Search results for: Long Short-Term Memory Network
Commenced in January 2007
Frequency: Monthly
Edition: International
Paper Count: 4287

Search results for: Long Short-Term Memory Network

207 The Impact of Temporal Impairment on Quality of Experience (QoE) in Video Streaming: A No Reference (NR) Subjective and Objective Study

Authors: Muhammad Arslan Usman, Muhammad Rehan Usman, Soo Young Shin

Abstract:

Live video streaming is one of the most widely used service among end users, yet it is a big challenge for the network operators in terms of quality. The only way to provide excellent Quality of Experience (QoE) to the end users is continuous monitoring of live video streaming. For this purpose, there are several objective algorithms available that monitor the quality of the video in a live stream. Subjective tests play a very important role in fine tuning the results of objective algorithms. As human perception is considered to be the most reliable source for assessing the quality of a video stream subjective tests are conducted in order to develop more reliable objective algorithms. Temporal impairments in a live video stream can have a negative impact on the end users. In this paper we have conducted subjective evaluation tests on a set of video sequences containing temporal impairment known as frame freezing. Frame Freezing is considered as a transmission error as well as a hardware error which can result in loss of video frames on the reception side of a transmission system. In our subjective tests, we have performed tests on videos that contain a single freezing event and also for videos that contain multiple freezing events. We have recorded our subjective test results for all the videos in order to give a comparison on the available No Reference (NR) objective algorithms. Finally, we have shown the performance of no reference algorithms used for objective evaluation of videos and suggested the algorithm that works better. The outcome of this study shows the importance of QoE and its effect on human perception. The results for the subjective evaluation can serve the purpose for validating objective algorithms.

Keywords: Objective evaluation, subjective evaluation, quality of experience (QoE), video quality assessment (VQA).

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206 Machine Learning Techniques for COVID-19 Detection: A Comparative Analysis

Authors: Abeer Aljohani

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The COVID-19 virus spread has been one of the extreme pandemics across the globe. It is also referred as corona virus which is a contagious disease that continuously mutates into numerous variants. Currently, the B.1.1.529 variant labeled as Omicron is detected in South Africa. The huge spread of COVID-19 disease has affected several lives and has surged exceptional pressure on the healthcare systems worldwide. Also, everyday life and the global economy have been at stake. Numerous COVID-19 cases have produced a huge burden on hospitals as well as health workers. To reduce this burden, this paper predicts COVID-19 disease based on the symptoms and medical history of the patient. As machine learning is a widely accepted area and gives promising results for healthcare, this research presents an architecture for COVID-19 detection using ML techniques integrated with feature dimensionality reduction. This paper uses a standard University of California Irvine (UCI) dataset for predicting COVID-19 disease. This dataset comprises symptoms of 5434 patients. This paper also compares several supervised ML techniques on the presented architecture. The architecture has also utilized 10-fold cross validation process for generalization and Principal Component Analysis (PCA) technique for feature reduction. Standard parameters are used to evaluate the proposed architecture including F1-Score, precision, accuracy, recall, Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) and Area under Curve (AUC). The results depict that Decision tree, Random Forest and neural networks outperform all other state-of-the-art ML techniques. This result can be used to effectively identify COVID-19 infection cases.

Keywords: Supervised machine learning, COVID-19 prediction, healthcare analytics, Random Forest, Neural Network.

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205 Use of Waste Tire Rubber Alkali-Activated-Based Mortars in Repair of Concrete Structures

Authors: Mohammad Ebrahim Kianifar, Ehsan Ahmadi

Abstract:

Reinforced concrete structures experience local defects such as cracks over their lifetime under various environmental loadings. Consequently, they are repaired by mortars to avoid detrimental effects such as corrosion of reinforcement, which in long-term may lead to strength loss of a member or collapse of structures. However, repaired structures may need multiple repairs due to changes in load distribution, and thus, lack of compatibility between mortar and substrate concrete. On the other hand, waste tire rubber alkali-activated (WTRAA)-based materials have very high potential to be used as repair mortars because of their ductility and flexibility, which may delay failure of repair mortar, and thus, provide sufficient compatibility. Hence, this work presents a study on suitability of WTRAA-based materials as mortars for repair of concrete structures through an experimental program. To this end, WTRAA mortars with 15% aggregate replacement, alkali-activated (AA) mortars, and ordinary mortars are made to repair a number of concrete beams. The WTRAA mortars are composed of slag as base material, sodium hydroxide as alkaline activator, and different gradation of waste tire rubber (fine and coarse gradations). Flexural tests are conducted on the concrete beams repaired by the ordinary, AA, and WTRAA mortars. It is found that, despite having lower compressive strength and modulus of elasticity, the WTRAA and AA mortars increase flexural strength of the repaired beams, give compatible failures, and provide sufficient mortar-concrete interface bondings. The ordinary mortars, however, show incompatible failure modes. This study demonstrates promising application of WTRAA mortars in practical repairs of concrete structures.

Keywords: Alkali-activated mortars, concrete repair, mortar compatibility flexural strength, waste tire rubber.

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204 The Flashnews as a Commercial Session of Political Marketing: The Content Analysis of the Embedded Political Narratives in Non-Political Media Products

Authors: Zsolt Szabolcsi

Abstract:

Political communication in Hungary has undergone a significant change in the 2010s. One element of the transformation is the Flashnews. This media product was launched in March 2015 and since then 40-50 blocks are broadcasted, daily, on 5 channels. Flashnews blocks are condensed news sessions, containing the summary of political narratives. It starts with the introduction of the narrator, then, usually four news topics are presented and, finally, the narrator concludes the block. The block lasts only one minute and, therefore, it provides a blink session into the main narratives of political communication at the time. Beyond its rapid pace, what makes its avoidance difficult is that these blocks are always in the first position in the commercial break of a non-political media product. Although it is only one minute long, its significance is high. The content of the Flashnews reflects the main governmental narratives and, therefore, the Flashnews is part of the agenda-setting capacity of political communication. It reaches media consumers who have limited knowledge and interest in politics, and their use of media products is not politically related. For this audience, the Flashnews pops up in the same way as commercials. Due to its structure and appearance, the impact of Flashnews seems to be similar to commercials, imbedded into the break of media products. It activates existing knowledge constructs, builds up associational links and maintains their presence in a way that the recipient is not aware of the phenomenon. The research aims to examine the extent to which the Flashnews and the main news narratives are identical in their content. This aim is realized with the content analysis of the two news products by examining the Flashnews and the evening news during main sport events from 2016 to 2018. The initial hypothesis of the research is that Flashnews is a contribution to the news management technique for an effective articulation of political narratives in public service media channels.

Keywords: Flashnews, political communication, political marketing, news management.

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203 Application of Remote Sensing for Monitoring the Impact of Lapindo Mud Sedimentation for Mangrove Ecosystem: Case Study in Sidoarjo, East Java

Authors: Akbar Cahyadhi Pratama Putra, Tantri Utami Widhaningtyas, M. Randy Aswin

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Indonesia, as an archipelagic nation, has a very long coastline with significant potential for marine resources, including mangrove ecosystems. The Lapindo mudflow disaster in Sidoarjo, East Java, resulted in mudflow being discharged into the sea through the Brantas and Porong rivers. The mud material transported by the river flow is feared to be dangerous because it contains harmful substances such as heavy metals. This study aims to map the mangrove ecosystem in terms of its density and assess the impact of the Lapindo mud disaster on the mangrove ecosystem, along with efforts to sustain its continuity. The mapping of the coastal mangrove conditions in Sidoarjo was carried out using remote sensing products, specifically Landsat 7 ETM+ images, taken during dry months in 2002, 2006, 2009, and 2014. The density of mangroves was determined using NDVI, which utilizes band 3 (the red channel) and band 4 (the near IR channel). Image processing to generate NDVI was performed using ENVI 5.1 software. The NDVI results were used to assess mangrove density on a scale from 0 to 1. The growth of mangrove ecosystems, both in terms of area and density, showed a significant increase from year to year. The development of mangrove ecosystems was influenced by the deposition of Lapindo mud in the estuaries of the Porong and Brantas rivers, where the silt provided a suitable medium for the growth of the mangrove ecosystem, leading to an increase in its density. The rise in density was supported by public awareness to mitigate heavy metal contamination, allowing for mangrove breeding near the affected areas.

Keywords: Archipelagic nation, Mangrove, Lapindo mudflow disaster, NDVI.

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202 Cost Benefit Analysis: Evaluation among the Millimetre Wavebands and SHF Bands of Small Cell 5G Networks

Authors: Emanuel Teixeira, Anderson Ramos, Marisa Lourenço, Fernando J. Velez, Jon M. Peha

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This article discusses the benefit cost analysis aspects of millimetre wavebands (mmWaves) and Super High Frequency (SHF). The devaluation along the distance of the carrier-to-noise-plus-interference ratio with the coverage distance is assessed by considering two different path loss models, the two-slope urban micro Line-of-Sight (UMiLoS) for the SHF band and the modified Friis propagation model, for frequencies above 24 GHz. The equivalent supported throughput is estimated at the 5.62, 28, 38, 60 and 73 GHz frequency bands and the influence of carrier-to-noise-plus-interference ratio in the radio and network optimization process is explored. Mostly owing to the lessening caused by the behaviour of the two-slope propagation model for SHF band, the supported throughput at this band is higher than at the millimetre wavebands only for the longest cell lengths. The benefit cost analysis of these pico-cellular networks was analysed for regular cellular topologies, by considering the unlicensed spectrum. For shortest distances, we can distinguish an optimal of the revenue in percentage terms for values of the cell length, R ≈ 10 m for the millimeter wavebands and for longest distances an optimal of the revenue can be observed at R ≈ 550 m for the 5.62 GHz. It is possible to observe that, for the 5.62 GHz band, the profit is slightly inferior than for millimetre wavebands, for the shortest Rs, and starts to increase for cell lengths approximately equal to the ratio between the break-point distance and the co-channel reuse factor, achieving a maximum for values of R approximately equal to 550 m.

Keywords: 5G, millimetre wavebands, super high-frequency band, SINR, signal-to-interference-plus-noise ratio, cost benefit analysis.

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201 Consumer Insolvency in the Czech Republic

Authors: Jindřiška Šedová

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The Czech Republic is a country whose economy has undergone a transformation since 1989. Since joining the EU it has been striving to reduce the differences in its economic standard and the quality of its institutional environment in comparison with developed countries. According to an assessment carried out by the World Bank, the Czech Republic was long classed as a country whose institutional development was seen as problematic. For many years one of the things it was rated most poorly on was its bankruptcy law. The new Insolvency Act, which is a modern law in terms of its treatment of bankruptcy, was first adopted in the Czech Republic in 2006. This law, together with other regulatory measures, offers debtridden Czech economic subjects legal instruments which are well established and in common practice in developed market economies. Since then, analyses performed by the World Bank and the London EBRD have shown that there have been significant steps forward in the quality of Czech bankruptcy law. The Czech Republic still lacks an analytical apparatus which can offer a structured characterisation of the general and specific conditions of Czech company and household debt which is subject to current changes in the global economy. This area has so far not been given the attention it deserves. The lack of research is particularly clear as regards analysis of household debt and householders- ability to settle their debts in a reasonable manner using legal and other state means of regulation. We assume that Czech households have recourse to a modern insolvency law, yet the effective application of this law is hampered by the inconsistencies in the formal and informal institutions involved in resolving debt. This in turn is based on the assumption that this lack of consistency is more marked in cases of personal bankruptcy. Our aim is to identify the symptoms which indicate that for some time the effective application of bankruptcy law in the Czech Republic will be hindered by factors originating in householders- relative inability to identify the risks of falling into debt.

Keywords: bankruptcy law, household debt, consumer bankruptcy, business bankruptcy

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200 Methane versus Carbon Dioxide: Mitigation Prospects

Authors: Alexander J. Severinsky, Allen L. Sessoms

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Atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) has dominated the discussion around the causes of climate change. This is a reflection of a 100-year time horizon for all greenhouse gases that became a norm.  The 100-year time horizon is much too long – and yet, almost all mitigation efforts, including those set in the near-term frame of within 30 years, are still geared toward it. In this paper, we show that for a 30-year time horizon, methane (CH4) is the greenhouse gas whose radiative forcing exceeds that of CO2. In our analysis, we use the radiative forcing of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, because they directly affect the rise in temperature on Earth. We found that in 2019, the radiative forcing (RF) of methane was ~2.5 W/m2 and that of carbon dioxide was ~2.1 W/m2. Under a business-as-usual (BAU) scenario until 2050, such forcing would be ~2.8 W/m2 and ~3.1 W/m2 respectively. There is a substantial spread in the data for anthropogenic and natural methane (CH4) emissions, along with natural gas, (which is primarily CH4), leakages from industrial production to consumption. For this reason, we estimate the minimum and maximum effects of a reduction of these leakages, and assume an effective immediate reduction by 80%. Such action may serve to reduce the annual radiative forcing of all CH4 emissions by ~15% to ~30%. This translates into a reduction of RF by 2050 from ~2.8 W/m2 to ~2.5 W/m2 in the case of the minimum effect that can be expected, and to ~2.15 W/m2 in the case of the maximum effort to reduce methane leakages. Under the BAU, we find that the RF of CO2 will increase from ~2.1 W/m2 now to ~3.1 W/m2 by 2050. We assume a linear reduction of 50% in anthropogenic emission over the course of the next 30 years, which would reduce the radiative forcing of CO2 from ~3.1 W/m2 to ~2.9 W/m2. In the case of "net zero," the other 50% of only anthropogenic CO2 emissions reduction would be limited to being either from sources of emissions or directly from the atmosphere. In this instance, the total reduction would be from ~3.1 W/m2 to ~2.7 W/m2, or ~0.4 W/m2. To achieve the same radiative forcing as in the scenario of maximum reduction of methane leakages of ~2.15 W/m2, an additional reduction of radiative forcing of CO2 would be approximately 2.7 -2.15 = 0.55 W/m2. In total, one would need to remove ~660 GT of CO2 from the atmosphere in order to match the maximum reduction of current methane leakages, and ~270 GT of CO2 from emitting sources, to reach "negative emissions". This amounts to over 900 GT of CO2.

Keywords: Methane Leakages, Methane Radiative Forcing, Methane Mitigation, Methane Net Zero.

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199 Scientific Methods in Educational Management: The Metasystems Perspective

Authors: Elena A. Railean

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Although scientific methods have been the subject of a large number of papers, the term ‘scientific methods in educational management’ is still not well defined. In this paper, it is adopted the metasystems perspective to define the mentioned term and distinguish them from methods used in time of the scientific management and knowledge management paradigms. In our opinion, scientific methods in educational management rely on global phenomena, events, and processes and their influence on the educational organization. Currently, scientific methods in educational management are integrated with the phenomenon of globalization, cognitivisation, and openness, etc. of educational systems and with global events like the COVID-19 pandemic. Concrete scientific methods are nested in a hierarchy of more and more abstract models of educational management, which form the context of the global impact on education, in general, and learning outcomes, in particular. However, scientific methods can be assigned to a specific mission, strategy, or tactics of educational management of the concrete organization, either by the global management, local development of school organization, or/and development of the life-long successful learner. By accepting this assignment, the scientific method becomes a personal goal of each individual with the educational organization or the option to develop the educational organization at the global standards. In our opinion, in educational management, the scientific methods need to confine the scope to the deep analysis of concrete tasks of the educational system (i.e., teaching, learning, assessment, development), which result in concrete strategies of organizational development. More important are seeking the ways for dynamic equilibrium between the strategy and tactic of the planetary tasks in the field of global education, which result in a need for ecological methods of learning and communication. In sum, distinction between local and global scientific methods is dependent on the subjective conception of the task assignment, measurement, and appraisal. Finally, we conclude that scientific methods are not holistic scientific methods, but the strategy and tactics implemented in the global context by an effective educational/academic manager.

Keywords: Educational management, scientific management, educational leadership, scientific method in educational management.

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198 Numerical Simulation in the Air-Curtain Installed Subway Tunnel for the Indoor Air Quality

Authors: Kyung Jin Ryu, Makhsuda Juraeva, Sang-Hyun Jeong, Dong Joo Song

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The Platform Screen Doors improve Indoor Air Quality (IAQ) in the subway station; however, and the air quality is degraded in the subway tunnel. CO2 concentration and indoor particulate matter value are high in the tunnel. The IAQ level in subway tunnel degrades by increasing the train movements. Air-curtain installation reduces dusts, particles and moving toxic smokes and permits traffic by generating virtual wall. The ventilation systems of the subway tunnel need improvements to have better air-quality. Numerical analyses might be effective tools analyze the flowfield inside the air-curtain installed subway tunnel. The ANSYS CFX software is used for steady computations of the airflow inside the tunnel. The single-track subway tunnel has the natural shaft, the mechanical shaft, and the PSDs installed stations. The height and width of the tunnel are 6.0 m and 4.0 m respectively. The tunnel is 400 m long and the air-curtain is installed at the top of the tunnel. The thickness and the width of the air-curtain are 0.08 m and 4 m respectively. The velocity of the air-curtain changes between 20 - 30 m/s. Three cases are analyzed depending on the installing location of the air-curtain. The discharged-air through the natural shafts increases as the velocity of the air-curtain increases when the air-curtain is installed between the mechanical and the natural shafts. The pollutant-air is exhausted by the mechanical and the natural shafts and remained air is pushed toward tunnel end. The discharged-air through the natural shaft is low when the air-curtain installed before the natural shaft. The mass flow rate decreases in the tunnel after the mechanical shaft as the air-curtain velocity increases. The computational results of the air-curtain installed tunnel become basis for the optimum design study. The air-curtain installing location is chosen between the mechanical and the natural shafts. The velocity of the air-curtain is fixed as 25 m/s. The thickness and the blowing angles of the air-curtain are the design variables for the optimum design study. The object function of the design optimization is maximizing the discharged air through the natural shaft.

Keywords: air-curtain, indoor air quality, single-track subway tunnel

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197 The Social Area Disclosure to Reduce Conflicts between Community and the State: A Case of Mahakan Fortress, Bangkok

Authors: Saowapa Phaithayawat

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The purposes of this study are 1) to study the over 20-year attempt of Mahakan fort community to negotiate with Bangkok Metropolitan Administration (BMA) to remain in their residential area belonging to the state, and 2) to apply the new social and cultural dimension between the state and the community as an alternative for local participation in keeping their residential area. This is a qualitative research, and the findings reveal that the community claimed their ancestors’ right as owners of this piece of land for over 200 years. The community, therefore, requested to take part in the preservation of land, culture and local intellect and the area management in terms of being a learning resource on the cultural road in Rattanakosin Island. However, BMA imposed the law concerning the community area relocation in Rattanakosin Island. The result of law enforcement led to the failure of the area relocation, and the hard hit on physical structure of the area including the overall deterioration of the cultural road renovated in the year 1982, the 200 years’ celebration of Bangkok. The enforcement of law by the state required the move of the community, and the landscape improvement based on the capital city plan. However, this enforcement resulted in the unending conflicts between the community and the state, and the solution of this problem was unclear. At the same time the community has spent a long time opposing the state’s action, and preparing themselves by administrating the community behind Mahakan fortress with community administrative committee under the suggestion of external organization by registering all community members, providing funds for community administration. At the meantime the state lacked the continuation of the enforcement due to political problem and BMA’s administration problem. It is, therefore, suggested that an alternative solution to this problem lie at the negotiation between the state and the community with the purpose of the collaboration between the two to develop the area under the protective law of each side.

Keywords: Pom-Mahakan Community, The Reduction of Conflicts, The Social Area Disclosure.

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196 Sentiment Analysis of Fake Health News Using Naive Bayes Classification Models

Authors: Danielle Shackley, Yetunde Folajimi

Abstract:

As more people turn to the internet seeking health related information, there is more risk of finding false, inaccurate, or dangerous information. Sentiment analysis is a natural language processing technique that assigns polarity scores of text, ranging from positive, neutral and negative. In this research, we evaluate the weight of a sentiment analysis feature added to fake health news classification models. The dataset consists of existing reliably labeled health article headlines that were supplemented with health information collected about COVID-19 from social media sources. We started with data preprocessing, tested out various vectorization methods such as Count and TFIDF vectorization. We implemented 3 Naive Bayes classifier models, including Bernoulli, Multinomial and Complement. To test the weight of the sentiment analysis feature on the dataset, we created benchmark Naive Bayes classification models without sentiment analysis, and those same models were reproduced and the feature was added. We evaluated using the precision and accuracy scores. The Bernoulli initial model performed with 90% precision and 75.2% accuracy, while the model supplemented with sentiment labels performed with 90.4% precision and stayed constant at 75.2% accuracy. Our results show that the addition of sentiment analysis did not improve model precision by a wide margin; while there was no evidence of improvement in accuracy, we had a 1.9% improvement margin of the precision score with the Complement model. Future expansion of this work could include replicating the experiment process, and substituting the Naive Bayes for a deep learning neural network model.

Keywords: Sentiment analysis, Naive Bayes model, natural language processing, topic analysis, fake health news classification model.

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195 Optimization of Doubly Fed Induction Generator Equivalent Circuit Parameters by Direct Search Method

Authors: Mamidi Ramakrishna Rao

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Doubly-fed induction generator (DFIG) is currently the choice for many wind turbines. These generators, when connected to the grid through a converter, is subjected to varied power system conditions like voltage variation, frequency variation, short circuit fault conditions, etc. Further, many countries like Canada, Germany, UK, Scotland, etc. have distinct grid codes relating to wind turbines. Accordingly, following the network faults, wind turbines have to supply a definite reactive current. To satisfy the requirements including reactive current capability, an optimum electrical design becomes a mandate for DFIG to function. This paper intends to optimize the equivalent circuit parameters of an electrical design for satisfactory DFIG performance. Direct search method has been used for optimization of the parameters. The variables selected include electromagnetic core dimensions (diameters and stack length), slot dimensions, radial air gap between stator and rotor and winding copper cross section area. Optimization for 2 MW DFIG has been executed separately for three objective functions - maximum reactive power capability (Case I), maximum efficiency (Case II) and minimum weight (Case III). In the optimization analysis program, voltage variations (10%), power factor- leading and lagging (0.95), speeds for corresponding to slips (-0.3 to +0.3) have been considered. The optimum designs obtained for objective functions were compared. It can be concluded that direct search method of optimization helps in determining an optimum electrical design for each objective function like efficiency or reactive power capability or weight minimization.

Keywords: Direct search, DFIG, equivalent circuit parameters, optimization.

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194 Biaxial Testing of Fabrics - A Comparison of Various Testing Methodologies

Authors: O.B. Ozipek, E. Bozdag, E. Sunbuloglu, A. Abdullahoglu, E. Belen, E. Celikkanat

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In textile industry, besides the conventional textile products, technical textile goods, that have been brought external functional properties into, are being developed for technical textile industry. Especially these products produced with weaving technology are widely preferred in areas such as sports, geology, medical, automotive, construction and marine sectors. These textile products are exposed to various stresses and large deformations under typical conditions of use. At this point, sufficient and reliable data could not be obtained with uniaxial tensile tests for determination of the mechanical properties of such products due to mainly biaxial stress state. Therefore, the most preferred method is a biaxial tensile test method and analysis. These tests and analysis is applied to fabrics with different functional features in order to establish the textile material with several characteristics and mechanical properties of the product. Planar biaxial tensile test, cylindrical inflation and bulge tests are generally required to apply for textile products that are used in automotive, sailing and sports areas and construction industry to minimize accidents as long as their service life. Airbags, seat belts and car tires in the automotive sector are also subject to the same biaxial stress states, and can be characterized by same types of experiments. In this study, in accordance with the research literature related to the various biaxial test methods are compared. Results with discussions are elaborated mainly focusing on the design of a biaxial test apparatus to obtain applicable experimental data for developing a finite element model. Sample experimental results on a prototype system are expressed.

Keywords: Biaxial Stress, Bulge Test, Cylindrical Inflation, Fabric Testing, Planar Tension.

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193 An Exploration of Chinese Foreign Direct Investment in Africa from Ethical and Cultural Perspectives

Authors: Yongsheng Guo, Mirza Muhammad Naseer, Xiaoxian Zhu

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This study explores the perceptions and conducts of Chinese foreign direct investment (FDI) in Africa from ethical and cultural perspectives. It offers a better understanding of how ethical and cultural factors affect Chinese investment in Africa and how the investment projects performed in Africa from both Chinese investors and African stakeholders’ perceptions. It adopted a grounded theory approach and conducted 30 in-depth interviews with corporate managers. Grounded theory models are developed to link the ethical and cultural factors, actions, and consequences. Results reveal that some ethical concepts like the unity of humans and nature, benevolence, virtue and responsibility, and cultural traits including propriety, righteousness, sincerity, equilibrium, long-term orientation, and principles affect Chinese investors when making investments in Africa. Most Chinese investors harmonize with local managers, cooperate with each other, and are gentle and courteous to partners. They take stable and steady actions and invest in infrastructure and agriculture projects and adopt a virtue governance system in the organization. This study finds that consequently, Chinese investors and local partners take complementary advantages, make achievements sequentially, and therefore both sides can win. They recognize great potentials and make sustainable development in Africa to achieve the Great Together in the future. This study proposes a Chinese ethics and governance system including economic, social, and political perspectives and compares it with alternative systems. It makes implications to the world island theory and propose suggestions to solve the Clash of Civilizations problem.

Keywords: Foreign Direct Investment, Ethics, National Culture, China, Africa.

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192 Evaluation of Seismic Damage for Gisha Bridge in Tehran by HAZUS Methodology

Authors: Langroudi B., Salehi E., Keshani S., Baghersad M.

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Transportation is of great importance in the current life of human beings. The transportation system plays many roles, from economical development to after-catastrophe aids such as rescue operation in the first hours and days after an earthquake. In after earthquakes response phase, transportation system acts as a basis for ground operations including rescue and relief operation, food providing for victims and etc. It is obvious that partial or complete obstruction of this system results in the stop of these operations. Bridges are one of the most important elements of transportation network. Failure of a bridge, in the most optimistic case, cuts the relation between two regions and in more developed countries, cuts the relation of numerous regions. In this paper, to evaluate the vulnerability and estimate the damage level of Tehran bridges, HAZUS method, developed by Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) with the aid of National Institute of Building Science (NIBS), is used for the first time in Iran. In this method, to evaluate the collapse probability, fragility curves are used. Iran is located on seismic belt and thus, it is vulnerable to earthquakes. Thus, the study of the probability of bridge collapses, as an important part of transportation system, during earthquakes is of great importance. The purpose of this study is to provide fragility curves for Gisha Bridge, one of the longest steel bridges in Tehran, as an important lifeline element. Besides, the damage probability for this bridge during a specific earthquake, introduced as scenario earthquakes, is calculated. The fragility curves show that for the considered scenario, the probability of occurrence of complete collapse for the bridge is 8.6%.

Keywords: Bridge, Damage evaluation, Fragility curve, Lifelines, Seismic vulnerability.

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191 Job in Modern Arabic Poetry: A Semantic and Comparative Approach to Two Poems Referring to the Poet Al-Sayyab

Authors: Jeries Khoury

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The use of legendary, folkloric and religious symbols is one of the most important phenomena in modern Arabic poetry. Interestingly enough, most of the modern Arabic poetry’s pioneers were so fascinated by the biblical symbols and they managed to use many modern techniques to make these symbols adequate for their personal life from one side and fit to their Islamic beliefs from the other. One of the most famous poets to do so was al-Sayya:b. The way he employed one of these symbols ‘job’, the new features he adds to this character and the link between this character and his personal life will be discussed in this study. Besides, the study will examine the influence of al-Sayya:b on another modern poet Saadi Yusuf, who, following al-Sayya:b, used the character of Job in a special way, by mixing its features with al-Sayya:b’s personal features and in this way creating a new mixed character. A semantic, cultural and comparative analysis of the poems written by al-Sayya:b himself and the other poets who evoked the mixed image of al-Sayya:b-Job, can reveal the changes Arab poets made to the original biblical figure of Job to bring it closer to Islamic culture. The paper will make an intensive use of intertextuality idioms in order to shed light on the network of relations between three kinds of texts (indeed three palimpsests’: 1- biblical- the primary text; 2- poetic- al-Syya:b’s secondary version; 3- re-poetic- Sa’di Yusuf’s tertiary version). The bottom line in this paper is that that al-Sayya:b was directly influenced by the dramatic biblical story of Job more than the brief Quranic version of the story. In fact, the ‘new’ character of Job designed by al-Sayya:b himself differs from the original one in many aspects that we can safely say it is the Sayyabian-Job that cannot be found in the poems of any other poets, unless they are evoking the own tragedy of al-Sayya:b himself, like what Saadi Yusuf did.

Keywords: Arabic poetry, intertextuality, job, meter, modernism, symbolism.

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190 Investigation and Identification of a Number of Precious and Semi-Precious Stones Related to Bam Historical Citadel Using Micro Raman Spectroscopy and Scanning Electron Microscopy

Authors: Nazli Darkhal

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The use of gems and ornaments has been common in Iran since the beginning of history. The prosperity of the country, the wealth, and the interest of the people of this land in a luxurious and glorious life, combined with beauty, have always attracted the attention of Iranian people to gems and jewelry. Iranians are famous in the world for having a long history of collecting and recognizing precious stones. In this case, we can use the unique treasure of national jewelry. Raman spectroscopy method is one of the oscillating spectroscopy methods that is classified in the group of nondestructive study methods, and like other methods, in addition to several advantages, it also has disadvantages and problems. Micro Raman spectroscopy is one of the different types of Raman spectroscopy in which an optical microscope is combined with a Raman device to provide more capabilities and advantages than its original method. In this way, with the help of Raman spectroscopy and a light microscope, while observing more details from different parts of the historical sample, natural or artificial pigments can be identified in a small part of it. The EDX (Energy Dispersive X ray) electron microscope also functions as the basis for the interaction of the electron beam with the matter. The beams emitted from this interaction can be used to examine samples. In this article, in addition to introducing the micro-Raman spectroscopy method, studies have been conducted on the structure of three samples of existing stones in the historic citadel of Bam. Using this method of study on precious and semi-precious stones, in addition to requiring a short time, can provide us with complete information about the structure and theme of these samples. The results of experiments and gemology of the stones showed that the selected beads are agate and jasper, and they can be placed in the chalcedony group.

Keywords: Bam citadel, precious stones, semi-precious stones, Raman spectroscopy, scanning electron microscope.

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189 Tactical Urbanism and Sustainability: Tactical Experiences in the Promotion of Active Transportation

Authors: Aline Fernandes Barata, Adriana Sansão Fontes

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The overvaluation of the use of automobile has detrimentally affected the importance of pedestrians within the city and consequently its public spaces. As a way of treating contemporary urban paradigms, Tactical Urbanism aims to recover and activate spaces through fast and easily-applied actions that demonstrate the possibility of large-scale and long-term changes in cities. Tactical interventions have represented an important practice of redefining public spaces and urban mobility. The concept of Active Transportation coheres with the idea of sustainable urban mobility, characterizing the means of transportation through human propulsion, such as walking and cycling. This paper aims to debate the potential of Tactical Urbanism in promoting Active Transportation by revealing opportunities of transformation in the urban space of contemporary cities through initiatives that promote the protection and valorization of the presence of pedestrians and cyclists in cities, and that subvert the importance of motorized vehicles. In this paper, we present the character of these actions in two different ways: when they are used as tests for permanent interventions and when they have pre-defined start and end periods. Using recent initiatives to illustrate, we aim to discuss the role of small-scale actions in promoting and incentivizing a more active, healthy, sustainable and responsive urban way of life, presenting how some of them have developed through public policies. For that, we will present some examples of tactical actions that illustrate the encouragement of Active Transportation and trials to balance the urban opportunities for pedestrians and cyclists. These include temporary closure of streets, the creation of new alternatives and more comfortable areas for walking and cycling, and the subversion of uses in public spaces where the usage of cars are predominant.

Keywords: Tactical urbanism, active transportation, sustainable mobility, non-motorized means.

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188 Exploration of Influential Factors on First Year Architecture Students’ Productivity

Authors: Shima Nikanjam, Badiossadat Hassanpour, Adi Irfan Che Ani

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The design process in architecture education is based upon the Learning-by-Doing method, which leads students to understand how to design by practicing rather than studying. First-year design studios, as starting educational stage, provide integrated knowledge and skills of design for newly jointed architecture students. Within the basic design studio environment, students are guided to transfer their abstract thoughts into visual concrete decisions under the supervision of design educators for the first time. Therefore, introductory design studios have predominant impacts on students’ operational thinking and designing. Architectural design thinking is quite different from students’ educational backgrounds and learning habits. This educational challenge at basic design studios creates a severe need to study the reality of design education at foundation year and define appropriate educational methods with convenient project types with the intention of enhancing architecture education quality. Material for this study has been gathered through long-term direct observation at a first year second semester design studio at the faculty of architecture at EMU (known as FARC 102), fall and spring academic semester 2014-15. Distribution of a questionnaire among case study students and interviews with third and fourth design studio students who passed through the same methods of education in the past 2 years and conducting interviews with instructors are other methodologies used in this research. The results of this study reveal a risk of a mismatch between the implemented teaching method, project type and scale in this particular level and students’ learning styles. Although the existence of such risk due to varieties in students’ profiles could be expected to some extent, recommendations can support educators to reach maximum compatibility.

Keywords: Architecture education, basic design studio, educational method, forms creation skill.

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187 Food Security Model and the Role of Community Empowerment: The Case of a Marginalized Village in Mexico, Tatoxcac, Puebla

Authors: Marco Antonio Lara De la Calleja, María Catalina Ovando Chico, Eduardo Lopez Ruiz

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Community empowerment has been proved to be a key element in the solution of the food security problem. As a result of a conceptual analysis, it was found that agricultural production, economic development and governance, are the traditional basis of food security models. Although the literature points to social inclusion as an important factor for food security, no model has considered it as the basis of it. The aim of this research is to identify different dimensions that make an integral model for food security, with emphasis on community empowerment. A diagnosis was made in the study community (Tatoxcac, Zacapoaxtla, Puebla), to know the aspects that impact the level of food insecurity. With a statistical sample integrated by 200 families, the Latin American and Caribbean Food Security Scale (ELCSA) was applied, finding that: in households composed by adults and children, have moderated food insecurity, (ELCSA scale has three levels, low, moderated and high); that result is produced mainly by the economic income capacity and the diversity of the diet on its food. With that being said, a model was developed to promote food security through five dimensions: 1. Regional context of the community; 2. Structure and system of local food; 3. Health and nutrition; 4. Information and technology access; and 5. Self-awareness and empowerment. The specific actions on each axis of the model, allowed a systemic approach needed to attend food security in the community, through the empowerment of society. It is concluded that the self-awareness of local communities is an area of extreme importance, which must be taken into account for participatory schemes to improve food security. In the long term, the model requires the integrated participation of different actors, such as government, companies and universities, to solve something such vital as food security.

Keywords: Community empowerment, food security, model, systemic approach.

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186 Sea Level Characteristics Referenced to Specific Geodetic Datum in Alexandria, Egypt

Authors: Ahmed M. Khedr, Saad M. Abdelrahman, Kareem M. Tonbol

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Two geo-referenced sea level datasets (September 2008 – November 2010) and (April 2012 – January 2014) were recorded at Alexandria Western Harbour (AWH). Accurate re-definition of tidal datum, referred to the latest International Terrestrial Reference Frame (ITRF-2014), was discussed and updated to improve our understanding of the old predefined tidal datum at Alexandria. Tidal and non-tidal components of sea level were separated with the use of Delft-3D hydrodynamic model-tide suit (Delft-3D, 2015). Tidal characteristics at AWH were investigated and harmonic analysis showed the most significant 34 constituents with their amplitudes and phases. Tide was identified as semi-diurnal pattern as indicated by a “Form Factor” of 0.24 and 0.25, respectively. Principle tidal datums related to major tidal phenomena were recalculated referred to a meaningful geodetic height datum. The portion of residual energy (surge) out of the total sea level energy was computed for each dataset and found 77% and 72%, respectively. Power spectral density (PSD) showed accurate resolvability in high band (1–6) cycle/days for the nominated independent constituents, except some neighbouring constituents, which are too close in frequency. Wind and atmospheric pressure data, during the recorded sea level time, were analysed and cross-correlated with the surge signals. Moderate association between surge and wind and atmospheric pressure data were obtained. In addition, long-term sea level rise trend at AWH was computed and showed good agreement with earlier estimated rates.

Keywords: Alexandria, Delft-3D, Egypt, geodetic reference, harmonic analysis, sea level.

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185 An Estimation of Rice Output Supply Response in Sierra Leone: A Nerlovian Model Approach

Authors: Alhaji M. H. Conteh, Xiangbin Yan, Issa Fofana, Brima Gegbe, Tamba I. Isaac

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Rice grain is Sierra Leone’s staple food and the nation imports over 120,000 metric tons annually due to a shortfall in its cultivation. Thus, the insufficient level of the crop's cultivation in Sierra Leone is caused by many problems and this led to the endlessly widening supply and demand for the crop within the country. Consequently, this has instigated the government to spend huge money on the importation of this grain that would have been otherwise cultivated domestically at a cheaper cost. Hence, this research attempts to explore the response of rice supply with respect to its demand in Sierra Leone within the period 1980-2010. The Nerlovian adjustment model to the Sierra Leone rice data set within the period 1980-2010 was used. The estimated trend equations revealed that time had significant effect on output, productivity (yield) and area (acreage) of rice grain within the period 1980-2010 and this occurred generally at the 1% level of significance. The results showed that, almost the entire growth in output had the tendency to increase in the area cultivated to the crop. The time trend variable that was included for government policy intervention showed an insignificant effect on all the variables considered in this research. Therefore, both the short-run and long-run price response was inelastic since all their values were less than one. From the findings above, immediate actions that will lead to productivity growth in rice cultivation are required. To achieve the above, the responsible agencies should provide extension service schemes to farmers as well as motivating them on the adoption of modern rice varieties and technology in their rice cultivation ventures.

Keywords: Nerlovian adjustment model, price elasticities, Sierra Leone, Trend equations.

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184 Congolese Wood in the Antwerp Interwar Interior

Authors: M. Jaenen, M. de Bouw, A. Verdonck, M. Leus

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During the interwar period artificial materials were often preferred, but many Antwerp architects relied on the application of wood for most of the interior finishing works and furnishings. Archival, literature and on site research of interwar suburban townhouses and the Belgian wood and furniture industry gave a new insight to the application of wood in the interwar interior. Many interwar designers favored the decorative values in all treatments of wood because of its warmth, comfort, good-wearing, and therefore, economic qualities. For the creation of a successful modern interior the texture and surface of the wood becomes as important as the color itself. This aesthetics valuation was the result of the modernization of the wood industry. The development of veneer and plywood gave the possibility to create strong, flat, long and plain wooden surfaces which are capable of retaining their shape. Also the modernization of cutting machines resulted in high quality and diversity in texture of veneer. The flat and plain plywood surfaces were modern decorated with all kinds of veneer-sliced options. In addition, wood species from the former Belgian Colony Congo were imported. Limba (Terminalia superba), kambala (Chlorophora excelsa), mubala (Pentaclethra macrophylla) and sapelli (Entandrophragma cylindricum) were used in the interior of many Antwerp interwar suburban town houses. From the thirties onwards Belgian wood firms established modern manufactures in Congo. There the local wood was dried, cut and prepared for exportation to the harbor of Antwerp. The presence of all kinds of strong and decorative Congolese wood products supported its application in the interwar interior design. The Antwerp architects combined them in their designs for doors, floors, stairs, built-in-furniture, wall paneling and movable furniture.

Keywords: Antwerp, Congo, furniture, interwar.

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183 Artificial Intelligent in Optimization of Steel Moment Frame Structures: A Review

Authors: Mohsen Soori, Fooad Karimi Ghaleh Jough

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The integration of Artificial Intelligence (AI) techniques in the optimization of steel moment frame structures represents a transformative approach to enhance the design, analysis, and performance of these critical engineering systems. The review encompasses a wide spectrum of AI methods, including machine learning algorithms, evolutionary algorithms, neural networks, and optimization techniques, applied to address various challenges in the field. The synthesis of research findings highlights the interdisciplinary nature of AI applications in structural engineering, emphasizing the synergy between domain expertise and advanced computational methodologies. This synthesis aims to serve as a valuable resource for researchers, practitioners, and policymakers seeking a comprehensive understanding of the state-of-the-art in AI-driven optimization for steel moment frame structures. The paper commences with an overview of the fundamental principles governing steel moment frame structures and identifies the key optimization objectives, such as efficiency of structures. Subsequently, it delves into the application of AI in the conceptual design phase, where algorithms aid in generating innovative structural configurations and optimizing material utilization. The review also explores the use of AI for real-time structural health monitoring and predictive maintenance, contributing to the long-term sustainability and reliability of steel moment frame structures. Furthermore, the paper investigates how AI-driven algorithms facilitate the calibration of structural models, enabling accurate prediction of dynamic responses and seismic performance. Thus, by reviewing and analyzing the recent achievements in applications artificial intelligent in optimization of steel moment frame structures, the process of designing, analysis, and performance of the structures can be analyzed and modified.

Keywords: Artificial Intelligent, optimization process, steel moment frame, structural engineering.

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182 Integration of Big Data to Predict Transportation for Smart Cities

Authors: Sun-Young Jang, Sung-Ah Kim, Dongyoun Shin

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The Intelligent transportation system is essential to build smarter cities. Machine learning based transportation prediction could be highly promising approach by delivering invisible aspect visible. In this context, this research aims to make a prototype model that predicts transportation network by using big data and machine learning technology. In detail, among urban transportation systems this research chooses bus system.  The research problem that existing headway model cannot response dynamic transportation conditions. Thus, bus delay problem is often occurred. To overcome this problem, a prediction model is presented to fine patterns of bus delay by using a machine learning implementing the following data sets; traffics, weathers, and bus statues. This research presents a flexible headway model to predict bus delay and analyze the result. The prototyping model is composed by real-time data of buses. The data are gathered through public data portals and real time Application Program Interface (API) by the government. These data are fundamental resources to organize interval pattern models of bus operations as traffic environment factors (road speeds, station conditions, weathers, and bus information of operating in real-time). The prototyping model is designed by the machine learning tool (RapidMiner Studio) and conducted tests for bus delays prediction. This research presents experiments to increase prediction accuracy for bus headway by analyzing the urban big data. The big data analysis is important to predict the future and to find correlations by processing huge amount of data. Therefore, based on the analysis method, this research represents an effective use of the machine learning and urban big data to understand urban dynamics.

Keywords: Big data, bus headway prediction, machine learning, public transportation.

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181 Investment Trend Analysis of Dhaka Stock Exchange: A Comparative Study

Authors: Azaz Zaman, Mirazur Rahman

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Capital market is a crucial financial market place where companies and the government can raise long-term funds and, at the same time, investors get the opportunity to invest in the listed companies. Capital markets play a vital role not only in shifting the funds from surplus entity to deficit for investment, but also in the overall economic development of any developing country like Bangladesh. Being the first and biggest capital market of Bangladesh, Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE) is the prime bourse of the country. The differences in the investment preference— among three broad categories of investors in DSE including individual investors, institutional investors, and government— are easily observed. Authors of this article have used five categories of investors such as sponsors or directors of the company, institutional investors, foreign investors, government, and the general public in order to present a comparative analysis of their investment patterns. Obtaining data on the percentage of investment by these five types of investors in different sectors from the DSE website, this study aims to analyze the sector-wise investment preference of these investors using August 2018 data. The study has found that the sponsors or directors of the company have the highest percentage of investment in the textile industry which is close to 16%. The Bangladesh government, as an investor, has the highest percentage of investment in the fuel & power sector, approximately 32%. It has also found that the mutual funds' sector is mostly financed by institutional investors, nearly 28%. Foreign investors have their most investments in the banking sector, which is close to 22%. It has also revealed that the textile sector is mostly financed by the general public, close to 17%. Nevertheless, general public, surprisingly, has the lowest percentage of investment in the telecommunication sector, which is 0.10%.

Keywords: Stock market investment, Dhaka stock exchange, capital market, Bangladesh.

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180 Climate Change and Its Impacts: The Case of Coastal Fishing Communities of the Meghna River in South-Central Bangladesh

Authors: Md. Royhanur Islam, Thomas Cansse, Md. Sahidul Islam, Atiqur Rahman Sunny

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The geographical location of Bangladesh makes it one of the most vulnerable countries to climate change. Climate-induced phenomena mainly affect the south-central region of Bangladesh (Laxmipur district) where they have begun to occur more frequently. The aim of the study was to identify the hydro-climatic factors that lead to weather-related disasters in the coastal areas and analyse the consequences of these factors on coastal livelihoods, with possible adaptation options using participatory rural appraisal (PRA) tools. The present study showed several disasters such as land erosion, depressions and cyclones, coastal flooding, storm surge, and precipitation. The frequency of these disasters is of a noticeable rate. Surveys have also discovered that land erosion is ongoing. Tidal water is being introduced directly into the mainland, and as a result of the salt intrusion, production capacity is declining. The coastal belt is an important area for fishing activities, but due to changed fishing times and a lack of Alternative Income Generating Activities (AIGAs), people have been forced to search for alternative livelihood options by taking both short-term and long-term adaptation options. Therefore, in order to increase awareness and minimize the losses, vulnerable communities must be fully incorporated into disaster response strategies. The government as well as national and international donor organizations should come forward and resolve the present situation of these vulnerable groups since otherwise, they will have to endure endless and miserable suffering due to the effects of climate change ahead in their lives.

Keywords: Adaptation, community, fishery development, livelihood.

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179 Adapting Tools for Text Monitoring and for Scenario Analysis Related to the Field of Social Disasters

Authors: Svetlana Cojocaru, Mircea Petic, Inga Titchiev

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Humanity faces more and more often with different social disasters, which in turn can generate new accidents and catastrophes. To mitigate their consequences, it is important to obtain early possible signals about the events which are or can occur and to prepare the corresponding scenarios that could be applied. Our research is focused on solving two problems in this domain: identifying signals related that an accident occurred or may occur and mitigation of some consequences of disasters. To solve the first problem, methods of selecting and processing texts from global network Internet are developed. Information in Romanian is of special interest for us. In order to obtain the mentioned tools, we should follow several steps, divided into preparatory stage and processing stage. Throughout the first stage, we manually collected over 724 news articles and classified them into 10 categories of social disasters. It constitutes more than 150 thousand words. Using this information, a controlled vocabulary of more than 300 keywords was elaborated, that will help in the process of classification and identification of the texts related to the field of social disasters. To solve the second problem, the formalism of Petri net has been used. We deal with the problem of inhabitants’ evacuation in useful time. The analysis methods such as reachability or coverability tree and invariants technique to determine dynamic properties of the modeled systems will be used. To perform a case study of properties of extended evacuation system by adding time, the analysis modules of PIPE such as Generalized Stochastic Petri Nets (GSPN) Analysis, Simulation, State Space Analysis, and Invariant Analysis have been used. These modules helped us to obtain the average number of persons situated in the rooms and the other quantitative properties and characteristics related to its dynamics.

Keywords: Lexicon of disasters, modelling, Petri nets, text annotation, social disasters.

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178 Potential Climate Change Impacts on the Hydrological System of the Harvey River Catchment

Authors: Hashim Isam Jameel Al-Safi, P. Ranjan Sarukkalige

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Climate change is likely to impact the Australian continent by changing the trends of rainfall, increasing temperature, and affecting the accessibility of water quantity and quality. This study investigates the possible impacts of future climate change on the hydrological system of the Harvey River catchment in Western Australia by using the conceptual modelling approach (HBV mode). Daily observations of rainfall and temperature and the long-term monthly mean potential evapotranspiration, from six weather stations, were available for the period (1961-2015). The observed streamflow data at Clifton Park gauging station for 33 years (1983-2015) in line with the observed climate variables were used to run, calibrate and validate the HBV-model prior to the simulation process. The calibrated model was then forced with the downscaled future climate signals from a multi-model ensemble of fifteen GCMs of the CMIP3 model under three emission scenarios (A2, A1B and B1) to simulate the future runoff at the catchment outlet. Two periods were selected to represent the future climate conditions including the mid (2046-2065) and late (2080-2099) of the 21st century. A control run, with the reference climate period (1981-2000), was used to represent the current climate status. The modelling outcomes show an evident reduction in the mean annual streamflow during the mid of this century particularly for the A1B scenario relative to the control run. Toward the end of the century, all scenarios show a relatively high reduction trends in the mean annual streamflow, especially the A1B scenario, compared to the control run. The decline in the mean annual streamflow ranged between 4-15% during the mid of the current century and 9-42% by the end of the century.

Keywords: Climate change impact, Harvey catchment, HBV model, hydrological modelling, GCMs, LARS-WG, Australia.

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