Search results for: tooth root stress

Authors: Mookgo Solomon Kgatle

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Introductory Statement: The effect of corruption in South Africa has seriously constrained development of the national economy and has significantly inhibited good governance in the country. The significance of this paper is a demonstration that Corruption in a South African government is greatly influenced by the culture of greed by leaders in government. Many leaders in government are not satisfied with what they receive on monthly basis in the form of salaries and allowances. Thus, the quest to accumulate, as many material possessions by cabinet ministers and public servants is what is crippling the annual budget and disadvantaging the poor masses of our people including women, children and the elderly. Basic Methodology: In order to deal with this dilemma, this paper proposes ethical leadership as a theological and ethical alternative and antidote to the culture of greed in government. Research Findings: Ethical leadership is proposed because unlike the culture of greed, it is a leadership that is based on respect for ethical principles and standards and for the dignity and privileges of others. Ethical leadership is synonymous with principles like trust, morality, consideration, equality, and justice. Conclusion: The conclusion is that ethical leadership is one of the solutions that can assist the South African government to deal with the root causes of corruption, that is, the culture of greed.

Keywords: ethical leadership, theological ethics, culture of greed, corruption, governance

Procedia PDF Downloads 191

Authors: Daniel M. Wolff, Patricia Gray, Rafael de la Parra Venegas

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An unsupervised machine listening system is constructed and applied to a dataset of 17,195 30-second marine hydrophone recordings. The system is then heuristically supplemented with anecdotal listening, contextual recording information, and supervised learning techniques to reduce the number of false positives. Features for classification are assembled by extracting the following data from each of the audio files: the spectral centroid, root-mean-squared values for each frequency band of a 10-octave filter bank, and mel-frequency cepstral coefficients in 5-second frames. In this way both time- and frequency-domain information are contained in the features to be passed to a clustering algorithm. Classification is performed using the k-means algorithm and then a k-nearest neighbors search. Different values of k are experimented with, in addition to different combinations of the available feature sets. Hypothesized class labels are 'primarily anthrophony' and 'primarily biophony', where the best class result conforming to the former label has 104 members after heuristic pruning. This demonstrates how a large audio dataset has been made more tractable with machine learning techniques, forming the foundation of a framework designed to acoustically monitor and gauge biological and anthropogenic activity in a marine environment.

Keywords: anthrophony, hydrophone, k-means, machine learning

Procedia PDF Downloads 172

Authors: Hoda Zolfagharnejad, Behnam Kamkar, Omid Abdi

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Crop coefficient (Kc) is an important factor contributing to estimation of evapotranspiration, and is also used to determine the irrigation schedule. This study investigated and determined the monthly Kc of winter wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) using five vegetation indices (VIs): Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI), Difference Vegetation Index (DVI), Soil Adjusted Vegetation Index (SAVI), Infrared Percentage Vegetation Index (IPVI), and Ratio Vegetation Index (RVI) of four basins in Golestan province, Iran. 14 Landsat-8 images according to crop growth stage were used to estimate monthly Kc of wheat. VIs were calculated based on infrared and near infrared bands of Landsat 8 images using Geographical Information System (GIS) software. The best VIs were chosen after establishing a regression relationship among these VIs with FAO Kc and Kc that was modified for the study area by the previous research based on R² and Root Mean Square Error (RMSE). The result showed that local modified SAVI with R²= 0.767 and RMSE= 0.174 was the best index to produce monthly wheat Kc maps.

Keywords: crop coefficient, remote sensing, vegetation indices, wheat

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Authors: Devinder Singh, Arvind Kumar, Rajneesh Kumar

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The general solution of the equations for a homogeneous isotropic microstretch thermo elastic medium with mass diffusion for two dimensional problems is obtained due to normal and tangential forces. The integral transform technique is used to obtain the components of displacements, microrotation, stress and mass concentration, temperature change and mass concentration. A particular case of interest is deduced from the present investigation.

Keywords: normal force, tangential force, microstretch, thermoelastic, the integral transform technique, deforming force, microstress force, boundary value problem

Procedia PDF Downloads 622

Authors: Malcolm Dinovitzer, Calvin Miller, Adam Hacker, Gabriel Wong, Zach Annen, Padmassun Rajakareyar, Jordan Mulvihill, Mostafa S.A. ElSayed

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The research work presented in this paper is developed by the Blended Wing Body (BWB) Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) team, a fourth-year capstone project at Carleton University Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering. Here, a clean sheet UAV with BWB configuration is designed and optimized using Multiscale Design Optimization (MSDO) approach employing lattice materials taking into consideration design for additive manufacturing constraints. The BWB-UAV is being developed with a mission profile designed for surveillance purposes with a minimum payload of 1000 grams. To demonstrate the design methodology, a single design loop of a sample rib from the airframe is shown in details. This includes presentation of the conceptual design, materials selection, experimental characterization and residual thermal stress distribution analysis of additively manufactured materials, manufacturing constraint identification, critical loads computations, stress analysis and design optimization. A dynamic turbulent critical load case was identified composed of a 1-g static maneuver with an incremental Power Spectral Density (PSD) gust which was used as a deterministic design load case for the design optimization. 2D flat plate Doublet Lattice Method (DLM) was used to simulate aerodynamics in the aeroelastic analysis. The aerodynamic results were verified versus a 3D CFD analysis applying Spalart-Allmaras and SST k-omega turbulence to the rigid UAV and vortex lattice method applied in the OpenVSP environment. Design optimization of a single rib was conducted using topology optimization as well as MSDO. Compared to a solid rib, weight savings of 36.44% and 59.65% were obtained for the topology optimization and the MSDO, respectively. These results suggest that MSDO is an acceptable alternative to topology optimization in weight critical applications while preserving the functional requirements.

Keywords: blended wing body, multiscale design optimization, additive manufacturing, unmanned aerial vehicle

Procedia PDF Downloads 383

Authors: Sarah Beaver, Renee Bryce

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Audiograms detect hearing impairment, but missing values pose problems. This work explores imputations in an attempt to improve accuracy. This work implements Linear Regression, Lasso, Linear Support Vector Regression, Bayesian Ridge, K Nearest Neighbors (KNN), and Random Forest machine learning techniques to impute audiogram frequencies ranging from 125Hz to 8000Hz. The data contains patients who had or were candidates for cochlear implants. Accuracy is compared across two different Nested Cross-Validation k values. Over 4000 audiograms were used from 800 unique patients. Additionally, training on data combines and compares left and right ear audiograms versus single ear side audiograms. The accuracy achieved using Root Mean Square Error (RMSE) values for the best models for Random Forest ranges from 4.74 to 6.37. The R\textsuperscript{2} values for the best models for Random Forest ranges from .91 to .96. The accuracy achieved using RMSE values for the best models for KNN ranges from 5.00 to 7.72. The R\textsuperscript{2} values for the best models for KNN ranges from .89 to .95. The best imputation models received R\textsuperscript{2} between .89 to .96 and RMSE values less than 8dB. We also show that the accuracy of classification predictive models performed better with our best imputation models versus constant imputations by a two percent increase.

Keywords: machine learning, audiograms, data imputations, single imputations

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Authors: Patel Kailash P, Patel Parimal M

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The effect of coal fly ash treatment on the chromosomes of Raphanus sativus L. was investigated. The seeds of Raphanus sativusL. were placed in petri dishes in three replicates and allowed to germinate for five days in different concentration of coal fly ash solution. The root was treated with the diluted, semidiluted, and concentrated solution of fly ash while the control group had distilled water.The total aberration were examined. The mitotic index was calculated and the results were statically evaluated by the analysis of variance 5% significant level. The mitotic index decreased as the concentration increased. The highest mitotic index value was diluted fly ash solution while the least was concentrated fly ash treatment. The results show the most frequent chromosomal abnormalities observed included: chromatid bridge, c-mitosis, and stickiness. Concentrated fly ash solution is much more genotoxic than semidiluted fly ash solution, as it induced more aberrations having percentage abnormalities for the highest concentration tested. Increased fly ash pollution can lead to some irreversible cytogenetic effect in plants. The study is an attempt to corroborate the toxic effect of coal fly ash of thermal power plant on the chromosome of plants. These results will be useful in environmental monitoring of the cytotoxicity of coal fly ash.

Keywords: coal fly-ash, genotoxic, cytogenetic, mitotic index, Raphanus sativus L.

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Authors: Fhajema Kunso

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People who live in the same region and who seemed to speak the same language still vary in some aspects of their language. The variation may occur in terms of pronunciation, lexicon, morphology, and syntax. This qualitative study described the phonological, morphological, and lexical variations of the Maguindanaon language among the ten Maguindanao municipalities. Purposive sampling, in-depth interviews, focus group discussion, and sorting and classifying of words according to phonological and morphological as well as lexical structures in data analysis were employed. The variations occurred through phonemic changes and other phonological processes and morphological processes. Phonological processes consisted of vowel lengthening and deletion while morphological processes included affixation, borrowing, and coinage. In the phonological variation, it was observed that there were phonemic changes in one dialect to another. For example, there was a change of phoneme /r/ to /l/. The phoneme /r/ was most likely to occur in Kabuntalan like /biru/, /kurIt/, and /kɘmɅr/ whereas in the rest of the dialects these were /bilu/, /kuIɪt/, and /kɘmɅl/ respectively. Morphologically, the affixation was the main way to know the tenses. For example, the root sarig (expect) when inserted with im becomes simarig, i.e. s + im + arig = simarig (expected). Lexical variation also existed in the Maguindanaon language. Results revealed that the variation in phonology, morphology, and lexicon were observed to be associated primarily on geographic distribution.

Keywords: applied linguistics, language, lexicon, Maguindanao, morphology, Philippines, phonology, processes, qualitative, variation

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Authors: Knol Hester, Müller Swantje, Danchenko Natalya

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Objective: Falls in older people cause an autonomy loss and result in an economic burden. LCare is an AI-based application to manage fall risks. The study's aim was to assess the effect of LCare use on patient outcomes in nursing homes in Germany. Methods: LCare identifies and monitors fall risks through a 3D-gait analysis and a digital questionnaire, resulting in tailored recommendations on fall prevention. A study was conducted with AOK Baden-Württemberg (01.09.2019- 31.05.2021) in 16 care facilities. Assessments at baseline and follow-up included: a fall risk score; falls (baseline: fall history in the past 12 months; follow-up: a fall record since the last analysis); fall-related injuries and hospitalizations; gait speed; fear of falling; psychological stress; nurses experience on app use. Results: 94 seniors were aged 65-99 years at the initial analysis (average 84±7 years); 566 mobility analyses were carried out in total. On average, the fall risk was reduced by 17.8 % as compared to the baseline (p<0.05). The risk of falling decreased across all subgroups, including a trend in dementia patients (p=0.06), constituting 43% of analyzed patients, and patients with walking aids (p<0.05), constituting 76% of analyzed patients. There was a trend (p<0.1) towards fewer falls and fall-related injuries and hospitalizations (baseline: 23 seniors who fell, 13 injury consequences, 9 hospitalizations; follow-up: 14 seniors who fell, 2 injury consequences, 0 hospitalizations). There was a 16% improvement in gait speed (p<0.05). Residents reported less fear of falling and psychological stress by 38% in both outcomes (p<0.05). 81% of nurses found LCare effective. Conclusions: In the presented study, the use of LCare app was associated with a reduction of fall risk among nursing home residents, improvement of health-related outcomes, and a trend toward reduction in injuries and hospitalizations. LCare may help to improve senior resident care and save healthcare costs.

Keywords: falls, digital healthcare, falls prevention, nursing homes, seniors, AI, digital assessment

Procedia PDF Downloads 137

Authors: Nkatow Mafany Christian

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According to UNHCR’s annual Database, humanitarian crises have globally been on the increase since the beginning of the 21st Century, especially in the Middle East and in Sub-Saharan Africa. Cameroon is one of the countries that has suffered tremendously from humanitarian challenges in recent years, especially with crises in the Far North, the East and its Two English-speaking Regions. These have been a result of failed mechanisms in conflict resolution peacebuilding by the government. The paper draws from this basic premise to argue that the failure to reach a consensus in order to curb internal conflicts has largely been due to the government’s attachment to the domineering attitude which emphasizes an imposition of peace terms by a superordinate (government) agency on the subordinate (aggrieved) entities. This has stalled peace efforts that have so far been engaged to address the dreaded armed conflicts in the North and South West Regions, leading to the persistence of the armed conflict. The paper exploits written, oral and online sources to sustain its argument. It suggests that an eclectic approach to resolving conflicts, which emphasizes open and frank dialogue as well as a review of the root causes, can go a long way not only to build trust but also to address the Anglophone-Cameroonian problems in Cameroon.

Keywords: conflict, conflict resolution, peace building, humanitarian crisis

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Authors: Zellagui Redouane, Bellaouar Ahmed, Lachi Mohammed

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The railway axles are the essential parts in the bogie of train, and its failure creates a big problem in the railway transport; during the work of this parts we noticed a premature deterioration. The aim has been presented a predictive model allowing the identification of the probable causes that are the cause of these premature deterioration. The results are employed for predicting fatigue crack growth in the railway axle, Also we want to present the variation value of stress intensity factor in different positions of elliptical crack tip. The modeling of axle in performed by the SOLID WORKS software and imported into ANSYS.

Keywords: crack growth, static load, railway axle, lifetime

Procedia PDF Downloads 367

Authors: Said Benkaciali, Mourad Haddadi, Abdallah Khellaf, Kacem Gairaa, Mawloud Guermoui

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In this study, many experiments were carried out to assess the influence of the input parameters on the performance of multilayer perceptron which is one the configuration of the artificial neural networks. To estimate the daily global solar radiation on the horizontal surface, we have developed some models by using seven combinations of twelve meteorological and geographical input parameters collected from a radiometric station installed at Ghardaïa city (southern of Algeria). For selecting of best combination which provides a good accuracy, six statistical formulas (or statistical indicators) have been evaluated, such as the root mean square errors, mean absolute errors, correlation coefficient, and determination coefficient. We noted that multilayer perceptron techniques have the best performance, except when the sunshine duration parameter is not included in the input variables. The maximum of determination coefficient and correlation coefficient are equal to 98.20 and 99.11%. On the other hand, some empirical models were developed to compare their performances with those of multilayer perceptron neural networks. Results obtained show that the neural networks techniques give the best performance compared to the empirical models.

Keywords: empirical models, multilayer perceptron neural network, solar radiation, statistical formulas

Procedia PDF Downloads 348

Authors: Naeem Khan

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In 1971 Williams in his essay titled "What Educational Planning is About in Higher Education" defined educational planning as "planning in education, as in anything else consist essentially of deciding, in advance, what you want, to do and how you are going to do in". In the “World Year book of Education”. While Anderson and Bowman in 1976 in their joint article titled "Theoretical Considerations in Educational Planning" defined it as "the process of preparing a set of decisions for future action pertaining in education". There are so many other definitions which are related to educational planning in which every one stress on the importance of educational planning. But developing countries face a lot of problems related to the educational planning and this paper is to discuss few of them.

Keywords: educational planning, problems, developing countries, education system,

Procedia PDF Downloads 557

Authors: Dalal Tarfaoui, Salah Zkim

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Today, environmental sustainability is everyone’s concern as it contributes in many aspects to a country's development. Morocco is also aware of the increasing threats to its natural resources. Accordingly, many projects and research have been discussed pointing mainly to water security, pollution, desertification, and land degradation, but few studies bothered to dig into the human demeanor to disclose its ecological behavior. Human behavior is accountable for environment deterioration in the first place, but we keep fighting the symptoms instead of limiting the root causes. In the conceptual framework highlighted in the present article, semi-structured interviews have been conducted using a grounded theory approach. Initially this study will serve as a pilot study and a cornerstone to approve a bigger project now in progress. Beyond the existing general ecological measures (GEM), this study has chosen the grounded theory approach to bring out firsthand insights, and probe to which extent an ecological dimension exists in Morocco as a developing country. The discourse of the ecological behavior within the Moroccan context is seen in more realist, social, and community philosophy. The study has revealed an appreciative ecological behavior that is unfortunately repressed by variables beyond people’s control, which would prevent the people’s environmental good intentions to be translated into real ecological actions.

Keywords: ecological behavior, ecological dimension, variables beyond people’s control, Morocco

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Authors: Farida Azzouz-Olden, Arthur G. Hunt, Gloria Degrandi-Hoffman

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Bees are confronting several environmental challenges, including the intermingled effects of malnutrition and disease. Intuitively, pollen is the healthiest nutritional choice; however, commercial substitutes, such as BeePro and MegaBee, are widely used. Herein we examined how feeding natural and artificial diets shapes transcription in the abdomen of the honey bee, and how transcription shifts in combination with Nosema parasitism. Gene ontology enrichment revealed that, compared with poor diet (carbohydrates (C)), bees fed pollen (P > C), BeePro (B > C), and MegaBee (M > C) showed a broad upregulation of metabolic processes, especially lipids; however, pollen feeding promoted more functions and superior proteolysis. The superiority of the pollen diet was also evident through the remarkable overexpression of vitellogenin in bees fed pollen instead of MegaBee or BeePro. Upregulation of bioprocesses under carbohydrates feeding compared to pollen (C > P) provided a clear poor nutritional status, uncovering stark expression changes that were slight or absent relatively to BeePro (C > B) or MegaBee (C > M). Poor diet feeding (C > P) induced starvation response genes and hippo signaling pathway, while it repressed growth through different mechanisms. Carbohydrate feeding (C > P) also elicited ‘adult behavior’, and developmental processes suggesting transition to foraging. Finally, it altered the ‘circadian rhythm’, reflecting the role of this mechanism in the adaptation to nutritional stress in mammals. Nosema-infected bees fed pollen compared to carbohydrates (PN > CN) upheld certain bioprocesses of uninfected bees (P > C). Poor nutritional status was more apparent against pollen (CN > PN) than BeePro (CN > BN) or MegaBee (CN > MN). Nosema accentuated the effects of malnutrition since more starvation-response genes and stress response mechanisms were upregulated in CN > PN compared to C > P. The bioprocess ‘Macromolecular complex assembly’ was also enriched in CN > PN, and involved genes associated with human HIV and/or influenza, thus providing potential candidates for bee-Nosema interactions. Finally, the enzyme Duox emerged as essential for guts defense in bees, similarly to Drosophila. These results provide evidence of the superior nutritional status of bees fed pollen instead of artificial substitutes in terms of overall health, even in the presence of a pathogen.

Keywords: honeybee, immunity, Nosema, nutrition, RNA-seq

Procedia PDF Downloads 159

Authors: Mahdi Biabanaki

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Religion is present in all human societies and has been for tens of thousands of years. What is noteworthy is that although religious traditions vary in different societies, there are considerable similarities in their religious beliefs. In all human cultures, for example, there is a widespread belief in the afterlife. Cognitive science of Religion (CSR), an emerging branch of cognitive science, searches for the root of these widespread similarities and the widespread prevalence of beliefs such as beliefs in the afterlife in common mental structures among humans. Accordingly, the cognitive architecture of the human mind has evolved to produce such beliefs automatically and non-reflectively. For CSR researchers, belief in the afterlife is an intuitive belief resulting from the functioning of mental tools. Our purpose in this article is to extract and evaluate the cognitive explanations presented in the CSR field for explaining beliefs in the afterlife. Our research shows that there are two basic theories in this area of CSR, namely "intuitive dualism" and "simulation constraint" theory. We show that these two theories face four major challenges and limitations in explaining belief in the afterlife: inability to provide a causal explanation, inability to explain cultural/religious differences in afterlife belief, the lack of distinction between the natural and the rational foundations of belief in the afterlife and disregarding the supernatural foundations of the afterlife belief.

Keywords: afterlife, cognitive science of religion, intuitive dualism, simulation constraint

Procedia PDF Downloads 218

Authors: Krystof Kryniski, Asa Kassman Rudolphi, Su Zhao, Per Lindholm

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ABB offers range of turbochargers from 500 kW to 80+ MW diesel and gas engines. Those operate on ships, power stations, generator-sets, diesel locomotives and large, off-highway vehicles. The units need to sustain harsh operating conditions, exposure to high speeds, temperatures and varying loads. They are expected to work at over-critical speeds damping effectively any transients and encountered resonances. Components are often connected via friction joints. Designs of those interfaces need to account for surface roughness, texture, pre-stress, etc. to sustain against fretting fatigue. The experience from field contributed with valuable input on components performance in hash sea environment and their exposure to high temperature, speed and load conditions. Study of tribological interactions of oxide formations provided an insight into dynamic activities occurring between the surfaces. Oxidation was recognized as the dominant factor of a wear. Microscopic inspections of fatigue cracks on turbine indicated insufficient damping and unrestrained structural stress leading to catastrophic failure, if not prevented in time. The contact interface exhibits strongly non-linear mechanism and to describe it the piecewise approach was used. Set of samples representing the combinations of materials, texture, surface and heat treatment were tested on a friction rig under range of loads, frequencies and excitation amplitudes. Developed numerical technique extracted the friction coefficient, tangential contact stiffness and damping. Vast amount of experimental data was processed with the multi-harmonics balance (MHB) method to categorize the components subjected to the periodic excitations. At the pre-defined excitation level both force and displacement formed semi-elliptical hysteresis curves having the same area and secant as the actual ones. By cross-correlating the terms remaining in the phase and out of the phase, respectively it was possible to separate an elastic energy from dissipation and derive the stiffness and damping characteristics.

Keywords: contact interface, fatigue, rotor-dynamics, torsional resonances

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Authors: Rhadinia Tayag-Relanes, Felina C. Young

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This study was conducted to analyze the noodle production process at Yan Hu Food Manufacturing for the basis of production improvement. The study utilized the PDCA approach and record review in the gathering of data for the calendar year 2019 from August to October data of the noodle products miki, canton, and misua. Causal-comparative research was used in this study; it attempts to establish cause-effect relationships among the variables such as descriptive statistics and correlation, both were used to compute the data gathered. The study found that miki, canton, and misua production has different cycle time sets for each production and has different production outputs in every set of its production process and a different number of wastages. The company has not yet established its allowable rejection rate/ wastage; instead, this paper used a 1% wastage limit. The researcher recommended the following: machines used for each process of the noodle product must be consistently maintained and monitored; an assessment of all the production operators by checking their performance statistically based on the output and the machine performance; a root cause analysis for finding the solution must be conducted; and an improvement on the recording system of the input and output of the production process of noodle product should be established to eliminate the poor recording of data.

Keywords: continuous improvement, process, operations, PDCA

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Authors: Shigeyuki Haruyama, Oke Oktavianty, Zefry Darmawan, Tadayuki Kyoutani, Ken Kaminishi

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Cab’s frame strength is considered as an important factor in excavator’s operator safety, especially during roll-over. In this study, we use a model of cab frame with different thicknesses and perform elastoplastic numerical analysis by using Finite Element Method (FEM). Deformation mode and energy absorption's of cab’s frame part are investigated on two conditions, with wrinkle and without wrinkle. The occurrence of wrinkle when deforming cab frame can reduce energy absorption, and among 4 parts with wrinkle, the energy absorption significantly decreases in part C. Residual stress that generated upon the bending process of part C is analyzed to confirm it possibility in increasing the energy absorption.

Keywords: ROPS, FEM, hydraulic excavator, cab frame

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Authors: Anthony Bawa, Konstantinos Banitsas

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Rheumatism is a muscular disorder that affects the muscles of the upper and lower limbs. This condition could potentially progress to impair the movement of patients. This study aims to investigate the hip muscular imbalance in patients with chronic rheumatism. A clinical trial involving a total of 15 participants, made up of 10 patients and 5 control subjects, took place in KATH Hospital between August and September. Participants recruited for the study were of age 54 ± 8years, weight 65± 8kg, and height 176 ± 8cm. Muscle signals were recorded from the rectus femoris, and vastus lateralis on the right and left hip of participants. The parameters used in determining the hip muscular imbalances were the maximum voluntary contraction (MVC%), the mean difference, and hip muscle fatigue levels. The mean signals were compared using a t-test, and the metrics for muscle fatigue assessment were based on the root mean square (RMS), mean absolute value (MAV) and mean frequency (MEF), which were computed between the hip muscles of participants. The results indicated that there were significant imbalances in the muscle coactivity between the right and left hip muscles of patients. The patients’ MVC values were observed to be above 10% when compared with control subjects. Furthermore, the mean difference was seen to be higher with p > 0.002 among patients, which indicated clear differences in the hip muscle contraction activities. The findings indicate significant hip muscular imbalances for patients with rheumatism compared with control subjects. Information about the imbalances among patients will be useful for clinicians in designing therapeutic muscle-strengthening exercises.

Keywords: muscular, imbalances, rheumatism, Hip

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Authors: Yang Xinyu, Gong Cong, Hu Changjuan

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Stairway spaces are a crucial component of the pathway systems and vertical transportation networks in mountain city parks. These spaces are closely integrated with the undulating terrain of mountain environments, resulting in continuously changing spatial conditions that can significantly influence participants' behavioral characteristics, thereby affecting their perception. EEG signals, which have been proven to reflect various non-attentive physiological activities in the brain, are widely used in studies related to stress recovery effects and emotional perception. Existing research predominantly examines the impact of spatial characteristics and landscape elements of trails and greenways in plain cities on participants' perception, utilizing EEG signals in laboratory-simulated environments. These studies have preliminarily revealed the relationship between spatial environments and perception preferences. However, on-site ergonomics research in mountain environments remains relatively underdeveloped. To address this gap, the Stairway spaces in Pipashan Park, Chongqing, were selected as the research object. Wearable hydrogel EEG devices were employed to monitor participants' EEG data in real environments, and a Generalized Linear Mixed Model (GLMM) was constructed to explore differences in participants' perception under different paths and modes of movement, as well as the impact of visual and auditory environmental elements within each path on their perception. The model analysis results indicate significant differences in EEG data across different paths and movement modes. Additionally, typical mountainous spatial characteristics, such as openness, green view index, and elevation difference, are identified as key factors influencing participants' EEG data. Higher levels of natural sound and green view index were shown to effectively alleviate participants' stress perception in mountain stairway spaces. The findings reveal the intrinsic connections between environment, behavior, and perception in stairway spaces of mountain city parks, providing a theoretical basis for optimizing the design of stairway spaces in mountain cities.

Keywords: audio-visual perception, EEG monitoring, mountain city park, real environment, stairway space

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Authors: Princess Ncube

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In the context of South Africa's banking sector, the prevention of bank failures is of paramount importance to ensure financial stability and economic growth. This paper focuses on the role of regulatory frameworks in safeguarding the resilience of South African banks and mitigating the risks of failures. It aims to assess the effectiveness of existing regulatory measures and proposes strategies to enhance the resilience of financial institutions in the country. The paper begins by examining the specific regulatory frameworks in place in South Africa, including capital adequacy requirements, stress testing methodologies, risk management guidelines, and supervisory practices. It delves into the evolution of these measures in response to lessons learned from past financial crises and their relevance in the unique South African banking landscape. Drawing on empirical evidence and case studies specific to South Africa, this paper evaluates the effectiveness of regulatory frameworks in preventing bank failures within the country. It analyses the impact of these frameworks on crucial aspects such as early detection of distress signals, improvements in risk management practices, and advancements in corporate governance within South African financial institutions. Additionally, it explores the interplay between regulatory frameworks and the specific economic environment of South Africa, including the role of macroprudential policies in preventing systemic risks. Based on the assessment, this paper proposes recommendations to strengthen regulatory frameworks and enhance their effectiveness in bank failure prevention in South Africa. It explores avenues for refining existing regulations to align capital requirements with the risk profiles of South African banks, enhancing stress testing methodologies to capture specific vulnerabilities, and fostering better coordination among regulatory authorities within the country. Furthermore, it examines the potential benefits of adopting innovative approaches, such as leveraging technology and data analytics, to improve risk assessment and supervision in the South African banking sector.

Keywords: banks, resolution, liquidity, regulation

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Authors: Ramin Vafadary, Maryam Khanbaghi

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Forecasting electricity load is important for various purposes like planning, operation, and control. Forecasts can save operating and maintenance costs, increase the reliability of power supply and delivery systems, and correct decisions for future development. This paper compares various time series methods to forecast 24 hours ahead of electricity load. The methods considered are the Holt-Winters smoothing, SARIMA Modeling, LSTM Network, Fbprophet, and Tensorflow probability. The performance of each method is evaluated by using the forecasting accuracy criteria, namely, the mean absolute error and root mean square error. The National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) residential energy consumption data is used to train the models. The results of this study show that the SARIMA model is superior to the others for 24 hours ahead forecasts. Furthermore, a Bagging technique is used to make the predictions more robust. The obtained results show that by Bagging multiple time-series forecasts, we can improve the robustness of the models for 24 hours ahead of electricity load forecasting.

Keywords: bagging, Fbprophet, Holt-Winters, LSTM, load forecast, SARIMA, TensorFlow probability, time series

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Authors: Ludmila A. Gavriliuc, Jerry McLarty, Heather E. Kleiner, J. Michael Mathis

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Abstract -- Background: The citrus coumarine Auraptene (Aur) is an effective chemopreventive agent, as manifested in many models of diseases and cancer. Nuclear factor erythroid 2-related factor (Nrf2) is an important regulator of genes induced by oxidative stress, such as glutathione S-transferases, heme oxygenase-1, and peroxiredoxin 1, by activating the antioxidant response element (ARE). Genetic and biochemical evidence has demonstrated that glutathione (GSH) and glutathione-dependent enzymes, glutathione reductase (GR), glutathione peroxidases (GPs), glutathione S-transferases (GSTs) are responsible for the control of intracellular reduction-oxidation status and participate in cellular adaptation to oxidative stress. The effect of Aur on the activity of GR, GPs (Se-GP and Se-iGP), and content of GSH in the liver, kidney, and spleen is insufficiently explored. Aim: Our goal was the examination of the Aur influence on the redox-system of GSH in Nrf2 wild type and Nrf2 knockout mice via activation of Nrf2 and ARE. Methods: Twenty female mice, 10 Nrf2 wild-type (WT) and 10 Nrf2 (-/-) knockout (KO), were bred and genotyped for our study. The activity of GR, Se-GP, Se-iGP, GST, G6PD, CytP450 reductase, catalase (Cat), and content of GSH were analyzed in the liver, kidney, and spleen using Spectrophotometry methods. The results of the specific activity of enzymes and the amount of GSH were analyzed with ANOVA and Spearman statistical methods. Results: Aur (200 mg/kg) treatment induced hepatic GST, GR, Se-GP activity and inhibited their activity in the spleen of mice, most likely via activation of the ARE through Nrf2. Activation in kidney Se-GP and G6PD by Aur is also controlled, apparently through Nrf2. Results of the non-parametric Spearman correlation analysis indicated the strong positive correlation between GR and G6PD only in the liver in WT control mice (r=+0.972; p < 0.005) and in the kidney KO control mice (r=+0.958; p < 0.005). The observed low content of GSH in the liver of KO mice indicated an increase in its participation in the neutralization of toxic substances with the absence of induction of GSH-dependent enzymes, such as GST, GR, Se-GP, and Se-iGP. Activation of CytP450 in kidney and spleen and Cat in the liver in KO mice probably revealed another regulatory mechanism for these enzymes. Conclusion: Thereby, obtained results testify that Aur can modulate the activity of genes and antioxidant enzymatic redox-system of GSH, responsible for the control of intracellular reduction-oxidation status.

Keywords: auraptene, glutathione, GST, Nrf2

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Authors: Vidhya Venugopal, Jeremiah Chinnadurai, Rebekah A. I. Lucas, Tord Kjellstrom, Bruno Lemke

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Introduction: The effects of climate change (CC) are largely discussed across the globe in terms of impacts on the environment and the general population, but the impacts on workers remain largely unexplored. The predicted rise in temperatures and heat events in the CC scenario have health implications on millions of workers in physically exerting jobs. The current health and productivity risks associated with heat exposures are characterized, future risk estimates as temperature rises and recommendations towards developing protective and preventive occupational health and safety guidelines for India are discussed. Methodology: Cross-sectional studies were conducted in several occupational sectors with workers engaged in moderate to heavy labor (n=1580). Quantitative data on heat exposures (WBGT°C), physiological heat strain indicators viz., Core temperature (CBT), Urine specific gravity (USG), Sweat rate (SwR) and qualitative data on heat-related health symptoms and productivity losses were collected. Data were analyzed for associations between heat exposures, health and productivity outcomes related to heat stress. Findings: Heat conditions exceeded the Threshold Limit Value (TLV) for safe manual work in 66% of the workers across several sectors (Avg.WBGT of 28.7°C±3.1°C). Widespread concerns about heat-related health outcomes (86%) were prevalent among workers exposed to high TLVs, with excessive sweating, fatigue and tiredness being commonly reported by workers. The heat stress indicators, core temperature (14%), Sweat rate (8%) and USG (9%), were above normal levels in the study population. A significant association was found between rise in Core Temperatures and WBGT exposures (p=0.000179) Elevated USG and SwR in the worker population indicate moderate dehydration, with potential risks of developing heat-related illnesses. In a steel industry with high heat exposures, an alarming 9% prevalence of kidney/urogenital anomalies was observed in a young workforce. Heat exposures above TLVs were associated with significantly increased odds of various adverse health outcomes (OR=2.43, 95% CI 1.88 to 3.13, p-value = <0.0001) and productivity losses (OR=1.79, 95% CI 1.32 to 2.4, p-value = 0.0002). Rough estimates for the number of workers who would be subjected to higher than TLV levels in the various RCP scenarios are RCP2.6 =79%, RCP4.5 & RCP6 = 81% and at RCP 8.5 = 85%. Rising temperatures due to CC has the capacity to further reduce already compromised health and productivity by subjecting the workers to increased heat exposures in the RCP scenarios are of concern for the country’s occupational health and economy. Conclusion: The findings of this study clearly identify that health protection from hot weather will become increasingly necessary in the Indian subcontinent and understanding the various adaptation techniques needs urgent attention. Further research with a multi-targeted approach to develop strategies for implementing interventions to protect the millions of workers is imperative. Approaches to include health aspects of climate change within sectoral and climate change specific policies should be encouraged, via a number of mechanisms, such as the “Health in All Policies” approach to avert adverse health and productivity consequences as climate change proceeds.

Keywords: heat stress, occupational health, productivity loss, heat strain, adverse health outcomes

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Authors: Abdullah Alnutayfat, Alexander Sutin, Dong Liu

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Wind turbine has become one of the most popular energy productions. However, failure of blades and maintenance costs evolve into significant issues in the wind power industry, so it is essential to detect the initial blade defects to avoid the collapse of the blades and structure. This paper aims to apply modulation of high-frequency blade vibrations by low-frequency blade rotation, which is close to the known Vibro-Acoustic Modulation (VAM) method. The high-frequency wideband blade vibration is produced by the interaction of the surface blades with the environment air turbulence, and the low-frequency modulation is produced by alternating bending stress due to gravity. The low-frequency load of rotational wind turbine blades ranges between 0.2-0.4 Hz and can reach up to 2 Hz for strong wind. The main difference between this study and previous ones on VAM methods is the use of a wideband vibration signal from the blade's natural vibrations. Different features of the vibroacoustic modulation are considered using a simple model of breathing crack. This model considers the simple mechanical oscillator, where the parameters of the oscillator are varied due to low-frequency blade rotation. During the blade's operation, the internal stress caused by the weight of the blade modifies the crack's elasticity and damping. The laboratory experiment using steel samples demonstrates the possibility of VAM using a probe wideband noise signal. A cycle load with a small amplitude was used as a pump wave to damage the tested sample, and a small transducer generated a wideband probe wave. The received signal demodulation was conducted using the Detecting of Envelope Modulation on Noise (DEMON) approach. In addition, the experimental results were compared with the modulation index (MI) technique regarding the harmonic pump wave. The wideband and traditional VAM methods demonstrated similar sensitivity for earlier detection of invisible cracks. Importantly, employing a wideband probe signal with the DEMON approach speeds up and simplifies testing since it eliminates the need to conduct tests repeatedly for various harmonic probe frequencies and to adjust the probe frequency.

Keywords: vibro-acoustic modulation, detecting of envelope modulation on noise, damage, turbine blades

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Authors: Xiaojie Cheng, Ulrike Frank, Feng Zhao, Karin Pritsch

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Ragweed (Ambrosia artemisiifolia) is an invasive weed that has become an increasing global problem. In addition to affecting land use and crop yields, ragweed has a strong impact on human health as it produces highly allergenic pollen. Global warming will result in an earlier and longer pollen season enhanced pollen production and an increase in pollen allergenicity with a negative effect on atopic patients. The aims of this study were to investigate the effects of increasing temperature, the future climate scenario in the Munich area, southern Germany, predicted on the basis of RCP8.5 until the end of 2050s, or/and NO₂, a major air pollutant, 1) on the vegetative and reproductive characteristics of ragweed plants, 2) on the total allergenicity of ragweed pollen, 3) on the total pollen proteomic patterns. Ragweed plants were cultivated for the whole plant vegetation period under controlled conditions either under ambient climate conditions or 4°C higher temperatures with or without additional NO₂. Higher temperature resulted in bigger plant sizes, longer male inflorescences, and longer pollen seasons. The total allergenic potential of the pollen was accessed by dot blot using serum from ragweed pollen sensitized patients. The comparative immunoblot analysis revealed that the in vivo fumigation of ragweed plants with elevated NO₂-concentrations significantly increased the allergenic potential of the pollen, and in combination with increased temperature, the allergenic potential was even higher. On the other hand, label-free protein quantification by liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) was performed. The results showed that more proteins were significantly up- and down-regulated under higher temperatures with/without elevated NO₂ conditions. Most of the highly expressed proteins were participating intensively in the metabolic process, the cellular process, and the stress defense process. These findings suggest that rising temperature and elevated NO₂ are important environmental factors for higher abiotic stress activities, catalytic activities, and thus higher allergenic potential observed in pollen proteins.

Keywords: climate change, NO₂, pollen proteome, ragweed, temperature

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Authors: Faraj A. E. Alhegagi, Bassam F. A. Alhajaji

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Ductile and brittle fractures are the two main modes for the failure of engineering components. Fractures are classified with respect to several characteristics, such as strain to fracture, ductile or brittle crystallographic mode, shear or cleavage, and the appearance of fracture, granular or transgranular. Cleavage is a brittle fracture involves transcrystalline fracture along specific crystallographic planes and in certain directions. Fracture of duplex stainless steels takes place transgranularly by cleavage of the ferrite phase. On the other hand, ductile fracture occurs after considerable plastic deformation prior to failure and takes place by void nucleation, growth, and coalescence to provide an easy fracture path. Twinning causes depassivation more readily than slip and appears at stress lower than the theoretical yield stress. Consequently, damage due to twinning can occur well before that due to slip. Stainless steels are clean materials with the low efficiency of second particles phases on the fracture mechanism. The ferrite cleavage and austenite tear off are the main mode by which duplex stainless steels fails. In this study, the cracking mode and path of specimens of duplex stainless steels were investigated. Zeron 100 specimens were heat treated to different times cooled down and pulled to failure. The fracture surface was investigated by scanning electron microscopy (SEM) concentrating on the cracking mechanism, path, and origin. Cracking mechanisms were studied for those grains either as ferrite or austenite grains identified according to fracture surface features. Cracks propagated through the ferrite and the austenite two phases were investigated. Cracks arrested at the grain boundary were studied as well. For specimens aged for 100h, the ferrite phase was noted to crack by cleavage along well-defined planes while austenite ridges were clearly observed within the ferrite grains. Some grains were observed to fail with topographic features that were not clearly identifiable as ferrite cleavage or austenite tearing. Transgranular cracking was observed taking place in the ferrite phase on well-defined planes. No intergranular cracks were observed for the tested material. The austenite phase was observed to serve as a crack bridge and crack arrester.

Keywords: austenite ductile tear off, cracking mode, ferrite cleavage, stainless steels failure

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Authors: Ankur Chaudhuri, Sibani Sen Chakraborty

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In human, glutaminyl cyclase activity is highly abundant in neuronal and secretory tissues and is preferentially restricted to hypothalamus and pituitary. The N-terminal modification of β-amyloids (Aβs) peptides by the generation of a pyro-glutamyl (pGlu) modified Aβs (pE-Aβs) is an important process in the initiation of the formation of neurotoxic plaques in Alzheimer’s disease (AD). This process is catalyzed by glutaminyl cyclase (QC). The expression of QC is characteristically up-regulated in the early stage of AD, and the hallmark of the inhibition of QC is the prevention of the formation of pE-Aβs and plaques. A computer-aided drug design (CADD) process was employed to give an idea for the designing of potentially active compounds to understand the inhibitory potency against human glutaminyl cyclase (QC). This work elaborates the ligand-based and structure-based pharmacophore exploration of glutaminyl cyclase (QC) by using the known inhibitors. Three dimensional (3D) quantitative structure-activity relationship (QSAR) methods were applied to 154 compounds with known IC50 values. All the inhibitors were divided into two sets, training-set, and test-sets. Generally, training-set was used to build the quantitative pharmacophore model based on the principle of structural diversity, whereas the test-set was employed to evaluate the predictive ability of the pharmacophore hypotheses. A chemical feature-based pharmacophore model was generated from the known 92 training-set compounds by HypoGen module implemented in Discovery Studio 2017 R2 software package. The best hypothesis was selected (Hypo1) based upon the highest correlation coefficient (0.8906), lowest total cost (463.72), and the lowest root mean square deviation (2.24Å) values. The highest correlation coefficient value indicates greater predictive activity of the hypothesis, whereas the lower root mean square deviation signifies a small deviation of experimental activity from the predicted one. The best pharmacophore model (Hypo1) of the candidate inhibitors predicted comprised four features: two hydrogen bond acceptor, one hydrogen bond donor, and one hydrophobic feature. The Hypo1 was validated by several parameters such as test set activity prediction, cost analysis, Fischer's randomization test, leave-one-out method, and heat map of ligand profiler. The predicted features were then used for virtual screening of potential compounds from NCI, ASINEX, Maybridge and Chembridge databases. More than seven million compounds were used for this purpose. The hit compounds were filtered by drug-likeness and pharmacokinetics properties. The selective hits were docked to the high-resolution three-dimensional structure of the target protein glutaminyl cyclase (PDB ID: 2AFU/2AFW) to filter these hits further. To validate the molecular docking results, the most active compound from the dataset was selected as a reference molecule. From the density functional theory (DFT) study, ten molecules were selected based on their highest HOMO (highest occupied molecular orbitals) energy and the lowest bandgap values. Molecular dynamics simulations with explicit solvation systems of the final ten hit compounds revealed that a large number of non-covalent interactions were formed with the binding site of the human glutaminyl cyclase. It was suggested that the hit compounds reported in this study could help in future designing of potent inhibitors as leads against human glutaminyl cyclase.

Keywords: glutaminyl cyclase, hit lead, pharmacophore model, simulation

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Authors: Pranjali Sharma, Swati Neogi

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Composite pressure vessels are low weight structures mainly used in a variety of applications such as automobiles, aeronautics and chemical engineering. Fiber reinforced polymer (FRP) composite materials offer the simplicity of design and use, high fuel storage capacity, rapid refueling capability, excellent shelf life, minimal infrastructure impact, high safety due to the inherent strength of the pressure vessel, and little to no development risk. Apart from these preliminary merits, the subsidized weight of composite vessels over metallic cylinders act as the biggest asset to the automotive industry, increasing the fuel efficiency. The result is a lightweight, flexible, non-explosive, and non-fragmenting pressure vessel that can be tailor-made to attune with specific applications. The winding pattern of the composite over-wrap is a primary focus while designing a pressure vessel. The critical stresses in the system depend on the thickness, angle and sequence of the composite layers. The composite over-wrap is wound over a plastic liner, whose geometry can be varied for the ease of winding. In the present study, we aim to optimize the FRP vessel geometry that provides an ease in winding and also aids in weight reduction for enhancing the vessel performance. Finite element analysis is used to study the effect of dome geometry, yielding a design with maximum value of burst pressure and least value of vessel weight. The stress and strain analysis of different dome ends along with the cylindrical portion is carried out in ANSYS 19.2. The failure is predicted using different failure theories like Tsai-Wu theory, Tsai-Hill theory and Maximum stress theory. Corresponding to a given winding sequence, the optimum dome geometry is determined for a fixed internal pressure to identify the theoretical value of burst pressure. Finally, this geometry is used to decrease the number of layers to reach the set value of safety in accordance with the available safety standards. This results in decrease in the weight of the composite over-wrap and manufacturing cost of the pressure vessel. An improvement in the overall weight performance of the pressure vessel gives higher fuel efficiency for its use in automobile applications.

Keywords: Compressed Gas Storage, Dome geometry, Theoretical Analysis, Type-4 Composite Pressure Vessel, Improvement in Vessel Weight Performance

Procedia PDF Downloads 151