Search results for: Brazilian roads

Authors: Vinayaka Gude Divya Sampath

Abstract:

The research introduces an integrated prediction model to assess the susceptibility of roads in a future flooding event. The model consists of deep learning algorithm for forecasting gauge height data and Flood Inundation Mapper (FIM) for spatial flooding. An optimal architecture for Long short-term memory network (LSTM) was identified for the gauge located on Tangipahoa River at Robert, LA. Dropout was applied to the model to evaluate the uncertainty associated with the predictions. The estimates are then used along with FIM to identify the spatial flooding. Further geoprocessing in ArcGIS provides the susceptibility values for different roads. The model was validated based on the devastating flood of August 2016. The paper discusses the challenges for generalization the methodology for other locations and also for various types of flooding. The developed model can be used by the transportation department and other emergency response organizations for effective disaster management.

Keywords: deep learning, disaster management, flood prediction, urban flooding

Procedia PDF Downloads 118

Authors: Elida M. R. Bonifacio

Abstract:

English language proficiency has become an essential issue in aviation communication after aviation incidents, and accidents happened. Lack of proficiency or inappropriate use of the English language has been found as one of the factors that cause most of those incidents or accidents. Therefore, the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) established the requirements for minimum English language proficiency of aviation personnel, especially pilots and air traffic controllers in the 192 member states. In Brazil, the discussions about this topic became patent after an accident that occurred in 2006, which was a mid-air collision and costed the life of 154 passengers and crew members. Thus, the number of schools and private practitioners willing to teach English for aviation purposes started to increase. Although the number of teaching materials internationally used for general purposes is relatively large, it would be inappropriate to adopt the same materials in classes that focus on communication in aviation contexts. On the contrary, the options of aviation English materials are scarce; moreover, they are internationally used and may not fulfill the linguistic needs of all their users around the world. In order to diminish the problems that Brazilian practitioners may encounter in the adoption of materials that demand a great level of adaptation to meet their students’ needs, a checklist was thought to evaluate textbooks. The aim of this paper is to propose a checklist that evaluates textbooks used in English language training of Brazilian air traffic controllers. The criteria used to compound the checklist are based on materials development literature, as well as on linguistic requirements established by ICAO on its publications, on English for Specific Purposes (ESP) principles, and on Brazilian aviation English language proficiency test format. The checklist has as main indicators the language learning tenets under which the book was written, graphical features, lexical, grammatical and functional competencies required for minimum proficiency, similarities to official testing format, and support materials, totaling 117 items marked as YES, NO or PARTIALLY. In order to verify if the use of the checklist is effective, an aviation English textbook was evaluated. From this evaluation, it is possible to measure quantitatively how much the material meets the students’ needs and to offer a tool to help professionals engaged in aviation English teaching around the world to choose the most appropriate textbook according to their audience. From the results, practitioners are able to verify which items the material does not fulfill and to make proper adaptations since the perfect material will be difficult to find.

Keywords: aviation English, ICAO, materials development, English language proficiency

Procedia PDF Downloads 108

Authors: Fernanda Goulart, Rita de Cássia Barbirato

Abstract:

Task-based language teaching has received attention among researchers as it has been pointed out with the potential to provide more significant opportunities for using the target language and therefore generate successful language acquisition. Nevertheless, in the Brazilian context, few studies have analyzed the potential of tasks in English language acquisition. There is also a need for textbooks to meet the needs of Brazilian students. This work is part of doctoral research in its initial phase. It aims to demonstrate and discuss thematic textbook samples on tasks designed to be applied among high school and undergraduate students in a public technological educational context in São Paulo State, Brazil. It is a qualitative study. The data collection process for course design and textbook development initially included a survey administered to 159 students. Questions related to students’ English background knowledge, main learning interests, and needs. Most students reported difficulties communicating in English and showed a strong interest in a communicative English course. The theme “Cultural diversity” was chosen among other options provided. The textbook was then designed and comprised nine task cycles divided into four sequences. Cycles were composed of pre-tasks, tasks, and post-tasks. The main findings of this first phase of the research revealed that designing a task-based textbook is not easy and requires the necessary steps and lots of effort to meet students’ language needs. Several revisions were needed before the conclusion of the final version of the textbook. The material will be further applied in a three-month English course. In this presentation, we hope to contribute to discussions in research on task-based teaching. Also, we intend to support teachers with their knowledge of tasks and thematic material development in this field.

Keywords: task-based language teaching, language acquisition, English language teaching, task cycles

Procedia PDF Downloads 51

Authors: Sandra Regina Cavalcante, Rodolfo A. G. Vilela

Abstract:

Introduction: Work accidents and occupational diseases are a big problem for public health around the world and the main health problem of workers with high social and economic costs. Brazil has shown progress over the last years, with the development of the regulatory system to improve safety and quality of life in the workplace. However, the situation is far from acceptable, because the occurrences remain high and there is a great gap between legislation and reality, generated by the low level of voluntary compliance with the law. Brazilian laws provide procedural legal instruments for both, to compensate the damage caused to the worker's health and to prevent future injuries. In the Judiciary, the prevention idea is in the collective action, effected through Brazilian Class Actions. Inhibitory guardianships may impose both, improvements to the working environment, as well as determine the interruption of activity or a ban on the machine that put workers at risk. Both the Labor Prosecution and trade unions have to stand to promote this type of action, providing payment of compensation for collective moral damage. Objectives: To verify how class actions (known as ‘public civil actions’), regulated in Brazilian legal system to protect diffuse, collective and homogeneous rights, are being used to protect workers' health and safety. Methods: The author identified and evaluated decisions of Brazilian Superior Court of Labor involving collective actions and work accidents. The timeframe chosen was December 2015. The online jurisprudence database was consulted in page available for public consultation on the court website. The categorization of the data was made considering the result (court application was rejected or accepted), the request type, the amount of compensation and the author of the cause, besides knowing the reasoning used by the judges. Results: The High Court issued 21,948 decisions in December 2015, with 1448 judgments (6.6%) about work accidents and only 20 (0.09%) on collective action. After analyzing these 20 decisions, it was found that the judgments granted compensation for collective moral damage (85%) and/or obligation to make, that is, changes to improve prevention and safety (71%). The processes have been filed mainly by the Labor Prosecutor (83%), and also appeared lawsuits filed by unions (17%). The compensation for collective moral damage had average of 250,000 reais (about US$65,000), but it should be noted that there is a great range of values found, also are several situations repaired by this compensation. This is the last instance resource for this kind of lawsuit and all decisions were well founded and received partially the request made for working environment protection. Conclusions: When triggered, the labor court system provides the requested collective protection in class action. The values of convictions arbitrated in collective actions are significant and indicate that it creates social and economic repercussions, stimulating employers to improve the working environment conditions of their companies. It is necessary to intensify the use of collective actions, however, because they are more efficient for prevention than reparatory individual lawsuits, but it has been underutilized, mainly by Unions.

Keywords: Brazilian Class Action, collective action, work accident penalization, workplace accident prevention, workplace protection law

Procedia PDF Downloads 252

Authors: Cruz, G. P., Nagamatsu, R. N., Scacchetti, F. A. P., Merlin, F. K.

Abstract:

This study aims to assess a set of technical parameters that provide quality products to the companies that produce caps, APL Apucarana / PR, the city that produces most Brazilian caps, in order to verify the potential of Brazilian caps to compete with international brands, recognized by the standard of excellence when it comes to quality of its products. The determination of the technical parameters was arbitrated from textile ABNT, a total of six technical parameters, providing eight tests for cotton caps. For the evaluation, we used as reference a leading brand recognized worldwide (based on their sales volume in $) for comparison with 3 companies of the APL Apucarana. The results showed that, of the 8 tests, of 8 tests, the companies Apucarana did not obtain better performance than the competitor. They obtained the same results in three tests and lower performance in 5. Given these values, it is concluded that local caps are not far from reaching the quality of leading brand. It is recommended that the APL companies use the parameters to evaluate their products, using this information to support decision-making that seek to improve both the product design and its production process, enabling the feasibility for faster international recognition . Thus, they may have an edge over its main competitor.

Keywords: technical parameters, making caps, quality, evaluation

Procedia PDF Downloads 320

Authors: Josiane N. Muller, Allan K. R. Galardo, Tatiane A. Barbosa, Evan P. Ferro, Wellington M. Dos Santos, Ana Paula S. A. Correa, Edinaldo C. Rego, Jose B. P. Lima

Abstract:

The susceptibility status of an insect population to any larvicide depends on several factors such includes genetic constitution, environmental conditions and others. The mosquito Aedes aegypti is the primary vector of three important viral diseases, Zika, Dengue, and Chikungunya. The frequent outbreaks of those diseases in different parts of Brazil demonstrate the importance of testing the susceptibility of vectors in different environments. Since the control of this mosquito leads to the control of disease, alternatives for vector control that value the different Brazilian environmental conditions are needed for effective actions. The aim of this study was to evaluate a new commercial formulation of Bacillus thuringiensis israelenses (DengueTech: Brazilian innovative technology) in the Brazilian Legal Amazon considering the climate conditions. Semi-field tests were conducted in the Institute of Scientific and Technological Research of the State of Amapa in two different environments, one in a shaded area and the other exposed to sunlight. The mosquito larvae were exposed to larvicide concentration and a control; each group was tested in three containers of 40 liters each. To assess persistence 50 third instar larvae of Aedes aegypti laboratory lineages (Rockefeller) and 50 larvae of Aedes aegypti collected in the municipality of Macapa, Brazil’s Amapa state, were added weekly and after 24 hours the mortality was assessed. In total 16 tests were performed, where 12 were done with replacement of water (1/5 of the volume, three times per week). The effectiveness of the product was determined through mortality of ≥ 80%, as recommend by the World Health Organization. The results demonstrated that high-water temperatures (26-35 °C) on the containers influenced the residual time of the product, where the maximum effect achieved was 21 days in the shaded area; and no effectiveness of 60 days was found in any of the tests, as expected according to the larvicide company. The test with and without water replacement did not present significant differences in the mortality rate. Considering the different environments and climate, these results stimulate the need to test larvicide and its effectiveness in specific environmental settings in order to identify the parameters required for better results. Thus, we see the importance of semi-field researches considering the local climate conditions for a successful control of Aedes aegypti.

Keywords: Aedes aegypti, bioassay, larvicida, vector control

Procedia PDF Downloads 104

Authors: Pedro P. Drumond, James E. Ball, Priscilla M. Moura, Márcia M. L. P. Coelho

Abstract:

In recent decades, On-site Stormwater Detention (OSD) systems have been implemented in many cities around the world. In Brazil, urban drainage source control policies were created in the 1990’s and were mainly based on OSD. The concept of this technique is to promote the detention of additional stormwater runoff caused by impervious areas, in order to maintain pre-urbanization peak flow levels. In Australia OSD, was first adopted in the early 1980’s by the Ku-ring-gai Council in Sydney’s northern suburbs and Wollongong City Council. Many papers on the topic were published at that time. However, source control techniques related to stormwater quality have become to the forefront and OSD has been relegated to the background. In order to evaluate the effectiveness of the current regulations regarding OSD, the existing policies were compared in Australian cities, a country considered experienced in the use of this technique, and in Brazilian cities where OSD adoption has been increasing. The cities selected for analysis were Wollongong and Belo Horizonte, the first municipalities to adopt OSD in their respective countries, and Sydney and Porto Alegre, cities where these policies are local references. The Australian and Brazilian cities are located in Southern Hemisphere of the planet and similar rainfall intensities can be observed, especially in storm bursts greater than 15 minutes. Regarding technical criteria, Brazilian cities have a site-based approach, analyzing only on-site system drainage. This approach is criticized for not evaluating impacts on urban drainage systems and in rare cases may cause the increase of peak flows downstream. The city of Wollongong and most of the Sydney Councils adopted a catchment-based approach, requiring the use of Permissible Site Discharge (PSD) and Site Storage Requirements (SSR) values based on analysis of entire catchments via hydrograph-producing computer models. Based on the premise that OSD should be designed to dampen storms of 100 years Average Recurrence Interval (ARI) storm, the values of PSD and SSR in these four municipalities were compared. In general, Brazilian cities presented low values of PSD and high values of SSR. This can be explained by site-based approach and the low runoff coefficient value adopted for pre-development conditions. The results clearly show the differences between approaches and methodologies adopted in OSD designs among Brazilian and Australian municipalities, especially with regard to PSD values, being on opposite sides of the scale. However, lack of research regarding the real performance of constructed OSD does not allow for determining which is best. It is necessary to investigate OSD performance in a real situation, assessing the damping provided throughout its useful life, maintenance issues, debris blockage problems and the parameters related to rain-flow methods. Acknowledgments: The authors wish to thank CNPq - Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico (Chamada Universal – MCTI/CNPq Nº 14/2014), FAPEMIG - Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de Minas Gerais, and CAPES - Coordenação de Aperfeiçoamento de Pessoal de Nível Superior for their financial support.

Keywords: on-site stormwater detention, source control, stormwater, urban drainage

Procedia PDF Downloads 160

Authors: Monica Dantas

Abstract:

At what socio-economic costs can the food industry offer products at low prices? This research seeks to understand and to explore how we attribute competence and meaning, what enables the outcomes of agriculture and what institutions provides validation regarding food production. This study objective is to explain and interpret conditions of the present state of agriculture in Brazil centring on two distinct segments, agribusiness and family farming, as the Brazilian, rapidly changing political environment unfolds. The approach is grounded in multidisciplinary literature drawing from the politics of development, the sociology of food, the sustainability framework and the conceptual differences between agribusiness and family farming regarding the innate purpose of the two segments. In addition, a quantitative portion of the research includes secondary data analysis from statistical measurements, economic indicators, federal budget information, and census data to compare the two segments, conveying a general snapshot of the conditions investigated. The results raised questions about the perceived image of the success of agribusiness, against some contradicting economic checks and balances. Analyzing how public funds are invested in agriculture shed light on what can enable or undermine the development of food systems in Brazil. It also revealed how politics, ideology, and corporations might influence the Brazilian Federal. In the 2000-2018 observed timeline of annual federal spending on agriculture in Brazil, there is variation in the amount invested in family farming that seems to 'coincide' with the ideological direction of the federal government in power. It was also observed that significant changes in the institutional framework and financial support either promoted or purposely undermined family farming importance using public institutions to validate support for agribusiness.

Keywords: food politics, sustainability, family farming, food system, public budget

Procedia PDF Downloads 102

Authors: Ana Maria Girotti Sperandio, Jussara Conceição Guarnieri, Lauro Luiz Francisco Filho, Ana Claudia Martins Alves, Adriana Aparecida Carneiro Rosa

Abstract:

The urban planning of a city should contemplate the construction of healthy spaces to provide quality of life for people. In a Brazilian municipality located 180 km from the capital of São Paulo with around 27,000 thousand inhabitants, the federal government made possible a program that allows the improvement of the quality of life of the inhabitants through the practice of physical activity. To describe health promotion strategies in the city that collaborate in the reduction of chronic non-communicable diseases (CDNT) and the improvement the quality of its residents. Considering the CDNT as a fundamental public health concern in different countries, the methodology of this work considered the different actions of health promotion that occurred in the city for the implementation of the Polo Health Academy with the objective of increasing the population's access to places that could develop targeted physical activities. As an instrument, it used records of participants of this academy such as: assessment sheets, evolution, photos, filming and daily reports of physical activities. Results: The implantation and implementation process of the Polo Health Academy in the city of Conchal / SP / Brazil was in accordance with the principles and values of the National Health Promotion Policy (PNaPS) in Brazil and with the city statute, that provides improvement in the quality of life of the Brazilian population. An increase was observed in the number of participants in different hours practicing physical activities in the territory linked to one of the five Health Units, showing the program provides that happiness and well-being to the students. The Brazilian health promotion policy, combined with the city’s development policy, provides the population with access to programs that stimulate the reduction of CDNTs, confirming the urban planning of a healthy city.

Keywords: health city, health promotion, physical activity, urban planning

Procedia PDF Downloads 170

Authors: Byl Farney Cunha Junior

Abstract:

In this work the dynamic three-dimensional analysis of a 47-story building located in Goiania city when subjected to wind loads generated using both the Wind Brazilian code, NBR6123 (ABNT, 1988) and the Synthetic-Wind method is realized. To model the frames three different methodologies are used: the shear building model and both bi and three-dimensional finite element models. To start the analysis, a plane frame is initially studied to validate the shear building model and, in order to compare the results of natural frequencies and displacements at the top of the structure the same plane frame was modeled using the finite element method through the SAP2000 V10 software. The same steps were applied to an idealized 20-story spacial frame that helps in the presentation of the stiffness correction process applied to columns. Based on these models the two methods used to generate the Wind loads are presented: a discrete model proposed in the Wind Brazilian code, NBR6123 (ABNT, 1988) and the Synthetic-Wind method. The method uses the Davenport spectrum which is divided into a variety of frequencies to generate the temporal series of loads. Finally, the 47- story building was analyzed using both the three-dimensional finite element method through the SAP2000 V10 software and the shear building model. The models were loaded with Wind load generated by the Wind code NBR6123 (ABNT, 1988) and by the Synthetic-Wind method considering different wind directions. The displacements and internal forces in columns and beams were compared and a comparative study considering a situation of a full elevated reservoir is realized. As can be observed the displacements obtained by the SAP2000 V10 model are greater when loaded with NBR6123 (ABNT, 1988) wind load related to the permanent phase of the structure’s response.

Keywords: finite element method, synthetic wind, tall buildings, shear building

Procedia PDF Downloads 257

Authors: Juliana C. Alencar, Monica Ferreira do Amaral Porto

Abstract:

Watercourses in Brazilian urban areas are constantly being degraded due to the unplanned use of the urban space; however, due to the different contexts of land use and occupation in the river watersheds, different intervention strategies are required to requalify them. When it comes to requalifying watercourses, we can list three main techniques to fulfill this purpose: restoration, revitalization and recovery; each one being indicated for specific contexts of land use and occupation in the basin. In this study, it was demonstrated that the application of these three techniques to three small basins in São Paulo city, listing the aspects involved in each of the contexts and techniques of requalification. For a protected watercourse within a forest park, renaturalization was proposed, where the watercourse is preserved in a state closer to the natural one. For a watercourse in an urban context that still preserves open spaces for its maintenance as a landscape element, an intervention was proposed following the principles of revitalization, integrating the watercourse with the landscape and the population. In the case of a watercourse in a harder context, only recovery was proposed, since the watercourse is found under the road system, which makes it difficult to integrate it into the landscape.

Keywords: sustainable drainage, river restoration, river revitalization, river recovery

Procedia PDF Downloads 137

Authors: Weber A. R. Souza, Andre A. N. Dantas, Marcio A. Medeiros, Rafaella F. Costa

Abstract:

The erosive processes are natural phenomena that cause changes in the soil continuously due to the actions of natural erosive agents and their speed can be intensified or retarded by factors such as climate, inclination, type of matrix rock, vegetation and anthropic activities, the latter being very relevant in occupied areas without planning and urban infrastructure. Inadequate housing sites associated with an inefficient urban drainage network and lack of vegetation cover potentiate the erosive processes that, over time, are gaining alarming proportions, as is the case of the erosion in Planaltina in Federal district, a Brazilian state in the central west. Thus, the aim of this work was to compare the use of Vetiver grass and Alfalfa as vegetation cover to slope protection. For that, a study was carried out in the scientific literature about the improvement of the soil properties provided by them and verification of the safety factor through the simulation of slopes with different heights and inclination using SLOPE / W software. The Vetiver grass presented little more satisfactory results than the Alfalfa, but these obtained results slightly closer to that of the vetiver grass in less time of planting.

Keywords: erosive processes, planting, slope protection, vegetation cover

Procedia PDF Downloads 153

Authors: Leandro Marcos Alves Vaz

Abstract:

The teaching of physics in Brazilian public schools emphasizes strongly the theoretical aspects of this science, showing its philosophical and mathematical basis, but neglecting its experimental character. Perhaps the lack of science laboratories explains this practice. In this work, we present a method of teaching physics using the computer. As alternatives to real experiments, we have the trials through simulators, many of which are free software available on the internet. In order to develop a study on the use of simulators in teaching, knowing the impossibility of simulations on all topics in a given subject, we combined these programs with phenomenological and/or experimental texts in order to mitigate this limitation. This study proposes the use of simulators and the debate using phenomenological/experimental texts on electrostatic theme in groups of the 3rd year of EJA (Adult and Youth Education) in order to verify the advantages of this methodology. Some benefits of the hybridization of the traditional method with the tools used were: Greater motivation of the students in learning, development of experimental notions, proactive socialization to learning, greater easiness to understand some concepts and the creation of collaborative activities that can reduce timidity of part of the students.

Keywords: experimentation, learning physical, simulators, youth and adult

Procedia PDF Downloads 261

Authors: Laerte Pereira da Silva Júnior, Maria Manuel Borges

Abstract:

Institutional Repositories (IR) are complex constructs that depend on political, cultural and technological aspects. Because IRs are a mirror of the organization's intellectual production, their main function is to make that production available worldwide, and also to consider its long term preservation. To this end, there is a need to define clearly the digital preservation policies supported by political decisions. There are several guidelines about the definition of digital preservation policies focusing in different themes from preservation planning to rights and restriction management, sustainability planning, etc., but this work aims to verify the implementation of digital preservation policies on the Institutional Repositories of the Federal Universities of Brazil. The methodology used was to check the information available on the websites of the IRs selected against two fields of the OpenDOAR, policies and OpenDOAR ID, to verify the existence of digital preservation policies. For this purpose a sample of the 21 of the 25 IRs registered at the Directory of Open Access Repositories (DOAR) was used, which is about 1/3 rd of the total of the brazilian universities. The 4 IRs that presented no information by the OpenDOAR team were desconsidered. The main conclusion is that most of the IRs of these universities have no polices clearly stated or no policies at all, and that there is a need to include these concerns at the top level management of IRs. The number of initiatives in digital preservation policies around the world stress the need of awareness of its importance in Brazil and requires measures to raise this awareness.

Keywords: Brazil, digital preservation policies, institutional repositories, openDOAR

Procedia PDF Downloads 513

Authors: Thelma Maria Melo Pinheiro, Guilherme Raposo Diniz Vieira, Sidney Matos da Silva, Leonardo Mendonça de Oliveira Queiroz, Mateus Sousa Pinheiro, Danyllo Wenceslau de Oliveira Lopes

Abstract:

The present article has the objective to describe the regulatory impact analysis (RIA) of the contracting efficiency of the Brazilian transmission system usage. This contracting is made by users connected to the main transmission network and is used to guide necessary investments to supply the electrical energy demand. Therefore, an inefficient contracting of this energy amount distorts the real need for grid capacity, affecting the sector planning accuracy and resources optimization. In order to provide this efficiency, the Brazilian Electricity Regulatory Agency (ANEEL) homologated the Normative Resolution (NR) No. 666, from July 23th of 2015, which consolidated the procedures for the contracting of transmission system usage and the contracting efficiency verification. Aiming for a more efficient and rational transmission system contracting, the resolution established economic incentives denominated as Inefficiency installment for excess (IIE) and inefficiency installment for over-contracting (IIOC). The first one, IIE, is verified when the contracted demand exceeds the established regulatory limit; it is applied to consumer units, generators, and distribution companies. The second one, IIOC, is verified when the distributors over-contract their demand. Thus, the establishment of the inefficiency installments IIE and IIOC intends to avoid the agent contract less energy than necessary or more than it is needed. Knowing that RIA evaluates a regulatory intervention to verify if its goals were achieved, the results from the application of the above-mentioned normative resolution to the Brazilian transmission sector were analyzed through indicators that were created for this RIA to evaluate the contracting efficiency transmission system usage, using real data from before and after the homologation of the normative resolution in 2015. For this, indicators were used as the efficiency contracting indicator (ECI), excess of demand indicator (EDI), and over-contracting of demand indicator (ODI). The results demonstrated, through the ECI analysis, a decrease of the contracting efficiency, a behaviour that was happening even before the normative resolution of 2015. On the other side, the EDI showed a considerable decrease in the amount of excess for the distributors and a small reduction for the generators; moreover, the ODI notable decreased, which optimizes the usage of the transmission installations. Hence, with the complete evaluation from the data and indicators, it was possible to conclude that IIE is a relevant incentive for a more efficient contracting, indicating to the agents that their contracting values are not adequate to keep their service provisions for their users. The IIOC also has its relevance, to the point that it shows to the distributors that their contracting values are overestimated.

Keywords: contracting, electricity regulation, evaluation, regulatory impact analysis, transmission power system

Procedia PDF Downloads 93

Authors: Juliana Brandao, Holly Gibbs, Lisa Naughton, Lisa Rausch

Abstract:

The Brazilian Amazon continues to be plagued by modern day slave labor, specifically within the cattle production industry. In response to this issue, modern day anti-slavery activists have implemented additional regulations designed to combat slave labor associated with cattle. These regulations have been incorporated into existing agreements designed to control deforestation. The goal of these rules is to prevent the trade of beef contaminated with modern slave labor between supplier farms and slaughterhouses. In this study, we identify farms that make use of modern slave labor, and we use cattle transaction data to track the sale of cattle between farms and slaughterhouses. Our analysis reveals that slaughterhouses, which have signed cattle agreements that include requirements to refuse cattle associated with modern slave labor, have avoided buying cattle from suppliers that were on the dirty list. This trend is especially evident when the "dirty lists" that identify modern-day slave labor users are made publicly accessible online. We conclude that the "dirty list" of modern-day slave labor users should be maintained on publicly available websites to allow slaughterhouses, retailers, and consumers to send powerful market signals that discourage the use of modern-day slave labor.

Keywords: cattle ranchers, modern slave labor, deforestation, brazilian amazon

Procedia PDF Downloads 77

Authors: Selvam M., Vadthya Poornachandar, Surender Singh

Abstract:

These Reclaimed Asphalt Pavement (RAP) aggregates are generally dumped in the open area after the demolition of Asphalt Pavements. The utilization of RAP aggregates in cement concrete pavements may provide several socio-economic-environmental benefits and could embrace the circular economy. The cross recycling of RAP aggregates in the concrete pavement could reduce the consumption of virgin aggregates and saves the fertile land. However, the structural, as well as functional properties of RAP-concrete could be significantly lower than the conventional Pavement Quality Control (PQC) pavements. This warrants judicious selection of RAP fraction (coarse and fine aggregates) along with the accurate proportion of the same for PQC highways. Also, the selection of the RAP fraction and its proportion shall not be solely based on the mechanical properties of RAP-concrete specimens but also governed by the structural and functional behavior of the pavement system. In this study, an effort has been made to predict the optimum RAP fraction and its corresponding proportion for cement concrete pavements by considering the low-volume and high-volume roads. Initially, the effect of inclusions of RAP on the fresh and mechanical properties of concrete pavement mixes is mapped through an extensive literature survey. Almost all the studies available to date are considered for this study. Generally, Indian Roads Congress (IRC) methods are the most widely used design method in India for the analysis of concrete pavements, and the same has been considered for this study. Subsequently, fatigue damage analysis is performed to evaluate the required safe thickness of pavement slab for different fractions of RAP (coarse RAP). Consequently, the performance of RAP-concrete is predicted by employing the AASHTO-1993 model for the following distresses conditions: faulting, cracking, and smoothness. The performance prediction and total cost analysis of RAP aggregates depict that the optimum proportions of coarse RAP aggregates in the PQC mix are 35% and 50% for high volume and low volume roads, respectively.

Keywords: concrete pavement, RAP aggregate, performance prediction, pavement design

Procedia PDF Downloads 136

Authors: Valdir Moura, FranciléIa De Oliveira E. Silva, Erivelto Mercante, Ranieli Dos Anjos De Souza, Jerry Adriani Johann

Abstract:

Several colonization projects were implemented in the Brazilian Legal Amazon in the 1970s and 1980s. Among all of these colonization projects, the most prominent were those with the Fishbone and Topographic models. Within this scope, the projects of settlements known as Anari and Machadinho were created, which stood out because they are contiguous areas with different models and structure of occupation and colonization. The main objective of this work was to evaluate the dynamics of Land-Use and Land-Cover (LULC) in two different colonization models, implanted in the State of Rondonia in the 1980s. The Fishbone and Topographic models were implanted in the Anari and Machadinho settlements respectively. The understanding of these two forms of occupation will help in future colonization programs of the Brazilian Legal Amazon. These settlements are contiguous areas with different occupancy structures. A 32-year Landsat time series (1984-2016) was used to evaluate the rates and trends in the LULC process in the different colonization models. In the different occupation models analyzed, the results showed a rapid loss of primary and secondary forests (deforestation), mainly due to the dynamics of use, established by the Agriculture/Pasture (A/P) relation and, with heavy dependence due to road construction.

Keywords: land-cover, deforestation, rate fragments, remote sensing, secondary succession

Procedia PDF Downloads 115

Authors: Gerardo Casal, Miguel E. Vázquez-Méndez

Abstract:

The clothoid (also known as Cornu spiral or Euler spiral) is a curve that is characterized because its curvature is proportional to its length. This property makes that it would be widely used as transition curve for designing the layout of roads and railway tracks. In this work, from the geometrical property characterizing the clothoid, its parametric equations are obtained and two algorithms to compute it are compared. The first (classical), is widely used in Surveying Schools and it is based on the use of explicit formulas obtained from Taylor expansions of sine and cosine functions. The second one (alternative) is a very simple algorithm, based on the numerical solution of the initial value problems giving the clothoid parameterization. Both methods are compared in some typical surveying problems. The alternative method does not use complex formulas and so it is conceptually very simple and easy to apply. It gives good results, even if the classical method goes wrong (if the quotient between length and radius of curvature is high), needs no subsequent translations nor rotations and, consequently, it seems an efficient tool for designing the layout of roads and railway tracks.

Keywords: transition curves, railroad and highway engineering, Runge-Kutta methods

Procedia PDF Downloads 249

Authors: N. A. P. Camaforte, P. M. P. Vareda, L. L. Saldanha, A. L. Dokkedal, J. M. Rezende-Neto, M. R. Senger, F. P. Silva-Jr, J. R. Bosqueiro

Abstract:

Diabetes mellitus is a disease characterized by deficiency of insulin secretion and/or action which results in hyperglycemia. Nowadays, acarbose is a medicine used by diabetic people to inhibit alpha-glucosidases leading to the decreasing of post-feeding glycaemia, but with low effectiveness and many side effects. Medicinal plants have been used for the treatment of many diseases including diabetes and their action occurs through the modulation of insulin-depending processes, pancreas regeneration or inhibiting glucose absorption by the intestine. Previous studies in our laboratory showed that the treatment using two crude extracts of plants from Brazilian cerrado was able to decrease fasting blood glucose and improve glucose tolerance in streptozotocin-diabetic mice. Because of this and the importance of the search for new alternatives to decrease the hyperglycemia, we decided to evaluate the inhibitory action of two plants from Brazilian cerrado - B.H. and Myrcia bella. The enzymatic assay was performed in 50 µL of final volume using pancreatic α-amylase and maltase together with theirs commercial substrates. The inhibition potency (IC50) was determined by the incubation of eight different concentrations of both extracts and the enzymes for 5 minutes at 37ºC. After, the substrate was added to start the reaction. Glucosidases assay was evaluated measuring the quantity of p-nitrophenol in 405 nmin 384 wells automatic reader. The in vitro assay with the extracts of B.H. and M. bella showed an IC50 of 28,04µg/mL and 16,93 µg/mL for α-amilase, and 43,01µg/mL and 17 µg/mL for maltase, respectively. M. bella extract showed a higher inhibitory activity for those enzymes than B.H. extract. The crude extracts tested showed a higher inhibition rate to α-amylase, but were less effective against maltase in comparison to acarbose (IC50 36µg/mL and 9 µg/mL, respectively). In conclusion, the crude extract of B.H. and M. bella showed a potent inhibitory effect against α-amylase and showed promising results to the possible development of new medicines to treat diabetes with less or even without side effects.

Keywords: alfa-glucosidases, diabetes mellitus, glycaemia, medicinal plants

Procedia PDF Downloads 216

Authors: Luís Antonio de Almeida Rodriguez, José Maria Parente de Oliveira, Ednelson Oliveira

Abstract:

In the last two decades, the world’s aviation authorities have made several attempts to create consensus about a global and accepted approach for applying semantics to web services registry descriptions. This problem has led communities to face a fat and disorganized infrastructure to describe aeronautical web services. It is usual for developers to implement ad-hoc connections among consumers and providers and manually create non-standardized service compositions, which need some particular approach to compose and semantically discover a desired web service. Current practices are not precise and tend to focus on lightweight specifications of some parts of the OWL-S and embed them into syntactic descriptions (SOAP artifacts and OWL language). It is necessary to have the ability to manage the use of both technologies. This paper presents an implementation of the ontology OWL-S that describes a Brazilian Aeronautical Web Service Registry, which makes it able to publish, advertise, make multi-criteria semantic discovery aligned with the ideas of the System Wide Information Management (SWIM) Program, and invoke web services within the Air Traffic Management context. The proposal’s best finding is a generic approach to describe semantic web services. The paper also presents a set of functional requirements to guide the ontology development and to compare them to the results to validate the implementation of the OWL-S Ontology.

Keywords: aeronautical web services, OWL-S, semantic web services discovery, ontologies

Procedia PDF Downloads 63

Authors: Geovana Soncin, Larissa Berti

Abstract:

Some aspects of prosody acquisition remain still unclear, especially regarding atypical speech development processes. This work deals with prosody acquisition and its implications for clinical purposes. Therefore, we analyze speech samples produced by adult speakers, children in typical language development, and children with phonological disorders. Phonological disorder comprises deviating manifestations characterized by inconsistencies in the phonological representation of a linguistic system under acquisition. The clinical assessment is performed mostly based on contrasts whose manifestations occur in the segmental level of a phonological system. Prosodic organization of spoken utterances is not included in the standard assessment. However, assuming that prosody is part of the phonological system, it was hypothesized that children with Phonological Disorders could present inconsistencies that also occur at a prosodic level. Based on this hypothesis, the paper aims to analyze contrastive focus marking in the speech of children with Phonological Disorders in comparison with the speech of children under Typical Language Development and adults. The participants of all groups were native speakers of Brazilian Portuguese. The investigation was designed in such a way as to identify differences and similarities among the groups that could be interpreted as clues of normal or deviant processes of prosody acquisition. Contrastive focus in Brazilian Portuguese is marked by increasing duration, f0, and intensity on the focused element as well as by a particular type of pitch accent (L*+H). Thirty-nine subjects participated, thirteen from each group. Acoustic analysis was performed, considering duration, intensity, and intonation as parameters. Children with PD were recruited in sessions from a service provided by Speech-Language Pathology Therapy; children in TD, paired in age and sex with the first group, were recruited in a regular school; and 20-24 years old adults were recruited from a University class. In a game prepared to elicit focused sentences, all of them produced the sentence “Girls love red dress,” marking focus on different syntactic positions: subject, verb, and object. Results showed that adults, children in typical language development, and children with Phonological Disorders marked contrastive focus differently: typical children used all parameters like adults do; however, in comparison with them, they exaggerated duration and, in the opposite direction, they did not increase f0 in a sufficient magnitude as adults; children with Phonological Disorder presented inconsistencies in duration, not increasing it in some syntactic positions, and also in intonation, not producing the representative pitch accent of contrastive focus. The results suggest prosody is also affected by phonological disorder and give clues of developmental processes of prosody acquisition.

Keywords: Brazilian Portuguese, contrastive focus, phonological disorder, prosody acquisition

Procedia PDF Downloads 60

Authors: Saumya Srivastava, Rina Maiti

Abstract:

In order to achieve a better performance of vehicle detection in a complex environment, we present an efficient approach for a multi-vehicle detection system using an adaptive sliding window technique. For a given frame, image segmentation is carried out to establish the region of interest. Gradient computation followed by thresholding, denoising, and morphological operations is performed to extract the binary search image. Near-region field and far-region field are defined to generate hypotheses using the adaptive sliding window technique on the resultant binary search image. For each vehicle candidate, features are extracted using a histogram of oriented gradients, and a pre-trained support vector machine is applied for hypothesis verification. Later, the Kalman filter is used for tracking the vanishing point. The experimental results show that the method is robust and effective on various roads and driving scenarios. The algorithm was tested on highways and urban roads in India.

Keywords: gradient, vehicle detection, histograms of oriented gradients, support vector machine

Procedia PDF Downloads 96

Authors: Dražen Cvitanić, Biljana Maljković

Abstract:

This paper presents models for predicting operating speeds on tangent sections of two-lane rural roads developed on continuous speed data. The data corresponds to 20 drivers of different ages and driving experiences, driving their own cars along an 18 km long section of a state road. The data were first used for determination of maximum operating speeds on tangents and their comparison with speeds in the middle of tangents i.e. speed data used in most of operating speed studies. Analysis of continuous speed data indicated that the spot speed data are not reliable indicators of relevant speeds. After that, operating speed models for tangent sections were developed. There was no significant difference between models developed using speed data in the middle of tangent sections and models developed using maximum operating speeds on tangent sections. All developed models have higher coefficient of determination then models developed on spot speed data. Thus, it can be concluded that the method of measuring has more significant impact on the quality of operating speed model than the location of measurement.

Keywords: operating speed, continuous speed data, tangent sections, spot speed, consistency

Procedia PDF Downloads 427

Authors: Kidist Mesfin Nguse

Abstract:

Ethiopia is the second most densely populated nation in Africa, and about 121 million people as the 2022 Ethiopia population live report recorded. In recent years, the Ethiopian government (GOE) has been gradually growing its road network. With 138,127 kilometers (85,825 miles) of all-weather roads as of the end of 2018–19, Ethiopia possessed just 39% of the nation's necessary road network and lacked a well-organized system. The Ethiopian urban population report recorded that about 21% of the population lives in urban areas, and the high population, coupled with growth in various infrastructures, has led to the migration of the workforce from rural areas to cities across the country. In main roads, the heterogeneous traffic flow with various operational features makes it more unfavorable, causing frequent congestion in the stretch of road. The Level of Service (LOS), a qualitative measure of traffic, is categorized based on the operating conditions in the traffic stream. Determining the capacity and LOS for this city is very crucial as this affects the planning and design of traffic systems and their operation, and the allocation of route selection for infrastructure building projects to provide for a considerably good level of service.

Keywords: capacity, level of service, traffic volume, free flow speed

Procedia PDF Downloads 25

Authors: Renan Caseiro De Almeida, Mateus Mello Garrute

Abstract:

The world walks to be ever more globalised. This trend promotes an increase on the number of transnational commercial transactions. The main modal for carriage of goods is by sea, and many countries have their economies dependent on the maritime freightage – it could be because they exercise largely this activity or because they follow the tendency of using the maritime logistic widely. Among these ones, Brazil is included. This nation counts with sixteen ports with good capacities, which receive most of the international income by sea. It is estimated that 85 per cent of the total influx of goods in Brazil is by maritime modal, leaving mere 15 per cent for the other ones. This made it necessary to develop maritime law in international and national basis, to create a standard to be applied with the intention to harmonize the transnational carriage of goods by sea. Maritime contracts are very specific and have interesting peculiarities, but in their range, little research has been made on what causes the main divergences when it comes to international contracts: the jurisdiction conflict. Likewise any other international contract, it is common for the parties to set a forum selection clause to choose the forum which will be able to judge the litigations that could rise from a maritime transport contract and, consequently, also which law should be applied to the cases. However, the forum choice in Brazil has always been somewhat polemical – not only in the maritime law sphere - for sometimes national tribunals overlook the parties’ choice and call the competence for themselves. In this sense, it is interesting to mention that the Mexico Convention of 1994 about the law applicable to international contracts did not gain strength in Brazil, nor even reached the Congress to be considered for ratification. Furthermore, it is also noteworthy that Brazil has a new Civil Procedure Code, which was put into reinforcement in 2016 bringing new legal provisions specifically about the forum selection. This represented a mark in the national legal system in this matter. Therefore, this paper intends to give an insight through Brazilian jurisprudence, making an analysis of how this issue has been treated on litigations about maritime contracts in the national tribunals, as well as the solutions found by the Brazilian legal system for the jurisdiction conflicts in those cases. To achieve the expected results, the hypothetical-deductive method will be used in combination with researches on doctrine and legislations. Also, jurisprudential research and case law study will have a special role, since the main point of this paper is to verify and study the position of the courts in Brazil in a specific matter. As a country of civil law, the Brazilian judges and tribunals are very attached to the rules displayed on codes. However, the jurisprudential understanding has been changing during the years and with the advent of the new rules about the applicable law and forum selection clause, it is noticeable that new winds are being blown.

Keywords: applicable law, forum selection clause, international business, international maritime contracts, litigation in courts

Procedia PDF Downloads 251

Authors: Rogerio Vieira Dos Reis

Abstract:

Countries like Brazil that despite fighting hard against corruption are not improving their corruption perception, especially due to systemic political corruption, should review their corruption prevention strategies. This thesis brings a case study based on an alternative way of preventing corruption: addressing the corruption drivers in public policies that lead to poor economic performance. After discussing the Brazilian industrial policies adopted recently, especially the measures towards the automotive sector, two corruption issues in this sector are analyzed: facilitating payment for fiscal benefits and buying the extension of fiscal benefits. In-depth interviews conducted with a policymaker and an executive of the automobile sector provide insights for identifying three main corruption drivers: excessive and unnecessary bureaucracy, a complex tax system and the existence of a closed market without setting performance requirements to be achieved by the benefited firms. Both the identification of the drivers of successful industrial policies and the proposal of anti-corruption strategies to ensure developmental outcomes are based on the economic perspective of industrial policy advocated by developmental authors and on the successful South Korean economic development experience. Structural anti-corruption measures include tax reform, the regulation of lobbying and legislation to allow corporate political contribution. Besides improving policymakers’ technical capabilities, measures at the ministry level include redesigning the automotive regimes as long-term policies focused on national investment with simple and clear rules and making fiscal benefits conditional upon performance targets focused on suppliers. This case study is of broader interest because it recommends the importance of adapting performance audits conducted by anti-corruption agencies, to focus not only on the delivery of public services, but also on the identification of potentially highly damaging corruption drivers in public policies that grant fiscal benefits to achieve developmental outcomes.

Keywords: Brazilian automotive sector, corruption, economic development, industrial policy, Inovar-Auto

Procedia PDF Downloads 193

Authors: Thabo M. Bafitlhile, Adewole Oladele

Abstract:

Botswana has been affected by floods since long ago and is still experiencing this tragic event. Flooding occurs mostly in the North-West, North-East, and parts of Central district due to heavy rainfalls experienced in these areas. The torrential rains destroyed homes, roads, flooded dams, fields and destroyed livestock and livelihoods. Palapye is one area in the central district that has been experiencing floods ever since 1995 when its greatest flood on record occurred. Heavy storms result in floods and inundation; this has been exacerbated by poor and absence of drainage structures. Since floods are a part of nature, they have existed and will to continue to exist, hence more destruction. Furthermore floods and highway plays major role in erosion and destruction of roads structures. Already today, many culverts, trenches, and other drainage facilities lack the capacity to deal with current frequency for extreme flows. Future changes in the pattern of hydro climatic events will have implications for the design and maintenance costs of roads. Increase in rainfall and severe weather events can affect the demand for emergent responses. Therefore flood forecasting and warning is a prerequisite for successful mitigation of flood damage. In flood prone areas like Palapye, preventive measures should be taken to reduce possible adverse effects of floods on the environment including road structures. Therefore this paper attempts to estimate return periods associated with huge storms of different magnitude from recorded historical rainfall depth using statistical method. The method of annual maxima was used to select data sets for the rainfall analysis. In the statistical method, the Type 1 extreme value (Gumbel), Log Normal, Log Pearson 3 distributions were all applied to the annual maximum series for Palapye area to produce IDF curves. The Kolmogorov-Smirnov test and Chi Squared were used to confirm the appropriateness of fitted distributions for the location and the data do fit the distributions used to predict expected frequencies. This will be a beneficial tool for urgent flood forecasting and water resource administration as proper drainage design will be design based on the estimated flood events and will help to reclaim and protect the road structures from adverse impacts of flood.

Keywords: drainage, estimate, evaluation, floods, flood forecasting

Procedia PDF Downloads 342

Authors: B. Karabuluter, O. Karaduman

Abstract:

Traffic management and traffic planning are important issues, especially in big cities. Due to the increase of personal vehicles and the physical constraints of urban roads, the problem of transportation especially in crowded cities over time is revealed. This situation reduces the living standards, and it can put human life at risk because the vehicles such as ambulance, fire department are prevented from reaching their targets. Even if the city planners take these problems into account, emergency planning and traffic management are needed to avoid cases such as traffic congestion, intersections, traffic jams caused by traffic accidents or roadworks. In this study, in smart traffic management issues, proposed solutions using intelligent vehicles acting in cooperation with urban roads are examined. Traffic management is becoming more difficult due to factors such as fatigue, carelessness, sleeplessness, social behavior patterns, and lack of education. However, autonomous vehicles, which remove the problems caused by human weaknesses by providing driving control, are increasing the success of practicing the algorithms developed in city traffic management. Such intelligent vehicles have become an important solution in urban life by using 'swarm intelligence' algorithms and cooperative driving methods to provide traffic flow, prevent traffic accidents, and increase living standards. In this study, studies conducted in this area have been dealt with in terms of traffic jam, intersections, regulation of traffic flow, signaling, prevention of traffic accidents, cooperation and communication techniques of vehicles, fleet management, transportation of emergency vehicles. From these concepts, some taxonomies were made out of the way. This work helps to develop new solutions and algorithms for cities where intelligent vehicles that can perform cooperative driving can take place, and at the same time emphasize the trend in this area.

Keywords: intelligent traffic management, cooperative driving, smart driving, urban road, swarm intelligence, connected vehicles

Procedia PDF Downloads 306

Authors: Mahshid Hatamzad, Geanette Polanco

Abstract:

Improving the performance of Winter Road Maintenance (WRM) can increase the traffic safety and reduce the cost as well as environmental impacts. This study evaluates the efficiency of WRM technique, named salting, in the Arctic area by using Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA), which is a non-parametric linear method to measure the efficiencies of decision-making units (DMUs) based on handling multiple inputs and multiple outputs at the same time that their associated weights are not known. Here, roads are considered as DMUs for which the efficiency must be determined. The three input variables considered are traffic flow, road area and WRM cost. In addition, the two output variables included are level of safety in the roads and environment impacts resulted from WRM, which is also considered as an uncontrollable factor in the second scenario. The results show the performance of DMUs from the most efficient WRM to the inefficient/least efficient one and this information provides decision makers with technical support and the required suggested improvements for inefficient WRM, in order to achieve a cost-effective WRM and a safe road transportation during wintertime in the Arctic areas.

Keywords: environmental impacts, DEA, risk and safety, WRM

Procedia PDF Downloads 99