Search results for: life cycle based analysis

Authors: Cassandra Pratt Romero, Andres Gomez de Silva Garza

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This paper describes a computational system designed to imitate human inspiration during musical composition. The system is called MIS (Musical Inspiration Simulator). The MIS system is inspired by media to which human beings are exposed daily (visual, textual, or auditory) to create new musical compositions based on the emotions detected in said media. After building the system we carried out a series of evaluations with volunteer users who used MIS to compose music based on images, texts, and audio files. The volunteers were asked to judge the harmoniousness and innovation in the system's compositions. An analysis of the results points to the difficulty of computational analysis of the characteristics of the media to which we are exposed daily, as human emotions have a subjective character. This observation will direct future improvements in the system.

Keywords: human inspiration, musical composition, musical composition by computer, theory of sensation and human perception

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Authors: Uvais Qidwai, Amor Moursi, Mohamed Tahar, Malek Hamad, Hamad Alansi

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This paper focuses on the development and implementation of an advanced plant health monitoring system with an AI backbone and IoT sensory network. Our approach involves addressing the critical environmental factors essential for preserving a plant’s well-being, including air temperature, soil moisture, soil temperature, soil conductivity, pH, water levels, and humidity, as well as the presence of essential nutrients like nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium. Central to our methodology is the utilization of computer vision technology, particularly a night vision camera. The captured data is then compared against a reference database containing different health statuses. This comparative analysis is implemented using an AI deep learning model, which enables us to generate accurate assessments of plant health status. By combining the AI-based decision-making approach, our system aims to provide precise and timely insights into the overall health and well-being of plants, offering a valuable tool for effective plant care and management.

Keywords: deep learning image model, IoT sensing, cloud-based analysis, remote monitoring app, computer vision, fuzzy control

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Authors: Vaishali Chaurasia

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Ageing is the universal phenomenon that is associated with deteriorating health status. As the human becomes old, certain changes take place in an organism leading to morbidities, disabilities, and event death. Furthermore, older people are more vulnerable for the various kinds of diseases and health problem. Due to the some unhealthy conventions like smoking, drinking and unhealthy foods is the genesis of the lifestyle diseases. These diseases associated with the way a person or group of people lives. The main purpose of the study is to determine the prevalence of lifestyle diseases and its association with physical activity as well as the risk factors associated with it among the adult population in India. Longitudinal Aging Study in India and Study on Global Aging and Adult Health in India were used in the study. We will take population aged 50 and older, began in 1935, and regularly refreshed at younger ages with new birth cohorts. Life style diseases are more prominent in 65+ age group. The study finds an association between prevalence of life style diseases and life style risk factors. The lifestyle disease prevalence is more among higher age group people, female, richest quintile, and doing lesser physical activity. A higher prevalence of lifestyle diseases associated with the multiple risk factors. The occurrence of three and four risk factors was more prevalent in India. The frequency of different type of life style disease is higher among those who hardly or never do any physical activity as compare to those who do physical activity every day. The pattern remains the same in Moderate as well as vigorous physical activity. Those who are regularly doing physical activities have lesser percentage of having any disease and those who hardly ever or never do any physical activities and equally involve with some risk factors have higher percentage of having all type of diseases.

Keywords: lifestyle disease, morbidity, disability, physical activity

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Authors: Raana Babadi Fathipour

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Tea, a beverage widely cherished across the globe, has captured the interest of scholars with its recent acknowledgement for possessing noteworthy health advantages. Of particular significance is its proven ability to ward off ailments such as cancer and cardiovascular afflictions. Moreover, within the realm of culinary creations, lipid oxidation poses a significant challenge for food product development. In light of these aforementioned concerns, this present discourse turns its attention towards exploring diverse methodologies employed in extracting polyphenols from various types of tea leaves and examining their utility within the vast landscape of the ever-evolving food industry. Based on the discoveries unearthed in this comprehensive investigation, it has been determined that the fundamental constituents of tea are polyphenols possessed of intrinsic health-enhancing properties. This includes an assortment of catechins, namely epicatechin, epigallocatechin, epicatechin gallate, and epigallocatechin gallate. Moreover, gallic acid, flavonoids, flavonols and theaphlavins have also been detected within this aromatic beverage. Of these myriad components examined vigorously in this study's analysis, catechin emerges as particularly beneficial. Multiple techniques have emerged over time to successfully extract key compounds from tea plants, including solvent-based extraction methodologies, microwave-assisted water extraction approaches and ultrasound-assisted extraction techniques. In particular, consideration is given to microwave-assisted water extraction method as a viable scheme which effectively procures valuable polyphenols from tea extracts. This methodology appears adaptable for implementation within sectors such as dairy production along with meat and oil industries alike.

Keywords: camellia sinensis, extraction, food application, shelf life, tea

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Authors: Liming Chen, Baoxin Xu, Zhaoyun Ding, Bin Liu, Xianqiang Zhu

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In the era of big data, public investors are faced with more complicated information related to investment decisions than ever before. To survive in the fierce competition, it has become increasingly urgent for investors to combine multi-source knowledge and evaluate the companies’ true value efficiently. For this, a rule-based ontology reasoning method is proposed to support steel companies’ value assessment. Considering the delay in financial disclosure and based on cost-benefit analysis, this paper introduces the supply chain enterprises financial analysis and constructs the ontology model used to value the value of steel company. In addition, domain knowledge is formally expressed with the help of Web Ontology Language (OWL) language and SWRL (Semantic Web Rule Language) rules. Finally, a case study on a steel company in China proved the effectiveness of the method we proposed.

Keywords: financial ontology, steel company, supply chain, ontology reasoning

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Authors: Alida Sandison, Louise A. Stroud

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Narcissism is a personality configuration which has both normal and pathological personality expressions. Narcissism is highly complex, and is linked to a broad field of research. There are both dimensional and categorical conceptualisations of narcissism, and a variety of theoretical formulations that have been put forward to understand the narcissistic personality configuration. Currently, Kernberg’s Object Relations theory is well supported for this purpose. The complexity and particular defense mechanisms at play in the narcissistic personality make it a difficult personality configuration worth further research. Psychobiography as a methodology allows for the exploration of the lived life, and is thus a useful methodology to surmount these inherent challenges. Narcissism has been a focus of academic interest for a long time, and although there is a lot of research done in this area, to the researchers' knowledge, narcissistic dynamics have never been explored within a psychobiographical format. Thus, the primary aim of the research was to explore and describe narcissism in the life of Howard Hughes, with the objective of gaining further insight into narcissism through the use of this unconventional research approach. Hughes was chosen as subject for the study as he is renowned as an eccentric billionaire who had his revolutionary effect on the world, but was concurrently disturbed within his personal pathologies. Hughes was dynamic in three different sectors, namely motion pictures, aviation and gambling. He became more and more reclusive as he entered into middle age. From his early fifties he was agoraphobic, and the social network of connectivity that could reasonably be expected from someone in the top of their field was notably distorted. Due to his strong narcissistic personality configuration, and the interpersonal difficulties he experienced, Hughes represents an ideal figure to explore narcissism. The study used a single case study design, and purposive sampling to select Hughes. Qualitative data was sampled, using secondary data sources. Given that Hughes was a famous figure, there is a plethora of information on his life, which is primarily autobiographical. This includes books written about his life, and archival material in the form of newspaper articles, interviews and movies. Gathered data were triangulated to avoid the effect of author bias, and increase the credibility of the data used. It was collected using Yin’s guidelines for data collection. Data was analysed using Miles and Huberman strategy of data analysis, which consists of three steps, namely, data reduction, data display, and conclusion drawing and verification. Patterns which emerged in the data highlighted the defense mechanisms used by Hughes, in particular that of splitting and projection, in defending his sense of self. These defense mechanisms help us to understand the high levels of entitlement and paranoia experienced by Hughes. Findings provide further insight into his sense of isolation and difference, and the consequent difficulty he experienced in maintaining connections with others. Findings furthermore confirm the effectiveness of Kernberg’s theory in understanding narcissism observing an individual life.

Keywords: Howard Hughes, narcissism, narcissistic defenses, object relations

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Authors: Archil Motsonelidze, Vitaly Dvalishvili

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Existing roller compacted concrete (RCC) dams indicate that the layer-by-layer construction method gives considerable economies as compared with the conventional methods. RCC dams have also gained acceptance in the regions of high seismic activity. Earthquake resistance analysis of RCC gravity dams based on nonlinear finite element technique is presented. An elastic-plastic approach is used to describe the material of a dam while it is under static conditions (period of construction). Seismic force, as an acceleration equivalent to that produced by a real earthquake, is supposed to act when the dam is completed. The materials of the dam and foundation may be nonhomogeneous and anisotropic. The “dam-foundation” system is idealized as a plain strain problem.

Keywords: finite element method, layer-by-layer construction, RCC dams, strength analysis

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Authors: Md. Maksudur Rahman Khan, Chee Wai Woon, Huei Ruey Ong, Vignes Rasiah, Chin Kui Cheng, Kar Min Chan, E. Baranitharan

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The present work represents a preparation of non-precious iron-based electrocatalyst (FeN) for ORR in air-cathode microbial fuel cell by pyrolysis treatment. Iron oxalate which recovered from the industrial wastewater and Phenanthroline (Phen) were used as the iron and nitrogen precursors, respectively in preparing FeN catalyst. The performance of as prepared catalyst (FeN) was investigated in a single chambered air cathode MFC in which anaerobic sludge was used as inoculum and palm oil mill effluent as substrate. The maximum open circuit potential (OCV) and the highest power density recorded were 0.543 V and 4.9 mW/m2, respectively. Physical characterization of FeN was elucidated by using Brunauner Emmett Teller (BET), X-Ray Diffraction (XRD) analysis and Field Emission Scanning Electron Microscopy (FESEM) while the electrochemical properties were characterized by cyclic voltammetry (CV) analysis. The presence of biofilm on anode surface was examined using FESEM and confirmed using Infrared Spectroscopy and Thermogravimetric Analysis. The findings of this study demonstrated that FeN is electrochemically active and further modification is needed to increase the ORR catalytic activity.

Keywords: iron based catalyst, microbial fuel cells, oxygen reduction reaction, palm oil mill effluent

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Authors: Zahra Soltani Shal

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Introduction: The COVID-19 pandemic marks an extraordinary global public health crisis unseen in the last century, with its rapid spread worldwide and associated mortality burden. Healthcare resilience during a pandemic is crucial not only for continuous and safe patients care but also for control of any outbreak. Aim: The present study was conducted to discover the organizational variables effective in increasing resilience and continuing the work of nurses in critical and stressful pandemic conditions. Method: The study population is nurses working in hospitals for patients with coronavirus. Sampling was done purposefully and information was collected from 15 nurses through In-depth semi-structured interviews. The interview was conducted to analyze the data using the framework analysis method consisting of five steps and is classified in the table. Results: According to the findings through semi-structural interviews, among organizational variables, organizational commitment (Affective commitment, continuous commitment, normative commitment) has played a prominent role in nurses' resilience. Discussion: despite the non-withdrawal of nurses and their resilience, due to the negative quality of their working life, the mentioned variable has affected their level of performance and ability and leads to fatigue and physical and mental exhaustion. Implications for practice: By equipping hospitals and improving the facilities of nurses, their organizational commitment can be increased and lead to their resilience in critical situations. Supervisors and senior officials at the hospitals should be responsible for nurses' health and safety. A clear and codified program in critical situations and comprehensive management is effective in improving the quality of the work-life of nurses. Creating an empathetic and interactive environment can help promote nurses' mental health.

Keywords: organizational commitment, quality of work life, nurses resilience, pandemic, coronavirus

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Authors: Daniel Suarez Alonso

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This study has tried to focus on the alternatives offered to police institutions by the implementation of Geographic Information systems. Providing operational police commanders with effective and efficient tools, providing analytical capacity to reduce criminal opportunities, must be a priority. Given the intimate connection of crimes and infractions to the environment, law enforcement institutions must respond proactively to changing circumstances of anti-norm behaviors. To this end, it has been intended to analyze the antisocial spatial distribution of the city of Móstoles, trying to identify those spatiotemporal patterns that occur to anticipate their commission through the planning of dynamic preventive strategies. The application of GIS offers alternative analytical approaches to the different problems that underlie the development of life in society, focusing resources on those places with the highest concentration of incidents.

Keywords: data analysis, police organizations, police prevention, geographic information systems

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Authors: A. C. Obosi, H. O. Osinowo, L. I. Okeke

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Benign prostatic hyperplasia (BPH) is one among other prostate diseases with an increasing public health concern. The prevalence and increased psychological distress of BPH among men negatively impact on their health-related quality of life (HRQoL). Although several biomedical factors have been implicated in poor HRQoL among people with BPH, there is a dearth of research on the psychosocial factors predicting HRQoL among them especially in developing climes. This study, therefore, examined the psychosocial (knowledge, perceived stigma, depression, anxiety, perceived social support and illness acceptance) predictors of health-related quality of life among persons living with BPH in Ibadan, Nigeria. Biopsychosocial model and Health-related Quality of life guided this study which utilized ex-post facto design. Eighty-seven males living with BPH were purposively selected and actively participated in the study. Participants’ mean age was 61.77 ± 15.80 years. A standardized questionnaire comprising Socio-demographics and measures of health-related quality of life (α = 0.47); knowledge (α = 0.72); psychological distress (α = 0.95); perceived social support (α = 0.96) and Illness acceptance (α = 0.89) scales was utilized in the study. Data were content analysed, while bivariate correlation, hierarchical multiple regression and t-test for independent samples were computed at p < 0.05. Results revealed that 42.5% of the respondents reported poor HRQoL. Furthermore, age, length of illness, perceived stigma, depression, anxiety, knowledge, perceived social support and illness acceptance jointly predicted HRQoL significantly (R2=0.33, F(9,75)=4.05) and accounted for 33% variance in the total observed variance on HRQoL, while Illness acceptance (β=0.43), anxiety (β=-0.54), and perceived social support (β=0.16) had significant independent contributions to the observed variance on HRQoL. Illness acceptance, knowledge, perceived social support and psychological distress such as anxiety, depression and perceived stigma are important predictors of HRQoL. Therefore, it was recommended that urgent psychological intervention targeted at improving the quality of life of these persons be undertaken.

Keywords: benign prostatic hyperplasia, Health-related quality of life, prostate disorders, psychosocial factors

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Authors: Kyu Jin Kim, Byung Kwan Oh, Hyo Seon Park

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The seismic responses-based structural health monitoring system has been performed to prevent seismic damage. Structural seismic damage of building is caused by the instantaneous stress concentration which is related with dynamic characteristic of earthquake. Meanwhile, seismic response analysis to estimate the dynamic responses of building demands significantly high computational cost. To prevent the failure of structural members from the characteristic of the earthquake and the significantly high computational cost for seismic response analysis, this paper presents an artificial neural network (ANN) based prediction model for dynamic responses of building considering specific time length. Through the measured dynamic responses, input and output node of the ANN are formed by the length of specific time, and adopted for the training. In the model, evolutionary radial basis function neural network (ERBFNN), that radial basis function network (RBFN) is integrated with evolutionary optimization algorithm to find variables in RBF, is implemented. The effectiveness of the proposed model is verified through an analytical study applying responses from dynamic analysis for multi-degree of freedom system to training data in ERBFNN.

Keywords: structural health monitoring, dynamic response, artificial neural network, radial basis function network, genetic algorithm

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Authors: Sifeddine Abderrahmani, Sonia Bouafia

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The finite element method is the most practical tool for the analysis of structures, whatever the geometrical shape and behavior. It is extensively used in many high-tech industries, such as civil or military engineering, for the modeling of bridges, motor bodies, fuselages, and airplane wings. Additionally, experience demonstrates that engineers like modeling their structures using the most basic finite elements. Numerous models of finite elements may be utilized in the numerical analysis depending on the interpolation field that is selected, and it is generally known that convergence to the proper value will occur considerably more quickly with a good displacement pattern than with a poor pattern, saving computation time. The method for creating finite elements using the strain approach (S.B.A.) is presented in this presentation. When the results are compared with those provided by equivalent displacement-based elements, having the same total number of degrees of freedom, an excellent convergence can be obtained through some application and validation tests using recently developed membrane elements, plate bending elements, and flat shell elements. The effectiveness and performance of the strain-based finite elements in modeling structures are proven by the findings for deflections and stresses.

Keywords: finite elements, plate bending, strain approach, displacement formulation, shell element

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Authors: Sharmistha Chanda, Anindita Chaudhuri

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This exploratory study highlights the psychological aspects of women's empowerment to find the importance of the psychological dimension of empowerment, such as; meaning, competence, self-determination, impact, and assumption, especially in the weaker marginalized section of women. A large proportion of rural, suburban, and urban poor survive by working in unorganized sectors of metropolitan cities. Relative Poverty and lack of employment in rural areas and small towns drive many people to the metropolitan city for work and livelihood. Women working in that field remain unrecognized as people of low socio-economic status. They are usually willing to do domestic work as daily wage workers, single wage earners, street vendors, family businesses like agricultural activities, domestic workers, and self-employed. Usually, these women accept such jobs because they do not have such an opportunity as they lack the basic level of education that is required for better-paid jobs. The unorganized sector, on the other hand, has no such clear-cut employer-employee relationships and lacks most forms of social protection. Having no fixed employer, these workers are casual, contractual, migrant, home-based, own-account workers who attempt to earn a living from whatever meager assets and skills they possess. Women have become more empowered both financially and individually through small-scale business ownership or entrepreneurship development and in household-based work. In-depth interviews have been done with 10 participants in order to understand their living styles, habits, self-identity, and empowerment in their society in order to evaluate the key challenges that they may face following by qualitative research approach. Transcription has been done from the collected data. The three-layer coding technique guides the data analysis process, encompassing – open coding, axial coding, and selective coding. Women’s Entrepreneurship is one of the foremost concerns as the Government, and non-government institutions are readily serving this domain with the primary objectives of promoting self-employment opportunities in general and empowering women in specific. Thus, despite hardship and unrecognition unorganized sector provides a huge array of opportunities for rural and sub-urban poor to earn. Also, the upper section of society tends to depend on this working force. This study gave an idea about the well-being, and meaning in life, life satisfaction on the basis of their lived experience.

Keywords: marginalized women, psychological empowerment, relative poverty, and unorganized sector.

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Authors: Silindile Gumede, Amir Hossein Mohammadi, Mbuyu Germain Ntunka

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Goal 12 of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) encourages sustainable consumption and production patterns. This necessitates achieving the environmentally safe management of chemicals and all wastes throughout their life cycle and the proper disposal of pollutants and toxic waste. Fluid catalytic cracking (FCC) catalysts are widely used in the refinery to convert heavy feedstocks to lighter ones. During the refining processes, the catalysts are deactivated and discarded as hazardous toxic solid waste. Spent catalysts (SC) contain high-cost metal, and the recovery of metals from SCs is a tactical plan for supplying part of the demand for these substances and minimizing the environmental impacts. Leaching followed by solvent extraction, has been found to be the most efficient method to recover valuable metals with high purity from spent catalysts. However, the use of inorganic acids during the leaching process causes a secondary environmental issue. Therefore, it is necessary to explore other alternative efficient leaching agents that are economical and environmentally friendly. In this study, the waste catalyst was collected from a domestic refinery and was characterised using XRD, ICP, XRF, and SEM. Response surface methodology (RSM) and Box Behnken design were used to model and optimize the influence of some parameters affecting the acidic leaching process. The parameters selected in this investigation were the acid concentration, temperature, and leaching time. From the characterisation results, it was found that the spent catalyst consists of high concentrations of Vanadium (V) and Nickel (Ni); hence this study focuses on the leaching of Ni and V using a biodegradable acid to eliminate the formation of the secondary pollution.

Keywords: eco-friendly leaching, optimization, metal recovery, leaching

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Authors: Ewa M. Laskowska, Jorn Vatn

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Industry 4.0 focuses on digital optimization of industrial processes. The idea is to use extracted data in order to build a decision support model enabling use of those data for real time decision making. In terms of predictive maintenance, the desired decision support tool would be a model enabling prognostics of system's health based on the current condition of considered equipment. Within area of system prognostics and health management, a commonly used health indicator is Remaining Useful Lifetime (RUL) of a system. Because the RUL is a random variable, it has to be estimated based on available health indicators. Health indicators can be of different types and come from different sources. They can be process variables, equipment performance variables, data related to number of experienced failures, etc. The aim of this study is the analysis of performance variables of emergency shutdown valves (ESV) used in oil and gas industry. ESV is inspected periodically, and at each inspection torque and time of valve operation are registered. The data will be analyzed by means of machine learning or statistical analysis. The purpose is to investigate whether the available data could be used as a health indicator for a prognostic purpose. The second objective is to examine what is the most efficient way to incorporate the data into predictive model. The idea is to check whether the data can be applied in form of explanatory variables in Markov process or whether other stochastic processes would be a more convenient to build an RUL model based on the information coming from registered data.

Keywords: emergency shutdown valves, health indicator, prognostics, remaining useful lifetime, RUL

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Authors: Katya E. Manalastas

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This thesis is a dialogue with Freud about vulnerability and any forms of transience we encounter in life. This study argues that Freud’s Ethics of Finitude, which is framed within the psychoanalytic context, is a critical theory about how human beings fail to become what they are because of their attachment to their illusions—to their visions of perfection and immortality. Freud’s Ethics of Finitude positions itself between our detachment to ideals and recognition of our own death through our loved one. His texts portray the predicament of the finite individual who suffers from feelings of guilt and anxiety because of his failure to live up to the demands of his idealistic civilized society. The civilized society has overestimated men’s susceptibility to culture. It imposes excessive sublimation, conformity to rigid moral ideals, and instinctive repression to manage human aggression. However, by doing this, civilization becomes a main source of men’s suffering. The lack of instinctive freedom will result in a community of tamed but unhappy people. Civilization has also constructed theories and measures to rule out death and pain from the realities of life. Therefore, a man lives his life repressing his instincts and ignorant of his own mortality. For Freud, war and neurosis are just few of the consequences of a civilization that imprisons the individual from cultural hypocrisy instead of giving more play to truthfulness. The occurrence of Great War destroyed our pride in the attainments of civilization and let loose the hostile impulses within us which we thought had been totally eradicated by means of instinctive repression and sublimation. War destroyed most of the things that we had loved and showed us the impermanence of all the things that we had deemed perfect and everlasting. This chaotic event also revealed the damaging impact of our attachment to past values that no longer bind us; our futile attempts to escape suffering; and our refusal to confront the painfulness of loss and mourning. With this given backdrop, this study launches Freud’s Ethics of Finitude—which culminates not in the submission of an individual to the unquestioned authority nor in the blind optimism and love for illusory happiness but in the pedagogy of mourning which brings forth the authentic education of man towards the truth about himself. His Ethics of Finitude is a form of labor in and through which the individual steps out of the realm of illusions and ideals that hinder him to confront his imperfections and accept the difficulties of existence. Through his analysis of the Great War, Freud seeks to awaken in us our ability to evaluate the way we see ourselves and to live our lives with death in mind. His Ethics of Finitude leads us to the fulfillment of our first duty as a living being, which is to endure life. We can only endure life if we are prepared to die and let go.

Keywords: critical theory, ethics of finitude, psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud

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Authors: Shao Qi

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The article uses the CiteSpace knowledge graph analysis tool to sort and visualize the journal literature on urban plants and habitats in the Web of Science and China National Knowledge Infrastructure databases. Based on a comprehensive interpretation of the visualization results of various data sources and the description of the intrinsic relationship between high-frequency keywords using knowledge mapping, the research hotspots, processes and evolution trends in this field are analyzed. Relevant case studies are also conducted for the hotspot contents to explore the means of landscape intervention and synthesize the understanding of research theories. The results show that (1) from 1999 to 2022, the research direction of urban plants and habitats gradually changed from focusing on plant and animal extinction and biological invasion to the field of human urban habitat creation, ecological restoration, and ecosystem services. (2) The results of keyword emergence and keyword growth trend analysis show that habitat creation research has shown a rapid and stable growth trend since 2017, and ecological restoration has gained long-term sustained attention since 2004. The hotspots of future research on urban plants and habitats in China may focus on habitat creation and ecological restoration.

Keywords: research trends, visual analysis, habitat creation, ecological restoration

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Authors: Olesya Bolkhovskaya, Alexey Davydov, Alexander Maltsev

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In this paper two approaches to joint signal detection, time of arrival (ToA) and angle of arrival (AoA) estimation in multi-element antenna array are investigated. Two scenarios were considered: first one, when the waveform of the useful signal is known a priori and, second one, when the waveform of the desired signal is unknown. For first scenario, the antenna array signal processing based on multi-element matched filtering (MF) with the following non-coherent detection scheme and maximum likelihood (ML) parameter estimation blocks is exploited. For second scenario, the signal processing based on the antenna array elements covariance matrix estimation with the following eigenvector analysis and ML parameter estimation blocks is applied. The performance characteristics of both signal processing schemes are thoroughly investigated and compared for different useful signals and noise parameters.

Keywords: antenna array, signal detection, ToA, AoA estimation

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Authors: Shiau-Fang Chao, Yu-Chih Chen

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Owing to physical limitations and restrained lifestyle, older long-term care (LTC) residents are more likely to be affected by their environment than their community-dwelling counterparts. They also participate fewer activities and experience worse mental health than healthy older adults. This study adopts the ICF model to determine the extent to which the clustered patterns of LTC environment and activity participation are associated with older residents’ mental health. Method: Data were collected from a stratified equal probability sample of 634 older residents in 155 LTC institutions in Taiwan. Latent profile analysis (LPA) and latent class analysis (LCA) were conducted to explore the profiles for environment and activity participation. Multilevel modeling was performed to elucidate the relationships among environment profiles, activity profiles, and mental health. Results: LPA identified three mutually exclusive environment profiles (Low-, Moderate-, and High-Support Environment) based on the physical, social, and attitudinal environmental domains, consolidated from 12 environmental measures. LCA constructed two distinct activity profiles (Low- and High-Activity Participation) across seven activity domains (outdoor, volunteer-led leisure, spiritual, household chores, interpersonal exchange, social, and sedentary activity) that were factored from 20 activities. Compared to the Low-Support Environment class, older adults in the Moderate- and High-Support Environment classes had better mental health. Older residents in the Moderate- and High-Support Environment classes were more likely to be in the “High Activity” class, which in turn, exhibited better mental health. Conclusion: This study advances the current knowledge through rigorous methods and study design. The study findings lead to several conclusions. First, this study supports the use of ICF framework to institutionalized older individuals with functional limitations and demonstrates that both measures of environment and activity participation can be refined from multiple indicators. Second, environmental measures that encompass the physical, social, and attitudinal domains would provide a more comprehensive assessment on the place where an older individual embeds. Third, simply counting activities in which an older individual participates or considering a certain type of activity may not capture his or her way of life. Practitioners should not only focus on group or leisure activities within the institutions; rather, more efforts should be made to consider residents’ preferences for everyday life and support their remaining ability by encouraging continuous participation in activities they still willing and capable to perform. Fourth, environment and activity participation are modifiable factors which have greater potential to strengthen older LTC residents’ mental health, and activity participation should be considered in the link between environment and mental health. A combination of enhanced physical, social, and attitudinal environments, and continual engagement in various activities may optimize older LTC residents’ mental health.

Keywords: activity, environment, mental health, older LTC residents

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Authors: Sara Hasani

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This research focuses on natural sudden onset disasters characterised as ‘occurring with little or no warning and often cause excessive injuries far surpassing the national response capacities’. Based on the panel analysis of the historic record of 4,252 natural onset disasters between 1980 to 2015, a predictive method was developed to predict the human impact of the disaster (fatality, injured, homeless) with less than 3% of errors. The geographical dispersion of the disasters includes every country where the data were available and cross-examined from various humanitarian sources. The records were then filtered into 4252 records of the disasters where the five predictive variables (disaster type, HDI, DRI, population, and population density) were clearly stated. The procedure was designed based on a combination of pattern recognition techniques and rule-based clustering for prediction and discrimination analysis to validate the results further. The result indicates that there is a relationship between the disaster human impact and the five socio-economic characteristics of the affected country mentioned above. As a result, a framework was put forward, which could predict the disaster’s human impact based on their severity rank in the early hours of disaster strike. The predictions in this model were outlined in two worst and best-case scenarios, which respectively inform the lower range and higher range of the prediction. A necessity to develop the predictive framework can be highlighted by noticing that despite the existing research in literature, a framework for predicting the human impact and estimating the needs at the time of the disaster is yet to be developed. This can further be used to allocate the resources at the response phase of the disaster where the data is scarce.

Keywords: disaster management, natural disaster, pattern recognition, prediction

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Authors: Manoj Malviya, Shubham Shinde

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The present study focuses on the determination of torsional stiffness of a space frame chassis and comparison of elements used in the Finite Element Analysis of frame. The study also discusses various concepts and design aspects of a space frame chassis with the emphasis on their applicability in BAJA SAE vehicles. Torsional stiffness is a very important factor that determines the chassis strength, vehicle control, and handling. Therefore, it is very important to determine the torsional stiffness of the vehicle before designing an optimum chassis so that it should not fail during extreme conditions. This study determines the torsional stiffness of frame with respect to suspension shocks, roll-stiffness and anti-roll bar rates. A spring model is developed to study the effects of suspension parameters. The engine greatly contributes to torsional stiffness, and therefore, its effects on torsional stiffness need to be considered. Deflections in the tire have not been considered in the present study. The proper element shape should be selected to analyze the effects of various loadings on chassis while implementing finite element methods. The study compares the accuracy of results and computational time for different element types. Shape functions of these elements are also discussed. Modelling methodology is discussed for the multibody analysis of chassis integrated with suspension arms and engine. Proper boundary conditions are presented so as to replicate the real life conditions.

Keywords: space frame chassis, torsional stiffness, multi-body analysis of chassis, element selection

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Authors: Atje Setiawan Abdullah, Budi Nurani Ruchjana, I. Gede Nyoman Mindra Jaya, Eddy Hermawan

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Ethnoscience is used to see the culture with a scientific perspective, which may help to understand how people develop various forms of knowledge and belief, initially focusing on the ecology and history of the contributions that have been there. One of the areas studied in ethnoscience is etno-informatics, is the application of informatics in the culture. In this study the science of informatics used is data mining, a process to automatically extract knowledge from large databases, to obtain interesting patterns in order to obtain a knowledge. While the application of culture described by naming database village on the island of Java were obtained from Geographic Indonesia Information Agency (BIG), 2014. The purpose of this study is; first, to classify the naming of the village on the island of Java based on the structure of the word naming the village, including the prefix of the word, syllable contained, and complete word. Second to classify the meaning of naming the village based on specific categories, as well as its role in the community behavioral characteristics. Third, how to visualize the naming of the village to a map location, to see the similarity of naming villages in each province. In this research we have developed two theorems, i.e theorems area as a result of research studies have collected intersection naming villages in each province on the island of Java, and the composition of the wedge theorem sets the provinces in Java is used to view the peculiarities of a location study. The methodology in this study base on the method of Knowledge Discovery in Database (KDD) on data mining, the process includes preprocessing, data mining and post processing. The results showed that the Java community prioritizes merit in running his life, always working hard to achieve a more prosperous life, and love as well as water and environmental sustainment. Naming villages in each location adjacent province has a high degree of similarity, and influence each other. Cultural similarities in the province of Central Java, East Java and West Java-Banten have a high similarity, whereas in Jakarta-Yogyakarta has a low similarity. This research resulted in the cultural character of communities within the meaning of the naming of the village on the island of Java, this character is expected to serve as a guide in the behavior of people's daily life on the island of Java.

Keywords: ethnoscience, ethno-informatics, data mining, clustering, Java island culture

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Authors: C. S. Wong, K. H. Badri, N. Ataollahi, K. P. Law, M. S. Su’ait, N. I. Hassan

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Novel bio-based polymer electrolyte was synthesized with LiClO4 as the main source of charge carrier. Initially, polyurethane-LiClO4 polymer electrolytes were synthesized via polymerization method with different NCO/OH ratios and labelled as PU1, PU2, PU3, and PU4. Subsequently, the chemical, thermal properties and ionic conductivity of the films produced were determined. Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) analysis indicates the co-ordination between Li+ ion and polyurethane in PU1 due to the greatest amount of hard segment of polyurethane in PU1 as proven by soxhlet analysis. The structures of polyurethanes were confirmed by 13 nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy (13C NMR) and FTIR spectroscopy. Differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) analysis indicates PU 1 has the highest glass transition temperature (Tg) corresponds to the most abundant urethane group which is the hard segment in PU1. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) of the PU-LiClO4 shows the good miscibility between lithium salt and the polymer. The study found that PU1 possessed the greatest ionic conductivity (1.19 × 10-7 S.cm-1 at 298 K and 5.01 × 10-5 S.cm-1 at 373 K) and the lowest activation energy, Ea (0.32 eV) due to the greatest amount of hard segment formed in PU 1 induces the coordination between lithium ion and oxygen atom of carbonyl group in polyurethane. All the polyurethanes exhibited linear Arrhenius variations indicating ion transport via simple lithium ion hopping in polyurethane. This research proves the NCO content in polyurethane plays an important role in affecting the ionic conductivity of this polymer electrolyte.

Keywords: ionic conductivity, palm kernel oil-based monoester-OH, polyurethane, solid polymer electrolyte

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Authors: Pei-Jun Xue, Ming-Yu Hsiao

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Language is the emblem of a culture, representing the extension of cultural life. In addition, it is also an important tool for communication and message transmission. It carries not only information but also covers the self-conscious of the information constructor as well as the situational experiences of users from different backgrounds. Moreover, design can be regarded as a language, a dynamic process of coding and decoding. With the designers’ experiences in everyday life, they bring them into the products’ experiences. Considered from the aspects of atmosphere and the five senses, a designer should consider and reconsider how to communicate the messages effectively to suit the users’ needs. In the process of language learning, we should understand the construction behind it and the rules of the compositions of language codes. Regarding the understanding of the design of works or the form of product construction, it is necessary for us to understand the coding system during the process of product construction. The form (signifiers) and meanings (signified) of Chinese characters are closely related. At the same time, it is also a process of simplifying the complicated to the simple. This study discusses the chinese characters that used in the cultural symbols construction, and analysis of existing products by Peirce's semiotic triangles. Through people's cognition of Chinese characters and constitute method, help to understand the way of construction product symbol.

Keywords: cultural-creative product design, cultural product, cultural symbols, linguistic symbols

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Authors: Ibrahim Abubakar Mikugi

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Nigerian graduates could only be self-employed and marketable if they acquire relevant skills and knowledge for successful establishment in various occupation and gainful employment. Research has shown that entrepreneurship education will be successful through developing individual entrepreneurial attitudes, raising awareness of career options by integrating and inculcating a positive attitude in the mind of students through skill acquisition. This paper examined the student- led entrepreneurship education through skill acquisition with specific emphasis on analysis of David Kolb experiential learning cycle. This Model allows individual to review their experience through reflection and converting ideas into action by doing. The methodology used was theoretical approach through journal, internet and Textbooks. Challenges to entrepreneurship education through skill acquisition were outlined. The paper concludes that entrepreneurship education is recognised by both policy makers and academics; entrepreneurship is more than mere encouraging business start-ups. Recommendations were given which include the need for authorities to have a clear vision towards entrepreneurship education and skill acquisition. Authorities should also emphasise a periodic and appropriate evaluation of entrepreneurship and to also integrate into schools academic curriculum to encourage practical learning by doing.

Keywords: entrepreneurship, entrepreneurship education, active learning, Cefe methodology

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Authors: Elzbieta Sikorska-Simmons

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Advanced dementia is a progressive terminal brain disease that is accompanied by a syndrome of difficult to manage symptoms and complications that eventually lead to death. The management of advanced dementia poses major challenges to family caregivers who act as patient health care proxies in making medical treatment decisions. Little is known, however, about how they manage advanced dementia and how their treatment choices influence the quality of patient life. This prospective qualitative study examines the key medical treatment decisions that family caregivers make while managing advanced dementia. The term ‘family caregiver’ refers to a relative or a friend who is primarily responsible for managing patient’s medical care needs and legally authorized to give informed consent for medical treatments. Medical decision-making implies a process of choosing between treatment options in response to patient’s medical care needs (e.g., worsening comorbid conditions, pain, infections, acute medical events). Family caregivers engage in this process when they actively seek treatments or follow recommendations by healthcare professionals. Better understanding of medical decision-making from the family caregiver perspective is needed to design interventions that maximize the quality of patient life and limit inappropriate treatments. Data were collected in three waves of semi-structured interviews with 20 family caregivers for patients with advanced dementia. A purposive sample of 20 family caregivers was recruited from a senior care center in Central Florida. The qualitative personal interviews were conducted by the author in 4-5 months intervals. The ethical approval for the study was obtained prior to the data collection. Advanced dementia was operationalized as stage five or higher on the Global Deterioration Scale (GDS) (i.e., starting with the GDS score of five, patients are no longer able survive without assistance due to major cognitive and functional impairments). Information about patients’ GDS scores was obtained from the Center’s Medical Director, who had an in-depth knowledge of each patient’s health and medical treatment history. All interviews were audiotaped and transcribed verbatim. The qualitative data analysis was conducted to answer the following research questions: 1) what treatment decisions do family caregivers make while managing the symptoms of advanced dementia and 2) how do these treatment decisions influence the quality of patient life? To validate the results, the author asked each participating family caregiver if the summarized findings accurately captured his/her experiences. The identified medical decisions ranged from seeking specialist medical care to end-of-life care. The most common decisions were related to arranging medical appointments, medication management, seeking treatments for pain and other symptoms, nursing home placement, and accessing community-based healthcare services. The most challenging and consequential decisions were related to the management of acute complications, hospitalizations, and discontinuation of treatments. Decisions that had the greatest impact on the quality of patient life and survival were triggered by traumatic falls, worsening psychiatric symptoms, and aspiration pneumonia. The study findings have important implications for geriatric nurses in the context of patient/caregiver-centered dementia care. Innovative nursing approaches are needed to support family caregivers to effectively manage medical care needs of patients with advanced dementia.

Keywords: advanced dementia, family caregiver, medical decision-making, symptom management

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Authors: Surinder Pal Singh, Sanjay Goel

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The paper presents results of an investigation conducted to study the flexural fatigue characteristics of Self Compacting Concrete (SCC) and Self Compacting Fibre Reinforced Concrete (SCFRC). In total 360 flexural fatigue tests and 270 static flexural strength tests were conducted on SCC and SCFRC specimens to obtain the fatigue test data. The variability in the distribution of fatigue life of SCC and SCFRC have been analyzed and compared with that of NVC and NVFRC containing steel fibres of comparable size and shape. The experimental coefficients of fatigue equations have been estimated to represent relationship between stress level (S) and fatigue life (N) for SCC and SCFRC containing different fibre volume fractions. The probability of failure (Pf) has been incorporated in S-N relationships to obtain families of S-N-Pf relationships. A good agreement between the predicted curves and those obtained from the test data has been observed. The fatigue performance of SCC and SCFRC has been evaluated in terms of two-million cycles fatigue strength/endurance limit. The theoretic fatigue lives were also estimated using single-log fatigue equation for 10% probability of failure to estimate the enhanced extent of theoretic fatigue lives of SCFRC with reference to SCC and NVC. The reduction in variability in the fatigue life, increased endurance limit and increased theoretiac fatigue lives demonstrates an overall better fatigue performance for SCC and SCFRC.

Keywords: fatigue life, fibre, probability of failure, self-compacting concrete

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Authors: Patrick O. Bobbie, Prince S. Attrams

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In recent times, the rapid change in new technologies has spurred up the way and manner records are handled in educational institutions. Also, there is a need for reliable access and ease-of use to these records, resulting in increased productivity in organizations. In academic institutions, such benefits help in quality assessments, institutional performance, and assessments of teaching and evaluation methods. Students in educational institutions benefit the most when advanced technologies are deployed in accessing records. This research paper discusses the use of biometric technologies coupled with smartcard technologies to provide a unique way of identifying students and matching their data to financial records to grant them access to restricted areas such as examination halls. The system developed in this paper, has an identity verification component as part of its main functionalities. A systematic software development cycle of analysis, design, coding, testing and support was used. The system provides a secured way of verifying student’s identity and real time verification of financial records. An advanced prototype version of the system has been developed for testing purposes.

Keywords: biometrics, smartcards, identity-verification, fingerprints

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Authors: Chechen Liao, Pui-Lai To, Yi-Hui Wang

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Recently location-based augmented reality games (LBS+AR) have become increasingly popular as a major form of entertainment. Location-based augmented reality games have provided a lot of opportunities for face-to-face interaction among players. Prior studies also indicate that the social side of location-based augmented reality games are one of the major reasons for players to engage in the games. However, the impact of the usage of location-based augmented reality games has not been well explored. The study examines how interpersonal interaction affects social capital and health through playing location-based augmented reality games. The study also investigates how social capital mediates the relationships between interpersonal interaction and health. The study uses survey method to collect data. Six-hundred forty-seven questionnaires are collected. Structural equation modeling is used to investigate the relationships among variables. The causal relationships between variables in the research model are tested. The results of the study indicated that four interpersonal attraction attributes, including ability, proximity, similarity, and familiarity, are identified by ways of factor analysis. Interpersonal attraction is important for location-based augmented reality game-players to develop bonding and bridging social capital. Bonding and bridging social capital have a positive impact on the mental and social health of game-players. The results of the study provide academic and practical implications for future growth of location-based augmented reality games.

Keywords: health, interpersonal interaction, location-based augmented reality games, social capital

Procedia PDF Downloads 243