenability. Consequently, a new version of the sport motivation scale (SMS-II) was created to address certain weakness of the original SMS. Purpose: The purpose of this study is to assess the suitability of the SMS-II in the secondary PE setting. Methods: Three hundred and twenty (204 females, and 116 males; grades 7-9) completed the 18-item, six-subscale SMS-II at the end of a required PE class. Factor means, standard deviations, and correlations were calculated and further examined via confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). Model parameters were estimated maximum likelihood function. Results: Results indicate that participants held generally positive perceptions toward PE as a context (more so for males than females). Reliability analysis yielded adequate alphas (rα = 0.71 to 0.87, Mα = 0.78) with the exception of the AM subscale (αAM = .64). Correlation analysis indicated some support for the SIMPLEX pattern, but distal ends of the motivation continuum displayed no relationship. CFA yielded robust fit indices to the proposed structure of the SMS-II for PE. A small but significant variance across genders was noted and discussed. Conclusions: In all, the SMS-II suitably accesses PE context-specific motivational indices within Jr. High PE.

Keywords: motivation, self-determination theory, physical education, confirmatory factor analysis

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Authors: Ishapathik Das

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The purpose of this article is to find a method of comparing designs for ordinal regression models using quantile dispersion graphs in the presence of linear predictor misspecification. The true relationship between response variable and the corresponding control variables are usually unknown. Experimenter assumes certain form of the linear predictor of the ordinal regression models. The assumed form of the linear predictor may not be correct always. Thus, the maximum likelihood estimates (MLE) of the unknown parameters of the model may be biased due to misspecification of the linear predictor. In this article, the uncertainty in the linear predictor is represented by an unknown function. An algorithm is provided to estimate the unknown function at the design points where observations are available. The unknown function is estimated at all points in the design region using multivariate parametric kriging. The comparison of the designs are based on a scalar valued function of the mean squared error of prediction (MSEP) matrix, which incorporates both variance and bias of the prediction caused by the misspecification in the linear predictor. The designs are compared using quantile dispersion graphs approach. The graphs also visually depict the robustness of the designs on the changes in the parameter values. Numerical examples are presented to illustrate the proposed methodology.

Keywords: model misspecification, multivariate kriging, multivariate logistic link, ordinal response models, quantile dispersion graphs

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Authors: Ahmet Y. Arabul, Ibrahim Senol, Fatma Keskin Arabul, Mustafa G. Aydeniz, Yasemin Oner, Gokhan Kalkan

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In the standards of IEC 60076-2 and IEC 60076-7, three different hot-spot temperature estimation methods are suggested. In this study, the algorithms which used in hot-spot temperature calculations are analyzed by comparing the algorithms with the results of an experimental set-up made by a Transformer Monitoring System (TMS) in use. In tested system, TMS uses only top oil temperature and load ratio for hot-spot temperature calculation. And also, it uses some constants from standards which are on agreed statements tables. During the tests, it came out that hot-spot temperature calculation method is just making a simple calculation and not uses significant all other variables that could affect the hot-spot temperature.

Keywords: Hot-spot temperature, monitoring system, power transformer, smart grid

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Authors: Qian Zhao, Shi-Qi Liu, Bo Guo, Zhi-Jun Cheng, Xiao-Yue Wu

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Cold standby redundancy is considered to be an effective mechanism for improving system reliability and is widely used in industrial engineering. However, because of the complexity of the reliability structure, there is little literature studying on the residual life of cold standby system consisting of complex components. In this paper, a simulation method is presented to predict the residual life of k-out-of-n cold standby system. In practical cases, failure information of a system is either unknown, partly unknown or completely known. Our proposed method is designed to deal with the three scenarios, respectively. Differences between the procedures are analyzed. Finally, numerical examples are used to validate the proposed simulation method.

Keywords: cold standby system, k-out-of-n, residual life, simulation sampling

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Authors: Priti S. Tidke, Chandragouda R. Patil

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The present study was designed to investigate the effect of Magnesia phosphorica, a biochemical medicine on urine screeing, biochemical, histopathological, and electron microscopic images in ethylene glycol induced nepholithiasis in rats.Male Wistar albino rats were divided into six groups and were orally administered saline once daily (IR-sham and IR-control) or Magnesia phosphorica 100 mg/kg twice daily for 24 days.The effect of various dilutions of biochemical Mag phos3x, 6x, 30x was determined on urine output by comparing the urine volume collected by keeping individual animals in metabolic cages. Calcium oxalate urolithiasis and hyperoxaluria in male Wistar rats was induced by oral administration of 0.75% Ethylene glycol p.o. daily for 24 days. Simultaneous administration of biochemical 3x, 6x, 30xMag phos (100mg/kg p.o. twice a day) along with ethylene glycol significantly decreased calcium oxalate, urea, creatinine, Calcium, Magnesium, Chloride, Phosphorus, Albumin, Alkaline Phosphatase content in urine compared with vehicle-treated control group.After the completion of treatment period animals were sacrificed, kidneys were removed and subjected to microscopic examination for possible stone formation. Histological estimation of kidney treated with biochemical Mag phos (3x, 6x, 30xMag phos 100 mg/kg, p.o.) along with ethylene glycol inhibited the growth of calculi and reduced the number of stones in kidney compared with control group. Biochemical Mag phos of 3x dilution and its crude equivalent also showed potent diuretic and antiurolithiatic activity in ethylene glycol induced urolithiasis. A significant decrease in the weight of stones was observed after treatment in animals which received biochemical Mag phos of 3x dilution and its crude equivalent in comparison with control groups. From this study, it can be proposed that the 3x dilution of biochemical Mag phos exhibits a significant inhibitory effect on crystal growth, with the improvement of kidney function and substantiates claims on the biological activity of twelve tissue remedies which can be proved scientifically through laboratory animal studies.

Keywords: Mag phos, Magnesia phosphorica, ciochemic medicine, urolithiasis, kidney stone, ethylene glycol

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Authors: Somveer Singh, Vineet Kumar Singh

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We present a new model based on viscoelasticity for the Non-Newtonian fluids.We use a matrix formulated algorithm to approximate solutions of a class of partial integro-differential equations with the given initial and boundary conditions. Some numerical results are presented to simplify application of operational matrix formulation and reduce the computational cost. Convergence analysis, error estimation and numerical stability of the method are also investigated. Finally, some test examples are given to demonstrate accuracy and efficiency of the proposed method.

Keywords: Legendre Wavelets, operational matrices, partial integro-differential equation, viscoelasticity

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Authors: Neveen AlQasas, Daniel Johnson

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Membranes for water treatment are an established technology that attracts great attention due to its simplicity and cost effectiveness. However, membranes in operation suffer from the adverse effect of membrane fouling. Bio-fouling is a phenomenon that occurs at the water-membrane interface, and is a dynamic process that is initiated by the adsorption of dissolved organic material, including biomacromolecules, on the membrane surface. After initiation, attachment of microorganisms occurs, followed by biofilm growth. The biofilm blocks the pores of the membrane and consequently results in reducing the water flux. Moreover, the presence of a fouling layer can have a substantial impact on the membrane separation properties. Understanding the mechanism of the initiation phase of biofouling is a key point in eliminating the biofouling on membrane surfaces. The adhesion and attachment of different fouling materials is affected by the surface properties of the membrane materials. Therefore, surface properties of different polymeric materials had been studied in terms of their surface energies and Hansen solubility parameters (HSP). The difference between the combined HSP parameters (HSP distance) allows prediction of the affinity of two materials to each other. The possibilities of measuring the HSP of different polymer films via surface measurements, such as contact angle has been thoroughly investigated. Knowing the HSP of a membrane material and the HSP of a specific foulant, facilitate the estimation of the HSP distance between the two, and therefore the strength of attachment to the surface. Contact angle measurements using fourteen different solvents on five different polymeric films were carried out using the sessile drop method. Solvents were ranked as good or bad solvents using different ranking method and ranking was used to calculate the HSP of each polymeric film. Results clearly indicate the absence of a direct relation between contact angle values of each film and the HSP distance between each polymer film and the solvents used. Therefore, estimating HSP via contact angle alone is not sufficient. However, it was found if the surface tensions and viscosities of the used solvents are taken in to the account in the analysis of the contact angle values, a prediction of the HSP from contact angle measurements is possible. This was carried out via training of a neural network model. The trained neural network model has three inputs, contact angle value, surface tension and viscosity of solvent used. The model is able to predict the HSP distance between the used solvent and the tested polymer (material). The HSP distance prediction is further used to estimate the total and individual HSP parameters of each tested material. The results showed an accuracy of about 90% for all the five studied films

Keywords: surface characterization, hansen solubility parameter estimation, contact angle measurements, artificial neural network model, surface measurements

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Authors: Rui Teixeira, Alan O’Connor, Maria Nogal

Abstract:

The statistical theory of extreme events is progressively a topic of growing interest in all the fields of science and engineering. The changes currently experienced by the world, economic and environmental, emphasized the importance of dealing with extreme occurrences with improved accuracy. When it comes to the design of offshore structures, particularly offshore wind turbines, the importance of efficiently characterizing extreme events is of major relevance. Extreme events are commonly characterized by extreme values theory. As an alternative, the accurate modeling of the tails of statistical distributions and the characterization of the low occurrence events can be achieved with the application of the Peak-Over-Threshold (POT) methodology. The POT methodology allows for a more refined fit of the statistical distribution by truncating the data with a minimum value of a predefined threshold u. For mathematically approximating the tail of the empirical statistical distribution the Generalised Pareto is widely used. Although, in the case of the exceedances of significant wave data (H_s) the 2 parameters Weibull and the Exponential distribution, which is a specific case of the Generalised Pareto distribution, are frequently used as an alternative. The Generalized Pareto, despite the existence of practical cases where it is applied, is not completely recognized as the adequate solution to model exceedances over a certain threshold u. References that set the Generalised Pareto distribution as a secondary solution in the case of significant wave data can be identified in the literature. In this framework, the current study intends to tackle the discussion of the application of statistical models to characterize exceedances of wave data. Comparison of the application of the Generalised Pareto, the 2 parameters Weibull and the Exponential distribution are presented for different values of the threshold u. Real wave data obtained in four buoys along the Irish coast was used in the comparative analysis. Results show that the application of the statistical distributions to characterize significant wave data needs to be addressed carefully and in each particular case one of the statistical models mentioned fits better the data than the others. Depending on the value of the threshold u different results are obtained. Other variables of the fit, as the number of points and the estimation of the model parameters, are analyzed and the respective conclusions were drawn. Some guidelines on the application of the POT method are presented. Modeling the tail of the distributions shows to be, for the present case, a highly non-linear task and, due to its growing importance, should be addressed carefully for an efficient estimation of very low occurrence events.

Keywords: extreme events, offshore structures, peak-over-threshold, significant wave data

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Authors: Sadam Alwadi

Abstract:

Outlier values become a problem that frequently occurs in the data observation or recording process. Thus, the need for data imputation has become an essential matter. In this work, it will make use of the methods described in the prior work to detect the outlier values based on a collection of stock market data. In order to implement the detection and find some solutions that maybe helpful for investors, real closed price data were obtained from the Amman Stock Exchange (ASE). Tukey and Maximum Overlapping Discrete Wavelet Transform (MODWT) methods will be used to impute the detect the outlier values.

Keywords: outlier values, imputation, stock market data, detecting, estimation

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Authors: Rami S. Alasmari, Abdullah Al Zahrani, Hattan A. Hassani, Hattan A. Hassani, Nawwaf A. Almalky, Abdullah F. Bokhari, Alwalied A. Hafez

Abstract:

Diabetes mellitus type 2 (DMT2) is a major chronic condition that is considered common among elderly people, with multiple potential complications that could contribute to falls. However, this concept is not well understood, thus, the aim of this study is to determine whether diabetes is an independent risk factor for falls in elderly. In this observational cross-sectional study, 309 diabetic patients aged 60 or more who visited the primary healthcare centers of the Ministry of National Guard Health Affairs in Jeddah were chosen via convenience sampling method. To collect the data, Semi-structured Fall Risk Assessment questionnaire and Fall Efficacy Score scale were used. The mean age of the participants was estimated to be 68.5 (SD:7.4) years. Among the participants, 48.2% experienced falling before, and 63.1% of them suffered falls in the past 12-months. The results showed that gait problems were independently associated with a higher likelihood of fall among the elderly patients (OR = 1.98, 95%CI, 1.08 to 3.62, p = 0.026. This paper suggests that diabetes mellitus is an independent fall risk factor among elderly. Therefore, identifying such patients as being at higher risk and prompt referral to a specialist falls clinic is recommended.

Keywords: diabetes, fall, elderly, risk factors

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Authors: Garry A. Einicke, Langford B. White

Abstract:

This paper describes an optimum filter and smoother for recovering a Markov process message from noisy measurements. The developments follow from an equivalence between a state space model and a hidden Markov chain. The ensuing filter and smoother employ transition probability matrices and approximate probability distribution vectors. The properties of the optimum solutions are retained, namely, the estimates are unbiased and minimize the variance of the output estimation error, provided that the assumed parameter set are correct. Methods for estimating unknown parameters from noisy measurements are discussed. Signal recovery examples are described in which performance benefits are demonstrated at an increased calculation cost.

Keywords: optimal filtering, smoothing, Markov chains

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Authors: Bo Liu, Chi-Man Pun

Abstract:

A novel technique for digital forgery detection by signal noise inconsistency is proposed in this paper. The forged area spliced from the other picture contains some features which may be inconsistent with the rest part of the image. Noise pattern and the level is a possible factor to reveal such inconsistency. To detect such noise discrepancies, the test picture is initially segmented into small pieces. The noise pattern and level of each segment are then estimated by using various filters. The noise features constructed in this step are utilized in energy-based graph cut to expose forged area in the final step. Experimental results show that our method provides a good illustration of regions with noise inconsistency in various scenarios.

Keywords: forgery detection, splicing forgery, noise estimation, noise

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Authors: Musa Mayanja Lwanga, Annet Adong

Abstract:

This study provides a micro perspective on the impact of mobile money services on individual’s saving behavior using the 2013 Uganda FinScope data. Results show that although saving through the mobile phone is not a common practice in Uganda, being a registered mobile money user increases the likelihood to save with mobile money. Saving using mobile is more prevalent in urban areas and in Kampala and Central region compared to other regions. This can be explained by: first, rural dwellers tend on average to have lower incomes and thus have lower to saving compared to the urban counterpart. Similarly, residents of Kampala tend to have higher incomes and thus high savings compared to residents of other regions. Secondly, poor infrastructure in rural areas in terms of lack of electricity and poor telecommunication network coverage may limit the use of mobile phones and consequently the use of mobile money as a saving mechanism. Overall, the use of mobile money as a saving mechanism is still very low and this could be partly explained by limitations in the legislation that does not incorporate mobile finance services into mobile money. The absence of interest payments on mobile money savings may act as a disincentive to save through this mechanism. Given the emerging mobile banking services, there is a need to create more awareness and the need for enhanced synergies between telecom companies and commercial banks.

Keywords: financial inclusion, mobile money, savings, Uganda

Procedia PDF Downloads 271