Search results for: loss distribution approach

Authors: Salman Naseer

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One of the main challenges of operating a smart city (SC) is collecting the massive data generated from multiple data sources (DS) and to transmit them to the control units (CU) for further data processing and analysis. These ever-increasing data demands require not only more and more capacity of the transmission channels but also results in resource over-provision to meet the resilience requirements, thus the unavoidable waste because of the data fluctuations throughout the day. In addition, the high energy consumption (EC) and carbon discharges from these data transmissions posing serious issues to the environment we live in. Therefore, to overcome the issues of intensive EC and carbon emissions (CE) of massive data dissemination in Smart Cities, we propose an energy efficient and carbon reduction approach by utilizing the daily mobility of the existing vehicles as an alternative communications channel to accommodate the data dissemination in smart cities. To illustrate the effectiveness and efficiency of our approach, we take the Auckland City in New Zealand as an example, assuming massive data generated by various sources geographically scattered throughout the Auckland region to the control centres located in city centre. The numerical results show that our proposed approach can provide up to 5 times lower delay as transferring the large volume of data by utilizing the existing daily vehicles’ mobility than the conventional transmission network. Moreover, our proposed approach offers about 30% less EC and CE than that of conventional network transmission approach.

Keywords: smart city, delay tolerant network, infrastructure offloading, opportunistic network, vehicular mobility, energy consumption, carbon emission

Procedia PDF Downloads 126

Authors: Nisha Thapa, Ram Prasad Mainali, Prakriti Chand

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Broadleaf mustard is a commercialized leafy vegetable of Nepal. However, its utilization is hindered in terms of production and productivity due to the high intensity of insects, pests, and diseases causing great loss. The plant protection part of the crop’s disease and damage intensity has not been studied much from research perspectives in Nepal. The research aimed to evaluate broadleaf mustard genotypes for resistance against different diseases. A total of 35 native genotypes of broadleaf mustard were screened at weekly intervals by scoring the plants for ten weeks. Five different diseases, such as Rhizoctonia root rot, Alternaria blight, black rot, turnip mosaic virus disease, and white rust, were reported from the broad leaf mustard genotypes. Out of 35 genotypes, 23 genotypes were found with very high Rhizoctonia Root Rot severity, whereas 8 genotypes showed very high Alternaria blight severity. Likewise, 3 genotypes were found with high Black rot severity, and 1 genotype was found with very high Turnip mosaic virus disease incidence. Similarly, 2 genotypes were found to have very high White rust severity. Among the disease of national importance, Rhizoctonia root rot was found to be the most severe disease with the greatest loss. Broadleaf mustard genotypes like Rato Rayo, CO 1002, and CO 11007 showed average to the high level of field resistance; therefore, these genotypes should be used, conserved, and stored in a mustard improvement program as the disease resistance quality or susceptibility of these genotypes can be helpful for seed producing farmers, companies and other stakeholders through varietal improvement and developmental works that further aids in sustainable disease management of the vegetable.

Keywords: genotype, disease resistance, Rhizoctonia root rot severity, varietal improvement

Procedia PDF Downloads 63

Authors: Bin Wang, Yong Xu, Honggang Qu, Rongmei Liu, Zhenji Gao

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Based on the geodynamic environment, basic geological characteristics of minerals and so on, gold deposits in China are divided into 11 categories, of which tectonic fracture altered rock, mid-intrudes and contact zone, micro-fine disseminated and continental volcanic types are the main prospecting kinds. The metallogenic age of gold deposits in China is dominated by the Mesozoic and Cenozoic. According to the geotectonic units, geological evolution, geological conditions, spatial distribution, gold deposits types, metallogenic factors etc., 42 gold concentration areas are initially determined and have a concentrated distribution feature. On the basis of the gold exploration density, gold concentration areas are divided into high, medium and low level areas. High ones are mainly distributed in the central and eastern regions. 93.04% of the gold exploration drillings are within 500 meters, but there are some problems, such as less and shallower of drilling verification etc.. The paper discusses the resource potentials of gold deposits and proposes the future prospecting directions and suggestions. The deep and periphery of old mines in the central and eastern regions and western area, especially in Xinjiang and Qinghai, will be the future key prospecting one and have huge potential gold reserves. If the exploration depth is extended to 2,000 meters shallow, the gold resources will double.

Keywords: gold deposits, gold deposits types, gold concentration areas, prospecting, resource potentiality

Procedia PDF Downloads 57

Authors: Najlaa Yousef Qusti, Steven J. Brookes, Paul A. Brunton

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Background: Tooth discoloration can be an aesthetic problem, and tooth whitening using carbamide peroxide bleaching agents are a popular treatment option. However, there are concerns about possible adverse effects such as demineralisation of the bleached enamel; however, the cause of this demineralisation is unclear. Introduction: Teeth can become stained or discoloured over time. Tooth whitening is an aesthetic solution for tooth discoloration. Bleaching solutions of 10% carbamide peroxide (CP) have become the standard agent used in dentist-prescribed and home-applied ’vital bleaching techniques’. These materials release hydrogen peroxide (H₂O₂), the active whitening agent. However, there is controversy in the literature regarding the effect of bleaching agents on enamel integrity and enamel mineral content. The purpose of this study was to establish if carbamide peroxide bleaching agents affect the acid solubility of enamel (i.e., make teeth more prone to demineralisation). Materials and Methods: Twelve human premolar teeth were sectioned longitudinally along the midline and varnished to leave the natural enamel surface exposed. The baseline behavior of each tooth half in relation to its demineralisation in acid was established by sequential exposure to 4 vials containing 1ml of 10mM acetic acid (1 minute/vial). This was followed by exposure to 10% CP for 8 hours. After washing in distilled water, the tooth half was sequentially exposed to 4 further vials containing acid to test if the acid susceptibility of the enamel had been affected. The corresponding tooth half acted as a control and was exposed to distilled water instead of CP. The mineral loss was determined by measuring [Ca²⁺] and [PO₄³⁻] released in each vial using a calcium ion-selective electrode and the phosphomolybdenum blue method, respectively. The effect of bleaching on the tooth surfaces was also examined using SEM. Results: Exposure to carbamide peroxide did not significantly alter the susceptibility of enamel to acid attack, and SEM of the enamel surface revealed a slight alteration in surface appearance. SEM images of the control enamel surface showed a flat enamel surface with some shallow pits, whereas the bleached enamel appeared with an increase in surface porosity and some areas of mild erosion. Conclusions: Exposure to H₂O₂ equivalent to 10% CP does not significantly increase subsequent acid susceptibility of enamel as determined by Ca²⁺ release from the enamel surface. The effects of bleaching on mineral loss were indistinguishable from distilled water in the experimental system used. However, some surface differences were observed by SEM. The phosphomolybdenum blue method for phosphate is compromised by peroxide bleaching agents due to their oxidising properties. However, the Ca²⁺ electrode is unaffected by oxidising agents and can be used to determine the mineral loss in the presence of peroxides.

Keywords: bleaching, carbamide peroxide, demineralisation, teeth whitening

Procedia PDF Downloads 110

Authors: B. Arzhanov, A. Correia, P. Delgado, J. Meireles

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Due to the higher power loss levels in electronic components, the thermal design of PCBs (Printed Circuit Boards) of an assembled device becomes one of the most important quality factors in electronics. Nonetheless, some of leading causes of the microelectronic component failures are due to higher temperatures, the leakages or thermal-mechanical stress, which is a concern, is the reliability of microelectronic packages. This article presents an experimental approach to measure the junction temperature of exposed pad packages. The implemented solution is in a prototype phase, using a temperature-sensitive parameter (TSP) to measure temperature directly on the die, validating the numeric results provided by the Mechanical APDL (Ansys Parametric Design Language) under same conditions. The physical device-under-test is composed by a Thermal Test Chip (TTC-1002) and assembly in a QFN cavity, soldered to a test-board according to JEDEC Standards. Monitoring the voltage drop across a forward-biased diode, is an indirectly method but accurate to obtain the junction temperature of QFN component with an applied power range between 0,3W to 1.5W. The temperature distributions on the PCB test-board and QFN cavity surface were monitored by an infra-red thermal camera (Goby-384) controlled and images processed by the Xeneth software. The article provides a set-up to monitorize in real-time the junction temperature of ICs, namely devices with the exposed pad package (i.e. QFN). Presenting the PCB layout parameters that the designer should use to improve thermal performance, and evaluate the impact of voids in solder interface in the device junction temperature.

Keywords: quad flat no-Lead packages, exposed pads, junction temperature, thermal management and measurements

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Authors: Erwanda Nuryahya, Aas Nurasyiah, Sri Yayu Ninglasari

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Indonesia is the fourth most populous country that still has many troubles in its development. One of the problems which is very important and unresolved is poverty. Limited job opportunity is one unresolved cause of it until today. The purpose of making this scientific paper is to know benefits of E-Money Paytren Application to enhance its partners’ income, owned by company Veritra Sentosa International. The methodology used here is the quantitative and qualitative descriptive method by case study approach. The data used are primary and secondary data. The primary data is obtained from interviews and observation to company Veritra Sentosa International and the distribution of 400 questionnaires to Paytren partner. Secondary data is obtained from the literature study and documentary. The result is that the Paytren with a system direct sales tiered syariah proven able to enhance its partners’ income. Therefore, the Optimization Financial Technology through E-Money Paytren Application should be utilized by Indonesians because it is proven that it is able to increase the income of the partners. Therefore, Paytren Application is very useful for the government, the sharia financial industry, and society in reducing poverty in Indonesia.

Keywords: e-money PayTren application, financial technology, poverty, direct sales tiered Sharia

Procedia PDF Downloads 126

Authors: Ekin Nurbaş

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One of the essential challenges in array signal processing, which has drawn enormous research interest over the past several decades, is estimating the direction of arrival (DOA) of plane waves impinging on an array of sensors. In recent years, the Compressive Sensing based DoA estimation methods have been proposed by researchers, and it has been discovered that the Compressive Sensing (CS)-based algorithms achieved significant performances for DoA estimation even in scenarios where there are multiple coherent sources. On the other hand, the Genetic Algorithm, which is a method that provides a solution strategy inspired by natural selection, has been used in sparse representation problems in recent years and provides significant improvements in performance. With all of those in consideration, in this paper, a method that combines the Genetic Algorithm (GA) and the Multi-Criteria Decision Making (MCDM) approaches for Direction of Arrival (DoA) estimation in the Compressive Sensing (CS) framework is proposed. In this method, we generate a multi-objective optimization problem by splitting the norm minimization and reconstruction loss minimization parts of the Compressive Sensing algorithm. With the help of the Genetic Algorithm, multiple non-dominated solutions are achieved for the defined multi-objective optimization problem. Among the pareto-frontier solutions, the final solution is obtained with the multiple MCDM methods. Moreover, the performance of the proposed method is compared with the CS-based methods in the literature.

Keywords: genetic algorithm, direction of arrival esitmation, multi criteria decision making, compressive sensing

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Authors: Saad Algharib, Jay Lee

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Urbanization is a complex phenomenon that occurs during the city’s development from one form to another. In other words, it is the process when the activities in the land use/land cover change from rural to urban. Since the oil exploration, Kuwait City has been growing rapidly due to its urbanization and population growth by both natural growth and inward immigration. The main objective of this study is to detect changes in urban land use/land cover and to examine the changing spatial patterns of urban growth in and around Kuwait City between 1989 and 2001. In addition, this study also evaluates the spatial patterns of the changes detected and how they can be related to the spatial configuration of the city. Recently, the use of remote sensing and geographic information systems became very useful and important tools in urban studies because of the integration of them can allow and provide the analysts and planners to detect, monitor and analyze the urban growth in a region effectively. Moreover, both planners and users can predict the trends of the growth in urban areas in the future with remotely sensed and GIS data because they can be effectively updated with required precision levels. In order to identify the new urban areas between 1989 and 2001, the study uses satellite images of the study area and remote sensing technology for classifying these images. Unsupervised classification method was applied to classify images to land use and land cover data layers. After finishing the unsupervised classification method, GIS overlay function was applied to the classified images for detecting the locations and patterns of the new urban areas that developed during the study period. GIS was also utilized to evaluate the distribution of the spatial patterns. For example, Moran’s index was applied for all data inputs to examine the urban growth distribution. Furthermore, this study assesses if the spatial patterns and process of these changes take place in a random fashion or with certain identifiable trends. During the study period, the result of this study indicates that the urban growth has occurred and expanded 10% from 32.4% in 1989 to 42.4% in 2001. Also, the results revealed that the largest increase of the urban area occurred between the major highways after the forth ring road from the center of Kuwait City. Moreover, the spatial distribution of urban growth occurred in cluster manners.

Keywords: geographic information systems, remote sensing, urbanization, urban growth

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Authors: Ayşe Dilek Maden

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For a given a simple connected graph, we present some new bounds via a new approach for a special topological index given by the sum of the real number power of the non-zero normalized Laplacian eigenvalues. To use this approach presents an advantage not only to derive old and new bounds on this topic but also gives an idea how some previous results in similar area can be developed.

Keywords: degree Kirchhoff index, normalized Laplacian eigenvalue, spanning tree, simple connected graph

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Authors: Harish Bisht, Bahadur Singh Kotlia, Kireet Kumar

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In order to reconstruct past retreating rates, total area loss, volume change and shift in snout position were measured through multi-temporal satellite data from 1989 to 2016 and kinematic GPS survey from 2015 to 2016. The results obtained from satellite data indicate that in the last 27 years, Chaturangi glacier snout has retreated 1172.57 ± 38.3 m (average 45.07 ± 4.31 m/year) with a total area and volume loss of 0.626 ± 0.001 sq. Km and 0.139 Km³, respectively. The field measurements through differential global positioning system survey revealed that the annual retreating rate was 22.84 ± 0.05 m/year. The large variations in results derived from both the methods are probably because of higher difference in their accuracy. Snout monitoring of the Gangotri glacier during the ablation season (May to September) in the years 2005 and 2015 reveals that the retreating rate has been comparatively more declined than that shown by the earlier studies. The GPS dataset shows that the average recession rate is 10.26 ± 0.05 m/year. In order to determine the possible causes of decreased retreating rate, a relationship between debris thickness and melt rate was also established by using ablation stakes. The present study concludes that remote sensing method is suitable for large area and long term study, while kinematic GPS is more appropriate for the annual monitoring of retreating rate of glacier snout. The present study also emphasizes on mapping of all the tributary glaciers in order to assess the overall changes in the main glacier system and its health.

Keywords: Chaturangi glacier, Gangotri glacier, glacier snout, kinematic global positioning system, retreat rate

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Authors: B.J. Khoza, B. Kembo

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Global socioeconomic developments and ever-growing technological advancements of the art and design industry indicate the pivotal importance of lifelong learning. There exists a discrepancy between competencies, personal ambition, and workplace requirements. There are few , if at all, institutions of higher learning in South Africa which offer Short Learning Programmes (SLP) in Art and Design Education. Traditionally, Art and Design education is delivered face to face via a hands-on approach. In this way the enduring perception among educators is that art and design education does not lend itself to online delivery. Short Learning programmes (SLP) are a concentrated approach to make revenue and lure potential prospective students to embark on further education study, this is often of weighted value to both students and employers. SLPs are used by Higher Education institutions to generate income in support of the core academic programmes. However, there is a gap in terms of the translation of art and design studio pedagogy into SLPs which provide quality education, are adaptable and delivered via a blended mode. In our paper, we propose a conceptual framework drawing on secondary research to analyse existing research to SLPs for arts and design education. We aim to indicate a new dimension to the process of using a design-based research approach for short learning programmes in art and design education. The study draws on a conceptual framework, a qualitative analysis through the lenses of Herrington, McKenney, Reeves and Oliver (2005) principles of the design-based research approach. The results of this study indicate that design-based research is not only an effective methodological approach for developing and deploying arts and design education curriculum for 1st years in Higher Education context but it also has the potential to guide future research. The findings of this study propose that the design-based research approach could bring theory and praxis together regarding a common purpose to design context-based solutions to educational problems.

Keywords: design education, design-based research, digital literacies, multi-literacies, short learning programme

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Authors: Jeni A. Popescu, Ionut Porumbel, Valeriu A. Vilag, Cleopatra F. Cuciumita

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The paper presents a thermodynamic cycle analysis for three turboshaft engines. The first is the cycle is a Brayton cycle, describing the evolution of a classical turboshaft, based on the Klimov TV2 engine. The other two cycles aim at approaching an Ericsson cycle, by replacing the Brayton cycle adiabatic expansion in the turbine by quasi-isothermal expansion. The maximum quasi-Ericsson cycles temperature is set to a lower value than the maximum Brayton cycle temperature, equal to the Brayton cycle power turbine inlet temperature, in order to decrease the engine NOx emissions. Also, the power distribution over the stages of the gas generator turbine is maintained the same. In the first of the two considered quasi-Ericsson cycle, the efficiencies of the gas generator turbine stage. Also, the power distribution over the stages of the gas generator turbine is maintained the same. In the first of the two considered quasi-Ericsson cycle, the efficiencies of the gas generator turbine stages are maintained the same as for the reference case, while for the second, the efficiencies are increased in order to obtain the same shaft power as in the reference case. It is found that in the first case, both the shaft power and the thermodynamic efficiency of the engine decrease, while in the second, the power is maintained, and even a slight increase in efficiency can be noted.

Keywords: combustion, Ericsson, thermodynamic analysis, turbine

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Authors: Amel Ourici

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An electrical machine failure that is not identified in an initial stage may become catastrophic and it may suffer severe damage. Thus, undetected machine faults may cascade in it failure, which in turn may cause production shutdowns. Such shutdowns are costly in terms of lost production time, maintenance costs, and wasted raw materials. Doubly fed induction generators are used mainly for wind energy conversion in MW power plants. This paper presents a detection of an inter turn stator fault in a doubly fed induction machine whose stator and rotor are supplied by two pulse width modulation (PWM) inverters. The method used in this article to detect this fault, is based on Park’s Vector Approach, using a neural network.

Keywords: doubly fed induction machine, PWM inverter, inter turn stator fault, Park’s vector approach, neural network

Procedia PDF Downloads 583

Authors: Saleh Abu Dabous, Khaled Hamad, Rami Al-Ruzouq

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Bridge condition assessment and rating provide essential information needed for bridge management. This paper reviews bridge inspection and condition rating practices and introduces a defect-based urgency index. The index is estimated at the element-level based on the extent and severity of the different defects typical to the bridge element. The urgency index approach has the following advantages: (1) It facilitates judgment submission, i.e. instead of rating the bridge element with a specific linguistic overall expression (which can be subjective and used differently by different people), the approach is based on assessing the defects; (2) It captures multiple defects that can be present within a deteriorated element; and (3) It reflects how critical the element is through quantifying critical defects and their severity. The approach can be further developed and validated. It is expected to be useful for practical purposes as an early-warning system for critical bridge elements.

Keywords: condition rating, deterioration, inspection, maintenance

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Authors: Yingying Ding

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This study presents a methodology of specialized translation with the objective of helping teachers to improve the strategies in teaching translation. In order to allow students to acquire skills to translate specialized texts, they need to become familiar with the semantic and syntactic features of source texts and target texts. The aim of our study is to use a corpus-based approach in the teaching of specialized translation between Chinese and Italian. This study proposes to construct a specialized Chinese - Italian comparable corpus that consists of 50 economic contracts from the domain of food. With the help of AntConc, we propose to compile a comparable corpus in for translation teaching purposes. This paper attempts to provide insight into how teachers could benefit from comparable corpus in the teaching of specialized translation from Italian into Chinese and through some examples of passive sentences how students could learn to apply different strategies for translating appropriately the voice.

Keywords: contrastive studies, specialised translation, corpus-based approach, teaching

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Authors: Arefeh Arabaninezhad, Ali Fakher

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Since the deterministic analysis methods fail to take system uncertainties into account, probabilistic and non-probabilistic methods are suggested. Geotechnical analyses are used to determine the stress and deformation caused by construction; accordingly, many input variables which depend on ground behavior are required for geotechnical analyses. The Random Set approach is an applicable reliability analysis method when comprehensive sources of information are not available. Using Random Set method, with relatively small number of simulations compared to fully probabilistic methods, smooth extremes on system responses are obtained. Therefore random set approach has been proposed for reliability analysis in geotechnical problems. In the present study, the application of random set method in reliability analysis of deep excavations is investigated through three deep excavation projects which were monitored during the excavating process. A finite element code is utilized for numerical modeling. Two expected ranges, from different sources of information, are established for each input variable, and a specific probability assignment is defined for each range. To determine the most influential input variables and subsequently reducing the number of required finite element calculations, sensitivity analysis is carried out. Input data for finite element model are obtained by combining the upper and lower bounds of the input variables. The relevant probability share of each finite element calculation is determined considering the probability assigned to input variables present in these combinations. Horizontal displacement of the top point of excavation is considered as the main response of the system. The result of reliability analysis for each intended deep excavation is presented by constructing the Belief and Plausibility distribution function (i.e. lower and upper bounds) of system response obtained from deterministic finite element calculations. To evaluate the quality of input variables as well as applied reliability analysis method, the range of displacements extracted from models has been compared to the in situ measurements and good agreement is observed. The comparison also showed that Random Set Finite Element Method applies to estimate the horizontal displacement of the top point of deep excavation. Finally, the probability of failure or unsatisfactory performance of the system is evaluated by comparing the threshold displacement with reliability analysis results.

Keywords: deep excavation, random set finite element method, reliability analysis, uncertainty

Procedia PDF Downloads 254

Authors: Fabrizio Ascione, Martina Borrelli, Rosa Francesca De Masi, Silvia Ruggiero, Giuseppe Peter Vanoli

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The Directive 2010/31/EC 'Directive of the European Parliament and of the Council of 19 may 2010 on the energy performance of buildings' moved the targets of the previous version toward more ambitious targets, for instance by establishing that, by 31 December 2020, all new buildings should demand nearly zero-energy. Moreover, the demonstrative role of public buildings is strongly affirmed so that also the target nearly zero-energy buildings is anticipated, in January 2019. On the other hand, given the very low turn-over rate of buildings (in Europe, it ranges between 1-3%/yearly), each policy that does not consider the renovation of the existing building stock cannot be effective in the short and medium periods. According to this proposal, the study provides a novel, holistic approach to design the refurbishment of educational buildings in colder cities of Mediterranean regions enabling stakeholders to understand the uncertainty to use numerical modelling and the real environmental and economic impacts of adopting some energy efficiency technologies. The case study is a university building of Molise region in the centre of Italy. The proposed approach is based on the application of the cost-optimal methodology as it is shown in the Delegate Regulation 244/2012 and Guidelines of the European Commission, for evaluating the cost-optimal level of energy performance with a macroeconomic approach. This means that the refurbishment scenario should correspond to the configuration that leads to lowest global cost during the estimated economic life-cycle, taking into account not only the investment cost but also the operational costs, linked to energy consumption and polluting emissions. The definition of the reference building has been supported by various in-situ surveys, investigations, evaluations of the indoor comfort. Data collection can be divided into five categories: 1) geometrical features; 2) building envelope audit; 3) technical system and equipment characterization; 4) building use and thermal zones definition; 5) energy building data. For each category, the required measures have been indicated with some suggestions for the identifications of spatial distribution and timing of the measurements. With reference to the case study, the collected data, together with a comparison with energy bills, allowed a proper calibration of a numerical model suitable for the hourly energy simulation by means of EnergyPlus. Around 30 measures/packages of energy, efficiency measure has been taken into account both on the envelope than regarding plant systems. Starting from results, two-point will be examined exhaustively: (i) the importance to use validated models to simulate the present performance of building under investigation; (ii) the environmental benefits and the economic implications of a deep energy refurbishment of the educational building in cold climates.

Keywords: energy simulation, modelling calibration, cost-optimal retrofit, university building

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Authors: Sally J. Price, Greg F. Walker, Weiyi Liu, Craig R. Bunt

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Plastics, due to their long lifespan, are becoming more of an environmental concern once their useful life has been completed. There are a vast array of different types of plastic, and they can be found in almost every ecosystem on earth and are of particular concern in terrestrial environments where they can become incorporated into the food chain. Hence bioplastics have become more of interest to manufacturers and the public recently as they have the ability to (bio)degrade in commercial and in home composting situations. However, tools in which to quantify how they degrade in response to environmental variables are still being developed -one such approach is texture analysis using a TA.XT Texture Analyser, Stable Microsystems, was used to determine the force required to break or punch holes in standard ASTM D638 Type IV 3D printed bioplastic “dogbones” depending on the thicknesses of them. Manufacturers’ recommendations for calibrating the Texture Analyser are one such approach for standardising results; however, an independent technique using dummy dogbones and a substitute for the bioplastic was used alongside the samples. This approach was unexpectedly more valuable than realised at the start of the trial as irregular results were later discovered with the substitute material before valuable samples collected from the field were lost due to possible machine malfunction. This work will show the value of having an independent approach to machine calibration for accurate sample analysis with a Texture Analyser when analysing bioplastic samples.

Keywords: bioplastic, degradation, environment, texture analyzer

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Authors: Manana Kvetenadze, Dali Nikolaishvili

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The study revealed the territorial changes of Georgia before the Soviet and Post-Soviet periods. This includes the estimation of the country's borders, its administrative-territorial arrangement change as well as the establishment of territorial losses. Georgia’s old and new borders marked on the map are of great interest. The new boundary shows the condition of 1922 year, following the Soviet period. Neither on this map nor in other works Ivane Javakhishvili talks about what he implies in the old borders, though it is evident that this is the Pre-Soviet boundary until 1921 – i.e., before the period when historical Tao, Zaqatala, Lore, Karaia represented the parts of Georgia. According to cartometric-geographical terms, the work presents detailed analysis of Georgia’s borders, along with this the comparison of research results has been carried out: 1) At the boundary line on Soviet topographic maps, the maps of 100,000; 50,000 and 25,000 scales are used; 2) According to Ivane Javakhishvili’s work ('The borders of Georgia in terms of historical and contemporary issues'). During that research, we used multi-disciplined methodology and software. We used Arc GIS for Georeferencing maps, and after that, we compare all post-Soviet Union maps, in order to determine how the borders have changed. During this work, we also use many historical data. The features of the spatial distribution of the territorial administrative units of Georgia, as well as the distribution of administrative-territorial units of the objects depicted on the map, have been established. The results obtained are presented in the forms of thematic maps and diagrams.

Keywords: border, GIS, georgia, historical cartography, old maps

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Authors: Ravindra B. Patil, P. Krishnamoorthy, Shriram Sethuraman

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This work proposes a novel Gaussian Mixture Model (GMM) based approach for accurate tracking of the arterial wall and subsequent computation of the distension waveform using Radio Frequency (RF) ultrasound signal. The approach was evaluated on ultrasound RF data acquired using a prototype ultrasound system from an artery mimicking flow phantom. The effectiveness of the proposed algorithm is demonstrated by comparing with existing wall tracking algorithms. The experimental results show that the proposed method provides 20% reduction in the error margin compared to the existing approaches in tracking the arterial wall movement. This approach coupled with ultrasound system can be used to estimate the arterial compliance parameters required for screening of cardiovascular related disorders.

Keywords: distension waveform, Gaussian Mixture Model, RF ultrasound, arterial wall movement

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Authors: Fabienne Samyn, Pauline Tranchard, Sophie Duquesne, Emilie Goncalves, Bruno Estebe, Serge Boubigot

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Stringent fire safety regulations are enforced in the aeronautical industry due to the consequences that potential fire event on an aircraft might imply. This is so much true that the fire issue is considered right from the design of the aircraft structure. Due to the incorporation of an increasing amount of polymer matrix composites in replacement of more conventional materials like metals, the nature of the fire risks is changing. The choice of materials used is consequently of prime importance as well as the evaluation of its resistance to fire. The fire testing is mostly done using the so-called certification tests according to standards such as the ISO2685:1998(E). The latter describes a protocol to evaluate the fire resistance of structures located in fire zone (ability to withstand fire for 5min). The test consists in exposing an at least 300x300mm² sample to an 1100°C propane flame with a calibrated heat flux of 116kW/m². This type of test is time-consuming, expensive and gives access to limited information in terms of fire behavior of the materials (pass or fail test). Consequently, it can barely be used for material development purposes. In this context, the laboratory UMET in collaboration with industrial partners has developed a horizontal and a vertical small-scale instrumented fire benches for the characterization of the fire behavior of composites. The benches using smaller samples (no more than 150x150mm²) enables to cut downs costs and hence to increase sampling throughput. However, the main added value of our benches is the instrumentation used to collect useful information to understand the behavior of the materials. Indeed, measurements of the sample backside temperature are performed using IR camera in both configurations. In addition, for the vertical set up, a complete characterization of the degradation process, can be achieved via mass loss measurements and quantification of the gasses released during the tests. These benches have been used to characterize and study the fire behavior of aeronautical carbon/epoxy composites. The horizontal set up has been used in particular to study the performances and durability of protective intumescent coating on 2mm thick 2D laminates. The efficiency of this approach has been validated, and the optimized coating thickness has been determined as well as the performances after aging. Reductions of the performances after aging were attributed to the migration of some of the coating additives. The vertical set up has enabled to investigate the degradation process of composites under fire. An isotropic and a unidirectional 4mm thick laminates have been characterized using the bench and post-fire analyses. The mass loss measurements and the gas phase analyses of both composites do not present significant differences unlike the temperature profiles in the thickness of the samples. The differences have been attributed to differences of thermal conductivity as well as delamination that is much more pronounced for the isotropic composite (observed on the IR-images). This has been confirmed by X-ray microtomography. The developed benches have proven to be valuable tools to develop fire safe composites.

Keywords: aeronautical carbon/epoxy composite, durability, intumescent coating, small-scale ‘ISO 2685 like’ fire resistance test, X-ray microtomography

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Authors: Y. Ates, A. R. Boynuegri, M. Uzunoglu, A. Karakas

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The recent interest in alternative and renewable energy systems results in increased installed capacity ratio of such systems in total energy production of the world. Specifically, wind energy conversion systems (WECS) draw significant attention among possible alternative energy options, recently. On the contrary of the positive points of penetrating WECS in all over the world in terms of environment protection, energy independence of the countries, etc., there are significant problems to be solved for the grid connection of large scale WECS. The reactive power regulation, voltage variation suppression, etc. can be presented as major issues to be considered in this regard. Thus, this paper evaluates the application of a Static VAr Compensator (SVC) unit for the reactive power regulation and operation continuity of WECS during a fault condition. The system is modeled employing the IEEE 13 node test system. Thus, it is possible to evaluate the system performance with an overall grid simulation model close to real grid systems. The overall simulation model is developed in MATLAB/Simulink/SimPowerSystems® environments and the obtained results effectively match the target of the provided study.

Keywords: IEEE 13 bus distribution system, reactive power regulation, static VAr compensator, wind energy conversion system

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Authors: Zahid Iqbal, Ijaz Javed, Riaz Hussain, Ibadullah Jan, Amir Ali Khan

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This study was conducted to investigate the disposition kinetics of ciprofloxacin and calculate its optimal dosage in Pakistani sheep of Lohi breed. Injectable preparation of ciprofloxacin was given intramuscularly to eight sheep at a dose of 5 mg/Kg. Before administration of drug blood sample was drawn from each animal. Post drug administration, blood samples were also drawn at various predetermined time periods. Drug concentration in the blood samples was assessed through high performance liquid chromatograph (HPLC). Data were best described by two compartment open model and different pharmacokinetic (PK) parameters were calculated. Cmax of 1.97 ± 0.15 µg/ml was reached at Tmax of 0.88 ± 0.09 hours. Half life of absorption (t1/2 abs) was observed to be 0.63 ± 0.16 hours while t1/2 α (distribution half life) and t1/2 ß (elimination half life) were found to be 0.46 ± 0.05 and 2.93 ± 0.45 hours, respectively. Vd (apparent volume of distribution) was calculated as 2.89 ± 0.30 L/kg while AUC (area under the curve) was 7.19 ± 0.38 µg.hr/mL and CL (total body clearance) was 0.75 ± 0.04 L/hr/kg. Using these parameters, an optimal intramuscular dosage of ciprofloxacin in adult Lohi sheep was calculated as 21.43 mg/kg, advised to be repeated after 24 hours. From this, we came to the conclusion that calculated dose was much higher than the dose advised by the foreign manufacturer and to avoid antimicrobial resistance, it is advised that this locally investigated dosage regimen should be strictly followed in local sheep.

Keywords: pharmacokinetics, dosage regimen, ciprofloxacin, HPLC, sheep

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Authors: T. Hojageldiyev, Y. Bolmammedov

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Increasing evidence suggests late chronotype individuals are at increased risk of developing psychopathological conditions. Our previously conducted study aimed to know the distribution of chronotypes according to age revealed that evening-types reaching a peak at age 14. While there is growing number of studies evaluating associations between chronotype and affective symptoms, to our best knowledge there are no studies addressing the issue of prevalence of anhedonia according to age groups of people. The sample included 545 healthy students between 13-21 years old from secondary schools and universities of Turkmenistan. Self-report 14 item Snaith-Hamilton Pleasure Scale (SHAPS) was used to assess hedonic tone of students. SHAPS score of 3 or higher indicates the criteria for the anhedonia. According to similarity of hedonic capacity participants divided into three age groups. Group I (age 13-14-15) includes 206 students (92 female), group II (age 16-17) includes 256 students (111 female) and group III (age 18-19-20-21) includes 83 (37 female). Statistical analysis was performed using Microsoft Excel 2013 and GraphPad Prism 7.0 programs. According to results average SHAPS scores of group I is 1.93 ± 1.94, group II 1.08 ± 1.43 and group III 1.29 ± 1.62. Students with anhedonia in group I consisted 30.5%, in group II 13,2% and in group III 12.04%. There are no gender differences. According to questionnaire results, higher prevalence of anhedonia is at the age between 13-15 than other age groups, and hedonic capacity increases as the age of students increases (p < 0.05). As a result, distribution of evening-types according to age correlates with hedonic capacity which is evening-types tends to have lower hedonic capacity.

Keywords: anhedonia, age, chronotype, hedonic capacity

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Authors: Oke Oktavianty, Tadayuki Kyoutani, Shigeyuki Haruyama, Junji Kaneko, Ken Kaminishi

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Modelica has many advantages and it is very useful in modeling and simulation especially for the multi-domain with a complex technical system. However, the big obstacle for a beginner is to understand the basic concept and to build a new system model for a real system. In order to understand how to solve the simple circuit model by hand translation and to get a better understanding of how modelica works, we provide a detailed explanation about solver ordering system in horizontal and vertical sorting and make some proposals for improvement. In this study, some difficulties in using modelica software with the original concept and the comparison with Finite Element Method (FEM) approach is discussed. We also present our textual modeling approach using FEM concept for acausal and causal model construction. Furthermore, simulation results are provided that demonstrate the comparison between using textual modeling with original coding in modelica and FEM concept.

Keywords: FEM, a causal model, modelica, horizontal and vertical sorting

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Authors: Marek Dlapa

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The algebraic approach is applied to the control of the HiMAT (Highly Maneuverable Aircraft Technology). The objective is to find a robust controller which guarantees robust stability and decoupled control of longitudinal model of a scaled remotely controlled vehicle version of the advanced fighter HiMAT. Control design is performed by decoupling the nominal MIMO (multi-input multi-output) system into two identical SISO (single-input single-output) plants which are approximated by a 4th order transfer function. The algebraic approach is then used for pole placement design, and the nominal closed-loop poles are tuned so that the peak of the µ-function is minimal. As an optimization tool, evolutionary algorithm Differential Migration is used in order to overcome the multimodality of the cost function yielding simple controller with decoupling for nominal plant which is compared with the D-K iteration through simulations of standard longitudinal manoeuvres documenting decoupled control obtained from algebraic approach for nominal plant as well as worst case perturbation.

Keywords: algebraic approach, evolutionary computation, genetic algorithms, HiMAT, robust control, structured singular value

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Authors: Juan Zhou, Lusan Liu, Yanzhong Zhu, Kuixuan Lin, Wenqian Cai, Yu Wang, Xing Wang

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During the past few decades, there has been an increase in the number of coastal land reclamation projects for residential, commercial and industrial purposes in more and more coastal cities of China, which led to the destruction of the wetlands and loss of the sensitive marine habitats. Meanwhile, the influences and nature of these projects attract widespread public and academic concern. For identifying the trend of landscape (esp. Coastal reclamation) and ecological environment changes, understanding of which interacted, and offering a general science for the development of regional plans. In the paper, a case study was carried out in Bohai Bay area, based on the analysis of remote sensing data. Land use maps were created for 1954, 1970, 1981, 1990, 2000 and 2010. Landscape metrics were calculated and illustrated that the degree of reclamation changes was linked to the hydrodynamic environment and macrobenthos community. The results indicated that the worst of the loss of initial areas occurred during 1954-1970, with 65.6% lost mostly to salt field; to 2010, Coastal reclamation area increased more than 200km² as artificial landscape. The numerical simulation of tidal current field in 2003 and 2010 respectively showed that the flow velocity in offshore became faster (from 2-5 cm/s to 10-20 cm/s), and the flow direction seem to go astray. These significant changes of coastline were not conducive to the spread of pollutants and degradation. Additionally, the dominant macrobenthos analysis from 1958 to 2012 showed that Musculus senhousei (Benson, 1842) spread very fast and had been the predominant species in the recent years, which was a disturbance tolerant species.

Keywords: Bohai Bay, coastal reclamation, landscape change, spatial patterns

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Authors: Hatice Karakoyun, Mustafa Akdag

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This study has been made to examine the attitudes of pre-school teachers towards values education. The study has been made as a general scanning model. The study’s working group contains 108 pre-school teachers who worked in Diyarbakır, Turkey. In this study Values Education Attitude Scale (VEAS), which developed by Yaşaroğlu (2014), was used. In order to analyze the data for sociodemographic structure, percentage and frequency values were examined. The Kolmogorov-Smirnov method was used in determination of the normal distribution of data. During analyzing the data, KolmogorovSimirnov test and the normal curved histograms were examined to determine which statistical analyzes would be applied on the scale and it was found that the distribution was not normal. Thus, the Mann Whitney U analysis technique which is one of the nonparametric statistical analysis techniques were used to test the difference of the scores obtained from the scale in terms of independent variables. According to the analyses, it seems that pre-school teachers’ attitudes toward values education are positive. According to the scale with the highest average, it points out that pre-school teachers think that values education is very important for students’ and children’s future. The variables included in the scale (gender, seniority, age group, education, school type, school place) seem to have no effect on the pre-school teachers’ attitude grades which joined to the study.

Keywords: attitude scale, pedagogy, pre-school teacher, values education

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Authors: A. Abubakar, A. Parsa, S. Walker

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Despite advances made in the diagnosis and management of drug-sensitive tuberculosis (TB) over the past decades, treatment of multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB) remains challenging and complex particularly in high burden countries including Nigeria. Treatment of MDR-TB is cost-prohibitive with success rate generally lower compared to drug-sensitive TB and if care is not taken it may become the dominant form of TB in future with many treatment uncertainties and substantial morbidity and mortality. Addressing these challenges requires collaborative efforts thorough sustained researches to evaluate the current treatment guidelines, particularly in high burden countries and prevent progression of resistance. To our best knowledge, there has been no research exploring the acceptability, effectiveness, and cost-effectiveness of community-based-MDR-TB treatment model in Nigeria, which is among the high burden countries. The previous similar qualitative study looks at the home-based management of MDR-TB in rural Uganda. This research aimed to explore patient’s views and acceptability of community-based-MDR-TB treatment model and to evaluate and compare the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of community-based versus hospital-based MDR-TB treatment model of care from the Nigerian perspective. Knowledge of patient’s views and acceptability of community-based-MDR-TB treatment approach would help in designing future treatment recommendations and in health policymaking. Accordingly, knowledge of effectiveness and cost-effectiveness are part of the evidence needed to inform a decision about whether and how to scale up MDR-TB treatment, particularly in a poor resource setting with limited knowledge of TB. Mixed methods using qualitative and quantitative approach were employed. Qualitative data were obtained using in-depth semi-structured interviews with 21 MDR-TB patients in Nigeria to explore their views and acceptability of community-based MDR-TB treatment model. Qualitative data collection followed an iterative process which allowed adaptation of topic guides until data saturation. In-depth interviews were analyzed using thematic analysis. Quantitative data on treatment outcomes were obtained from medical records of MDR-TB patients to determine the effectiveness and direct and indirect costs were obtained from the patients using validated questionnaire and health system costs from the donor agencies to determine the cost-effectiveness difference between community and hospital-based model from the Nigerian perspective. Findings: Some themes have emerged from the patient’s perspectives indicating preference and high acceptability of community-based-MDR-TB treatment model by the patients and mixed feelings about the risk of MDR-TB transmission within the community due to poor infection control. The result of the modeling from the quantitative data is still on course. Community-based MDR-TB care was seen as the acceptable and most preferred model of care by the majority of the participants because of its convenience which in turn enhanced recovery, enables social interaction and offer more psychosocial benefits as well as averted productivity loss. However, there is a need to strengthen this model of care thorough enhanced strategies that ensure guidelines compliance and infection control in order to prevent the progression of resistance and curtail community transmission.

Keywords: acceptability, cost-effectiveness, multidrug-resistant TB treatment, community and hospital approach

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Authors: Bethany Wood

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The world pandemic led to a change in the way social media was used by audiences, with young people spending more hours on the platform due to lockdown. Reports by Ofcom have demonstrated that the internet is the second most popular platform for accessing news after television in the UK with social media and the internet ranked as the most popular platform to access news for those aged between 16-24. These statistics are unsurprising considering that at the time of writing, 98 percent of Generation Z (Gen Z) owned a smartphone and the subsequent ease and accessibility of social media. Technology is constantly developing and with this, its importance is becoming more prevalent with each generation: the Baby Boomers (1946-1964) consider it something useful whereas millennials (1981-1997) believe it a necessity for day to day living. Gen Z, otherwise known as the digital native, have grown up with this technology at their fingertips and social media is a norm. It helps form their identity, their affiliations and opens gateways for them to engage with news in a new way. It is a common misconception that Gen Z do not consume news, they are simply doing so in a different way to their predecessors. Using a sample of 800 18-20 year olds whilst utilising Generational theory, Actor Network Theory and the Social Shaping of Technology, this research provides a critical analyse regarding how Gen Z’s news consumption and engagement habits are developing along with technology to sculpture the future format of news and its distribution. From that perspective, allied with the empirical approach, it is possible to provide research orientated advice for the industry and even help to redefine traditional concepts of journalism.

Keywords: journalism, generation z, digital, social media

Procedia PDF Downloads 60