Search results for: Multiple Criteria Decision Making Analysis
Commenced in January 2007
Frequency: Monthly
Edition: International
Paper Count: 11393

Search results for: Multiple Criteria Decision Making Analysis

7043 Effect of adding Supercritical Carbon Dioxide Extracts of Cinnamomum tamala (Bay Leaf) on Nutraceutical Property of Tofu

Authors: Sudip Ghosh, Probir Kumar Ghosh, Paramita Bhattacharjee

Abstract:

Supercritical carbon dioxide extracts of Cinnamomum tamala (bay) leaves obtained at 55°C, 512 bar was found to have appreciable nutraceutical properties and was successfully employed as value-added ingredients in preparation of tofu. The bay leaf formulated tofu sample was evaluated for physicochemical properties (pH, texture analysis and lipid peroxidation), proximate analysis, phytochemical properties (total phenol content, antioxidant properties and total reducing sugar), microbial load and sensory profile analysis for a storage period of ten days, vis-à-vis an experimental control sample. These assays established the superiority of the tofu sample formulated with supercritical carbon dioxide extract of bay leaf over the control sample. Bay leaf extract formulated tofu is a new green functional food with promising nutraceutical benefits. 

Keywords: Cinnamomum tamala, Physicochemical properties Phytochemical properties, Supercritical carbon dioxide extraction, Tofu.

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7042 Sensitivity Analysis of the Heat Exchanger Design in Net Power Oxy-Combustion Cycle for Carbon Capture

Authors: Hirbod Varasteh, Hamidreza Gohari Darabkhani

Abstract:

The global warming and its impact on climate change is one of main challenges for current century. Global warming is mainly due to the emission of greenhouse gases (GHG) and carbon dioxide (CO2) is known to be the major contributor to the GHG emission profile. Whilst the energy sector is the primary source for CO2 emission, Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) are believed to be the solution for controlling this emission. Oxyfuel combustion (Oxy-combustion) is one of the major technologies for capturing CO2 from power plants. For gas turbines, several Oxy-combustion power cycles (Oxyturbine cycles) have been investigated by means of thermodynamic analysis. NetPower cycle is one of the leading oxyturbine power cycles with almost full carbon capture capability from a natural gas fired power plant. In this manuscript, sensitivity analysis of the heat exchanger design in NetPower cycle is completed by means of process modelling. The heat capacity variation and supercritical CO2 with gaseous admixtures are considered for multi-zone analysis with Aspen Plus software. It is found that the heat exchanger design has a major role to increase the efficiency of NetPower cycle. The pinch-point analysis is done to extract the composite and grand composite curve for the heat exchanger. In this paper, relationship between the cycle efficiency and the minimum approach temperature (∆Tmin) of the heat exchanger has also been evaluated.  Increase in ∆Tmin causes a decrease in the temperature of the recycle flue gases (RFG) and an overall decrease in the required power for the recycled gas compressor. The main challenge in the design of heat exchangers in power plants is a tradeoff between the capital and operational costs. To achieve lower ∆Tmin, larger size of heat exchanger is required. This means a higher capital cost but leading to a better heat recovery and lower operational cost. To achieve this, ∆Tmin is selected from the minimum point in the diagrams of capital and operational costs. This study provides an insight into the NetPower Oxy-combustion cycle’s performance analysis and operational condition based on its heat exchanger design.

Keywords: Carbon capture and storage, oxy-combustion, netpower cycle, oxyturbine power cycles, heat exchanger design, supercritical carbon dioxide, pinch point analysis.

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7041 Local Stability Analysis of Age Structural Model for Herpes Zoster in Thailand

Authors: P. Pongsumpun

Abstract:

Herpes zoster is a disease that manifests as a dermatological condition. The characteristic of this disease is an irritating skin rash with blisters. This is often limited to one side of body. From the data of Herpes zoster cases in Thailand, we found that age structure effects to the transmission of this disease. In this study, we construct the age structural model of Herpes zoster in Thailand. The local stability analysis of this model is given. The numerical solutions are shown to confirm the analytical results.

Keywords: Age structural model, Herpes zoster, local stability, Numerical solution.

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7040 Amplitude and Phase Analysis of EEG Signal by Complex Demodulation

Authors: Sun K. Yoo, Hee Cheol Kang

Abstract:

Analysis of amplitude and phase characteristics for delta, theta, and alpha bands at localized time instant from EEG signals is important for the characterizing information processing in the brain. In this paper, complex demodulation method was used to analyze EEG (Electroencephalographic) signal, particularly for auditory evoked potential response signal, with sufficient time resolution and designated frequency bandwidth resolution required. The complex demodulation decomposes raw EEG signal into 3 designated delta, theta, and alpha bands with complex EEG signal representation at sampled time instant, which can enable the extraction of amplitude envelope and phase information. Throughout simulated test data, and real EEG signal acquired during auditory attention task, it can extract the phase offset, phase and frequency changing instant and decomposed amplitude envelope for delta, theta, and alpha bands. The complex demodulation technique can be efficiently used in brain signal analysis in case of phase, and amplitude information required.

Keywords: EEG, Complex Demodulation, Amplitude, Phase.

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7039 Evaluation of Droplet Sizes from Video Images for Metal Working Fluids

Authors: R. Hacıoğlu, A. Genç, B. Bakırcı

Abstract:

Metal working fluids were used in the preparation of oil in water emulsions. The size of oil droplets were evaluated by using the analysis of video images taken from the zeta potential measurements. The evaluated size distributions for emulsions were also tested by microscopic analysis. In addition, emulsion stabilities were discussed depending on electrolyte concentration and pH. The results showed that the stability of oil emulsions was strongly related to pH and the concentration of CaCl2. However, the same dependency was not observed for NaCl.

Keywords: Droplet size distribution, emulsion stability, o/w emulsions, video images.

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7038 Analysis for MHD Flow of a Maxwell Fluid past a Vertical Stretching Sheet in the Presence of Thermophoresis and Chemical Reaction

Authors: Noor Fadiya Mohd Noor

Abstract:

The hydromagnetic flow of a Maxwell fluid past a vertical stretching sheet with thermophoresis is considered. The impact of chemical reaction species to the flow is analyzed for the first time by using the homotopy analysis method (HAM). The h-curves for the flow boundary layer equations are presented graphically. Several values of wall skin friction, heat and mass transfer are obtained and discussed.

Keywords: homotopy, MHD, thermophoresis, chemical reaction, Maxwell

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7037 Analysis of Synchronous Machine Excitation Systems: Comparative Study

Authors: Shewit Tsegaye, Kinde A. Fante

Abstract:

This paper presents the comparison and performance evaluation of synchronous machine excitation models. The two models, DC1A and AC4A, are among the IEEE standardized model structures for representing the wide variety of synchronous machine excitation systems. The performance evaluation of these models is done using SIMULINK simulation software. The simulation results obtained using transient analysis show that the DC1A excitation system is more reliable and stable than AC4A excitation system.

Keywords: Excitation system, synchronous machines, AC and DC regulators.

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7036 Effects of Process Parameters on the Yield of Oil from Coconut Fruit

Authors: Ndidi F. Amulu, Godian O. Mbah, Maxwel I. Onyiah, Callistus N. Ude

Abstract:

Analysis of the properties of coconut (Cocos nucifera) and its oil was evaluated in this work using standard analytical techniques. The analyses carried out include proximate composition of the fruit, extraction of oil from the fruit using different process parameters and physicochemical analysis of the extracted oil. The results showed the percentage (%) moisture, crude lipid, crude protein, ash and carbohydrate content of the coconut as 7.59, 55.15, 5.65, 7.35 and 19.51 respectively. The oil from the coconut fruit was odourless and yellowish liquid at room temperature (30oC). The treatment combinations used (leaching time, leaching temperature and solute: solvent ratio) showed significant differences (P<0.05) in the yield of oil from coconut flour. The oil yield ranged between 36.25%-49.83%. Lipid indices of the coconut oil indicated the acid value (AV) as 10.05Na0H/g of oil, free fatty acid (FFA) as 5.03%, saponification values (SV) as 183.26mgKOH-1g of oil, iodine value (IV) as 81.00 I2/g of oil, peroxide value (PV) as 5.00 ml/ g of oil and viscosity (V) as 0.002. A standard statistical package minitab version 16.0 program was used in the regression analysis and analysis of variance (ANOVA). The statistical software mentioned above was also used to generate various plots such as single effect plot, interactions effect plot and contour plot. The response or yield of oil from the coconut flour was used to develop a mathematical model that correlates the yield to the process variables studied. The maximum conditions obtained that gave the highest yield of coconut oil were leaching time of 2hrs, leaching temperature of 50oC and solute/solvent ratio of 0.05g/ml.

Keywords: Coconut, oil-extraction, optimization, physicochemical, proximate.

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7035 Development of Mobile Application Social Guidance and Counseling for Junior High School

Authors: Suyoto, Tri Prasetyaningrum

Abstract:

At this paper, we will present the development of mobile application Social Guidance and Counseling (GC) that called “m-NingBK: Social GC”. The application is used for GC services that run on mobile devices. The application is designed specifically for Junior High School student. The methods are a combination of interactive multimedia approaches and educational psychology. Therefore, the design process is carried out three processes, which are digitizing of material social GC services, visualizing wisely and making interactive. This method is intended to make students not only hear and see but also "do" the virtual. There are five components used in multimedia applications "m-NingBK: Social GC" i.e. text, images / graphics, audio / sound, animation and video. Four menus provided by this application is the potential self, social, Expert System and about. The application is built using the Java programming language. This application was tested using a Smartphone with Android Operating System. Based on the test, people give rating: 16.7% excellent, 61.1% good, 19.4% adequate, and 2.8% poor.

Keywords: Expert Systems, Guidance and Counseling, mobile application, multimedia.

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7034 Array Signal Processing: DOA Estimation for Missing Sensors

Authors: Lalita Gupta, R. P. Singh

Abstract:

Array signal processing involves signal enumeration and source localization. Array signal processing is centered on the ability to fuse temporal and spatial information captured via sampling signals emitted from a number of sources at the sensors of an array in order to carry out a specific estimation task: source characteristics (mainly localization of the sources) and/or array characteristics (mainly array geometry) estimation. Array signal processing is a part of signal processing that uses sensors organized in patterns or arrays, to detect signals and to determine information about them. Beamforming is a general signal processing technique used to control the directionality of the reception or transmission of a signal. Using Beamforming we can direct the majority of signal energy we receive from a group of array. Multiple signal classification (MUSIC) is a highly popular eigenstructure-based estimation method of direction of arrival (DOA) with high resolution. This Paper enumerates the effect of missing sensors in DOA estimation. The accuracy of the MUSIC-based DOA estimation is degraded significantly both by the effects of the missing sensors among the receiving array elements and the unequal channel gain and phase errors of the receiver.

Keywords: Array Signal Processing, Beamforming, ULA, Direction of Arrival, MUSIC

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7033 Nonlinearity and Spectrum Analysis of Drill Strings with Component Mass Unbalance

Authors: F. Abdul Majeed, H. Karki, Y. Abdel Magid, M. Karkoub

Abstract:

This paper analyses the non linear properties exhibited by a drill string system under various un balanced mass conditions. The drill string is affected by continuous friction in the form of drill bit and well bore hole interactions. This paper proves the origin of limit cycling and increase of non linearity with increase in speed of the drilling in the presence of friction. The spectrum of the frequency response is also studied to detect the presence of vibration abnormalities arising during the drilling process.

Keywords: Drill strings, Nonlinear, Spectrum analysis, Unbalanced mass

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7032 Analysis of DNA from Fired Cartridge Casings

Authors: S. Mawlood, L. Dennany, N. Watson, B. Pickard

Abstract:

DNA analysis has been widely accepted as providing valuable evidence concerning the identity of the source of biological traces. Our work has showed that DNA samples can survive on cartridges even after firing. The study also raised the possibility of determining other information such as the age of the donor. Such information may be invaluable in certain cases where spent cartridges from automatic weapons are left behind at the scene of a crime. In spite of the nature of touch evidence and exposure to high chamber temperatures during shooting, we were still capable to retrieve enough DNA for profile typing. In order to estimate age of contributor, DNA methylation levels were analyzed using EpiTect system for retrieved DNA. However, results were not conclusive, due to low amount of input DNA.

Keywords: Age prediction, Fired cartridge, Trace DNA sample.

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7031 Dynamic Analyze of Snake Robot

Authors: Seif Dalilsafaei

Abstract:

Crawling movement as a motive mode seen in nature of some animals such as snakes possesses a specific syntactic and dynamic analysis. Serpentine robot designed by inspiration from nature and snake-s crawling motion, is regarded as a crawling robot. In this paper, a serpentine robot with spiral motion model will be analyzed. The purpose of this analysis is to calculate the vertical and tangential forces along snake-s body and to determine the parameters affecting on these forces. Two types of serpentine robots have been designed in order to examine the achieved relations explained below.

Keywords: Force, Dynamic analyze, Joint and Snake robot.

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7030 Multiple Job Shop-Scheduling using Hybrid Heuristic Algorithm

Authors: R.A.Mahdavinejad

Abstract:

In this paper, multi-processors job shop scheduling problems are solved by a heuristic algorithm based on the hybrid of priority dispatching rules according to an ant colony optimization algorithm. The objective function is to minimize the makespan, i.e. total completion time, in which a simultanous presence of various kinds of ferons is allowed. By using the suitable hybrid of priority dispatching rules, the process of finding the best solution will be improved. Ant colony optimization algorithm, not only promote the ability of this proposed algorithm, but also decreases the total working time because of decreasing in setup times and modifying the working production line. Thus, the similar work has the same production lines. Other advantage of this algorithm is that the similar machines (not the same) can be considered. So, these machines are able to process a job with different processing and setup times. According to this capability and from this algorithm evaluation point of view, a number of test problems are solved and the associated results are analyzed. The results show a significant decrease in throughput time. It also shows that, this algorithm is able to recognize the bottleneck machine and to schedule jobs in an efficient way.

Keywords: Job shops scheduling, Priority dispatching rules, Makespan, Hybrid heuristic algorithm.

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7029 Spatial-Temporal Clustering Characteristics of Dengue in the Northern Region of Sri Lanka, 2010-2013

Authors: Sumiko Anno, Keiji Imaoka, Takeo Tadono, Tamotsu Igarashi, Subramaniam Sivaganesh, Selvam Kannathasan, Vaithehi Kumaran, Sinnathamby Noble Surendran

Abstract:

Dengue outbreaks are affected by biological, ecological, socio-economic and demographic factors that vary over time and space. These factors have been examined separately and still require systematic clarification. The present study aimed to investigate the spatial-temporal clustering relationships between these factors and dengue outbreaks in the northern region of Sri Lanka. Remote sensing (RS) data gathered from a plurality of satellites were used to develop an index comprising rainfall, humidity and temperature data. RS data gathered by ALOS/AVNIR-2 were used to detect urbanization, and a digital land cover map was used to extract land cover information. Other data on relevant factors and dengue outbreaks were collected through institutions and extant databases. The analyzed RS data and databases were integrated into geographic information systems, enabling temporal analysis, spatial statistical analysis and space-time clustering analysis. Our present results showed that increases in the number of the combination of ecological factor and socio-economic and demographic factors with above the average or the presence contribute to significantly high rates of space-time dengue clusters.

Keywords: ALOS/AVNIR-2, Dengue, Space-time clustering analysis, Sri Lanka.

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7028 Accurate Time Domain Method for Simulation of Microstructured Electromagnetic and Photonic Structures

Authors: Vijay Janyani, Trevor M. Benson, Ana Vukovic

Abstract:

A time-domain numerical model within the framework of transmission line modeling (TLM) is developed to simulate electromagnetic pulse propagation inside multiple microcavities forming photonic crystal (PhC) structures. The model developed is quite general and is capable of simulating complex electromagnetic problems accurately. The field quantities can be mapped onto a passive electrical circuit equivalent what ensures that TLM is provably stable and conservative at a local level. Furthermore, the circuit representation allows a high level of hybridization of TLM with other techniques and lumped circuit models of components and devices. A photonic crystal structure formed by rods (or blocks) of high-permittivity dieletric material embedded in a low-dielectric background medium is simulated as an example. The model developed gives vital spatio-temporal information about the signal, and also gives spectral information over a wide frequency range in a single run. The model has wide applications in microwave communication systems, optical waveguides and electromagnetic materials simulations.

Keywords: Computational Electromagnetics, Numerical Simulation, Transmission Line Modeling.

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7027 Geochemical Study of Natural Bitumen, Condensate and Gas Seeps from Sousse Area, Central Tunisia

Authors: A. Belhaj Mohamed, M. Saidi, N. Boucherb, N. Ourtani, A. Soltani, I. Bouazizi, M. Ben Jrad

Abstract:

Natural hydrocarbon seepage has helped petroleum exploration as a direct indicator of gas and/or oil subsurface accumulations. Surface macro-seeps are generally an indication of a fault in an active Petroleum Seepage System belonging to a Total Petroleum System. This paper describes a case study in which multiple analytical techniques were used to identify and characterize trace petroleum-related hydrocarbons and other volatile organic compounds in groundwater samples collected from Sousse aquifer (Central Tunisia). The analytical techniques used for analyses of water samples included gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GCMS), capillary GC with flame-ionization detection, Compound Specific Isotope Analysis, Rock Eval Pyrolysis. The objective of the study was to confirm the presence of gasoline and other petroleum products or other volatile organic pollutants in those samples in order to assess the respective implication of each of the potentially responsible parties to the contamination of the aquifer. In addition, the degree of contamination at different depths in the aquifer was also of interest. The oil and gas seeps have been investigated using biomarker and stable carbon isotope analyses to perform oil-oil and oil-source rock correlations. The seepage gases are characterized by high CH4 content, very low δ13CCH4 values (-71,9 ‰) and high C1/C1–5 ratios (0.95–1.0), light deuterium–hydrogen isotope ratios (- 198 ‰) and light δ13CC2 and δ13CCO2 values (-23,8‰ and-23,8‰ respectively) indicating a thermogenic origin with the contribution of the biogenic gas. An organic geochemistry study was carried out on the more ten oil seep samples. This study includes light hydrocarbon and biomarkers analyses (hopanes, steranes, n-alkanes, acyclic isoprenoids, and aromatic steroids) using GC and GC-MS. The studied samples show at least two distinct families, suggesting two different types of crude oil origins: the first oil seeps appears to be highly mature, showing evidence of chemical and/or biological degradation and was derived from a clay-rich source rock deposited in suboxic conditions. It has been sourced mainly by the lower Fahdene (Albian) source rocks. The second oil seeps was derived from a carbonate-rich source rock deposited in anoxic conditions, well correlated with the Bahloul (Cenomanian-Turonian) source rock.

Keywords: Biomarkers, oil and gas seeps, organic geochemistry, source rock.

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7026 Improved Neutron Leakage Treatment on Nodal Expansion Method for PWR Reactors

Authors: Antonio Carlos Marques Alvim, Fernando Carvalho da Silva, Aquilino Senra Martinez

Abstract:

For a quick and accurate calculation of spatial neutron distribution in nuclear power reactors 3D nodal codes are usually used aiming at solving the neutron diffusion equation for a given reactor core geometry and material composition. These codes use a second order polynomial to represent the transverse leakage term. In this work, a nodal method based on the well known nodal expansion method (NEM), developed at COPPE, making use of this polynomial expansion was modified to treat the transverse leakage term for the external surfaces of peripheral reflector nodes. The proposed method was implemented into a computational system which, besides solving the diffusion equation, also solves the burnup equations governing the gradual changes in material compositions of the core due to fuel depletion. Results confirm the effectiveness of this modified treatment of peripheral nodes for practical purposes in PWR reactors.

Keywords: Transverse leakage, nodal expansion method, power density, PWR reactors

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7025 Pushover Analysis of Reinforced Concrete Buildings Using Full Jacket Technics: A Case Study on an Existing Old Building in Madinah

Authors: Tarek M. Alguhane, Ayman H. Khalil, M. N. Fayed, Ayman M. Ismail

Abstract:

The retrofitting of existing buildings to resist the seismic loads is very important to avoid losing lives or financial disasters. The aim at retrofitting processes is increasing total structure strength by increasing stiffness or ductility ratio. In addition, the response modification factors (R) have to satisfy the code requirements for suggested retrofitting types. In this study, two types of jackets are used, i.e. full reinforced concrete jackets and surrounding steel plate jackets. The study is carried out on an existing building in Madinah by performing static pushover analysis before and after retrofitting the columns. The selected model building represents nearly all-typical structure lacks structure built before 30 years ago in Madina City, KSA. The comparison of the results indicates a good enhancement of the structure respect to the applied seismic forces. Also, the response modification factor of the RC building is evaluated for the studied cases before and after retrofitting. The design of all vertical elements (columns) is given. The results show that the design of retrofitted columns satisfied the code's design stress requirements. However, for some retrofitting types, the ductility requirements represented by response modification factor do not satisfy KSA design code (SBC- 301).

Keywords: Concrete jackets, steel jackets, RC buildings pushover analysis, non-linear analysis.

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7024 Iron Recovery from Red Mud as Zero-Valent Iron Metal Powder Using Direct Electrochemical Reduction Method

Authors: Franky Michael Hamonangan Siagian, Affan Maulana, Himawan Tri Bayu Murti Petrus, Panut Mulyono, Widi Astuti

Abstract:

In this study, the feasibility of the direct electrowinning method was used to produce zero-valent iron from red mud. The red mud sample came from the Tayan mine, Indonesia, which contains high hematite (Fe2O3). Before electrolysis, the samples were characterized by various analytical techniques (ICP-AES, SEM, XRD) to determine their chemical composition and mineralogy. The direct electrowinning method of red mud suspended in NaOH was introduced at low temperatures ranging from 30-110 °C. Current density and temperature variations were carried out to determine the optimum operation of the direct electrowinning process. Cathode deposits and residues in electrochemical cells were analyzed using XRD, XRF, and SEM to determine the chemical composition and current recovery. The low-temperature electrolysis current efficiency on Redmud can reach 11.8% recovery at a current density of 796 A/m². The moderate performance of the process was investigated with red mud, which was attributed to the troublesome adsorption of red mud particles on the cathode, making the reduction far less efficient than that with hematite.

Keywords: Alumina, electrochemical reduction, iron production, red mud.

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7023 Life Experiences are Important Factors of Making Stronger SOC (Sense of Coherence) on the Workers in Tsukuba Research Park City (TRPC)

Authors: Shinichiro Sasahara, Yusuke Tomotsune, Yuichi Ohi, Shun Suzuki, Akihiro Seki, Junko Sakano, Yoshihiko Yamazaki, Ichiyo Matsuzaki

Abstract:

Via a large scale cross-sectional study among Japanese white color workers, the authors aimed to elucidate: (1) the distributions of Sense of Coherence (SOC), which reflect stress coping abilities, (2) the distributions of Life experience; (3) and the association between SOC and Life experience. Anonymous self-administered questionnaires were sent to 15,891 in 2001 and 21,922 in 2011 employees at educational and research institutions in Tsukuba Research Park City. A total of 5,868 (36.9%) and 9,528 (43.5%) respectively workers completed and returned the questionnaire; 5,715 and 9,515 respectively workers without missing data were analyzed. SOC scale scores differed by gender, age, and other demographic features in both study years. Among the life experiences, workers who have got over parenting or management position were higher SOC scale scores adjusted by gender and age. The life experiences that workers have got over could develop their stronger SOC in their life course.

Keywords: field study, life experience, mental health, SOC (sense of coherence)

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7022 Negative Impact of Bacteria Legionella Pneumophila in Hot Water Distribution Systems on Human Health

Authors: Daniela Ocipova, Zuzana Vranayova, Ondrej Sikula

Abstract:

Safe drinking water is one of the biggest issues facing the planet this century. The primary aim of this paper is to present our research focused on theoretical and experimental analysis of potable water and in-building water distribution systems from the point of view of microbiological risk on the basis of confrontation between the theoretical analysis and synthesis of gathered information in conditions of the Slovak Republic. The presence of the bacteria Legionella in water systems, especially in hot water distribution system, represents in terms of health protection of inhabitants the crucial problem which cannot be overlooked. Legionella pneumophila discovery, its classification and its influence on installations inside buildings are relatively new. There are a lot of guidelines and regulations developed in many individual countries for the design, operation and maintenance for tap water systems to avoid the growth of bacteria Legionella pneumophila, but in Slovakia we don-t have any. The goal of this paper is to show the necessity of prevention and regulations for installations inside buildings verified by simulation methods.

Keywords: Legionella pneumophila, water temperature, distribution system, risk analysis, simulations.

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7021 Neural Network Based Determination of Splice Junctions by ROC Analysis

Authors: S. Makal, L. Ozyilmaz, S. Palavaroglu

Abstract:

Gene, principal unit of inheritance, is an ordered sequence of nucleotides. The genes of eukaryotic organisms include alternating segments of exons and introns. The region of Deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) within a gene containing instructions for coding a protein is called exon. On the other hand, non-coding regions called introns are another part of DNA that regulates gene expression by removing from the messenger Ribonucleic acid (RNA) in a splicing process. This paper proposes to determine splice junctions that are exon-intron boundaries by analyzing DNA sequences. A splice junction can be either exon-intron (EI) or intron exon (IE). Because of the popularity and compatibility of the artificial neural network (ANN) in genetic fields; various ANN models are applied in this research. Multi-layer Perceptron (MLP), Radial Basis Function (RBF) and Generalized Regression Neural Networks (GRNN) are used to analyze and detect the splice junctions of gene sequences. 10-fold cross validation is used to demonstrate the accuracy of networks. The real performances of these networks are found by applying Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) analysis.

Keywords: Gene, neural networks, ROC analysis, splice junctions.

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7020 NGN and WiMAX: Putting the Pieces Together

Authors: Mohamed K. Watfa, Khaled Abdel Naby, Chetan Govind Bhatia

Abstract:

With the exponential rise in the number of multimedia applications available, the best-effort service provided by the Internet today is insufficient. Researchers have been working on new architectures like the Next Generation Network (NGN) which, by definition, will ensure Quality of Service (QoS) in an all-IP based network [1]. For this approach to become a reality, reservation of bandwidth is required per application per user. WiMAX (Worldwide Interoperability for Microwave Access) is a wireless communication technology which has predefined levels of QoS which can be provided to the user [4]. IPv6 has been created as the successor for IPv4 and resolves issues like the availability of IP addresses and QoS. This paper provides a design to use the power of WiMAX as an NSP (Network Service Provider) for NGN using IPv6. The use of the Traffic Class (TC) field and the Flow Label (FL) field of IPv6 has been explained for making QoS requests and grants [6], [7]. Using these fields, the processing time is reduced and routing is simplified. Also, we define the functioning of the ASN gateway and the NGN gateway (NGNG) which are edge node interfaces in the NGNWiMAX design. These gateways ensure QoS management through built in functions and by certain physical resources and networking capabilities.

Keywords: WiMAX, NGN, QoS, IPv6, Flow Label, ASNGateway

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7019 Leveraging Quality Metrics in Voting Model Based Thread Retrieval

Authors: Atefeh Heydari, Mohammadali Tavakoli, Zuriati Ismail, Naomie Salim

Abstract:

Seeking and sharing knowledge on online forums have made them popular in recent years. Although online forums are valuable sources of information, due to variety of sources of messages, retrieving reliable threads with high quality content is an issue. Majority of the existing information retrieval systems ignore the quality of retrieved documents, particularly, in the field of thread retrieval. In this research, we present an approach that employs various quality features in order to investigate the quality of retrieved threads. Different aspects of content quality, including completeness, comprehensiveness, and politeness, are assessed using these features, which lead to finding not only textual, but also conceptual relevant threads for a user query within a forum. To analyse the influence of the features, we used an adopted version of voting model thread search as a retrieval system. We equipped it with each feature solely and also various combinations of features in turn during multiple runs. The results show that incorporating the quality features enhances the effectiveness of the utilised retrieval system significantly.

Keywords: Content quality, Forum search, Thread retrieval, Voting techniques.

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7018 Rubber Wood as a Potential Biomass Feedstock for Biochar via Slow Pyrolysis

Authors: Adilah Shariff, Radin Hakim, Nurhayati Abdullah

Abstract:

Utilisation of biomass feedstock for biochar has received increasing attention because of their potential for carbon sequestration and soil amendment. The aim of this study is to investigate the characteristics of rubber wood as a biomass feedstock for biochar via slow pyrolysis process. This was achieved by using proximate, ultimate, and thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) as well as heating value, pH and lignocellulosic determination. Rubber wood contains 4.13 mf wt.% moisture, 86.30 mf wt.% volatile matter, 0.60 mf wt.% ash content, and 13.10 mf wt.% fixed carbon. The ultimate analysis shows that rubber wood consists of 44.33 mf wt.% carbon, 6.26 mf wt.% hydrogen, 19.31 mf wt.% nitrogen, 0.31 mf wt.% sulphur, and 29.79 mf wt.% oxygen. The higher heating value of rubber wood is 22.5 MJ/kg, and its lower heating value is 21.2 MJ/kg. At 27 °C, the pH value of rubber wood is 6.83 which is acidic. The lignocellulosic analysis revealed that rubber wood composition consists of 2.63 mf wt.% lignin, 20.13 mf wt.% cellulose, and 65.04 mf wt.% hemicellulose. The volatile matter to fixed carbon ratio is 6.58. This led to a biochar yield of 25.14 wt.% at 500 °C. Rubber wood is an environmental friendly feedstock due to its low sulphur content. Rubber wood therefore is a suitable and a potential feedstock for biochar production via slow pyrolysis.

Keywords: Biochar, biomass, rubber wood, slow pyrolysis.

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7017 Creep Behaviour of Heterogeneous Timber-UHPFRC Beams Assembled by Bonding: Experimental and Analytical Investigation

Authors: K. Kong, E. Ferrier, L. Michel

Abstract:

The purpose of this research was to investigate the creep behaviour of the heterogeneous Timber-UHPFRC beams. New developments have been done to further improve the structural performance, such as strengthening of the timber (glulam) beam by bonding composite material combine with an ultra-high performance fibre reinforced concrete (UHPFRC) internally reinforced with or without carbon fibre reinforced polymer (CFRP) bars. However, in the design of wooden structures, in addition to the criteria of strengthening and stiffness, deformability due to the creep of wood, especially in horizontal elements, is also a design criterion. Glulam, UHPFRC and CFRP may be an interesting composite mix to respond to the issue of creep behaviour of composite structures made of different materials with different rheological properties. In this paper, we describe an experimental and analytical investigation of the creep performance of the glulam-UHPFRC-CFRP beams assembled by bonding. The experimental investigations creep behaviour was conducted for different environments: in- and outside under constant loading for approximately a year. The measured results are compared with numerical ones obtained by an analytical model. This model was developed to predict the creep response of the glulam-UHPFRCCFRP beams based on the creep characteristics of the individual components. The results show that heterogeneous glulam-UHPFRC beams provide an improvement in both the strengthening and stiffness, and can also effectively reduce the creep deflection of wooden beams.

Keywords: Carbon fibre-reinforced polymer (CFRP) bars, creep behaviour, glulam, ultra-high performance fibre reinforced concrete (UHPFRC).

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7016 Noise Level Investigation in Printing Industry in Novi Sad, Serbia

Authors: Grujić S., Mihailović A., Kiurski J., Adamović S., Adamović D

Abstract:

The aim of this study was to determine noise level of six different types of machines in printing companies in Novi Sad. The A-weighted levels on Leq, Lmax and Lmin Sound Pressure Level (SPL) in dBA were measured. It was found that the folders, offset printing presses and binding machines are the predominant noise sources. The noise levels produced by 12 of 38 machines exceed the limiting threshold level of 85 dBA, tolerated by law. Since it was determined that the average noise level for folders (87.7 dB) exceeds the permitted value the octave analysis of noise was performed.

Keywords: noise levels, octave analysis, printing machines.

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7015 Thermal Hydraulic Analysis of the IAEA 10MW Benchmark Reactor under Normal Operating Condition

Authors: Hamed Djalal

Abstract:

The aim of this paper is to perform a thermal-hydraulic analysis of the IAEA 10 MW benchmark reactor solving analytically and numerically, by mean of the finite volume method, respectively the steady state and transient forced convection in rectangular narrow channel between two parallel MTR-type fuel plates, imposed under a cosine shape heat flux. A comparison between both solutions is presented to determine the minimal coolant velocity which can ensure a safe reactor core cooling, where the cladding temperature should not reach a specific safety limit 90 °C. For this purpose, a computer program is developed to determine the principal parameter related to the nuclear core safety, such as the temperature distribution in the fuel plate and in the coolant (light water) as a function of the inlet coolant velocity. Finally, a good agreement is noticed between the both analytical and numerical solutions, where the obtained results are displayed graphically.

Keywords: Forced convection, friction factor pressure drop thermal hydraulic analysis, vertical heated rectangular channel.

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7014 Analysis of Combined Use of NN and MFCC for Speech Recognition

Authors: Safdar Tanweer, Abdul Mobin, Afshar Alam

Abstract:

The performance and analysis of speech recognition system is illustrated in this paper. An approach to recognize the English word corresponding to digit (0-9) spoken by 2 different speakers is captured in noise free environment. For feature extraction, speech Mel frequency cepstral coefficients (MFCC) has been used which gives a set of feature vectors from recorded speech samples. Neural network model is used to enhance the recognition performance. Feed forward neural network with back propagation algorithm model is used. However other speech recognition techniques such as HMM, DTW exist. All experiments are carried out on Matlab.

Keywords: Speech Recognition, MFCC, Neural Network, classifier.

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