Search results for: cuckoo search optimization

Authors: Marwa M. Abu-Serie, Marwa M. Eltarahony

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The search for reliable, effective, and safe nanoparticles (NPs) as a treatment for cancer is a pressing priority. In this study, Cu-NPs were fabricated by Streptomyces cyaneofuscatus through simultaneous bioreduction strategy of copper nitrate salt. The as-prepared Cu-NPs subjected to structural analysis; energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy, elemental mapping, X-ray diffraction, transmission electron microscopy, and ζ-potential. These biological synthesized Cu-NPs were mixed with disulfiram (DS), forming a nanocomplex of Cu-DS with a size of ~135 nm. The prepared nanocomplex (nanoCu-DS) exhibited higher anticancer activity than that of free complex of DS-Cu, Cu-NPs, and DS alone. This was illustrated by the lowest IC50 of nanoCu-DS (< 4 µM) against human breast and liver cancer cell lines comparing with DS-Cu, Cu-NPs, and DS (~8, 22.98-33.51 and 11.95-14.86, respectively). Moreover, flow cytometric analysis confirmed that higher apoptosis percentage range of nanoCu-DS-treated in MDA-MB 231, MCF-7, Huh-7, and HepG-2 cells (51.24-65.28%) than free complex of Cu-DS ( < 4.5%). Regarding inhibition potency of liver and breast cancer cell migration, no significant difference was recorded between free and nanocomplex. Furthermore, nanoCu-DS suppressed gene expression of β-catenine, Akt, and NF-κB and upregulated p53 expression (> 3, >15, > 5 and ≥ 3 folds, respectively) more efficiently than free complex (all ~ 1 fold) in MDA-MB 231 and Huh-7 cells. Our finding proved this prepared nano complex has a powerful anticancer activity relative to free complex, thereby offering a promising cancer treatment.

Keywords: biologically prepared Cu-NPs, breast cancer cell lines, liver cancer cell lines, nanoCu- disulfiram

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Authors: Noura Kichou, Manel Tafergguenit, Nabila Ghechtouli, Zakia Hank

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The aim of this work is to synthesize, characterize and evaluate the biological activity of two Ligands : glyoxime and dimethylglyoxime, and their metal Ni(II) chelates. The newly chelates were characterized by elemental analysis, IR, EPR, nuclear magnetic resonances (1H and 13C), and biological activity. The antibacterial and antifungal activities of the ligands and its metal complexes were screened against bacterial species (Staphylococcus aureus, Bacillus subtilis, and Escherichia coli) and fungi (Candida albicans). Ampicillin and amphotericin were used as references for antibacterial and antifungal studies. The activity data show that the metal complexes have a promising biological activity comparable with parent free ligand against bacterial and fungal species. A structural, energetic, and electronic theoretical study was carried out using the DFT method, with the functional B3LYP and the gaussian program 09. A complete optimization of geometries was made, followed by a calculation of the frequencies of the normal modes of vibration. The UV spectrum was also interpreted. The theoretical results were compared with the experimental data.

Keywords: glyoxime, dimetylglyoxime, nickel, antibacterial activity

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Authors: Noura Kichou, Manel Tafergguenit, Nabila Ghechtouli, Zakia Hank

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The aim of this work is to synthesize, characterize and evaluate the biological activity of two Ligands: glyoxime and dimethylglyoxime, and their metal Ni(II) chelates. The newly chelates were characterized by elemental analysis, IR, EPR, nuclear magnetic resonances (1H and 13C), and biological activity. The antibacterial and antifungal activities of the ligands and its metal complexes were screened against bacterial species (Staphylococcus aureus, Bacillus subtilis, and Escherichia coli) and fungi (Candida albicans). Ampicillin and amphotericin were used as references for antibacterial and antifungal studies. The activity data show that the metal complexes have a promising biological activity comparable with parent free ligand against bacterial and fungal species. A structural, energetic, and electronic theoretical study was carried out using the DFT method, with the functional B3LYP and the gaussian program 09. A complete optimization of geometries was made, followed by a calculation of the frequencies of the normal modes of vibration. The UV spectrum was also interpreted. The theoretical results were compared with the experimental data.

Keywords: glyoxime, dimetylglyoxime, nickel, antibacterial activity

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Authors: Sim Nee Ting, Lan Eng Ng

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Standard forms of contract in Malaysia are pre-written, printed contractual documents drafted by recognised authoritative bodies in order to describe the rights and obligations of the contracting parties in all construction projects in Malaysia. Studies and form revisions are usually conducted in a relatively random and qualitative manner, but the search of contractual documents idealization remains. It is not clear how these qualitative findings could be helpful for contractual documents improvements and re-drafting. This study aims to quantitatively and systematically analyse and evaluate the rights and obligations of the contracting parties as stated in the standard forms of contract. The Institution of Engineers Malaysia (IEM) published a new standard form of contract in 2012 with a total of 63 classes but the improvements and changes in the newly revised form that are yet to be analysed. IEM form will be used as the case study for this study. Every clause in this said form were interpreted and analysed according to the involved parties including contractor, engineer and employer. Modified from Matrix Method and Likert Scale, the result analysis were conducted based on a scale from 0 to 1 with five ratings namely “Very Unbalance”, “Unbalance”, “Balance”, “Good Balance” and “Very Good Balance”. It is hoped that quantitative method of form study can be used for future form revisions and any new forms drafting so to reduce on any subjectivity in standard forms of contract studies.

Keywords: contracting parties, Malaysia, obligations, quantitative measurement, rights, standard form of contract

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Authors: Harshith Gowda K. S, Tejaskumar N, Shubhanga R. B, Gowtham N, Deekshith Gowda H. S

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Phasor measurement units (PMU) are playing an important role in the current power system for state estimation. It is necessary to have complete observability of the power system while minimizing the cost. For this purpose, the optimal location of the phasor measurement units in the power system is essential. In a bus system, zero injection buses need to be evaluated to minimize the number of PMUs. In this paper, the optimization problem is formulated using mixed integer programming to obtain the optimal location of the PMUs with increased observability. The formulation consists of with and without zero injection bus as constraints. The formulated problem is simulated using a CPLEX solver in the GAMS software package. The proposed method is tested on IEEE 30, IEEE 39, IEEE 57, and IEEE 118 bus systems. The results obtained show that the number of PMUs required is minimal with increased observability.

Keywords: PMU, observability, mixed integer programming (MIP), zero injection buses (ZIB)

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Authors: Abdulrahman Sumayli, Saad M. AlShahrani

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For the hydrogenation process, knowing the solubility of hydrogen (H2) in hydrocarbons is critical to improve the efficiency of the process. We investigated the H2 solubility computation in four heavy crude oil feedstocks using machine learning techniques. Temperature, pressure, and feedstock type were considered as the inputs to the models, while the hydrogen solubility was the sole response. Specifically, we employed three different models: Support Vector Regression (SVR), Gaussian process regression (GPR), and Bayesian ridge regression (BRR). To achieve the best performance, the hyper-parameters of these models are optimized using the whale optimization algorithm (WOA). We evaluated the models using a dataset of solubility measurements in various feedstocks, and we compared their performance based on several metrics. Our results show that the WOA-SVR model tuned with WOA achieves the best performance overall, with an RMSE of 1.38 × 10− 2 and an R-squared of 0.991. These findings suggest that machine learning techniques can provide accurate predictions of hydrogen solubility in different feedstocks, which could be useful in the development of hydrogen-related technologies. Besides, the solubility of hydrogen in the four heavy oil fractions is estimated in different ranges of temperatures and pressures of 150 ◦C–350 ◦C and 1.2 MPa–10.8 MPa, respectively

Keywords: temperature, pressure variations, machine learning, oil treatment

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Authors: Adeolu O. Dairo

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Getting the consumer marketing strategy right is a crucial and complex task for firms with a large customer base such as mobile operators in a competitive mobile market. While empirical studies have made efforts to identify key constructs, no geospatial model has been developed to comprehensively assess the viability and interdependency of ground realities regarding the customer, competition, channel and the network quality of mobile operators. With this research, a geo-analytic framework is proposed for strategy formulation and allocation for mobile operators. Firstly, a fuzzy analytic network using a self-organizing feature map clustering technique based on inputs from managers and literature, which depicts the interrelationships amongst ground realities is developed. The model is tested with a mobile operator in the Nigeria mobile market. As a result, a customer-centric geospatial and visualization solution is developed. This provides a consolidated and integrated insight that serves as a transparent, logical and practical guide for strategic, tactical and operational decision making.

Keywords: geospatial, geo-analytics, self-organizing map, customer-centric

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Authors: A. Hamidi, S. Khelladi, L. Illoul, A. Tcharkhtchi

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Reactive rotational molding (RRM) is a process to manufacture hollow plastic parts with reactive material has several advantages compared to conventional roto molding of thermoplastic powders: process cycle time is shorter; raw material is less expensive because polymerization occurs during processing and high-performance polymers may be used such as thermosets, thermoplastics or blends. However, several phenomena occur during this process which makes the optimization of the process quite complex. In this study, we have used a mixture of isocyanate and polyol as a reactive system. The chemical transformation of this system to polyurethane has been studied by thermal analysis and rheology tests. Thanks to these results of the curing process and rheological measurements, the kinetic and rheokinetik of polyurethane was identified. Smoothed Particle Hydrodynamics, a Lagrangian meshless method, was chosen to simulate reactive fluid flow in 2 and 3D configurations of the polyurethane during the process taking into account the chemical, and chemiorehological results obtained experimentally in this study.

Keywords: reactive rotational molding, simulation, smoothed particle hydrodynamics, surface tension, rheology, free surface flows, viscoelastic, interpolation

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Authors: Boris Melnikov, Ye Zhang, Dmitrii Chaikovskii

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We continue to consider one of the cybernetic methods in computational biology related to the study of DNA chains. Namely, we are considering the problem of reconstructing the not fully filled distance matrix of DNA chains. When applied in a programming context, it is revealed that with a modern computer of average capabilities, creating even a small-sized distance matrix for mitochondrial DNA sequences is quite time-consuming with standard algorithms. As the size of the matrix grows larger, the computational effort required increases significantly, potentially spanning several weeks to months of non-stop computer processing. Hence, calculating the distance matrix on conventional computers is hardly feasible, and supercomputers are usually not available. Therefore, we started publishing our variants of the algorithms for calculating the distance between two DNA chains; then, we published algorithms for restoring partially filled matrices, i.e., the inverse problem of matrix processing. In this paper, we propose an algorithm for restoring the distance matrix for DNA chains, and the primary focus is on enhancing the algorithms that shape the greedy function within the branches and boundaries method framework.

Keywords: DNA chains, distance matrix, optimization problem, restoring algorithm, greedy algorithm, heuristics

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Authors: Rouag N., Khalifa M. W., Bencheikh A., Abed H.

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The behavior study of forty-two varieties and genotypes of chickpeas regarding root wilt disease induced by Fusarium oxysporum under the natural conditions of infection was conducted at the ITGC experimental station in Sétif. The infected plants of the different chickpea genotypes have shown multiple symptoms in the field caused by the local strain of Fusarium oxysporum f.sp.cecris belonging to race II of the pathogen. These symptoms ranged from lateral or partial wilting of some ramifications to total desiccation of the plant, sometimes combined with the very slow growth of symptomatic plants. The results of the search for sources of resistance to Fusarium wilt of chickpeas in the 42 genotypes tested revealed that in terms of infection rate, the presence of 7 groups and no genotype showed absolute resistance. While in terms of severity, the results revealed the presence of three homogeneous groups. The first group formed by the most resistant genotypes, in this case, Flip10-368C; Flip11-77C; Flip11-186C; Flip11-124C; Flip11-142C, Flip11-152C; Flip11-69C; Ghab 05; Flip11-159C; Flip11-90C; Flip10-357C and Flip11-37C while the second group is the FLIP genotype 10-382C which was found to be the most sensitive for the natural infection test. Thus, the genotypes of Cicer arietinum L., which have shown significant levels of resistance to Fusarium wilt, can be integrated into breeding and improvement programs.

Keywords: chickpea, Cicer arietinum, Fusarium oxysporum, genotype resistance

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Authors: Ahmed Aisa, Tariq Iqbal

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This letter talks about the ready-to-use design of a solar water heating system because, in Canada, the average consumption of hot water per person is approximately 50 to 75 L per day and the average Canadian household uses 225 L. Therefore, this paper will demonstrate the method of designing a solar water heating system with thermal storage. It highlights the renewable hybrid power system, allowing you to obtain a reliable, independent system with the optimization of the ingredient size and at an improved capital cost. The system can provide hot water for a big building. The main power for the system comes from solar panels. Solar Advisory Model (SAM) and HOMER are used. HOMER and SAM are design models that calculate the consumption of hot water and cost for a house. Some results, obtained through simulation, were for monthly energy production, annual energy production, after tax cash flow, the lifetime of the system and monthly energy usage represented by three types of energy. These are system energy, electricity load electricity and net metering credit.

Keywords: water heating, thermal storage, capital cost solar, consumption

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Authors: Ilya B. Tsyrlov, Dmitry Y. Oshchepkov

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A computational search for dioxin response elements (DREs) in genes of proteins comprising the Ah receptor (AhR) cytosolic core complex was performed by highly efficient tool SITECON. Eventually, the following number of new DREs in 5’flanking region was detected by SITECON: one in AHR gene, five in XAP2, eight in HSP90AA1, and three in HSP90AB1 genes. Numerous DREs found in genes of AhR and AhR cytosolic complex members would shed a light on potential mechanisms of expression, the stoichiometry of unliganded AhR core complex, and its degradation vs biosynthesis dynamics resulted from treatment of target cells with the AhR most potent ligand, 2,3,7,8-TCDD. With human viruses, reduced susceptibility to TCDD of geneencoding HIV-1 P247 was justified by the only potential DRE determined in gag gene encoding HIV-1 P24 protein, whereas the regulatory region of CMV genes encoding IE gp/UL37 has five potent DRE, 1.65 kb/UL36 – six DRE, pp65 and pp71 – each has seven DRE, and pp150 – ten DRE. Also, from six to eight DRE were determined with SITECON in the regulatory region of HSV-1 IE genes encoding tegument proteins, UL36 and UL37, and of UL19 gene encoding bindingglycoprotein C (gC). So, TCDD in the low picomolar range may activate in human cells AhR: Arnt transcription pathway that triggers CMV and HSV-1 reactivation by binding to numerous promoter DRE within immediate-early (IE) genes UL37 and UL36, thus committing virus to the lytic cycle.

Keywords: dioxin response elements, Ah receptor, AhR: Arnt transcription pathway, human and viral genes

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Authors: Juan Portoviejo Brito, Daniel Icaza Alvarez, Christian Castro Samaniego

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In this article, we present the modeling, simulations, and energy conversion analysis of the solar-wind system for the Quingeo Heritage Center in Ecuador. A numerical model was constructed based on the 19 equations, it was coded in MATLAB R2017a, and the results were compared with the experimental data of the site. The model is built with the purpose of using it as a computer development for the optimization of resources and designs of hybrid systems in the Parish of Quingeo and its surroundings. The model obtained a fairly similar pattern compared to the data and curves obtained in the field experimentally and detailed in manuscript. It is important to indicate that this analysis has been carried out so that in the near future one or two of these power generation systems can be exploited in a massive way according to the budget assigned by the Parish GAD of Quingeo or other national or international organizations with the purpose of preserving this unique colonial helmet in Ecuador.

Keywords: hybrid system, wind turbine, modeling, simulation, Smart Grid, Quingeo Azuay Ecuador

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Authors: Sona Lorencova

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The practice of kindergartens shows that the communication and cooperation of teachers and directors of kindergartens with parents, who come with different expectations and ideas about preschool education, is becoming an increasing problem, which leads to many misunderstandings in their mutual functioning. In practice, little attention is paid to communication and cooperation between kindergartens and families, whether in the professional development of educators, in professional articles and publications, or in the field of research. The approach of teachers to parents whose children attend kindergarten requires more and more skills on the part of educators, which is also related to the introduction of the institute of compulsory preschool education. Thus, the discrepancy in mutual expectations and requirements for children's preschool education on the part of the kindergarten and the family is increasing. The aim of the research was to look into the world of parents and learn about their subjective experience with preschool education of children in kindergarten. The findings could be useful in the search for appropriate strategies for mutual communication and cooperation between kindergartens and families in order to achieve more effective progress for children in education. The data were collected through the method of a constellation with figures, semi-structured interviews, and the use of a research diary. Through an interpretive phenomenological analysis, it was found that the parents' view of preschool education in kindergarten is connected to 6 basic topics - parenting with a preschooler, adaptation to kindergarten, professionalism of teachers, cooperation with kindergarten, and parents' satisfaction with preschool education. The conducted research also revealed that the determinants at the level of microsystem, mesosystem, exosystem, macrosystem, and chronosystem influenced parents' view of children's preschool education in kindergarten.

Keywords: preschool education, parents, kindergarten, interpretive phenomenological analysis, subjective experience

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Authors: Rupu Yang, Cong Toan Tran, Assaad Zoughaib

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The work provides an iterative nonlinear programming method to synthesize a heat exchanger network by manipulating the trade-offs between the heat load of process heat exchangers (HEs) and utilities. We consider for the synthesis problem two cases, the first one without fixed cost for HEs, and the second one with fixed cost. For the no fixed cost problem, the nonlinear programming (NLP) model with all the potential HEs is optimized to obtain the global optimum. For the case with fixed cost, the NLP model is iterated through adding/removing HEs. The method was applied in five case studies and illustrated quite well effectiveness. Among which, the approach reaches the lowest TAC (2,904,026$/year) compared with the best record for the famous Aromatic plants problem. It also locates a slightly better design than records in literature for a 10 streams case without fixed cost with only 1/9 computational time. Moreover, compared to the traditional mixed-integer nonlinear programming approach, the iterative NLP method opens a possibility to consider constraints (such as controllability or dynamic performances) that require knowing the structure of the network to be calculated.

Keywords: heat exchanger network, synthesis, NLP, optimization

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Authors: A. W. Zularisam, Sveta Thakur, Lakhveer Singh, Mimi Sakinah Abdul Munaim

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Clostridium sp. LS2 was immobilised by entrapment in polyethylene glycol (PEG) gel beads to improve the biohydrogen production rate from palm oil mill effluent (POME). We sought to explore and optimise the hydrogen production capability of the immobilised cells by studying the conditions for cell immobilisation, including PEG concentration, cell loading and curing times, as well as the effects of temperature and K2HPO4 (500–2000 mg/L), NiCl2 (0.1–5.0 mg/L), FeCl2 (100–400 mg/L) MgSO4 (50–200 mg/L) concentrations on hydrogen production rate. The results showed that by optimising the PEG concentration (10% w/v), initial biomass (2.2 g dry weight), curing time (80 min) and temperature (37 °C), as well as the concentrations of K2HPO4 (2000 mg/L), NiCl2 (1 mg/L), FeCl2 (300 mg/L) and MgSO4 (100 mg/L), a maximum hydrogen production rate of 7.3 L/L-POME/day and a yield of 0.31 L H2/g chemical oxygen demand were obtained during continuous operation. We believe that this process may be potentially expanded for sustained and large-scale hydrogen production.

Keywords: hydrogen, polyethylene glycol, immobilised cell, fermentation, palm oil mill effluent

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Authors: Abdelfatah Elsenosy, Mahmoud Ebrahim

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Background: Distal radius fractures are commonly encountered in orthopedic practice, especially in elderly patients. A number of clinical papers have supported the idea that anatomic restoration of the distal end of the radius is essential to gain superior results. Aim and objectives: The aim of the study is to systematically review the literature for the management of distal end radius in elderly persons (conservative treatment versus percutaneous wire fixation) as regards radiological and functional outcomes. Subjects and methods: Studies were identified from the Medline, Cochrane, EMBASE, and Google Scholar databases were searched until 2019 using combinations of the following search terms: distal radius fracture, conservative treatment, non-operative treatment, and nonsurgical treatment, surgical treatment, operative, elderly, and older. Reference lists of relevant studies were manually searched. Results: There was no statistical significance difference between CI and PKF groups’ frequency of complication in all of the selected studies. Based on the results, we recommend more analysis regarding every parameter of the radiographic and functional results and specific complications related to each fixation need to be accomplished, which requires more Randomized controlled trials (RCTs) with high quality. Conclusion: Surgical treatment seems to be more effective distal radius fracture compared with conservative treatment when the radiographic outcomes were analyzed, and no significant differences were detected in the functional outcomes and complication rate.

Keywords: radius, fracture, surgical, RCTs, conservative, radiographic, outcomes, orthopedic

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Authors: Kumar N., Verma S., Park J., Srivastava V. C.

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Organic carbonates have the potential to be used as fuels and because of this, their production through non-phosgene routes is a thrust area of research. Di-ethyl carbonate (DEC) synthesis from propylene carbonate (PC) in the presence of alcohol is a green route. In this study, the use of reduced graphene oxide (rGO) based metal oxide catalysts [rGO-MO, where M = Ce] with different amounts of graphene oxide (0.2%, 0.5%, 1%, and 2%) has been investigated for the synthesis of DEC by using PC and ethanol as reactants. The GO sheets were synthesized by an electrochemical process and the catalysts were synthesized using an in-situ method. A theoretical study of the thermodynamics of the reaction was done, which revealed that the reaction is mildly endothermic. The theoretical value of optimum temperature was found to be 420 K. The synthesized catalysts were characterized for their morphological, structural and textural properties using field emission scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD), N2 adsorption/desorption, thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), and Raman spectroscopy. Optimization studies were carried out to study the effect of different reaction conditions like temperature (140 °C to 180 °C) and catalyst dosage (0.102 g to 0.255 g) on the yield of DEC. Amongst the various synthesized catalysts, 1% rGO-CeO2 gave the maximum yield of DEC.

Keywords: GO, DEC, propylene carbonate, transesterification, thermodynamics

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Authors: Zongjie Wang, Zhizhong Guo

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While the regular optimal power flow model focuses on a single time scan, the optimization of power systems is typically intended for a time duration with respect to a desired objective function. In this paper, a temporal optimal power flow model for a time period is proposed. To reduce the computation burden needed for calculating temporal optimal power flow, a characteristic optimal power flow model is proposed, which employs different characteristic load patterns to represent the objective function and security constraints. A numerical method based on the interior point method is also proposed for solving the characteristic optimal power flow model. Both the temporal optimal power flow model and characteristic optimal power flow model can improve the systems’ desired objective function for the entire time period. Numerical studies are conducted on the IEEE 14 and 118-bus test systems to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed characteristic optimal power flow model.

Keywords: optimal power flow, time period, security, economy

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Authors: AliAkbar Hafezi, Jahanbakhsh Asadi, Majid Shahbazi, Alijan Tabarraei, Nader Mansour Samaei, Hamed Sheibak, Roghaye Gharaei

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Background: Breast cancer is the most common cancer in women. In most cancer cells, apoptosis is blocked. As for the importance of apoptosis in cancer cell death and the role of different genes in its induction or inhibition, the search for compounds that can begin the process of apoptosis in tumor cells is discussed as a new strategy in anticancer drug discovery. The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of Naringenin (NGEN) on the apoptosis in the T47D cell line of breast cancer. Materials and Methods: In this experimental study in vitro, the T47D cell line of breast cancer was selected as a sample. The cells at 24, 48, and 72 hours were treated with doses of 20, 200, and 1000 µm of Naringenin. Then, the transcription levels of the genes involved in apoptosis, including Bcl-2, Bax, Caspase 3, Caspase 8, Caspase 9, P53, PARP-1, and FAS, were assessed using Real Time-PCR. The collected data were analyzed using IBM SPSS Statistics 24.0. Results: The results showed that Naringenin at doses of 20, 200, and 1000 µm in all three times of 24, 48, and 72 hours increased the expression of Caspase 3, P53, PARP-1 and FAS and reduced the expression of Bcl-2 and increased the Bax/Bcl-2 ratio, nevertheless in none of the studied doses and times, had not a significant effect on the expression of Bax, Caspase 8 and Caspase 9. Conclusion: This study indicates that Naringenin can reduce the growth of some cancer cells and cause their deaths through increased apoptosis and decreased anti-apoptotic Bcl-2 gene expression and, resulting in the induction of apoptosis via both internal and external pathways.

Keywords: apoptosis, breast cancer, naringenin, T47D cell line

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Authors: Oludare Isaac Abiodun, Esther Omolara Abiodun

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The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate that cyberterrorism is existing and poses a threat to computer security and national security. Nowadays, people have become excitedly dependent upon computers, phones, the Internet, and the Internet of things systems to share information, communicate, conduct a search, etc. However, these network systems are at risk from a different source that is known and unknown. These network systems risk being caused by some malicious individuals, groups, organizations, or governments, they take advantage of vulnerabilities in the computer system to hawk sensitive information from people, organizations, or governments. In doing so, they are engaging themselves in computer threats, crime, and terrorism, thereby making the use of computers insecure for others. The threat of cyberterrorism is of various forms and ranges from one country to another country. These threats include disrupting communications and information, stealing data, destroying data, leaking, and breaching data, interfering with messages and networks, and in some cases, demanding financial rewards for stolen data. Hence, this study identifies many ways that cyberterrorists utilize the Internet as a tool to advance their malicious mission, which negatively affects computer security and safety. One could identify causes for disparate anomaly behaviors and the theoretical, ideological, and current forms of the likelihood of cyberterrorism. Therefore, for a countermeasure, this paper proposes the use of previous and current computer security models as found in the literature to help in countering cyberterrorism

Keywords: cyberterrorism, computer security, information, internet, terrorism, threat, digital forensic solution

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Authors: Jatinder Kumar, Ajay Bansal

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Simulation of a photocatalytic reactor helps in understanding the complex behavior of the photocatalytic degradation. Simulation also aids the designing and optimization of the photocatalytic reactor. Lack of simulation strategies is a huge hindrance in the commercialization of the photocatalytic technology. With the increased performance of computational resources, and development of simulation software, computational fluid dynamics (CFD) is becoming an affordable engineering tool to simulate and optimize reactor designs. In the present paper, a CFD (Computational fluid dynamics) model for simulating the performance of an immobilized-titanium dioxide based annular photocatalytic reactor was developed. The computational model integrates hydrodynamics, species mass transport, and chemical reaction kinetics using a commercial CFD code Fluent 6.3.26. The CFD model was based on the intrinsic kinetic parameters determined experimentally in a perfectly mixed batch reactor. Rhodamine B, a complex organic compound, was selected as a test pollutant for photocatalytic degradation. It was observed that CFD could become a valuable tool to understand and improve the photocatalytic systems.

Keywords: simulation, computational fluid dynamics (CFD), annular photocatalytic reactor, titanium dioxide

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Authors: Saad M. Darwish, Mohamed A. El-Iskandarani, Guitar M. Shawkat

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Nowadays, the amount of available multimedia data is continuously on the rise. The need to find a required image for an ordinary user is a challenging task. Content based image retrieval (CBIR) computes relevance based on the visual similarity of low-level image features such as color, textures, etc. However, there is a gap between low-level visual features and semantic meanings required by applications. The typical method of bridging the semantic gap is through the automatic image annotation (AIA) that extracts semantic features using machine learning techniques. In this paper, a multi-label image annotation system guided by Firefly and Bayesian method is proposed. Firstly, images are segmented using the maximum variance intra cluster and Firefly algorithm, which is a swarm-based approach with high convergence speed, less computation rate and search for the optimal multiple threshold. Feature extraction techniques based on color features and region properties are applied to obtain the representative features. After that, the images are annotated using translation model based on the Net Bayes system, which is efficient for multi-label learning with high precision and less complexity. Experiments are performed using Corel Database. The results show that the proposed system is better than traditional ones for automatic image annotation and retrieval.

Keywords: feature extraction, feature selection, image annotation, classification

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Authors: Khaled A. Madi, Rema A. Mousbahi, Mostafa B. Abuitbel, Abdualhakim O. Nagi

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Antenna perhaps is the most important part of any communication system, it determines the overall efficiency and the direction of radiation of the system. Antennas vary in shape and size on a very wide range. For fast moving vehicles, the antenna should offer as litter aerodynamic resistance as possible. Slot antenna is best suited for this purpose. It offers very little aerodynamic resistance, compact, easy to feed and fabricate. This work presented in this paper deals with the investigation of a half wave slot antenna. The antenna has been studied, analyzed, designed, simulated, fabrication, and tested at the X-band. The field of antenna study is an extremely vast one, and to grasp the fundamentals, two pronged approaches have been used, and the focus was on the fabrication and testing of a slot waveguide directional antenna. Focuses on the design and simulation of slot antennas with an emphasis on optimization of a 9.1 GHz a rectangular waveguide have been used to feed slot antenna. A microwave fed slot antenna used in the communication lab was also simulated. The results have been presented and compared with the expected values, where a good agreement was achieved between the simulation and experimental results.

Keywords: microwave, slot antenna, simulation, fabrication

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Authors: Pongsatorn Tantrabundit, Lersak Phothong, Ong-art Chanprasitchai

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Due to the emergence of the Internet, it has extended the traditional Word-of-Mouth (WOM) to a new form called “Electronic Word-of-Mouth (eWOM).” Unlike traditional WOM, eWOM is able to present information in various ways by applying different components. Each eWOM component generates different effects on online consumer behavior. This research investigates the effects of Webcare (responding message) from product/ service providers on negative eWOM by applying two types of products (search and experience). The proposed conceptual model was developed based on the combination of the stages in consumer decision-making process, theory of reasoned action (TRA), theory of planned behavior (TPB), the technology acceptance model (TAM), the information integration theory and the elaboration likelihood model. The methodology techniques used in this study included multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) and multiple regression analysis. The results suggest that Webcare does slightly increase Thai online consumer’s perceptions on perceived eWOM trustworthiness, information diagnosticity and quality. For negative eWOM, we also found that perceived eWOM Trustworthiness, perceived eWOM diagnosticity and quality have a positive relationship with eWOM influence whereas perceived valence has a negative relationship with eWOM influence in Thai online consumers.

Keywords: consumer behavior, electronic word-of-mouth, online review, online word-of-mouth, Thai online consumer, webcare

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Authors: Shiksha Jain, Ramesh Mishra

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One of the most widely used complex signals processing operation is filtering. The most important FIR digital filter are widely used in DSP for filtering to alter the spectrum according to some given specifications. Power consumption and Area complexity in the algorithm of Finite Impulse Response (FIR) filter is mainly caused by multipliers. So we present a multiplier less technique (DA technique). In this technique, precomputed value of inner product is stored in LUT. Which are further added and shifted with number of iterations equal to the precision of input sample. But the exponential growth of LUT with the order of FIR filter, in this basic structure, makes it prohibitive for many applications. The significant area and power reduction over traditional Distributed Arithmetic (DA) structure is presented in this paper, by the use of slicing of LUT to the desired length. An architecture of 16 tap FIR filter is presented, with different length of slice of LUT. The result of FIR Filter implementation on Xilinx ISE synthesis tool (XST) vertex-4 FPGA Tool by using proposed method shows the increase of the maximum frequency, the decrease of the resources as usage saving in area with more number of slices and the reduction dynamic power.

Keywords: multiplier less technique, linear phase symmetric FIR filter, FPGA tool, look up table

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Authors: Shahab Mirzaean Mahabadi, Elham Ebrahimi

Abstract:

The urban development process in the historical urban context has predominately witnessed two main approaches: the first is the Preservation and conservation of the urban fabric and its value, and the second approach is urban renewal and redevelopment. The latter is generally supported by political and economic aspirations. These two approaches conflict evidently. The authors go through the history of urban planning in order to review the historical development of the mentioned approaches. In this article, various values which are inherent in the historical fabric of a city are illustrated by emphasizing on cultural identity and activity. In the following, it is tried to find an optimized plan which maximizes economic development and minimizes change in historical-cultural sites simultaneously. In the proposed model, regarding the decision maker’s intention, and the variety of functions, the selected zone is divided into a number of components. For each component, different alternatives can be assigned, namely, renovation, refurbishment, destruction, and change in function. The decision Variable in this model is to choose an alternative for each component. A set of decisions made upon all components results in a plan. A plan developed in this way can be evaluated based on the decision maker’s point of view. That is, interactions between selected alternatives can make a foundation for the assessment of urban context to design a historical-cultural landscape. A genetic algorithm (GA) approach is used to search for optimal future land use within the historical-culture landscape for a sustainable high-growth city.

Keywords: urban sustainability, green city, regeneration, genetic algorithm

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Authors: S. Toufigh Bararpour, Davood Karami, Nader Mahinpey

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Dependence of global economics on fossil fuels has led to a large growth in the emission of greenhouse gases (GHGs). Among the various GHGs, carbon dioxide is the main contributor to the greenhouse effect due to its huge emission amount. To mitigate the threatening effect of CO₂, carbon capture and sequestration (CCS) technologies have been studied widely in recent years. For the combustion processes, three main CO₂ capture techniques have been proposed such as post-combustion, pre-combustion and oxyfuel combustion. Post-combustion is the most commonly used CO₂ capture process as it can be readily retrofit into the existing power plants. Multiple advantages have been reported for the post-combustion by solid sorbents such as high CO₂ selectivity, high adsorption capacity, and low required regeneration energy. Chemical adsorption of CO₂ over alkali-metal-based solid sorbents such as K₂CO₃ is a promising method for the selective capture of diluted CO₂ from the huge amount of nitrogen existing in the flue gas. To improve the CO₂ capture performance, K₂CO₃ is supported by a stable and porous material. Al₂O₃ has been employed commonly as the support and enhanced the cyclic CO₂ capture efficiency of K₂CO₃. Different phases of alumina can be obtained by setting the calcination temperature of boehmite at 300, 600 (γ-alumina), 950 (δ-alumina) and 1200 °C (α-alumina). By increasing the calcination temperature, the regeneration capacity of alumina increases, while the surface area reduces. However, sorbents with lower surface areas have lower CO₂ capture capacity as well (except for the sorbents prepared by hydrophilic support materials). To resolve this issue, a highly efficient alumina-aerogel support was synthesized with a BET surface area of over 2000 m²/g and then calcined at a high temperature. The synthesized alumina-aerogel was impregnated on K₂CO₃ based on 50 wt% support/K₂CO₃, which resulted in the preparation of a sorbent with remarkable CO₂ capture performance. The effect of synthesis conditions such as types of alcohols, solvent-to-co-solvent ratios, and aging times was investigated on the performance of the support. The best support was synthesized using methanol as the solvent, after five days of aging time, and at a solvent-to-co-solvent (methanol-to-toluene) ratio (v/v) of 1/5. Response surface methodology was used to investigate the effect of operating parameters such as carbonation temperature and H₂O-to-CO₂ flowrate ratio on the CO₂ capture capacity. The maximum CO₂ capture capacity, at the optimum amounts of operating parameters, was 7.2 mmol CO₂ per gram K₂CO₃. Cyclic behavior of the sorbent was examined over 20 carbonation and regenerations cycles. The alumina-aerogel-supported K₂CO₃ showed a great performance compared to unsupported K₂CO₃ and γ-alumina-supported K₂CO₃. Fundamental performance analyses and long-term thermal and chemical stability test will be performed on the sorbent in the future. The applicability of the sorbent for a bench-scale process will be evaluated, and a corresponding process model will be established. The fundamental material knowledge and respective process development will be delivered to industrial partners for the design of a pilot-scale testing unit, thereby facilitating the industrial application of alumina-aerogel.

Keywords: alumina-aerogel, CO₂ capture, K₂CO₃, optimization

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Authors: Caroline Atef Shoukry Tadros

Abstract:

Massive Urbanization growth threatens the sustainability of cities and the quality of city life. This raised the need for an alternate model of sustainability, so we need to plan the future cities in a smarter way with smarter mobility. Smart Mobility planning applications are solutions that use digital technologies and infrastructure advances to improve the efficiency, sustainability, and inclusiveness of urban transportation systems. They can contribute to meeting the needs of Urbanization growth by addressing the challenges of traffic congestion, pollution, accessibility, and safety in cities. Some example of a Smart Mobility planning application are Mobility-as-a-service: This is a service that integrates different transport modes, such as public transport, shared mobility, and active mobility, into a single platform that allows users to plan, book, and pay for their trips. This can reduce the reliance on private cars, optimize the use of existing infrastructure, and provide more choices and convenience for travelers. MaaS Global is a company that offers mobility-as-a-service solutions in several cities around the world. Traffic flow optimization: This is a solution that uses data analytics, artificial intelligence, and sensors to monitor and manage traffic conditions in real-time. This can reduce congestion, emissions, and travel time, as well as improve road safety and user satisfaction. Waycare is a platform that leverages data from various sources, such as connected vehicles, mobile applications, and road cameras, to provide traffic management agencies with insights and recommendations to optimize traffic flow. Logistics optimization: This is a solution that uses smart algorithms, blockchain, and IoT to improve the efficiency and transparency of the delivery of goods and services in urban areas. This can reduce the costs, emissions, and delays associated with logistics, as well as enhance the customer experience and trust. ShipChain is a blockchain-based platform that connects shippers, carriers, and customers and provides end-to-end visibility and traceability of the shipments. Autonomous vehicles: This is a solution that uses advanced sensors, software, and communication systems to enable vehicles to operate without human intervention. This can improve the safety, accessibility, and productivity of transportation, as well as reduce the need for parking space and infrastructure maintenance. Waymo is a company that develops and operates autonomous vehicles for various purposes, such as ride-hailing, delivery, and trucking. These are some of the ways that Smart Mobility planning applications can contribute to meeting the needs of the Urbanization growth. However, there are also various opportunities and challenges related to the implementation and adoption of these solutions, such as the regulatory, ethical, social, and technical aspects. Therefore, it is important to consider the specific context and needs of each city and its stakeholders when designing and deploying Smart Mobility planning applications.

Keywords: smart mobility planning, smart mobility applications, smart mobility techniques, smart mobility tools, smart transportation, smart cities, urbanization growth, future smart cities, intelligent cities, ICT information and communications technologies, IoT internet of things, sensors, lidar, digital twin, ai artificial intelligence, AR augmented reality, VR virtual reality, robotics, cps cyber physical systems, citizens design science

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Authors: Sanjoy Mukherjee

Abstract:

Discussions on concepts of Single Axis Tracker (SAT) are becoming more and more apt for developing countries like India not just as an advancement in racking technology but due to the utmost necessity of reaching at the lowest Levelized Cost of Energy (LCOE) targets. With this increasing competition and significant fall in feed-in tariffs of solar PV projects, developers are under constant pressure to secure investment for their projects and eventually earn profits from them. Moreover, being the second largest populated country, India suffers from scarcity of land because of higher average population density. So, to mitigate the risk of this dual edged sword with reducing trend of unit (kWh) cost at one side and utilization of land on the other, tracking evolved as the call of the hour. Therefore, the prime objectives of this paper are not only to showcase how STT proves to be an effective mechanism to get more gain in Global Incidence in collector plane (G_inc) with respect to traditional mounting systems but also to introduce Seasonally Tilted Tracker (STT) technology as a possible option for high latitude locations.

Keywords: tracking system, grid connected solar PV plant, CAPEX reduction, levelized cost of energy

Procedia PDF Downloads 239