Search results for: choice situation

Authors: Abdelli Soulaima, Belhadj Besma

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The paper examines the choice of the central bank toward the movements of the nominal exchange rate and evaluates its effects on the volatility of the output growth and the inflation. The novel hybrid method of the dynamic stochastic general equilibrium called the DSGE-VAR is proposed for analyzing this policy experiment in a small scale open economy in particular Tunisia. The contribution is provided to the empirical literature as we apply the Tunisian data with this model, which is rarely used in this context. Note additionally that the issue of treating the degree of response of the central bank to the exchange rate in Tunisia is special. To ameliorate the estimation, the Bayesian technique is carried out for the sample 1980:q1 to 2011 q4. Our results reveal that the central bank should not react or softly react to the exchange rate. The variance decomposition displayed that the overall inflation volatility is more pronounced with the fixed exchange rate regime for most of the shocks except for the productivity and the interest rate. The output volatility is also higher with this regime with the majority of the shocks exempting the foreign interest rate and the interest rate shocks.

Keywords: DSGE-VAR modeling, exchange rate, monetary policy, Bayesian estimation

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Authors: Shawn Michael Condon

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Current research on teaching expressivity mainly involves instrumentalists. This study focuses on choral singers’ preference of priming techniques based on four methods for teaching expressivity. 112 choral singers answered the survey about their preferred methods for priming expressivity (vocal modelling, using metaphor, tapping into felt emotions, and drawing on past experiences) in three conditions (active, passive, and instructor). Analysis revealed higher preference for drawing on past experience among more experienced singers. The most preferred technique in the passive and instructor roles was vocal modelling, with metaphors and tapping into felt emotions favoured in an active role. Priming techniques are often used in combination with other methods to enhance singing technique or expressivity and are dependent upon the situation, repertoire, and the preferences of the instructor and performer.

Keywords: emotion, expressivity, performance, singing, teaching

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Authors: Mohsen Saleh Asheghabadi, Alireza Jafari Jebeli

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Increasing population growth requires more sustainable development of energy. This non-contaminated energy has an inexhaustible energy source. One of the vital parameters in such structures is the choice of foundation type. Suction caissons are now used extensively worldwide for offshore wind turbine. Considering the presence of a number of offshore wind farms in earthquake areas, the study of the seismic behavior of suction caisson is necessary for better design. In this paper, the results obtained from three suction caisson models with different diameter (D) and skirt length (L) in saturated sand were compared with centrifuge test results. All models are analyzed using 3D finite element (FE) method taking account of elasto-plastic Mohr–Coulomb constitutive model for soil which is available in the ABAQUS library. The earthquake load applied to the base of models with a maximum acceleration of 0.65g. The results showed that numerical method is in relative good agreement with centrifuge results. The settlement and rotation of foundation decrease by increasing the skirt length and foundation diameter. The sand soil outside the caisson is prone to liquefaction due to its low confinement.

Keywords: liquefaction, suction caisson foundation, offshore wind turbine, numerical analysis, seismic behavior

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Authors: Mohamed Elkholy, Ahmed Elfatatry

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Cloud computing has emerged as a flexible computing paradigm that reshaped the Information Technology map. However, cloud computing brought about a number of security challenges as a result of the physical distribution of computational resources and the limited control that users have over the physical storage. This situation raises many security challenges for data integrity and confidentiality as well as authentication and access control. This work proposes a security mechanism for data integrity that allows a data owner to be aware of any modification that takes place to his data. The data integrity mechanism is integrated with an extended Kerberos authentication that ensures authorized access control. The proposed mechanism protects data confidentiality even if data are stored on an untrusted storage. The proposed mechanism has been evaluated against different types of attacks and proved its efficiency to protect cloud data storage from different malicious attacks.

Keywords: access control, data integrity, data confidentiality, Kerberos authentication, cloud security

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Authors: H. Bakhshi, E. Khayyamian

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Cognitive radios have been recognized as one of the most promising technologies dealing with the scarcity of the radio spectrum. In cognitive radio systems, secondary users are allowed to utilize the frequency bands of primary users when the bands are idle. Hence, how to accurately detect the idle frequency bands has attracted many researchers’ interest. Detection performance is sensitive toward noise power and gain fluctuation. Since signal to noise ratio (SNR) between primary user and secondary users are not the same and change over the time, SNR and noise power estimation is essential. In this paper, we present a cooperative spectrum sensing algorithm using SNR estimation to improve detection performance in the real situation.

Keywords: cognitive radio, cooperative spectrum sensing, energy detection, SNR estimation, spectrum sensing, rayleigh fading channel

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Authors: Soo Hyung Kim

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Two different learning approaches were suggested: focusing on factual knowledge or focusing on the embedded meaning in the statements. Each way of learning has positive effects on different question categories, where factual knowledge helps more with simple fact questions, and searching for meaning in given information helps learn causal relationship and the embedded meaning. To test this belief, two groups of learners (12 male and 39 female adults aged 18-37) watched a ten-minute long Youtube video about various factual events of American history, their meaning, and the causal relations of the events. The fact group was asked to focus on factual knowledge in the video, and the meaning group was asked to focus on the embedded meaning in the video. After watching the video, both groups took multiple-choice questions, which consisted of 10 questions asking the factual knowledge addressed in the video and 10 questions asking embedded meaning in the video, such as the causal relationship between historical events and the significance of the event. From ANCOVA analysis, it was found that the factual knowledge showed higher performance on the factual questions than the meaning group, although there was no group difference on the questions about the meaning between the two groups. The finding suggests that teacher instruction plays an important role in learners constructing a different type of knowledge in online learning.

Keywords: factual knowledge, instruction, meaning-based knowledge, online learning

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Authors: Francisco J. Arias

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Consideration is given to a mechanism of heat and mass transport in solutions similar than that of natural convection but with one important difference. Here the mechanism is not promoted by density differences in the fluid occurring due to temperature gradients (coefficient of thermal expansion) but rather by solubility differences due to the thermal dependence of the solubility (coefficient of thermal solubility). Utilizing a simplified physical model, it is shown that by the proper choice of the concentration of a given solution, convection might be induced by the alternating precipitation of the solute -when the solution becomes supersaturated, and its posterior recombination when changes in temperature occurs. The spontaneous change in the Gibbs free energy during the mixing is the driven force for the mechanism. The maximum extractable energy from this new type of thermal convection was derived. Experimental data from a closed-loop circuit was obtained demonstrating the feasibility for continuous separation and recombination of the solution. This type of heat and mass transport -which doesn’t depend on gravity, might potentially be interesting for heat and mass transport downwards (as in solar-roof collectors to inside homes), horizontal (e.g., microelectronic applications), and in microgravity (space technology). Also, because the coefficient of thermal solubility could be positive or negative, the investigated thermo-osmosis convection can be used either for heating or cooling.

Keywords: natural convection, thermal gradient, solubility, osmotic pressure

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Authors: David Downey

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With the introduction of additive manufacturing (3D printing) to produce titanium (Ti6Al4V) components in the medical/aerospace and automotive industries, intricate geometries can be produced with virtually complete design freedom. However, the consideration of microstructural anisotropy resulting from the additive manufacturing process becomes necessary due to this design flexibility and the need to print a geometric shape that can consist of numerous angles, radii, and swept surfaces. A femoral knee implant serves as an example of a 3D-printed near-net-shaped product. The mechanical properties of the printed components, and consequently, their machinability, are affected by microstructural anisotropy. Currently, finish-machining operations performed on titanium printed parts using selective laser melting (SLM) utilize the same cutting tools employed for processing wrought titanium components. Cutting forces for components manufactured through SLM can be up to 70% higher than those for their wrought counterparts made of Ti6Al4V. Moreover, temperatures at the cutting interface of 3D printed material can surpass those of wrought titanium, leading to significant tool wear. Although the criteria for tool wear may be similar for both 3D printed and wrought materials, the rate of wear during the machining process may differ. The impact of these issues on the choice of cutting tool material and tool lifetimes will be discussed.

Keywords: additive manufacturing, build orientation, microstructural anisotropy, printed titanium Ti6Al4V, tool wear

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Authors: Herbert W. Corley

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A scalar equilibrium (SE) is an alternative type of equilibrium in pure strategies for an n-person normal-form game G. It is defined using optimization techniques to obtain a pure strategy for each player of G by maximizing an appropriate utility function over the acceptable joint actions. The players’ actions are determined by the choice of the utility function. Such a utility function could be agreed upon by the players or chosen by an arbitrator. An SE is an equilibrium since no players of G can increase the value of this utility function by changing their strategies. SEs are formally defined, and examples are given. In a greedy SE, the goal is to assign actions to the players giving them the largest individual payoffs jointly possible. In a weighted SE, each player is assigned weights modeling the degree to which he helps every player, including himself, achieve as large a payoff as jointly possible. In a compromise SE, each player wants a fair payoff for a reasonable interpretation of fairness. In a parity SE, the players want their payoffs to be as nearly equal as jointly possible. Finally, a satisficing SE achieves a personal target payoff value for each player. The vector payoffs associated with each of these SEs are shown to be Pareto optimal among all such acceptable vectors, as well as computationally tractable.

Keywords: compromise equilibrium, greedy equilibrium, normal-form game, parity equilibrium, pure strategies, satisficing equilibrium, scalar equilibria, utility function, weighted equilibrium

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Authors: Juanling Lin

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The construction of urban parks is an important part of eco-city construction, and the intervention of big data provides a more scientific and rational platform for the assessment of urban parks by identifying and correcting the irrationality of urban park planning from the macroscopic level and then promoting the rational planning of urban parks. The study builds an urban park assessment system based on urban road network data and POI data, taking Futian District of Shenzhen as the research object, and utilizes the GIS geographic information system to assess the park system of Futian District in five aspects: park spatial distribution, accessibility, service capacity, demand, and supply-demand relationship. The urban park assessment system can effectively reflect the current situation of urban park construction and provide a useful exploration for realizing the rationality and fairness of urban park planning.

Keywords: urban parks, assessment system, POI, supply and demand

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Authors: Fahad Ahmed Qureshi

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There were abundant renowned financial markets in Pre-Islamic Arabs. Most of those were patterned and settled during pre-particularized sunshine. Those markets were classified either as vernacular markets helping the neighboring clans, or habitual markets that people sojourned to from all articulations of the Arabian Peninsula, such as Okaz near Mecca. Some of those markets had leading significance due to their geographical positions, such as Prime market of Eden, because of their entanglement in international trade i.e. with the markets of Sub-Continent, Abyssinia, Persia and China. Other markets such as Market of Yamamah annex its gist from being situated on the caravan crossroads. Islamic worldview and Islamic epistemology base of Financial Market’s realistic theory, pragmatic model and operative approach is moderately constrained in terms of its growth. The existent situation only parasol the form of accommodative-modification and splendid-methodologies, which due to depleted and decorous endeavor in explaining Islamic financial market theoretically. This is the demand of time that particular studies should be conduct to magnify the devours in developing theoretical framework for Islamic Financial Market.

Keywords: Islam, financial market, history, research, product development

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Authors: Eylem Koç, Hasan Arda Burhan

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Location selection presents a crucial decision problem in today’s business world where strategic decision making processes have critical importance. Thus, location selection has strategic importance for companies in boosting their strength regarding competition, increasing corporate performances and efficiency in addition to lowering production and transportation costs. A right choice in location selection has a direct impact on companies’ commercial success. In this study, a store location selection problem of Carglass Turkey which operates in vehicle glass branch is handled. As this problem includes both tangible and intangible criteria, Analytic Network Process (ANP) was accepted as the main methodology. The model consists of control hierarchy and BOCR subnetworks which include clusters of actors, alternatives and criteria. In accordance with the management’s choices, five different locations were selected. In addition to the literature review, a strict cooperation with the actor group was ensured and maintained while determining the criteria and during whole process. Obtained results were presented to the management as a report and its feasibility was confirmed accordingly.

Keywords: analytic network process (ANP), BOCR, multi-actor decision making, multi-criteria decision making, real-life problem, location selection

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Authors: David Loh, Wan Chee Wai, Pei Nan, Chen Zhe

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To increase the conveyance capacity to Western Singapore and to meet Singapore’s long-term water needs in a more cost-effective manner, four new transmission pipelines consisting of two 2200 mm diameter water pipes and two 1200mm diameter water pipes will be needed by 2024 to convey water from a Water Reclamation Plant to existing networks in the west region of Singapore. Out of the several possible routes studied, the most cost-effective and technically feasible route was selected to lay the proposed 1.6km-long pipelines that cross a channel via a 6m diameter subsea tunnel. This paper outlines the challenges the team faced throughout the project thus far. It also examined the difficulties such as (1) construction of a 56m-deep launching shaft near a highly sensitive 700mm diameter Gas Transmission Pipeline (GTP) and at a location with high groundwater; (2) manpower and supply disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic situation.

Keywords: underwater tunnel, subsea engineering, subsea tunnel construction, waterpipe construction

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Authors: Luis Fonseca, Filipe Cabral Pinto, Susana Sargento

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The increase of the world population, especially in large urban centers, has resulted in new challenges particularly with the control and optimization of public safety. Thus, in the present work, a solution is proposed for the prediction of criminal occurrences in a city based on historical data of incidents and demographic information. The entire research and implementation will be presented start with the data collection from its original source, the treatment and transformations applied to them, choice and the evaluation and implementation of the Machine Learning model up to the application layer. Classification models will be implemented to predict criminal risk for a given time interval and location. Machine Learning algorithms such as Random Forest, Neural Networks, K-Nearest Neighbors and Logistic Regression will be used to predict occurrences, and their performance will be compared according to the data processing and transformation used. The results show that the use of Machine Learning techniques helps to anticipate criminal occurrences, which contributed to the reinforcement of public security. Finally, the models were implemented on a platform that will provide an API to enable other entities to make requests for predictions in real-time. An application will also be presented where it is possible to show criminal predictions visually.

Keywords: crime prediction, machine learning, public safety, smart city

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Authors: Maryam Nazari

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COVID-19 is a respiratory disease triggered by the novel coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2, that has reached pandemic status today. Acute inflammation and immune cells infiltration into lung injuries result in multi-organ failure. The presence of other non-communicable diseases (NCDs) with systemic inflammation derived from COVID-19 may exacerbate the patient's situation and increase the risk for adverse effects and mortality. This pandemic is a novel situation and the scientific community at this time is looking for vaccines or drugs to treat the pathology. One of the biggest challenges is focused on reducing inflammation without compromising the correct immune response of the patient. In this regard, addressing the nutritional factors should not be overlooked not only as a matter of avoiding the presence of NCDs with severe infections but also as an adjunctive way to modulate the inflammatory status of the patients. Despite the pivotal role of nutrition in modifying immune response, due to the novelty of the COVID-19 disease, information about the effects of specific dietary agents is limited in this area. From the macronutrients point of view, protein deficiency (quantity or quality) has negative effects on the number of functional immunoglobulins and gut-associated lymphoid tissue (GALT). High biological value proteins or some amino acids like arginine and glutamine are well known for their ability to augment the immune system. Among lipids, fish oil has the ability to inactivate enveloped viruses, suppress pro-inflammatory prostaglandin production and block platelet-activating factors and their receptors. In addition, protectin D1, which is an Omega-3 PUFAs derivation, is a novel antiviral drug. So it seems that these fatty acids can reduce the severity and/or improve recovery of patients with COVID-19. Carbohydrates with lower glycemic index and fibers are associated with lower levels of inflammatory cytokines (CRP, TNF-α, and IL-6). Short-Chain Fatty acids not only exert a direct anti-inflammatory effect but also provide appropriate gut microbial, which is important in gastrointestinal issues related to COVID-19. From the micronutrients point of view, Vitamins A, C, D, E, iron, magnesium, zinc, selenium and copper play a vital role in the maintenance of immune function. Inadequate status in these nutrients may result in decreased resistance against COVID-19 infection. There are specific bioactive compounds in the diet that interact with the ACE2 receptor, which is the gateway for SARS and SARS-CoV-2, and thus controls the viral infection. Regarding this, the potential benefits of probiotics, resveratrol (a polyphenol found in grape), oleoylethanolamide (derived from oleic acid), and natural peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor γ agonists in foodstuffs (like curcumin, pomegranate, hot pepper) are suggested. Yet, it should be pointed out that most of these results have been reported in animal models and further human studies are needed to be verified.

Keywords: Covid-19, inflammation, nutrition, dietary agents

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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: Amit Saraswat, Ruchi Tewari

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Purpose: The research paper aims at understanding the alignment of business and IT in the Indian context and the business value attached to such an alignment. Methodology: The study is conducted in two stages. Stage one: Bibliographic research was conducted to evolve the parameters for defining alignment. Stage two: Evolving a model for strategic alignment to conduct an empirical study. The model is defined in terms of four fundamental domains of strategic management choice – business strategy, information strategy, organizational structure, and information technology structure. A survey through a questionnaire was conducted across organizations from 4 different industries and Structure Equation Modelling (SEM) technique is used for validating the model. Findings: In the Indian scenario all the subscales of alignment could not be validated. It could be validated that organizational strategy impacts information strategy and information technology structure. Research Limitations: The study is limited to the Indian context. Business IT alignment may be culture dependent so further research is required to validate the model in other cultures. Originality/Value: In the western world several models of alignment of business strategy and information systems is available but they do not measure the extent of alignment which the current study in the Indian context. Findings of the study can be used by managers in strategizing and understanding their business and information systems needs holistically and cohesively leading to efficient use of resources and output.

Keywords: business strategy, information technology (IT), business IT alignment, SEM

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Authors: Swatantra

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Hinglish, a blended version of Hindi and English, emerged due to the lack of the competence and command of the speakers over the foreign language, i., e., English. But, amazingly, the trend has gained wide acceptance. In India, this acceptance has gone up to the extent that popular news anchors at the prime time shows are frequently using it. At the moment, instead of being considered a flaw of their presentation Hinglish is emerging as a trendy genre. Its pervasive usage and extensive acceptance is motivating youngsters to opt for the similar kind of patterns. The current study is an endeavour to assess the impact of this trend on the new language learners. With the help of semi-structured interviews, the researcher has tried to gauge the level of comfort and desire to be at par with the other fluent English speakers. The results clearly depict a substantiated boost in the confidence level of learners because they are able to use the vocabulary and sentence patterns of their own choice and convenience. The prevalence and acceptance of the trend in the main stream media have really served as a catalyst and the desire to be at par with the other fluent speakers is also fading away. The users of Hinglish find this trend to be closer to their heart as in the earlier times in the absence of exact translation they had to compromise with the meaning or spirit of the word/phrase / sentence. But now enhanced flexibility is leaving them more comfortable and confident.

Keywords: Hinglish, language learners, linguistic trends, media

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Authors: Gak-Gyu Kim, Won Il Jung

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According to a remarkable development of science and technology, function and role of the system of engineering fields has recently been diversified. The system has become increasingly more complex and precise, and thus, system designers intended to maximize reliability concentrate more effort at the design stage. This study deals with the reliability redundancy optimization problem (RROP) for k-out-of-n: G system configuration with cold standby and warm standby components. This paper further intends to present the optimal mathematical model through which the following three elements of (i) multiple components choices, (ii) redundant components quantity and (iii) the choice of redundancy strategies may be combined in order to maximize the reliability of the system. Therefore, we focus on the following three issues. First, we consider RROP that there exists warm standby state as well as cold standby state of the component. Second, as eliminating an approximation approach of the previous RROP studies, we construct a precise model for system reliability. Third, given transition time when the state of components changes, we present not simply a workable solution but the advanced method. For the wide applicability of RROPs, moreover, we use absorbing continuous time Markov chain and matrix analytic methods in the suggested mathematical model.

Keywords: RROP, matrix analytic methods, k-out-of-n: G system, MTTF, absorbing continuous time Markov Chain

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Authors: Bagus Indrawan Hardi

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Cellular Automata are widely used in land use modeling, it has been proven powerful to simulate land use change for small scale in many large cities in the world. In this paper, we try to implement CA for land use modeling in unique city in Indonesia, Karawang. Instead the complex numerical implementation, CA are simple, and it is accurate and also highly dependable on the on the rules (rule based). The most important to do in CA is how we form and calculate the neighborhood effect. The neighborhood effect represents the environment and relationship situation between the occupied cell and others. We adopted 196 cells of circular neighborhood with 8 cells of radius. For the results, CA works well in this study, we exhibit several analyzed and proceed of zoomed part in Karawang region. The rule set can handle the complexity in land use modeling. However, we cannot strictly believe of the result, many non-technical parameters, such as politics, natural disaster activities, etc. may change the results dramatically.

Keywords: cellular automata (CA), land use change, spatial dynamics, urban sprawl

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Authors: Janaína F. Guidolini, Jean P. H. B. Ometto, Angélica Giarolla, Peter M. Toledo, Carlos A. Valera

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The water crisis, a major problem of the 21^st century, occurs mainly due to poor management. The central issue that should govern the management is the integration of the various aspects that interfere with the use of water resources and their protection, supported by legal basis. A watershed is a unit of water interacting with the physical, biotic, social, economic and cultural variables. The Brazilian law recognized river basin as the territorial management unit. Based on the diagnosis of the current situation of the water resources of the Rio Grande Basin, a discussion informed in the Brazilian legal basis was made to propose measures to fight or mitigate damages and environmental degradation in the Basin. To manage water resources more efficiently, conserve water and optimize their multiple uses, the integration of acquired scientific knowledge and management is essential. Moreover, it is necessary to monitor compliance with environmental legislation.

Keywords: conservation of soil and water, environmental laws, river basin, sustainability

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Authors: JingWei Yu, Hong Yang Yu

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At present, the increasingly serious air pollution in various cities of China has made people pay more attention to the air quality index(hereinafter referred to as AQI) of their living areas. To face this situation, it is of great significance to predict air pollution in heavily polluted areas. In this paper, based on the time series model of LSTM, a spatiotemporal prediction model of PM2.5 concentration in Mianyang, Sichuan Province, is established. The model fully considers the temporal variability and spatial distribution characteristics of PM2.5 concentration. The spatial correlation of air quality at different locations is based on the Air quality status of other nearby monitoring stations, including AQI and meteorological data to predict the air quality of a monitoring station. The experimental results show that the method has good prediction accuracy that the fitting degree with the actual measured data reaches more than 0.7, which can be applied to the modeling and prediction of the spatial and temporal distribution of regional PM2.5 concentration.

Keywords: LSTM, PM2.5, neural networks, spatio-temporal prediction

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Authors: Ismail Sualman, Mohd Khairuddin Othman

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General Election has been the backbone of democracy that permits people to choose their representatives as they deem fit. The support preferences of the voter differ from one to another, particularly in a plural society like Malaysia. The turning up of high numbers of young voters during the Malaysia 14th General Election has been said to have been caused by social media including Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, Instagram, YouTube and Telegram, WeChat and SMS/MMs. It has been observed that, besides using social media as an interaction tool among social friends, it is also an important source of information to know about issues, politics and politicians. This paper exhibits the role of social media in providing political information to young voters, before an election and during the election campaign. This study examines how this information is being translated into election support. A total of 799 Malay young respondents in Selangor have been surveyed and interviewed. This study revealed that social media has become the source of political information among Malay young voters. This research suggested that social media had a significant effect on the support during the election. Social media plays an important role in carrying information such as current issues, voting trends, candidate imagery and matters that may influence the view of young voters. The information obtained from social media has been translated into a voting decision.

Keywords: social media, political behaviour, voters’ choice, election.

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Authors: Aida Alemany, Laura Ballester, Ana González-Urteaga

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From 2007 subprime crisis to the recent Eurozone debt crisis the European banking industry has experienced a terrible financial instability situation with increasing levels of CDS spreads (used as a proxy of credit risk). This paper investigates whether volatility transmission channels in European banking markets have changed after three significant crises’ events during the period January 2006 to March 2013. The global financial crisis is characterized by a unidirectional volatility shocks spillovers effect in credit risk from inside to outside the Eurozone. By contrast, the Eurozone debt crisis is revealed to be local in nature with the euro as the key element suggesting a market fragmentation between distressed peripheral and non-distressed core Eurozone countries, whereas retaining the local currency have acted as a firewall. With these findings we are able to shed light on the impact of the different crises on the European banking credit risk dynamics.

Keywords: CDS spreads, credit risk, volatility spillovers, financial crisis

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Authors: H. Troudi, M. Ghiss, Z. Tourki, M. Ellejmi

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Packed columns of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) consists of separating the liquid mixture of propane and butane to pure gas components by the distillation phenomenon. The flow of the gas and liquid inside the columns is operated by two ways: The co-current and the counter current operation. Heat, mass and species transfer between phases represent the most important factors that influence the choice between those two operations. In this paper, both processes are discussed using computational CFD simulation through ANSYS-Fluent software. Only 3D half section of the packed column was considered with one packed bed. The packed bed was characterized in our case as a porous media. The simulations were carried out at transient state conditions. A multi-component gas and liquid mixture were used out in the two processes. We utilized the Euler-Lagrange approach in which the gas was treated as a continuum phase and the liquid as a group of dispersed particles. The heat and the mass transfer process was modeled using multi-component droplet evaporation approach. The results show that the counter-current process performs better than the co-current, although such limitations of our approach are noted. This comparison gives accurate results for computations times higher than 2 s, at different gas velocity and at packed bed porosity of 0.9.

Keywords: co-current, counter-current, Euler-Lagrange model, heat transfer, mass transfer

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Authors: Ajibola O. Akinrinde, Andrew Swanson, Remy Tiako

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There exist significant losses on transmission lines due to distance, as power generating stations could be located far from some isolated settlements. Standalone wind farms could be a good choice of alternative power generation for such settlements that are far from the grid due to factors of long distance or socio-economic problems. However, uncompensated wind farms consume reactive power since wind turbines are induction generators. Therefore, capacitor banks are used to compensate reactive power, which in turn improves the voltage profile of the network. Although capacitor banks help improving voltage profile, they also undergo switching actions due to its compensating response to the variation of various types of load at the consumer’s end. These switching activities could cause transient overvoltage on the network, jeopardizing the end-life of other equipment on the system. In this paper, the overvoltage caused by these switching activities is investigated using the IEEE bus 14-network to represent a standalone wind farm, and the simulation is done using ATP/EMTP software. Scenarios involving the use of pre-insertion resistor and pre-insertion inductor, as well as controlled switching was also carried out in order to decide the best mitigation option to reduce the overvoltage.

Keywords: capacitor banks, IEEE bus 14-network, pre-insertion resistor, standalone wind farm

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Authors: Chokri Slim

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The objective of this research is attempting to respond to this question: Is there a significant difference between the regression model and statistical learning models in predicting credit risk management? A Multiple Linear Regression (MLR) model was compared with neural networks including Multi-Layer Perceptron (MLP), and a Support vector regression (SVR). The population of this study includes 50 listed Banks in Tunis Stock Exchange (TSE) market from 2000 to 2016. Firstly, we show the factors that have significant effect on the quality of loan portfolios of banks in Tunisia. Secondly, it attempts to establish that the systematic use of objective techniques and methods designed to apprehend and assess risk when considering applications for granting credit, has a positive effect on the quality of loan portfolios of banks and their future collectability. Finally, we will try to show that the bank governance has an impact on the choice of methods and techniques for analyzing and measuring the risks inherent in the banking business, including the risk of non-repayment. The results of empirical tests confirm our claims.

Keywords: credit risk management, multiple linear regression, principal components analysis, artificial neural networks, support vector machines

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Authors: Nengi A. H. Ejiobih

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Conflict is one of the defining features of human societies. Often, the use or misuse of language in interaction is the genesis of conflict. As such, it is expected that when people use language they do so in socially determined ways and with almost predictable social effects. The objective of this paper was to examine the interest at work as manifested in language choice and collocations in conflict discourse. It also scrutinized the implications of linguistic features in conflict discourse as it concerns ideology and power relations in political discourse in Nigeria. The methodology used for this paper is an approach from Critical discourse analysis because of its multidisciplinary model of analysis, linguistic features and its implications were analysed. The datum used is a text from the Sunday Sun Newspaper in Nigeria, West Africa titled Akunyili Memo: State of the Nation. Some of the findings include; different ideologies are inherent in conflict discourse, there is the presence of power relations being produced, exercised, maintained and produced throughout the discourse and the use of pronouns in conflict discourse is valuable because it is used to initiate and maintain relationships in social context. This paper has provided evidence that, taking into consideration the nature of the social actions and the way these activities are translated into languages, the meanings people convey by their words are identified by their immediate social, political and historical conditions.

Keywords: conflicts, discourse, language, linguistic features, social context

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Authors: M. Naveed Iqbal, Sheza Fatima, Noman Shabbir

Abstract:

In the presence of energy crisis in Pakistan, off-grid remote areas are not on priority list. The use of new large scale coal fired power plants will also make this situation worst. Therefore, the greatest challenge in our society is to explore new ways to power off grid remote areas with renewable energy sources. It is time for a sustainable energy policy which puts consumers, the environment, human health, and peace first. The renewable energy is one of the biggest growing sectors of the energy industry. Therefore, the large scale use of micro grid is thus described here with modeling, simulation, planning and operating of the micro grid. The goal of this research paper is to go into detail of a library of major components of micro grid. The introduction will go through the detail view of micro grid definition. Then, the simulation of Micro Grid in MATLAB/ Simulink including the Photo Voltaic Cell will be described with the detailed modeling. The simulation with the design and modeling will be introduced too.

Keywords: micro grids, distribution generation, PV, off-grid operations

Procedia PDF Downloads 312

Authors: Daniel Phifer, Anna Prokhodtseva

Abstract:

DualBeam (FIB-SEM) has long been the technology of choice to sub-sample and characterize materials at site-specific locations which are difficult or impossible to extract by conventional embedding/polishing methods. Whereas Ga based FIB provides excellent resolution and enables precise material removal, the current is usually limited and only allows the extraction of small material biopsies typically ranging from 5-70um wide. Xe Plasma FIB, by contrast, has around 38x more current and can remove more material at the same time to extract significant sized chunks (100-1000um) of materials for further analysis. This increased volume has enabled time-prohibitive investigations like large grain 3D serial sectioning and EBSD and micro-machining for micro-mechanical testing. Investigation of the pore spaces with 3D modeling can determine the relative characteristics of the materials to help design or select properties for best function. Pore spaces can be described with a tortuosity number which is calculated by modules in the 3D analysis software. Xe Plasma FIB technology provides a workflow with sufficient volume to characterize porosity when both large-volume 3D materials characterization and nanometer resolution is required to understand the system.

Keywords: dual-beam, FIB-SEM, porosity, SOFC, solid oxide fuel cell

Procedia PDF Downloads 205