Search results for: Quality cost

Authors: Dimitrie Marinceu, Alan Murchison

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The Canadian Used Fuel Container (UFC) is a mid-size hemispherical headed copper coated steel container measuring 2.5 meters in length and 0.5 meters in diameter containing 48 used fuel bundles. The contained used fuel produces significant gamma radiation requiring automated assembly processes to complete the assembly. The design throughput of 2,500 UFCs per year places constraints on equipment and hot cell design for repeatability, speed of processing, robustness and recovery from upset conditions. After UFC assembly, the UFC is inserted into a Buffer Box (BB). The BB is made from adequately pre-shaped blocks (lower and upper block) and Highly Compacted Bentonite (HCB) material. The blocks are practically ‘sandwiching’ the UFC between them after assembly. This paper identifies one possible approach for the BB automatic assembly cell and processes. Automation of the BB assembly will have a significant positive impact on nuclear safety, quality, productivity, and reliability.

Keywords: Used fuel packing plant, automatic assembly cell, used fuel container, buffer box, deep geological repository.

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Authors: Salaheddin Odeh, Ibrahim O. Adwan

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This interdisciplinary study is an investigation to evaluate user-interfaces in business administration. The study is going to be implemented on two computerized business administration systems with two distinctive user-interfaces, so that differences between the two systems can be determined. Both systems, a commercial and a prototype developed for the purpose of this study, deal with ordering of supplies, tendering procedures, issuing purchase orders, controlling the movement of the stocks against their actual balances on the shelves and editing them on their tabulations. In the second suggested system, modern computer graphics and multimedia issues were taken into consideration to cover the drawbacks of the first system. To highlight differences between the two investigated systems regarding some chosen standard quality criteria, the study employs various statistical techniques and methods to evaluate the users- interaction with both systems. The study variables are divided into two divisions: independent representing the interfaces of the two systems, and dependent embracing efficiency, effectiveness, satisfaction, error rate etc.

Keywords: Evaluation and usability testing, software prototyping, statistical methods, user-interface design.

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Authors: M. Khakbazan, S. L. Scott, H. C. Block, C. D. Robins, W. P. McCaughey

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A ten-year grazing study was conducted at the Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada Brandon Research Centre in Manitoba to study the effect of alfalfa inclusion and fertilizer (N, P, K, and S) addition on economics and efficiency of non-renewable energy use in meadow brome grass-based pasture systems for beef production. Fertilizing grass-only or alfalfa-grass pastures to full soil test recommendations improved pasture productivity, but did not improve profitability compared to unfertilized pastures. Fertilizing grass-only pastures resulted in the highest net loss of any pasture management strategy in this study. Adding alfalfa at the time of seeding, with no added fertilizer, was economically the best pasture improvement strategy in this study. Because of moisture limitations, adding commercial fertilizer to full soil test recommendations is probably not economically justifiable in most years, especially with the rising cost of fertilizer. Improving grass-only pastures by adding fertilizer and/or alfalfa required additional non-renewable energy inputs; however, the additional energy required for unfertilized alfalfa-grass pastures was minimal compared to the fertilized pastures. Of the four pasture management strategies, adding alfalfa to grass pastures without adding fertilizer had the highest efficiency of energy use. Based on energy use and economic performance, the unfertilized alfalfa-grass pasture was the most efficient and sustainable pasture system.

Keywords: Alfalfa, grass, fertilizer, pasture systems, economics, energy.

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Authors: Apusraporn Prompunjai, Waranyou Sridach

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The composite materials were prepared by sawdust, cassava starch and natural rubber latex (NR). The mixtures of 15%w/v gelatinized cassava starch and 15%w/v PVOH were used as the binder of these composite materials. The concentrated rubber latex was added to the mixtures. They were mixed rigorously to the treated sawdust in the ratio of 70:30 until achive uniform dispersion. The batters were subjected to the hot compression moulding at the temperature of 160°C and 3,000 psi pressure for 5 min. The experimental results showed that the mechanical properties of composite materials, which contained the gelatinized cassava starch and PVOH in the ratio of 2:1, 20% NR latex by weight of the dry starch and treated sawdust with 5%NaOH or 1% BPO, were the best. It contributed the maximal compression strength (341.10 + 26.11 N), puncture resistance (8.79 + 0.98 N/mm2) and flexural strength (3.99 + 0.72N/mm2). It is also found that the physicochemical and mechanical properties of composites strongly depends on the interface quality of sawdust, cassava starch and NR latex.

Keywords: Composites, sawdust, cassava starch, natural rubber (NR) latex, surface chemical treatments.

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Authors: Nassib Abdallah, Pierre Chauvet, Abd El Salam Hajjar, Bassam Daya

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In this paper, we propose an optimized brain computer interface (BCI) system for unspoken speech recognition, based on the fact that the constructions of unspoken words rely strongly on the Wernicke area, situated in the temporal lobe. Our BCI system has four modules: (i) the EEG Acquisition module based on a non-invasive headset with 14 electrodes; (ii) the Preprocessing module to remove noise and artifacts, using the Common Average Reference method; (iii) the Features Extraction module, using Wavelet Packet Transform (WPT); (iv) the Classification module based on a one-hidden layer artificial neural network. The present study consists of comparing the recognition accuracy of 5 Arabic words, when using all the headset electrodes or only the 4 electrodes situated near the Wernicke area, as well as the selection effect of the subbands produced by the WPT module. After applying the articial neural network on the produced database, we obtain, on the test dataset, an accuracy of 83.4% with all the electrodes and all the subbands of 8 levels of the WPT decomposition. However, by using only the 4 electrodes near Wernicke Area and the 6 middle subbands of the WPT, we obtain a high reduction of the dataset size, equal to approximately 19% of the total dataset, with 67.5% of accuracy rate. This reduction appears particularly important to improve the design of a low cost and simple to use BCI, trained for several words.

Keywords: Brain-computer interface, speech recognition, electroencephalography EEG, Wernicke area, artificial neural network.

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Authors: Derya Ören Duran, Şeyma Akalin Benderli

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Cold press technique is a traditional method to obtain oil. The cold-pressing procedure involves neither heat nor chemical treatments; therefore, cold press technique has low oil yield. The cold pressed herbal material residue still contains some oil after cold press. In this study, the oil that is remained in the cold pressed aniseed was extracted with hexane; and it was analyzed to determine physicochemical properties and quality parameters. It was found that the aniseed after cold press process still contained 10% oil. The values of other analysis parameters were 2.1 mgKOH/g for free fatty acid (FFA) and 7.6 meq0₂/kg for peroxide. Cold pressed aniseed oil values were determined as 2.1 mgKOH/g for FFA and 4.5 meq0₂/kg for peroxide, respectively. In addition, fatty acid composition was analyzed, and it was found that both types of oil had same fatty acid compositions. The main fatty acids were oleic, linoleic and palmitic acids.

Keywords: Aniseed oil, cold press, extraction, residue.

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Authors: Nuha Omran Abokhdair, Azizah Bt Abdul Manaf

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Reversible watermarking is a special branch of image watermarking, that is able to recover the original image after extracting the watermark from the image. In this paper, an adaptive prediction-based reversible watermarking scheme is presented, in order to increase the payload capacity of MRI medical images. The scheme divides the image into two parts, Region of Interest (ROI) and Region of Non-Interest (RONI). Two bits are embedded in each embeddable pixel of RONI and one bit is embedded in each embeddable pixel of ROI. The experimental results demonstrate that the proposed scheme is able to achieve high embedding capacity. This is mainly caused by two reasons. First, the pixels that were excluded from data embedding due to overflow/underflow are used for data embedding. Second, large location map that need to be added to watermark data as overhead is eliminated and thus lower data embedding capacity is prevented. Moreover, the scheme provides good visual quality to the watermarked image.

Keywords: Medical image watermarking, reversible watermarking, Difference Expansion, Prediction-Error Expansion.

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Authors: Salah Algabli

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As online learning takes center stage, Arabic language instructors face the imperative to adapt their practices for the digital realm. This study investigates the experiences of online Arabic instructors to unveil the pedagogical opportunities and challenges this format presents. Utilizing a transcendental phenomenological approach with 15 diverse participants, the research shines a light on the unique realities of online language teaching at the university level, specifically in the United States. The study proposes theoretical and practical solutions to maximize the benefits of online language learning while mitigating its challenges. Recommendations cater to instructors, researchers, and program coordinators, paving the way for enhancing the quality of online Arabic language education. The findings highlight the need for pedagogical approaches tailored to the online environment, ultimately shaping a future where both instructors and learners thrive in this digital landscape.

Keywords: Online Arabic language learning, pedagogical opportunities and challenges, online Arabic teachers, online language instruction, digital pedagogy.

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Authors: Y. Parvizi, M. Gorji, M.H. Mahdian, M. Omid

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Soil organic carbon (SOC) plays a key role in soil fertility, hydrology, contaminants control and acts as a sink or source of terrestrial carbon content that can affect the concentration of atmospheric CO2. SOC supports the sustainability and quality of ecosystems, especially in semi-arid region. This study was conducted to determine relative importance of 13 different exploratory climatic, soil and geometric factors on the SOC contents in one of the semiarid watershed zones in Iran. Two methods canonical discriminate analysis (CDA) and feed-forward back propagation neural networks were used to predict SOC. Stepwise regression and sensitivity analysis were performed to identify relative importance of exploratory variables. Results from sensitivity analysis showed that 7-2-1 neural networks and 5 inputs in CDA models output have highest predictive ability that explains %70 and %65 of SOC variability. Since neural network models outperformed CDA model, it should be preferred for estimating SOC.

Keywords: Soil organic carbon, modeling, neural networks, CDA.

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Authors: Anselm L. Schüle, Thomas Rollmann, Reiner Anderl

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Within the collaborative research center 666 a new product development approach and the innovative manufacturing method of linear flow splitting are being developed. So far the design process is supported by 3D-CAD models utilizing User Defined Features in standard CAD-Systems. This paper now presents new functions for generating 3D-models of integral sheet metal products with bifurcations using Siemens PLM NX 6. The emphasis is placed on design and semi-automated insertion of User Defined Features. Therefore User Defined Features for both, linear flow splitting and its derivative linear bend splitting, were developed. In order to facilitate the modeling process, an application was developed that guides through the insertion process. Its usability and dialog layout adapt known standard features. The work presented here has significant implications on the quality, accurateness and efficiency of the product generation process of sheet metal products with higher order bifurcations.

Keywords: Linear Flow Splitting, CRC 666, User Defined Features.

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Authors: Neelam Bawane nee' Singhal, C. V. Srikrishna

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Many metrics were proposed to evaluate the characteristics of the analysis and design model of a given product which in turn help to assess the quality of the product. Function point metric is a measure of the 'functionality' delivery by the software. This paper presents an analysis of a set of programs of a project developed in Cµ through Function Points metric. Function points are measured for a Data Flow Diagram (DFD) of the case developed at initial stage. Lines of Codes (LOCs) and possible errors are calculated with the help of measured Function Points (FPs). The calculations are performed using suitable established functions. Calculated LOCs and errors are compared with actual LOCs and errors found at the time of analysis & design review, implementation and testing. It has been observed that actual found errors are more than calculated errors. On the basis of analysis and observations, authors conclude that function point provides useful insight and helps to analyze the drawbacks in the development process.

Keywords: Function Points, Data Flow Diagram, Lines ofCodes.

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Authors: Sima Ziaee, Khosro Jafarpur

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Among all mechanical joining processes, welding has been employed for its advantage in design flexibility, cost saving, reduced overall weight and enhanced structural performance. However, for structures made of relatively thin components, welding can introduce significant buckling distortion which causes loss of dimensional control, structural integrity and increased fabrication costs. Different parameters can affect buckling behavior of welded thin structures such as, heat input, welding sequence, dimension of structure. In this work, a 3-D thermo elastic-viscoplastic finite element analysis technique is applied to evaluate the effect of shell dimensions on buckling behavior and entropy generation of welded thin shells. Also, in the present work, the approximated longitudinal transient stresses which produced in each time step, is applied to the 3D-eigenvalue analysis to ratify predicted buckling time and corresponding eigenmode. Besides, the possibility of buckling prediction by entropy generation at each time is investigated and it is found that one can predict time of buckling with drawing entropy generation versus out of plane deformation. The results of finite element analysis show that the length, span and thickness of welded thin shells affect the number of local buckling, mode shape of global buckling and post-buckling behavior of welded thin shells.

Keywords: Buckling behavior, Elastic viscoplastic model, Entropy generation, Finite element method, Shell dimensions.

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Authors: Manvjeet Kaur, Mukhwinder Singh, Akshay Girdhar, Parvinder S. Sandhu

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Most fingerprint recognition techniques are based on minutiae matching and have been well studied. However, this technology still suffers from problems associated with the handling of poor quality impressions. One problem besetting fingerprint matching is distortion. Distortion changes both geometric position and orientation, and leads to difficulties in establishing a match among multiple impressions acquired from the same finger tip. Marking all the minutiae accurately as well as rejecting false minutiae is another issue still under research. Our work has combined many methods to build a minutia extractor and a minutia matcher. The combination of multiple methods comes from a wide investigation into research papers. Also some novel changes like segmentation using Morphological operations, improved thinning, false minutiae removal methods, minutia marking with special considering the triple branch counting, minutia unification by decomposing a branch into three terminations, and matching in the unified x-y coordinate system after a two-step transformation are used in the work.

Keywords: Biometrics, Minutiae, Crossing number, False Accept Rate (FAR), False Reject Rate (FRR).

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Authors: Tomasz Sapiński, Dorota Kamińska, Adam Pelikant, Egils Avots, Cagri Ozcinar, Gholamreza Anbarjafari

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People express emotions through different modalities. Integration of verbal and non-verbal communication channels creates a system in which the message is easier to understand. Expanding the focus to several expression forms can facilitate research on emotion recognition as well as human-machine interaction. In this article, the authors present a Polish emotional database composed of three modalities: facial expressions, body movement and gestures, and speech. The corpora contains recordings registered in studio conditions, acted out by 16 professional actors (8 male and 8 female). The data is labeled with six basic emotions categories, according to Ekman’s emotion categories. To check the quality of performance, all recordings are evaluated by experts and volunteers. The database is available to academic community and might be useful in the study on audio-visual emotion recognition.

Keywords: Body movement, emotion recognition, emotional corpus, facial expressions, gestures, multimodal database, speech.

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Authors: Halleh Nejadriahi, Kamyar Arab

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Computer-aided design (CAD) tools have been extensively used by the architects for the several decades. It has evolved from being a simple drafting tool to being an intelligent architectural software and a powerful means of communication for architects. CAD plays an essential role in the profession of architecture and is a basic tool for any architectural firm. It is not possible for an architectural firm to compete without taking the advantage of computer software, due to the high demand and competition in the architectural industry. The aim of this study is to evaluate the impacts of CAD on the architectural design process from conceptual level to final product, particularly in architectural practice. It examines the range of benefits of integrating CAD into the industry and discusses the possible defects limiting the architects. Method of this study is qualitatively based on data collected from the professionals’ perspective. The identified benefits and limitations of CAD on the architectural design process will raise the awareness of professionals on the potentials of CAD and proper utilization of that in the industry, which would result in a higher productivity along with a better quality in the architectural offices.

Keywords: Architecture, architectural practice, computer aided design, CAD, design process.

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Authors: Rully D. Purwati, Tantri D. A. Anggraeni, Bambang Heliyanto, M. Machfud, Joko Hartono

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Jatropha curcas L. is one of the crops producing non edible oil which is potential for bio-energy. Jatropha cultivation and development program in Indonesia is facing several problems especially low seed yield resulting in inefficient crop cultivation cost. To cope with the problem, development of high yielding varieties is necessary. Development of varieties to improve seed yield was conducted by hybridization and selection, and resulted in 14 potential genotypes. The yield potential of the 14 genotypes were evaluated and compared with two check varieties. The objective of the evaluation was to find Jatropha hybrids with some characters i.e. productivity higher than check varieties, oil content > 40% and harvesting age ≤ 110 days. Hybridization and individual plant selection were carried out from 2010 to 2014. Evaluation of high yield was conducted in Asembagus experimental station, Situbondo, East Java in three years (2015-2017). The experimental designed was Randomized Complete Block Design with three replication and plot size of 10 m x 8 m. The characters observed were number of capsules per plant, dry seed yield (kg/ha) and seed oil content (%). The results of this experiment indicated that all the hybrids evaluated have higher productivity than check variety IP-3A. There were two superior hybrids i.e. HS-49xSP-65/32 and HS-49xSP-19/28 with highest seed yield per hectare and number of capsules per plant during three years.

Keywords: Jatropha, biodiesel, hybrid, high seed yield.

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Authors: Shahzad Hassan, Kamran Saeed

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People are always in search of Wi-Fi hotspots because Internet is a major demand nowadays. But like all other technologies, there is still room for improvement in the Wi-Fi technology with regards to the speed and quality of connectivity. In order to address these aspects, Harald Haas, a professor at the University of Edinburgh, proposed what we know as the Li-Fi (Light Fidelity). Li-Fi is a new technology in the field of wireless communication to provide connectivity within a network environment. It is a two-way mode of wireless communication using light. Basically, the data is transmitted through Light Emitting Diodes which can vary the intensity of light very fast, even faster than the blink of an eye. From the research and experiments conducted so far, it can be said that Li-Fi can increase the speed and reliability of the transfer of data. This paper pays particular attention on the assessment of the performance of this technology. In other words, it is a 5G technology which uses LED as the medium of data transfer. For coverage within the buildings, Wi-Fi is good but Li-Fi can be considered favorable in situations where large amounts of data are to be transferred in areas with electromagnetic interferences. It brings a lot of data related qualities such as efficiency, security as well as large throughputs to the table of wireless communication. All in all, it can be said that Li-Fi is going to be a future phenomenon where the presence of light will mean access to the Internet as well as speedy data transfer.

Keywords: Communication, LED, Li-Fi, Wi-Fi.

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Authors: Elias O. Tembe, Hussain A. Al-Salamin

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There is decagram of strategic decisions of operations and production/service management (POSM) within operational research (OR) which must collate, namely: design, inventory, quality, location, process and capacity, layout, scheduling, maintain ace, and supply chain. This paper presents an architectural configuration conceptual framework of a decagram of sets decisions in a form of mathematical complete graph and abelian graph. Mathematically, a complete graph is undirected (UDG), and directed (DG) a relationship where every pair of vertices is connected, collated, confluent, and holomorphic. There has not been any study conducted which, however, prioritizes the holomorphic sets which of POMS within OR field of study. The study utilizes OR structured technique known as The Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) analysis for organizing, sorting and prioritizing(ranking) the sets within the decagram of POMS according to their attribution (propensity), and provides an analysis how the prioritization has real-world application within the 21st century.

Keywords: AHP analysis, Decagram, Decagon, Holomorphic.

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Authors: C.-M. Militaru, A. Pǎcalǎ, I. Vlaicu, K. Bodor, G.-A. Dumitrel, T. Todinca

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A mathematical model for the hydrodynamics of a surface water treatment pilot plant was developed and validated by the determination of the residence time distribution (RTD) for the main equipments of the unit. The well known models of ideal/real mixing, ideal displacement (plug flow) and (one-dimensional axial) dispersion model were combined in order to identify the structure that gives the best fitting of the experimental data for each equipment of the pilot plant. RTD experimental results have shown that pilot plant hydrodynamics can be quite well approximated by a combination of simple mathematical models, structure which is suitable for engineering applications. Validated hydrodynamic models will be further used in the evaluation and selection of the most suitable coagulation-flocculation reagents, optimum operating conditions (injection point, reaction times, etc.), in order to improve the quality of the drinking water.

Keywords: drinking water, hydrodynamic modeling, pilot plant, residence time distribution, surface water.

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Authors: Jaroslav Polec, Lenka Krulikovská, Natália Helešová, Tomáš Hirner

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In this paper we present a novel approach for face image coding. The proposed method makes a use of the features of video encoders like motion prediction. At first encoder selects appropriate prototype from the database and warps it according to features of encoding face. Warped prototype is placed as first I frame. Encoding face is placed as second frame as P frame type. Information about features positions, color change, selected prototype and data flow of P frame will be sent to decoder. The condition is both encoder and decoder own the same database of prototypes. We have run experiment with H.264 video encoder and obtained results were compared to results achieved by JPEG and JPEG2000. Obtained results show that our approach is able to achieve 3 times lower bitrate and two times higher PSNR in comparison with JPEG. According to comparison with JPEG2000 the bitrate was very similar, but subjective quality achieved by proposed method is better.

Keywords: Triangulation, H.264, Model-based coding, Average face

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Authors: Sedighe Arabameri, Nasser Salmasi

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In this researcha particle swarm optimization (PSO) algorithm is proposedfor no-wait flowshopsequence dependent setuptime scheduling problem with weighted earliness-tardiness penalties as the criterion (
|, |Σ   " ).The smallestposition value (SPV) rule is applied to convert the continuous value of position vector of particles in PSO to job permutations.A timing algorithm is generated to find the optimal schedule and calculate the objective function value of a given sequence in PSO algorithm. Twodifferent neighborhood structures are applied to improve the solution quality of PSO algorithm.The first one is based on variable neighborhood search (VNS) and the second one is a simple one with invariable structure. In order to compare the performance of two neighborhood structures, random test problems are generated and solved by both neighborhood approaches.Computational results show that the VNS algorithmhas better performance than the other one especially for the large sized problems.

Keywords: minimization of summation of weighed earliness and tardiness, no-wait flowshop scheduling, particle swarm optimization, sequence dependent setup times

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Authors: Mazyar Ahrari, Ramin Khajavi, Mehdi Kamali Dolatabadi, Tayebeh Toliyat, Abosaeed Rashidi

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Fabric as the first and most common layer that is in permanent contact with human skin is a very good interface to provide coverage, as well as heat and cold insulation. Phase change materials (PCMs) are organic and inorganic compounds which have the capability of absorbing and releasing noticeable amounts of latent heat during phase transitions between solid and liquid phases at a low temperature range. PCMs come across phase changes (liquid-solid and solid-liquid transitions) during absorbing and releasing thermal heat; so, in order to use them for a long time, they should have been encapsulated in polymeric shells, so-called microcapsules. Microencapsulation and nanoencapsulation methods have been developed in order to reduce the reactivity of a PCM with outside environment, promoting the ease of handling, decreasing the diffusion and evaporation rates. Methods of incorporation of PCMs in textiles such as electrospinning and determining thermal properties had been summarized. Paraffin waxes catch a lot of attention due to their high thermal storage density, repeatability of phase change, thermal stability, small volume change during phase transition, chemical stability, non-toxicity, non-flammability, non-corrosive and low cost and they seem to play a key role in confronting with climate change and global warming. In this article, we aimed to review the researches concentrating on the characteristics of PCMs and new materials and methods of microencapsulation.

Keywords: Thermoregulation, phase change materials, microencapsulation, thermal energy storage, nanoencapsulation.

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Authors: A. Sayadi, A. Khodadadi D., S. Partani

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Today Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) is known as one of the most important tools for decision makers in the construction of civil and industrial projects towards sustainable development. In the past, projects were evaluated based on cost and benefit analysis regardless of the physical and biological environmental effects and its socio-economical impacts. According to the Department of Environment (DOE) of Iran's regulations, the construction of hydroelectric dams is an activity that requires an EIA report. In this paper the environmental impact assessment of the Gotvand hydro-electrical dam has been evaluated in the three environment elements, biological, Physical-chemical and cultural units. This dam is one of the largest dams in Iran with a volume of 4500 MCM and is going to be the last dam on the Karoon River in the south of Iran. In this paper the ICOLD (International Commission on Large Dams) technique was employed for the environmental impact assessment of the dam. The research includes all socio economical and environmental effects of the dam during the construction and operation of the hydro electric dam and Environmental management, monitoring and mitigation of negative impacts were analyzed. In this project the results led to using some techniques to protect the destructive impacts on biological aspects beside the effective long time period impacts on the biological aspects. The impacts on physical aspects are temporary and negative commonly that could be restored and rehabilitated in natural process in the long time in operation period.

Keywords: "Gotvand Hydro Electric Dam", "EIA", "ICOLD and Leopold matrices"

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Authors: Hamid Tavakolipour, Mohsen Mokhtarian, Ahmad Kalbasi Ashtari

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In this study, the effect of various drying methods (sun drying, shade drying and industrial drying) on final moisture content, shell splitting degree, shrinkage and color change were studied. Sun drying resulted higher degree of pistachio nuts shell splitting on pistachio nuts relative other drying methods. The ANOVA results showed that the different drying methods did not significantly effects on color change of dried pistachio nut. The results illustrated that pistachio nut dried by industrial drying had the lowest moisture content. After the end of drying process, initially, the experimental drying data were fitted with five famous drying models namely Newton, Page, Silva et al., Peleg and Henderson and Pabis. The results indicated that Peleg and Page models gave better results compared with other models to monitor the moisture ratio’s pistachio nut in industrial drying and open sun (or shade drying) methods, respectively.

Keywords: Industrial drying, Modeling, Pistachio, quality properties, Traditional drying.

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Authors: Hunachew B. Mengesha, Biruck Y. Dessalegn

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Owing to the dramatic expansion of universities in Ethiopia, understanding the composition and nature of solid waste at the source of generation plays an important role in designing a program for an integrated waste management program. In this study, we report the quantity, quality and recycling potential of the waste generated in the three campuses of the Hawassa University, Southern Ethiopia. A total of 3.5 tons of waste was generated per day in the three campuses of the university. More than 95% of the waste constituents were with potential to be recovered. It was a lesson from the study that there was no source reduction, recycling, composting, proper land filling or incineration practices in-place. The considerably high waste generation associated with the expansion of educational programs in the university appears worthwhile requiring implementation of programs for an integrated solid waste management to minimize health risk to humans and reduce environmental implications as a result of improper handling and disposal of wastes.

Keywords: Hawassa University, integrated solid waste management, solid waste generation.

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Authors: Arash Esmaeili, Zhibang Liu, Yang Xiang, Jimmy Yun, Lei Shao

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High pressure carbon dioxide (CO2) absorption from a specific off-gas in a conventional column has been evaluated for the environmental concerns by the Aspen HYSYS simulator using a wide range of single absorbents and piperazine (PZ) blended solutions to estimate the outlet CO2 concentration, CO2 loading, reboiler power supply and regeneration heat duty to choose the most efficient solution in terms of CO2 removal and required heat duty. The property package, which is compatible with all applied solutions for the simulation in this study, estimates the properties based on electrolyte non-random two-liquid (E-NRTL) model for electrolyte thermodynamics and Peng-Robinson equation of state for vapor phase and liquid hydrocarbon phase properties. The results of the simulation indicate that PZ in addition to the mixture of PZ and monoethanolamine (MEA) demand the highest regeneration heat duty compared with other studied single and blended amine solutions respectively. The blended amine solutions with the lowest PZ concentrations (5wt% and 10wt%) were considered and compared to reduce the cost of process, among which the blended solution of 10wt%PZ+35wt%MDEA (methyldiethanolamine) was found as the most appropriate solution in terms of CO2 content in the outlet gas, rich-CO2 loading and regeneration heat duty.

Keywords: Absorption, amine solutions, Aspen HYSYS, CO2 loading, piperazine, regeneration heat duty.

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Authors: Amir Alani, Mojtaba Mahmoodian, Anna Romanova, Asaad Faramarzi

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Pipelines are extensively used engineering structures which convey fluid from one place to another. Most of the time, pipelines are placed underground and are encumbered by soil weight and traffic loads. Corrosion of pipe material is the most common form of pipeline deterioration and should be considered in both the strength and serviceability analysis of pipes. The study in this research focuses on concrete pipes in sewage systems (concrete sewers). This research firstly investigates how to involve the effect of corrosion as a time dependent process of deterioration in the structural and failure analysis of this type of pipe. Then three probabilistic time dependent reliability analysis methods including the first passage probability theory, the gamma distributed degradation model and the Monte Carlo simulation technique are discussed and developed. Sensitivity analysis indexes which can be used to identify the most important parameters that affect pipe failure are also discussed. The reliability analysis methods developed in this paper contribute as rational tools for decision makers with regard to the strengthening and rehabilitation of existing pipelines. The results can be used to obtain a cost-effective strategy for the management of the sewer system.

Keywords: Reliability analysis, service life prediction, Monte Carlo simulation method, first passage probability theory, gamma distributed degradation model.

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Authors: Rumyana Peytcheva-Forsyth, Blagovesna Yovkova

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This paper presents the outcomes of a qualitative study which aims to investigate the pedagogical potentials of serious games in the preparation of future teachers. The authors discuss the existing problems and barriers associated with the organization of teaching practices in Bulgaria as part of the pre-service teacher training, as well as the attitudes and perceptions of the interviewed academics, teachers and trainees concerning the integration of serious games in the teaching practicum. The study outcomes strongly confirm the positive attitudes of the respondents to the introduction of virtual learning environments for the development of professional skills of future teachers as a supplement to the traditional forms of education. Through the inclusion of serious games it is expected to improve the quality of practical training of pre-service teachers as they overcome many of the problems identified in the existing teaching practices. The outcomes of the study will inform the design of the educational simulation software which is part of the project SimAula Tomorrow's Teachers Training.

Keywords: pre-service teacher training, serious games, virtual practicum, simulations

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Authors: Chih-Hung Wu, Chih-Chin Lai, Chun-Yen Chen, Yan-He Chen

Abstract:

Interpretation of aerial images is an important task in various applications. Image segmentation can be viewed as the essential step for extracting information from aerial images. Among many developed segmentation methods, the technique of clustering has been extensively investigated and used. However, determining the number of clusters in an image is inherently a difficult problem, especially when a priori information on the aerial image is unavailable. This study proposes a support vector machine approach for clustering aerial images. Three cluster validity indices, distance-based index, Davies-Bouldin index, and Xie-Beni index, are utilized as quantitative measures of the quality of clustering results. Comparisons on the effectiveness of these indices and various parameters settings on the proposed methods are conducted. Experimental results are provided to illustrate the feasibility of the proposed approach.

Keywords: Aerial imaging, image segmentation, machine learning, support vector machine, cluster validity index

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Authors: Reihaneh Montazeri Shatouri, Rosmini Omar, Wan Khairuzzaman Wan Ismail

Abstract:

This study aims at investigating factors in research and development (R&D) growth and exploring the role of R&D management in enhancing social innovation and productivity improvement in Iran-s industrial sector. It basically explores the common types of R&D activities and the industries which benefited the most from active R&D units in Iran. The researchers generated qualitative analyses obtained from primary and secondary data. The primary data have been retrieved through interviews with five key players (Managing Director, Internal Manager, General Manager, Executive Manager, and Project Manager) in the industrial sector. The secondary data acquired from an investigation on Mazandaran, a province of northern Iran. The findings highlight Iran-s focuses of R & D on cost reduction and upgrading productivity. Industries that have benefited the most from active R&D units are metallic, machinery and equipment design, and automotive. We rank order the primary effects of R&D on productivity improvement as follows, industry improvement, economic growth, using professional human resources, generating productivity and creativity culture, creating a competitive and innovative environment, and increasing people-s knowledge. Generally, low budget dedication and insufficient supply of highly skilled scientists and engineers are two important obstacles for R&D in Iran. Whereas, R&D has resulted in improvement in Iranian society, transfer of contemporary knowledge into the international market is still lacking.

Keywords: Productivity, R&D, Transfer of Knowledge

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