Search results for: audit quality control

Authors: Ammal M. Metwally, Lobna A. ElEtreby, Rehan M. Saleh, Ghada Abdrabou, Somia I. Salama, Amira Orabi, Mohamed Abdelrahman

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Hepatitis C virus infection is a public health threat in Egypt. To control infection, efforts should be spent to encourage healthy behavior. This study aimed to assess the level of behavioral development in order to create a positive environment for the adoption of the recommended behaviors. The study was conducted over one year from Jan. 2011 till Jan. 2012. Knowledge, attitude and behavior of 540 HCV patients and 102 of their contacts were assessed and the level of behavioral development was determined. The study revealed that the majority of patients and contacts knew that HCV infection is dangerous with perceived concern for early diagnosis and treatment. More than 75% knew the correct modes of transmission. The assessment showed positive attitudes towards the recommended practices with the intention to adopt those practices. Strategies to create opportunities to continue the recommended behaviors should be adopted together with the reinforcement of social support.

Keywords: hepatitis C virus, level of behavioral development, recommended behaviors

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Authors: Sonakshi Saxena, Moosath Harishankar Vasudevan

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The current study seeks to investigate the differences in the psychological impact of movies in their original and translated versions. International cinema is exemplar of the success of globalization. The multitude of languages in the global village does not seem to impede the common cinematic goal of filmmakers across linguistic boundaries. To understand, hence, whether the psychological impact of movies, intentional or otherwise, is preserved when the original is translated into a different language, an experimental design was adopted. Multilingual participants in the age group 18-25 years were recruited for the same. A control group and an experimental group were randomly assigned and the psychological impacts of movies were studied under two conditions- a) watching the movie in its original language, and b) watching the movie in its original language as well as translated version. For the second condition, the experimental group was further divided into two groups randomly to balance order effects. The major aspects of psychological impact assessed were emotional impact and attitude towards the movie. The scores were compared for the two groups. It is further discussed whether the experience is salient across language or do languages inherently possess the ability to alter experiences of the audience.

Keywords: experimental design, movies, psychological impact, translation

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Authors: Salwana Hassan, Rashidah Abdul Rahman

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Poverty in rural Malaysia remains unresolved and contribute 7.8% to the whole poverty figure in Malaysia. Among the rural folks, 50% is women. Thus, women, as the significant human capital to fight the long lost battle of poverty , is indispensable. This will also serve as an equal opportunity for women to play active and positive roles to develop the society that has been the tasks for men all this while. More importantly rural women folks have the potential to offer better quality of life for their family by providing extra income and monetary support whenever their husbands are not able to work. The reality in this, however, cannot be solved easily as there are many factors that stand in the way and prevent the resolutions to be observed.In this regard, this paper describes a model that has been used to resolve such issues in rural Malaysia. The model utilizes a synergetic effort between an academic institution, an NGO that govern the rural women folks and a private trading company that sell the finished product. The project was conducted in rural area of Selangor and has been in operations since the end of 2013. It shows positive outcome and could be used in other rural areas of Malaysia. The project captures the influence of the NGO programs upon rural women entrepreneurship and how a private trading company can facilitate to help develop a community. As a result the project reveals that self-income generating activities by entrepreneurship are the important contributing factor to empowering rural women folks in Malaysia.

Keywords: poverty, empowerment, rural, entrepreneurship, community

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Authors: Huma Balouch

Abstract:

Menochilus sexmaculatus commonly known as six spotted zig zag ladybird, is an aphidophagus and the most misidentified Coccinellids due to the occurrence of numerous color variants. The correct identification of Menochilus sexmaculatus and its strains is necessary to implement the use of biological control. In the present study phenotypic and genotypic polymorphism was investigated in Menochilus sexmaculatus collected from Punjab, NWFP and Sindh provinces of Pakistan. Six different morphs of the species were distinguished by analyzing its Elytral color and spot pattern and then Polymerase Chain Reaction was used to generate random amplification of polymorphic DNA (RAPD) from six different types of Menochilus sexmaculatus. Forty primers (OPA & OPC Kit) were used to perform RAPD PCR on six different types of Menochilus sexmaculatus of which, seven primers revealed different patterns related to the Menochilus sexmaculatus types. These seven primers (OPA-04, OPA-09, OPA-18, OPC-04, OPC-12, OPC-15 and OPC-18) produced 111 clear polymorphic bands and 6 scorable strain specific markers. The cluster analysis applied to RAPD data showed high polymorphism among six types and it can be concluded that these six types are six polymorphic strains of the same species.

Keywords: Menochilus sexmaculatus, aphidophagus, coccinellids, phenotypic and genotypic polymorphism, RAPD-PCR, strain specific markers

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Authors: Hicham Amine, Abdelouahab Mesnaoui

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Electronic data interchange EDI is the computer-to-computer exchange of structured business information. This information typically takes the form of standardized electronic business documents, such as invoices, purchase orders, bills of lading, and so on. The purpose of this study is to identify the impact EDI might have on supply chain and typically on customer satisfaction keeping in mind the constraints the organization might face. This study included 139 subject matter experts (SMEs) who participated by responding to a survey that was distributed. 85% responded that they are extremely for the implementation while 10% were neutral and 5% were against the implementation. From the quality assurance department, we have got 75% from the clients agreed to move on with the change whereas 10% stayed neutral and finally 15% were against the change. From the legal department where 80% of the answers were for the implementation and 10% of the participants stayed neutral whereas the last 10% were against it. The survey consisted of 40% male and 60% female (sex-ratio (F/M=1,5), who had chosen to participate. Our survey also contained 3 categories in terms of technical background where 80% are from technical background and 15% were from nontechnical background and 5% had some average technical background. This study examines the impact of EDI on customer satisfaction which is the primary hypothesis and justifies the importance of the implementation which enhances the customer satisfaction.

Keywords: electronic data interchange, supply chain, subject matter experts, customer satisfaction

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Authors: Amira M. Attia, Karim H. Youssef, Nabil H. Abbasi

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Demand Side Management (DSM) is an essential characteristic of current and future smart grid systems. As one of DSM functions, load management aims to control customers’ total electric consumption and utility’s load factor by using various load shaping techniques. However, applying load shaping techniques such as load shifting, peak clipping, or strategic conservation individually does not provide the desired level of improvement for load factor increment and/or customer’s bill reduction. In this paper, two load shaping techniques will be simulated as constrained optimization problems. The purpose is to reflect the application of combined load shifting and strategic conservation model together at the same time, and the application of combined load shifting and peak clipping model as well. The problem will be formulated and solved by using disciplined convex programming (CVX) based MATLAB® R2013b. Simulation results will be evaluated and compared for studying the most impactful multi-techniques model in improving load curve.

Keywords: convex programing, demand side management, load shaping, multiple, building energy optimization

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Authors: Kholil, Laksanto Utomo

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The food needs of the Indonesian people will continue increase year to year due to the increase of population growth. For ensuring food securityand and resilience, the government has developed a program food self-resilience village since 2006. Food resilience is a complex system, consisting of subsystem availability, distribution and consumption of the sufficiency of food consumed both in quantity and quality. Low access, and limited assets to food sources is the dominant factor vulnerable of food. Women have a major role in supporting the productive activities of the family to meet food sufficiency and resilience. The purpose of this paper is to discuss the model of food self-resilience village wich gender responsive by using a dynamic system model. Model will be developed into 3 level: family, vilage, and regency in accordance with the concept of village food resilience model wich has been developed by ministry of agriculture. Model development based on the results of experts discussion and field study. By some scenarios and simulation models we will able to develop appropriate policy strategies for family food resilience. The result of study show that food resilience was influenced by many factors: goverment policies, technology, human resource, and in the same time it will be a feed back for goverment policies and number of poor family.

Keywords: food availability, food sufficiency, gender, model dynamic, law enfrocement

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Authors: A. Mohamed Mydeen, Pallapa Venkataram

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The learning process needs to be so pervasive to impart the quality in acquiring the knowledge about a subject by making use of the advancement in the field of information and communication systems. However, pervasive learning paradigms designed so far are system automation types and they lack in factual pervasive realm. Providing factual pervasive realm requires subtle ways of teaching and learning with system intelligence. Augmentation of intelligence with pervasive learning necessitates the most efficient way of representing knowledge for the system in order to give the right learning material to the learner. This paper presents a method of representing knowledge for Pervasive Toolroom Maintenance System (PTMS) in which a learner acquires sublime knowledge about the various kinds of tools kept in the toolroom and also helps for effective maintenance of the toolroom. First, we explicate the generic model of knowledge representation for PTMS. Second, we expound the knowledge representation for specific cases of toolkits in PTMS. We have also presented the conceptual view of knowledge representation using ontology for both generic and specific cases. Third, we have devised the relations for pervasive knowledge in PTMS. Finally, events are identified in PTMS which are then linked with pervasive data of toolkits based on relation formulated. The experimental environment and case studies show the accuracy and efficient knowledge representation of toolkits in PTMS.

Keywords: knowledge representation, pervasive computing, agent technology, ECA rules

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Authors: Wooseok Song, Sunjung Park, Jongkwon Lee, Jaye Koo

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The objective of this paper is to observe the effects of injection conditions on flame structures in gas-centered swirl coaxial injector. Gaseous oxygen and liquid kerosene were used as propellants. For different injection conditions, two types of injector, which only differ in the diameter of the tangential inlet, were used in this study. In addition, oxidizer injection pressure was varied to control the combustion chamber pressure in different types of injector. In order to analyze the combustion instability intensity, the dynamic pressure was measured in both the combustion chamber and propellants lines. With the increase in differential pressure between the propellant injection pressure and the combustion chamber pressure, the combustion instability intensity increased. In addition, the flame structure was recorded using a high-speed camera to detect CH* chemiluminescence intensity. With the change in the injection conditions in the gas-centered swirl coaxial injector, the flame structure changed.

Keywords: liquid rocket engine, flame structure, combustion instability, dynamic pressure

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Authors: Mohsen Mazidi, Ali Abbaspour, Mahmud Fotuhi-Firuzabad, Mohamamd Rastegar

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To tackle the air pollution issues, Plug-in Hybrid Electric Vehicles (PHEVs) are proposed as an appropriate solution. Charging a large amount of PHEV batteries, if not controlled, would have negative impacts on the distribution system. The control process of charging of these vehicles can be centralized in parking lots that may provide a chance for better coordination than the individual charging in houses. In this paper, an optimization-based approach is proposed to determine the optimum PHEV parking capacities in candidate nodes of the distribution system. In so doing, a profile for charging and discharging of PHEVs is developed in order to flatten the network load profile. Then, this profile is used in solving an optimization problem to minimize the distribution system losses. The outputs of the proposed method are the proper place for PHEV parking lots and optimum capacity for each parking. The application of the proposed method on the IEEE-34 node test feeder verifies the effectiveness of the method.

Keywords: loss, plug-in hybrid electric vehicle (PHEV), PHEV parking lot, V2G

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Authors: Rita Magdalena, N. K. Caecar Pratiwi, Yunendah Nur Fuadah, Sofia Saidah, Bima Sakti

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Vessel segmentation of retinal fundus is important for biomedical sciences in diagnosing ailments related to the eye. Segmentation can simplify medical experts in diagnosing retinal fundus image state. Therefore, in this study, we designed a software using MATLAB which enables the segmentation of the retinal blood vessels on retinal fundus images. There are two main steps in the process of segmentation. The first step is image preprocessing that aims to improve the quality of the image to be optimum segmented. The second step is the image segmentation in order to perform the extraction process to retrieve the retina’s blood vessel from the eye fundus image. The image segmentation methods that will be analyzed in this study are Morphology Operation, Discrete Wavelet Transform and combination of both. The amount of data that used in this project is 40 for the retinal image and 40 for manually segmentation image. After doing some testing scenarios, the average accuracy for Morphology Operation method is 88.46 % while for Discrete Wavelet Transform is 89.28 %. By combining the two methods mentioned in later, the average accuracy was increased to 89.53 %. The result of this study is an image processing system that can segment the blood vessels in retinal fundus with high accuracy and low computation time.

Keywords: discrete wavelet transform, fundus retina, morphology operation, segmentation, vessel

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Authors: Bounmediene Farida, Nouani Abdelouahab, Bellal Mouloud

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The present study examined the influence of two production parameters namely genetic factor (race) and physiological factors (stage of lactation) on the composition of the traditional goat cheese made using the enzyme extract of caprine origin and commercial rennet. The results obtained show that the goat cheese of the Alpine race is richer in fat and protein than Saanen and Local breeds. Similar variations were observed depending on the stage of lactation for the third stage. Thus, analysis of the products obtained show that there is no difference in quality between the cheeses obtained with rennet and those obtained with goat coagulase. In addition, principal component analysis (PCA) made from individuals (races and stages of lactation) and variables (physicochemical parameters goat cheese) divides people into two groups: The first group includes cheeses races Alpine, Saanen and local third stages of lactation. This group corresponds to samples of the richest cheese in a useful matter. The second group includes cheeses from the three races in the second stage of lactation. This group corresponds to cheeses that have low contents in a useful matter.

Keywords: goat cheese, goat coagulase, rennet, coagulation

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Authors: Christos Chaschatzis, Chrysoula Karaiskou, Pantelis Angelidis, Sotirios K. Goudos, Igor Kotsiuba, Panagiotis Sarigiannidis

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Over the past few decades, the rapid growth of the global population has led to the need to increase agricultural production and improve the quality of agricultural goods. There is a growing focus on environmentally eco-friendly solutions, sustainable production, and biologically minimally fertilized products in contemporary society. Precision agriculture has the potential to incorporate a wide range of innovative solutions with the development of machine learning algorithms. YOLOv5 and YOLOv8 are two of the most advanced object detection algorithms capable of accurately recognizing objects in real time. Detecting tree diseases is crucial for improving the food production rate and ensuring sustainability. This research aims to evaluate the efficacy of YOLOv5 and YOLOv8 in detecting the symptoms of Armillaria spp. in sweet cherry trees and determining their health status, with the goal of enhancing the robustness of precision agriculture. Additionally, this study will explore Computer Vision (CV) techniques with machine learning algorithms to improve the detection process’s efficiency.

Keywords: Armillaria spp., machine learning, precision agriculture, smart farming, sweet cherries trees, YOLOv5, YOLOv8

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Authors: Gaoguang Yang, Shan Fu

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Human-machine interface (HMI) intermediate system information to human operators to facilitate human ability to manage and control the system. Well-designed HMI would enhance human ability. An evaluation must be performed to confirm that the designed HMI would enhance but not degrade human ability. However, the prevalent HMI evaluation techniques have difficulties in more thoroughly and accurately evaluating the suitability and fitness of a given HMI for the wide variety of uncertainty contained in both the existing HMI evaluation techniques and the large number of task scenarios. The first limitation should be attributed to the subjective and qualitative analysis characteristics of these evaluation methods, and the second one should be attributed to the cost balance. This study aims to explore the connection between objective HMI characters and ergonomic safety and step forward toward solving these limitations with objective, characterized HMI parameters. A simulation experiment was performed with the time needed for human operators to recognize the HMI information as characterized HMI parameter, and the result showed a strong correlation between the parameter and ergonomic safety level.

Keywords: Human-Machine Interface (HMI), evaluation, objective, characterization, simulation

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Authors: Akshay Dirisala

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Humans had developed a highly organized and efficient civilization to live in by improving the basic needs of humans like housing, transportation, and utilities. These developments have made a huge impact on major environmental factors. Air pollution is one prominent environmental factor that needs to be addressed to maintain a sustainable and healthier lifestyle. Textiles have always been at the forefront of helping humans shield from environmental conditions. With the growth in the field of electronic textiles, we now have the capability of monitoring the atmosphere in real time to understand and analyze the environment that a particular person is mostly spending their time at. Integrating textiles with the particulate matter sensors that measure air quality and pollutants that have a direct impact on human health will help to understand what type of air we are breathing. This research idea aims to develop a textile product and a process of collecting the pollutants through particulate matter sensors, which are equipped inside a smart textile product and store the data to develop a machine learning model to analyze the health conditions of the person wearing the garment and periodically notifying them not only will help to be cautious of airborne diseases but will help to regulate the diseases and could also help to take care of skin conditions.

Keywords: air pollution, e-textiles, particulate matter sensors, environment, machine learning models

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Authors: P. Mbecke

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The role of the government to tangibly alleviate poverty, improve and sustain the quality of people’s lives remains a “work in progress” twenty-two years after the dawn of democracy in South Africa despite a host of socio-economic programs and pro-poor policies and legislations. This paper assesses the development process and the implementation of the White Paper on Families in South Africa as one of the pro-poor policies intended to curb poverty and redress the imbalances of the apartheid regime. The paper is the result of a qualitative implementation research theory facilitated through in-depth interviews with social work managers complemented by literature and policy review techniques. It investigates the level of basic knowledge and understanding as well as the implementation challenges of the White Paper on Families as causes of its failure. The paper emphasizes the importance of the family-centered approach in the implementation of pro-poor policies. To facilitate the understanding of the White Paper on Families by its users, the Department of Social Development needs take stock of the identified challenges of its implementation so as to facilitate its success in fostering positive family well-being that will directly contributes to the overall socio-economic development of South Africa.

Keywords: poverty alleviation, pro-poor policy, social development, social welfare, South Africa

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Authors: Anek Apipatkul, Paphakorn Pitayachaval

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Preventive maintenance is a standardized procedure to control and prevent risky problems affecting production in order to increase work efficiency. Machine monitoring also routinely works to collect data for a scheduling maintenance period. This paper is to present the application of machine monitoring by using the internet of things (IOTs) and a lean technique in order to manage with complex maintenance tasks of an automated plastic granule packing machine. To organize the preventive maintenance, there are several processes that the machine monitoring was applied, starting with defining a clear scope of the machine, establishing standards in maintenance work, applying a just-in-time (JIT) technique for timely delivery in the maintenance work, solving problems on the floor, and also improving the inspection process. The result has shown that wasted time was reduced, and machines have been operated as scheduled. Furthermore, the efficiency of the scheduled maintenance period was increased by 95%.

Keywords: internet of things, preventive maintenance, machine monitoring, lean technique

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Authors: Muhammad Kashif

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The primary aim of this paper is to investigate the influence of financial technology (FinTech) on sustainable finance. The sample for this study spans from 2010 to 2021, encompassing data from 89 countries worldwide. The study employed two-stage least squares (2SLS) regression approach with the instrumental variables and validated the findings using a two-step system generalized method of moments (GMM). The findings indicate that fintech has a significant favorable impact on sustainable finance. While other factors such as institutional quality, socio-economic condition, and renewable energy have a significant and beneficial influence on the trajectory of sustainable finance, except globalization's impact is positive but insignificant. Furthermore, fintech is crucial in driving the transition toward a sustainable future characterized by a lower carbon economy. The study found that fintech has extensive application across various sectors of sustainable finance and has substantial potential to create long-term positive effects on sustainable finance. Fintech can integrate extensively with other technologies to facilitate diversified growth in sustainable finance. Additionally, this study highlights fintech-related trends and research opportunities in sustainable finance, showing how these can promote each other worldwide with important policy implications for countries looking to advance sustainable finance through technology.

Keywords: sustainable development goals (SDGs), financial technology (FinTech), genuine savings index (GSI), financial stability index, sustainable finance

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Authors: Yan Zeng, Li Tao, Liujun Han, Tianye Zhang, Yongan Yu, Kaijun Ma, Long Chen

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Mechanical asphyxia is one of the main cause of death; however, death by mechanical asphyxia may be difficult to prove in court, particularly in cases in which corpses exhibit no obvious signs of asphyxia. To identify a credible biomarker of asphyxia, we first examined the expression levels of all the mRNAs in human cardiac tissue specimens subjected to mechanical asphyxia and compared these expression levels with those of the corresponding mRNAs in specimens subjected to craniocerebral injury. A total of 119 differentially expressed mRNAs were selected and the expression levels of these mRNAs were examined in 44 human cardiac tissue specimens subjected to mechanical asphyxia, craniocerebral injury, hemorrhagic shock and other causes of death. We found that DUSP1 and KCNJ2 were up-regulated in tissue specimens of mechanical asphyxia compared with control tissues, with no significant correlation between age, environmental temperature and PMI, indicating that DUSP1 and KCNJ2 may associate with mechanical asphyxia-induced death and can thus serve as useful biomarkers of death by mechanical asphyxia.

Keywords: mechanical asphyxia, biomarkers, DUSP1, KCNJ2, cardiac tissue

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Authors: Rushi Tan, Yilun Xu, Xiaohui Wang

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The restrained construction zoning, an important part in the urban master plan, is a necessary planning tool to control the city sprawl, to guarantee the reservation implementation of the various types of protective elements, and to realize the storage of the essential urban spatial resources. Simultaneously, owing to the diverse constitutes of restrained construction area and the various stakeholders involved in, its planning requires an overall consideration of all elements from the perspective of coordination, balance and practicability to deal with the problems and conflicts in this process. Taking Yangzijin Ecological Restrained Construction Area in Yangzhou as an example, this study analyzes all the potential actors, agencies and stakeholders in this restrained construction area, as well as the relevant conflicts between each other. Besides, this study tries to build up a planning procedure based on the framework of governance theory, and proposes a possible planning method that combines "rigidity" and "flexibility" to protect the ecological limitation boundary, to take every interest into account, and to promote economic development in a harmonious society.

Keywords: restrained construction area, governance, stakeholder, flexible stratagem, China

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Authors: Ishtiaq A. Chaudhry, Z. R. Tahir, F. A. Siddiqui, Z. Anwar, F. Valenzuelacalva

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A series of experiments involving the particle image velocimetry technique are carried out to analyse the quantitative effectiveness of the synthesized vortical structures towards actual flow separation control. The streamwise vortices are synthesized from the synthetic jet actuator and introduced into the attached and separating boundary layer developed on the flat plate surface. Two types of actuators with different geometrical set up are used to analyse the evolution of vortical structures in the near wall region and their impact towards achieving separation delay on the actual aircraft wing. Firstly a single circular jet is synthesized at varying actuator operating parameters and issued into the boundary layer to evaluate the dynamics of the interaction between the vortical structures and the near wall low momentum fluid in the separated region. Secondly, an array of jets has been issued into the artificially separated region to assess the effectiveness of various vortical structures towards achieving the reattachment of the separated flow in the streamwise direction.

Keywords: boundary layer, flow separation, streamwise vortices, synthetic jet actuator

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Authors: Vishal Kumar Singh

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Bioprocess development is a time-constrained activity aimed at harnessing the full potential of culture performance in an ambience that is not natural to cells. Even with the use of chemically defined media and feeds, a significant amount of time is devoted in identifying the apt operating parameters. In addition, the scale-up of these processes is often accompanied by loss of antibody titer and product quality, which further delays the commercialization of the drug product. In such a scenario, the investigation of this disparity of culture performance is done by further experimentation at a smaller scale that is representative of at-scale production bioreactors. These scale-down model developments are also time-intensive. In this study, a computation fluid dynamics-based multi-objective scaling approach has been illustrated to speed up the process transfer. For the implementation of this approach, a transient multiphase water-air system has been studied in Ansys CFX to visualize the air bubble distribution and volumetric mass transfer coefficient (kLa) profiles, followed by the design of experiment based parametric optimization approach to define the operational space. The proposed approach is completely in silico and requires minimum experimentation, thereby rendering a high throughput to the overall process development.

Keywords: bioprocess development, scale up, scale down, computation fluid dynamics, multi-objective, Ansys CFX, design of experiment

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Authors: Leila Jafari, Viliam Makis, G. B. Akram Khaleghei

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In this paper, we present a maintenance model of a two-unit series system with economic dependence. Unit#1, which is considered to be more expensive and more important, is subject to condition monitoring (CM) at equidistant, discrete time epochs and unit#2, which is not subject to CM, has a general lifetime distribution. The multivariate observation vectors obtained through condition monitoring carry partial information about the hidden state of unit#1, which can be in a healthy or a warning state while operating. Only the failure state is assumed to be observable for both units. The objective is to find an optimal opportunistic maintenance policy minimizing the long-run expected average cost per unit time. The problem is formulated and solved in the partially observable semi-Markov decision process framework. An effective computational algorithm for finding the optimal policy and the minimum average cost is developed and illustrated by a numerical example.

Keywords: condition-based maintenance, semi-Markov decision process, multivariate Bayesian control chart, partially observable system, two-unit system

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Authors: Miju Choi, Ava Seo

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Japan has been positioned as a major inbound market to Korea, accounting for about 31% of total inbound visitors until 2012. The percentage has sharply dropped each year since and remained in second place, reaching 13.33% in 2016. Meanwhile, China has been boosted as a major inbound market, reaching 46.79% in 2016. Chinese tourists mainly visit Korea with the major purpose of shopping. They consume Korean cosmetic/beauty products and clothes while Japanese tourists prefer to purchase healthy food such as ginseng and seaweed. This study aims to investigate and compare tourist shopping patterns across two major inbound markets, China and Japan. A quantitative approach using survey was applied from 2009 to 2016. Findings suggest Chinese visit Korea due to quality of product, value for money, and accessibility, and trust. Meanwhile, Japanese choose Korea as a shopping destination mainly due to convenience, affordability, and tourist attractions. Also, there were significant differences in shopping venues. For example, Japanese tourists prefer shopping at department stores while Chinese tourists prefer retail outlets and local markets. This study contributes to deeper understanding on two major inbound markets to Korea and suggests future marketing strategies.

Keywords: tourist shopping patterns, Korea, China, Japan, historical data

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Authors: Hussein Altartouri

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The purpose of this paper is to present a modeling and control of the active suspension system using robust state feedback controller implemented for a half car model. This system represents a mechatronic system which contains all the essential components to be considered a complete mechatronic system. This system must adapt different conditions which are difficult to compromise, such as disturbances, slippage, and motion on rough road (that contains rocks, stones, and other miscellanies). Some current automobile suspension systems use passive components only by utilizing spring and damping coefficient with fixed rates. Vehicle suspensions systems are used to provide good road handling and improve passenger comfort. Passive suspensions only offer compromise between these two conflicting criteria. Active suspension poses the ability to reduce the traditional design as a compromise between handling and comfort by directly controlling the suspensions force actuators. In this study, the robust state feedback controller implemented to the active suspensions system for half car model.

Keywords: half-car model, active suspension system, state feedback, road profile

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Authors: Hao-Hsi Tseng, Hsin-Yun Lee

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In the process of building design, the designers have to complete the spatial design and consider the evacuation performance at the same time. It is usually difficult to combine the two planning processes and it results in the gap between spatial design and evacuation performance. Then the designers cannot complete an integrated optimal design solution. In addition, the evacuation routing models proposed by previous researchers is different from the practical evacuation decisions in the real field. On the other hand, more and more building design projects are executed by Building Information Modeling (BIM) in which the design content is formed by the object-oriented framework. Thus, the integration of BIM and evacuation simulation can make a significant contribution for designers. Therefore, this research plan will establish a model that integrates spatial design and evacuation planning. The proposed model will provide the support for the spatial design modifications and optimize the evacuation planning. The designers can complete the integrated design solution in BIM. Besides, this research plan improves the evacuation routing method to make the simulation results more practical. The proposed model will be applied in a building design project for evaluation and validation when it will provide the near-optimal design suggestion. By applying the proposed model, the integration and efficiency of the design process are improved and the evacuation plan is more useful. The quality of building spatial design will be better.

Keywords: building information modeling, evacuation, design, floor plan

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Authors: Dingding Chen, Kazuo Arakawa, Masakazu Uchino, Changheng Xu

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Vacuum assisted resin transfer moulding (VARTM) is a promising manufacture process for making large and complex fiber reinforced composite structures. However, the complexity of the flow of the resin in the infusion stage usually leads to nonuniform property distribution of the produced composite part. In order to control the flow of the resin, the situation of flow should be mastered. For the safety of the usage of the produced composite in practice, the understanding of the property distribution is essential. In this paper, we did some trials on monitoring the resin infusion stage and evaluation for the fiber volume fraction distribution of the VARTM produced composite using the digital image correlation methods. The results show that 3D-DIC is valid on monitoring the resin infusion stage and it is possible to use 2D-DIC to estimate the distribution of the fiber volume fraction on a FRP plate.

Keywords: digital image correlation, VARTM, FRP, fiber volume fraction

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Authors: Muhammad Isah Legbo

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The phytochemical screening and antimicrobial activity of Nauclea lotifolia fruit, leaf and stem-bark extracts at various concentration of (20.0,10.0, 5.0, and 2.5 mg/ml) were evaluated against some pathogenic microorganisms such as Escherichia coli, Klebsiella pneumoniae, Salmonella typhi, Staphylococcus aureus, Aspergillus niger and Candida albicans. The antimicrobial activity was assayed using agar well diffusion method. The result obtained show appreciable inhibitory effort of acetone, aqueous and methanolic extracts of Nauclea lotifolia. However, result obtained was less active compared to that of the control antibiotic (Ciprofloxacillin). The minimum inhibitory concentration (MIC) was determined using serial doubling dilution method and ranged from 5.0-10.0mg/ml, while the minimum bactericidal concentration (MBC) was determined by plating various dilution of extracts without turbidity and the result ranged from 5.0-7.5mg/ml. The phytochemical screening revealed the presence of alkaloid, anthraquinones, flavonoids, resin, steroid and saponin. The activities of the plant extract therefore justify their utilization in the treatment of various ailments associated with the test organism.

Keywords: Nauclea, lotifolia, antimicrobial, pathogens, saponin, extract

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Authors: K.L. Chiu, Johnny K. W. Ho, M. H. Chan, S. H. Cheung, K. H. Chan, S.K. So

Abstract:

Thermal diffusivity is an important quantity in heat conduction. It measures the rate of heat transfer from the hot side to the cold side of a material. In solid-state materials, thermal diffusivity reveals information related to morphologies and solid quality, as thermal diffusivity can be affected by microstructures. However, thermal diffusivity studies on organic semiconductors are very limited. In this study, scanning photothermal deflection (SPD) technique is used to study the thermal diffusivities of different classes of semiconducting polymers. The reliability of the technique was confirmed by crossing-checking our SPD derived experimental values of different reference materials with their known diffusivities from the literature. To show that thermal diffusivity determination is a potential tool for revealing microscopic properties of organic photovoltaic semiconductors, SPD measurements were applied to various organic semiconducting films with different crystallinities. It is observed that organic photovoltaic semiconductors possess low thermal diffusivity, with values in the range of 0.3mm²/s to 1mm²/s. It is also discovered that polymeric photovoltaic semiconductors with greater molecular planarity, stronger stacking and higher crystallinity would possess greater thermal diffusivities. Correlations between thermal, charge transport properties will be discussed.

Keywords: polymer crystallinity, photovoltaic organic semiconductors, photothermal deflection technique, thermal diffusion

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Authors: Hukam Chand

Abstract:

Over the past few years, the performance of Indian classical music has been improved a lot due to the technical inclusion of western instruments. Infect, the Indian classical music is all about raags which portray a mood and sentiments expressed through a microtonal scale based on natural harmonic series. And, most of the western instruments are not based on natural harmonic series and the tonal system is the only system which has considerable influence on the Indian classical music. However, the use of western instruments has been growing day by day in one way or the other by the Indian artists due to their quality of harmony. As a result of which, there are some common instruments such as harmonium, violin, guitar, saxophone, synthesizer which are being used commonly by Indian and western artists. On the other hand, a lot of fusion has taken place in the music of both sides due to the similar characteristics in their instruments. For example, harmonium which was originally the western instrument has now acquired an important position in Indian classical music to perform raags. Besides, a lot of suggestions for improving in the Indian music have been given by the artists for technical modification in the western instruments to cater the needs of Indian music through melody approach. Pt. Vishav Mohan Bhatt an Indian musician has developed Mohan Veena (called guitar) to perform raags. N. Rajam the Indian lady Violinist has made a remarkable work on Indian classical music by accompanied with vocal music. The purpose of the present research paper is to highlight the changes in Indian Classical Music through performance by using modified western music instruments.

Keywords: Indian classical music, Western instruments, harmonium, guitar, Violin and impact

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