Search results for: learning structure

Authors: Kai-Chieh Lin, Chih-Fu Wu, Hsiang Ling Hsu, Yung-Hsiang Tu, Chia-Chen Wu

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With the rapid development of computer technology, the design of computers and keyboards moves towards a trend of slimness. The change of mobile input devices directly influences users’ behavior. Although multi-touch applications allow entering texts through a virtual keyboard, the performance, feedback, and comfortableness of the technology is inferior to traditional keyboard, and while manufacturers launch mobile touch keyboards and projection keyboards, the performance has not been satisfying. Therefore, this study discussed the design factors of slim pressure-sensitive keyboards. The factors were evaluated with an objective (accuracy and speed) and a subjective evaluation (operability, recognition, feedback, and difficulty) depending on the shape (circle, rectangle, and L-shaped), thickness (flat, 3mm, and 6mm), and force (35±10g, 60±10g, and 85±10g) of the keyboard. Moreover, MANOVA and Taguchi methods (regarding signal-to-noise ratios) were conducted to find the optimal level of each design factor. The research participants, by their typing speed (30 words/ minute), were divided in two groups. Considering the multitude of variables and levels, the experiments were implemented using the fractional factorial design. A representative model of the research samples were established for input task testing. The findings of this study showed that participants with low typing speed primarily relied on vision to recognize the keys, and those with high typing speed relied on tactile feedback that was affected by the thickness and force of the keys. In the objective and subjective evaluation, a combination of keyboard design factors that might result in higher performance and satisfaction was identified (L-shaped, 3mm, and 60±10g) as the optimal combination. The learning curve was analyzed to make a comparison with a traditional standard keyboard to investigate the influence of user experience on keyboard operation. The research results indicated the optimal combination provided input performance to inferior to a standard keyboard. The results could serve as a reference for the development of related products in industry and for applying comprehensively to touch devices and input interfaces which are interacted with people.

Keywords: Input performance, mobile device, slim keyboard, tactile feedback.

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Authors: Peter Boyes, Sarah Sharples, Paul Tennent, Gary Priestnall, Jeremy Morley

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Significant long-term investment projects can involve complex decisions. These are often described as capital projects and the factors that contribute to their complexity include budgets, motivating reasons for investment, stakeholder involvement, interdependent projects, and the delivery phases required. The complexity of these projects often requires management groups to be established involving stakeholder representatives, these teams are inherently multidisciplinary. This study uses two university campus capital projects as case studies for this type of management group. Due to the interaction of projects with wider campus infrastructure and users, decisions are made at varying spatial granularity throughout the project lifespan. This spatial-related context brings complexity to the group decisions. Sensemaking is the process used to achieve group situational awareness of a complex situation, enabling the team to arrive at a consensus and make a decision. The purpose of this study is to understand the role of people and data in complex spatial related long-term decision and sensemaking processes. The paper aims to identify and present issues experienced in practical settings of these types of decision. A series of exploratory semi-structured interviews with members of the two projects elicit an understanding of their operation. From two stages of thematic analysis, inductive and deductive, emergent themes are identified around the group structure, the data usage, and the decision making within these groups. When data were made available to the group, there were commonly issues with perception of veracity and validity of the data presented; this impacted the ability of the group to reach consensus and therefore for decision to be made. Similarly, there were different responses to forecasted or modelled data, shaped by the experience and occupation of the individuals within the multidisciplinary management group. This paper provides an understanding of further support required for team sensemaking and decision making in complex capital projects. The paper also discusses the barriers found to effective decision making in this setting and suggests opportunities to develop decision support systems in this team strategic decision-making process. Recommendations are made for further research into the sensemaking and decision-making process of this complex spatial-related setting.

Keywords: decision making, decisions under uncertainty, real decisions, sensemaking, spatial, team decision making

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Authors: Elif Gencturk, Ekin Yurdakul, Ahmet Y. Celik, Senol Mutlu, Kutlu O. Ulgen

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Yeast cells are generally used as a model system of eukaryotes due to their complex genetic structure, rapid growth ability in optimum conditions, easy replication and well-defined genetic system properties. Thus, yeast cells increased the knowledge of the principal pathways in humans. During fermentation, carbohydrates (hexoses and pentoses) degrade into some toxic by-products such as 5-hydroxymethylfurfural (5-HMF or HMF) and furfural. HMF influences the ethanol yield, and ethanol productivity; it interferes with microbial growth and is considered as a potent inhibitor of bioethanol production. In this study, yeast single cell behavior under HMF application was monitored by using a continuous flow single phase microfluidic platform. Microfluidic device in operation is fabricated by hot embossing and thermo-compression techniques from cyclo-olefin polymer (COP). COP is biocompatible, transparent and rigid material and it is suitable for observing fluorescence of cells considering its low auto-fluorescence characteristic. The response of yeast cells was recorded through Red Fluorescent Protein (RFP) tagged Nop56 gene product, which is an essential evolutionary-conserved nucleolar protein, and also a member of the box C/D snoRNP complexes. With the application of HMF, yeast cell proliferation continued but HMF slowed down the cell growth, and after HMF treatment the cell proliferation stopped. By the addition of fresh nutrient medium, the yeast cells recovered after 6 hours of HMF exposure. Thus, HMF application suppresses normal functioning of cell cycle but it does not cause cells to die. The monitoring of Nop56 expression phases of the individual cells shed light on the protein and ribosome synthesis cycles along with their link to growth. Further computational study revealed that the mechanisms underlying the inhibitory or inductive effects of HMF on growth are enriched in functional categories of protein degradation, protein processing, DNA repair and multidrug resistance. The present microfluidic device can successfully be used for studying the effects of inhibitory agents on growth by single cell tracking, thus capturing cell to cell variations. By metabolic engineering techniques, engineered strains can be developed, and the metabolic network of the microorganism can thus be manipulated such that chemical overproduction of target metabolite is achieved along with the maximum growth/biomass yield.  

Keywords: COP, HMF, ribosome biogenesis, thermoplastic microbioreactor, yeast.

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Authors: Roberto de Lieto Vollaro, Emanuele de Lieto Vollaro, Gianluca Coltrinari

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The building sector is responsible, in many industrialized countries, for about 40% of the total energy requirements, so it seems necessary to devote some efforts in this area in order to achieve a significant reduction of energy consumption and of greenhouse gases emissions. The paper presents a study aiming at providing a design methodology able to identify the best configuration of the system building/plant, from a technical, economic and environmentally point of view. Normally, the classical approach involves a building's energy loads analysis under steady state conditions, and subsequent selection of measures aimed at improving the energy performance, based on previous experience made by architects and engineers in the design team. Instead, the proposed approach uses a sequence of two wellknown scientifically validated calculation methods (TRNSYS and RETScreen), that allow quite a detailed feasibility analysis. To assess the validity of the calculation model, an existing, historical building in Central Italy, that will be the object of restoration and preservative redevelopment, was selected as a casestudy. The building is made of a basement and three floors, with a total floor area of about 3,000 square meters. The first step has been the determination of the heating and cooling energy loads of the building in a dynamic regime by means, which allows simulating the real energy needs of the building in function of its use. Traditional methodologies, based as they are on steady-state conditions, cannot faithfully reproduce the effects of varying climatic conditions and of inertial properties of the structure. With this model is possible to obtain quite accurate and reliable results that allow identifying effective combinations building-HVAC system. The second step has consisted of using output data obtained as input to the calculation model, which enables to compare different system configurations from the energy, environmental and financial point of view, with an analysis of investment, and operation and maintenance costs, so allowing determining the economic benefit of possible interventions. The classical methodology often leads to the choice of conventional plant systems, while our calculation model provides a financial-economic assessment for innovative energy systems and low environmental impact. Computational analysis can help in the design phase, particularly in the case of complex structures with centralized plant systems, by comparing the data returned by the calculation model for different design options.

Keywords: Energy, Buildings, Systems, Evaluation.

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Authors: Zainab Algharibi, Julie McAdam, Catherine Fagan

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The purpose of this paper is to shed light on how Omani children in the first grade experience their needs during their transition to primary school. Theoretically, the paper was built on two perspectives: Dewey's concept of continuity of experience and the boundary objects introduced by Vygotsky (CHAT). The methodology of the study is based on the crucial role of children’s agency which is a very important activity as an educational tool to enhance the child’s participation in the learning process and develop their ability to face various issues in their life. Thus, the data were obtained from 45 children in grade one from four different primary schools using drawing and visual narrative activities, in addition to researcher observations during the start of the first weeks of the academic year for the first grade. As the study dealt with children, all of the necessary ethical laws were followed. This paper is considered original since it seeks to deal with the issue of children's transition from kindergarten to primary school not only in Oman, but in the Arab region. Therefore, it is expected to fill an important gap in this field and present a proposal that will be a door for researchers to enter this research field later. The analysis of drawing and visual narrative was performed according to the social semiotics approach in two phases. The first is to read out the surface message “denotation,” while the second is to go in-depth via the symbolism obtained from children while they talked and drew letters and signs. This stage is known as “signified”; a video was recorded of each child talking about their drawing and expressing themself. Then, the data were organised and classified according to a cross-data network. Regarding the researcher observation analyses, the collected data were analysed according to the "grounded theory". It is based on comparing the recent data collected from observations with data previously encoded by other methods in which children were drawing alongside the visual narrative in the current study, in order to identify the similarities and differences, and also to clarify the meaning of the accessed categories and to identify sub-categories of them with a description of possible links between them. This is a kind of triangulation in data collection. The study came up with a set of findings, the most vital being that the children's greatest interest goes to their social and psychological needs, such as friends, their teacher, and playing. Also, their biggest fears are a new place, a new teacher, and not having friends, while they showed less concern for their need for educational knowledge and skills.

Keywords: Children’s academic needs, children’s social needs, children transition, primary school.

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Authors: I. Lucas, N. Schomberg, F-A. Couturier

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Most empirical studies have analyzed how liquidity risks faced by individual institutions turn into systemic risk. Recent banking crisis has highlighted the importance of grasping and controlling the systemic risk, and the acceptance by Central Banks to ease their monetary policies for saving default or illiquid banks. This last point shows that banks would pay less attention to liquidity risk which, in turn, can become a new important channel of loss. The financial regulation focuses on the most important and “systemic” banks in the global network. However, to quantify the expected loss associated with liquidity risk, it is worth to analyze sensitivity to this channel for the various elements of the global bank network. A small bank is not considered as potentially systemic; however the interaction of small banks all together can become a systemic element. This paper analyzes the impact of medium and small banks interaction on a set of banks which is considered as the core of the network. The proposed method uses the structure of agent-based model in a two-class environment. In first class, the data from actual balance sheets of 22 large and systemic banks (such as BNP Paribas or Barclays) are collected. In second one, to model a network as closely as possible to actual interbank market, 578 fictitious banks smaller than the ones belonging to first class have been split into two groups of small and medium ones. All banks are active on the European interbank network and have deposit and market activity. A simulation of 12 three month periods representing a midterm time interval three years is projected. In each period, there is a set of behavioral descriptions: repayment of matured loans, liquidation of deposits, income from securities, collection of new deposits, new demands of credit, and securities sale. The last two actions are part of refunding process developed in this paper. To strengthen reliability of proposed model, random parameters dynamics are managed with stochastic equations as rates the variations of which are generated by Vasicek model. The Central Bank is considered as the lender of last resort which allows banks to borrow at REPO rate and some ejection conditions of banks from the system are introduced.

Liquidity crunch due to exogenous crisis is simulated in the first class and the loss impact on other bank classes is analyzed though aggregate values representing the aggregate of loans and/or the aggregate of borrowing between classes. It is mainly shown that the three groups of European interbank network do not have the same response, and that intermediate banks are the most sensitive to liquidity risk.

Keywords: Systemic Risk, Financial Contagion, Liquidity Risk, Interbank Market, Network Model.

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Authors: Srinivas Bathini, Duraichelvan Raju, Simona Badilescu, Muthukumaran Packirisamy

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A bio-sensing method, based on the plasmonic property of gold nano-islands, has been developed for detection of exosomes in a clinical setting. The position of the gold plasmon band in the UV-Visible spectrum depends on the size and shape of gold nanoparticles as well as on the surrounding environment. By adsorbing various chemical entities, or binding them, the gold plasmon band will shift toward longer wavelengths and the shift is proportional to the concentration. Exosomes transport cargoes of molecules and genetic materials to proximal and distal cells. Presently, the standard method for their isolation and quantification from body fluids is by ultracentrifugation, not a practical method to be implemented in a clinical setting. Thus, a versatile and cutting-edge platform is required to selectively detect and isolate exosomes for further analysis at clinical level. The new sensing protocol, instead of antibodies, makes use of a specially synthesized polypeptide (Vn96), to capture and quantify the exosomes from different media, by binding the heat shock proteins from exosomes. The protocol has been established and optimized by using a glass substrate, in order to facilitate the next stage, namely the transfer of the protocol to a microfluidic environment. After each step of the protocol, the UV-Vis spectrum was recorded and the position of gold Localized Surface Plasmon Resonance (LSPR) band was measured. The sensing process was modelled, taking into account the characteristics of the nano-island structure, prepared by thermal convection and annealing. The optimal molar ratios of the most important chemical entities, involved in the detection of exosomes were calculated as well. Indeed, it was found that the results of the sensing process depend on the two major steps: the molar ratios of streptavidin to biotin-PEG-Vn96 and, the final step, the capture of exosomes by the biotin-PEG-Vn96 complex. The microfluidic device designed for sensing of exosomes consists of a glass substrate, sealed by a PDMS layer that contains the channel and a collecting chamber. In the device, the solutions of linker, cross-linker, etc., are pumped over the gold nano-islands and an Ocean Optics spectrometer is used to measure the position of the Au plasmon band at each step of the sensing. The experiments have shown that the shift of the Au LSPR band is proportional to the concentration of exosomes and, thereby, exosomes can be accurately quantified. An important advantage of the method is the ability to discriminate between exosomes having different origins.

Keywords: Exosomes, gold nano-islands, microfluidics, plasmonic biosensing.

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Authors: Obaidul Fattah Tanvir, Zinat Ara Afroze

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Community living adjacent to forests and Protected Areas, especially in South Asian countries, have a common practice in extracting resources for their living and livelihoods. This extraction of resources, because the way it is done, destroys the biophysical features of the area. Deforestation, wildlife poaching, illegal logging, unauthorized hill cutting etc. are some of the serious issues of concern for the sustainability of the natural resources that has a direct impact on environment and climate as a whole. To ensure community involvement in conservation initiatives of the state, community based forest management, commonly known as Comanagement, has been in practice in 6 South Asian countries. These are -India, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Bhutan and Bangladesh. Involving community in forestry management was initiated first in Bangladesh in 1979 and reached as an effective co-management approach through a several paradigm shifts. This idea of Comanagement has been institutionalized through a Government Order (GO) by the Ministry of Environment and Forests, Government of Bangladesh on November 23, 2009. This GO clearly defines the structure and functions of Co-management and its different bodies. Bangladesh Forest Department has been working in association with community to conserve and manage the Forests and Protected areas of Bangladesh following this legal document. Demographically young people constitute the largest segment of population in Bangladesh. This group, if properly sensitized, can produce valuable impacts on the conservation initiatives, both by community and government. This study traced the major factors that motivate community youths to work effectively with different tiers of comanagement organizations in conservation of forests and Protected Areas of Bangladesh. For the purpose of this study, 3 FGDs were conducted with 30 youths from the community living around the Protected Areas of Cox’s bazar, South East corner of Bangladesh, who are actively involved in Co-management organizations. KII were conducted with 5 key officials of Forest Department stationed at Cox’s Bazar. 2 FGDs were conducted with the representatives of 7 Co-management organizations working in Cox’s Bazar region and approaches of different community outreach activities conducted for forest conservation by 3 private organizations and Projects have been reviewed. Also secondary literatures were reviewed for the history and evolution of Co-management in Bangladesh and six South Asian countries. This study found that innovative community outreach activities that are financed by public and private sectors involving youths and community as a whole have played a pivotal role in conservation of forests and Protected Areas of the region. This approach can be replicated in other regions of Bangladesh as well as other countries of South Asia where Co-Management exists in practice.

Keywords: Community, co-management, conservation, forests, protected areas, youth.

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Authors: A. D'Alessandro, F. Ubertini, A. L. Materazzi

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In the field of civil engineering, Structural Health Monitoring is a topic of growing interest. Effective monitoring instruments permit the control of the working conditions of structures and infrastructures, through the identification of behavioral anomalies due to incipient damages, especially in areas of high environmental hazards as earthquakes. While traditional sensors can be applied only in a limited number of points, providing a partial information for a structural diagnosis, novel transducers may allow a diffuse sensing. Thanks to the new tools and materials provided by nanotechnology, new types of multifunctional sensors are developing in the scientific panorama. In particular, cement-matrix composite materials capable of diagnosing their own state of strain and tension, could be originated by the addition of specific conductive nanofillers. Because of the nature of the material they are made of, these new cementitious nano-modified transducers can be inserted within the concrete elements, transforming the same structures in sets of widespread sensors. This paper is aimed at presenting the results of a research about a new self-sensing nanocomposite and about the implementation of smart sensors for Structural Health Monitoring. The developed nanocomposite has been obtained by inserting multi walled carbon nanotubes within a cementitious matrix. The insertion of such conductive carbon nanofillers provides the base material with piezoresistive characteristics and peculiar sensitivity to mechanical modifications. The self-sensing ability is achieved by correlating the variation of the external stress or strain with the variation of some electrical properties, such as the electrical resistance or conductivity. Through the measurement of such electrical characteristics, the performance and the working conditions of an element or a structure can be monitored. Among conductive carbon nanofillers, carbon nanotubes seem to be particularly promising for the realization of self-sensing cement-matrix materials. Some issues related to the nanofiller dispersion or to the influence of the nano-inclusions amount in the cement matrix need to be carefully investigated: the strain sensitivity of the resulting sensors is influenced by such factors. This work analyzes the dispersion of the carbon nanofillers, the physical properties of the fresh dough, the electrical properties of the hardened composites and the sensing properties of the realized sensors. The experimental campaign focuses specifically on their dynamic characterization and their applicability to the monitoring of full-scale elements. The results of the electromechanical tests with both slow varying and dynamic loads show that the developed nanocomposite sensors can be effectively used for the health monitoring of structures.

Keywords: Carbon nanotubes, self-sensing nanocomposites, smart cement-matrix sensors, structural health monitoring.

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Authors: Wang Yang

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Shenzhen is a modern city of China's reform and opening-up policy, the development of urban morphology has been established on the administration of the Chinese government. This city`s planning paradigm is primarily affected by the spatial structure and human behavior. The subjective urban agglomeration center is divided into several groups and centers. In comparisons of this effect, the city development law has better to be neglected. With the continuous development of the internet, extensive data technology has been introduced in China. Data mining and data analysis has become important tools in municipal research. Data mining has been utilized to improve data cleaning such as receiving business data, traffic data and population data. Prior to data mining, government data were collected by traditional means, then were analyzed using city-relationship research, delaying the timeliness of urban development, especially for the contemporary city. Data update speed is very fast and based on the Internet. The city's point of interest (POI) in the excavation serves as data source affecting the city design, while satellite remote sensing is used as a reference object, city analysis is conducted in both directions, the administrative paradigm of government is broken and urban research is restored. Therefore, the use of data mining in urban analysis is very important. The satellite remote sensing data of the Shenzhen city in July 2018 were measured by the satellite Modis sensor and can be utilized to perform land surface temperature inversion, and analyze city heat island distribution of Shenzhen. This article acquired and classified the data from Shenzhen by using Data crawler technology. Data of Shenzhen heat island and interest points were simulated and analyzed in the GIS platform to discover the main features of functional equivalent distribution influence. Shenzhen is located in the east-west area of China. The city’s main streets are also determined according to the direction of city development. Therefore, it is determined that the functional area of the city is also distributed in the east-west direction. The urban heat island can express the heat map according to the functional urban area. Regional POI has correspondence. The research result clearly explains that the distribution of the urban heat island and the distribution of urban POIs are one-to-one correspondence. Urban heat island is primarily influenced by the properties of the underlying surface, avoiding the impact of urban climate. Using urban POIs as analysis object, the distribution of municipal POIs and population aggregation are closely connected, so that the distribution of the population corresponded with the distribution of the urban heat island.

Keywords: POI, satellite remote sensing, the population distribution, urban heat island thermal map.

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Authors: V. L. M. F. Capellini, A. P. P. M. Maturana, N. C. M. Brondino, M. B. C. L. B. M. Peixoto, A. J. Broughton

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A paradigm shift is a process. The process of implementing inclusive education, a system constructed to support all learners, requires planning, identification, experimentation, and evaluation. In this vein, the purpose of the present study was to evaluate the capacity of one Brazilian state school systems to provide special education students with a quality inclusive education. This study originated at the behest of concerned families of students with special needs who filed complaints with the Municipality of Bauru, São Paulo. These families claimed, 1) children with learning differences and educational needs had not been identified for services, and 2) those who had been identified had not received sufficient specialized educational assistance (SEA) in schools across the City of Bauru. Hence, the Office of Civil Rights for the state of São Paulo (Ministério Público de São Paulo) summoned the local higher education institution, UNESP, to design a research study to investigate these allegations. In this exploratory study, descriptive data were gathered from all elementary and middle schools including 58 state schools and 17 city schools, for a total of 75 schools overall. Data collection consisted of each school's annual strategic action plan, surveys and interviews with all school stakeholders to determine their perceptions of the inclusive education available to students with Special Education Needs (SEN). The data were collected as one of four stages in a larger study which also included field observations of a focal students' experience and a continuing education course for all teachers and administrators in both state and city schools. For the purposes of this study, the researchers were interested in understanding the perceptions of school staff, parents, and students across all schools. Therefore, documents and surveys from 75 schools were analyzed for adherence to federal legislation guaranteeing students with SEN the right to special education assistance within the regular school setting. Results shows that while some schools recognized the legal rights of SEN students to receive special education, the plans to actually deliver services were absent. In conclusion, the results of this study revealed both school staff and families have insufficient planning and accessibility resources, and the schools have inadequate infrastructure for full-time support to SEN students, i.e., structures and systems to support the identification of SEN and delivery of services within schools of Bauru, SP. Having identified the areas of need, the city is now prepared to take next steps in the process toward preparing all schools to be inclusive.

Keywords: Inclusive education, special education, special needs.

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Authors: Niwatchai Namwichisirikul

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Due to the emergence of “Humanized Healthcare" introduced by Professor Dr. Prawase Wasi in 2003[1], the development of this paradigm tends to be widely implemented. The organizations included Healthcare Accreditation Institute (public organization), National Health Foundation, Mahidol University in cooperation with Thai Health Promotion Foundation, and National Health Security Office (Thailand) have selected the hospitals or infirmaries that are qualified for humanized healthcare since 2008- 2010 and 35 of them are chosen to be the outstandingly navigating organizations for the development of humanized healthcare, humanized healthcare award [2]. The research aims to study the current issue, characteristics and patterns of hospital administration contributing to humanized healthcare system in Thailand. The selected case studies are from four hospitals including Dansai Crown Prince Hospital, Leoi; Ubolrattana Hospital, Khon Kaen; Kapho Hospital, Pattani; and Prathai Hospital, Nakhonrachasima. The methodology is in-depth interviewing with 10 staffs working as hospital executive directors, and representatives from leader groups including directors, multidisciplinary hospital committees, personnel development committees, physicians and nurses in each hospital. (Total=40) In addition, focus group discussions between hospital staffs and general people (including patients and their relatives, the community leader, and other people) are held by means of setting 4 groups including 8 people within each group. (Total=128) The observation on the working in each hospital is also implemented. The findings of the study reveal that there are five important aspects found in each hospital including (1) the quality improvement under the mental and spiritual development policy from the chief executives and lead teams, leaders as Role model and they have visionary leadership; (2) the participation hospital administration system focusing on learning process and stakeholder- needs, spiritual human resource management and development; (3) the relationship among people especially staffs, team work skills, mutual understanding, effective communication and personal inner-development; (4) organization culture relevant to the awareness of patients- rights as well as the participation policy including spiritual growth achieving to the same goals, sharing vision, developing public mind, and caring; and (5) healing structures or environment providing warmth and convenience for hospital staffs, patients and their relatives and visitors.

Keywords: Hospital administration, Humanized healthcare.

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Authors: Orly Redlich

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Since the establishment of the state of Israel, and as a result of various events that led to it, Jewish citizens and Arab citizens of the state have been in constant conflict, which finds its expression in most levels of life. Therefore, the attitude of one group member to the other group members is mostly tense, loaded, and saturated with mutual suspicion. Within this reality, in many higher education institutions in Israel, Jews and Arabs meet with each other intensively and for several years. For some students, this is their first opportunity for a meaningful cross-cultural encounter. These intercultural encounters, which allow positive interactions between members of different cultural groups, may contribute to the formation of "intercultural competence" which means long-term change in knowledge, attitudes, and behavior towards 'the other culture'. The current study examined the concept of the ‘other’ among Jewish and Arab students studying together and their "intercultural competence". The study also examined whether there is a difference in the perception of the ‘other’ between students studying in different academic programs, and between students taking academic courses on multiculturalism. This quantitative study was conducted among 274 Arab and Jewish students studying together, for bachelors or master's degree, in various academic programs at the Israel Academic College of Ramat-Gan. The background data of the participants are varied, in terms of religion, origin, religiosity, employment status, living area, and marital status. The main hypothesis is that academic, social, and intercultural encounters between Jewish and Arab students, who attend college together, will be a significant factor in building "intercultural competence". Additionally, the existence of "intercultural competence" has been linked to demographic characteristics of the students, as well as the nature of intercultural encounters between Jews and Arabs in a higher education institution. The dependent variables were measured by a self-report questionnaire, using the components of '"intercultural competence"' among students, which are: 1. Cognitive knowledge of the ‘others’, 2. Feelings towards the ‘others’, 3. Change in attitudes towards the 'others', and 4. Change in behavior towards the ‘others’. The findings indicate a higher "intercultural competence" among Arab students than Jews; it was also found higher level of "intercultural competence" among Educational Counseling students than the other respondents. The importance of this research lies in finding the means to develop "intercultural competence" among Jewish and Arab students, which may reduce prejudice and stereotypes towards the other culture and may even prevent occurrences of alienation and violence in cross-cultural encounters in Israel.

Keywords: Cross-cultural learning, "intercultural competence", Jewish and Arab students, multiculturalism.

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Authors: S. K. Appiah, E. N. Aidoo, D. Asamoah Owusu, M. W. Nuonabuor

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Urbanization remains one of the unique predominant factors which is linked to the destruction of urban environment and its associated cases of soil contamination by heavy metals through the natural and anthropogenic activities. These activities are important sources of toxic heavy metals such as arsenic (As), cadmium (Cd), chromium (Cr), copper (Cu), iron (Fe), manganese (Mn), and lead (Pb), nickel (Ni) and zinc (Zn). Often, these heavy metals lead to increased levels in some areas due to the impact of atmospheric deposition caused by their proximity to industrial plants or the indiscriminately burning of substances. Information gathered on potentially hazardous levels of these heavy metals in soils leads to establish serious health and urban agriculture implications. However, characterization of spatial variations of soil contamination by heavy metals in Ghana is limited. Kumasi is a Metropolitan city in Ghana, West Africa and is challenged with the recent spate of deteriorating soil quality due to rapid economic development and other human activities such as “Galamsey”, illegal mining operations within the metropolis. The paper seeks to use both univariate and multivariate geostatistical techniques to assess the spatial distribution of heavy metals in soils and the potential risk associated with ingestion of sources of soil contamination in the Metropolis. Geostatistical tools have the ability to detect changes in correlation structure and how a good knowledge of the study area can help to explain the different scales of variation detected. To achieve this task, point referenced data on heavy metals measured from topsoil samples in a previous study, were collected at various locations. Linear models of regionalisation and coregionalisation were fitted to all experimental semivariograms to describe the spatial dependence between the topsoil heavy metals at different spatial scales, which led to ordinary kriging and cokriging at unsampled locations and production of risk maps of soil contamination by these heavy metals. Results obtained from both the univariate and multivariate semivariogram models showed strong spatial dependence with range of autocorrelations ranging from 100 to 300 meters. The risk maps produced show strong spatial heterogeneity for almost all the soil heavy metals with extremely risk of contamination found close to areas with commercial and industrial activities. Hence, ongoing pollution interventions should be geared towards these highly risk areas for efficient management of soil contamination to avert further pollution in the metropolis.

Keywords: Coregionalization, ordinary cokriging, multivariate geostatistical analysis, soil contamination, soil heavy metals, risk maps, spatial distribution.

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Authors: Victoria L. Nkosi, Parvaneh Farhangpour

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Often a Grade 12 certificate is perceived as a passport to tertiary education and the minimum requirement to enter the world of work. In spite of its importance, many students do not make this milestone in South Africa. It is important to find out why so many students still fail in spite of transformation in the education system in the post-apartheid era. Given the complexity of education and its context, this study adopted a case study design to examine one historically underperforming high school in Bushbuckridge, Mpumalanga Province, South Africa in 2013. The aim was to gain a understanding of the inner and outer school contextual factors associated with the high failure rate among Grade 12 students.  Government documents and reports were consulted to identify factors in the district and the village surrounding the school and a student survey was conducted to identify school, home and student factors. The randomly-sampled half of the population of Grade 12 students (53) participated in the survey and quantitative data are analyzed using descriptive statistical methods. The findings showed that a host of factors is at play. The school is located in a village within a municipality which has been one of the poorest three municipalities in South Africa and the lowest Grade 12 pass rate in the Mpumalanga province.   Moreover, over half of the families of the students are single parents, 43% are unemployed and the majority has a low level of education. In addition, most families (83%) do not have basic study materials such as a dictionary, books, tables, and chairs. A significant number of students (70%) are over-aged (+19 years old); close to half of them (49%) are grade repeaters. The school itself lacks essential resources, namely computers, science laboratories, library, and enough furniture and textbooks. Moreover, teaching and learning are negatively affected by the teachers’ occasional absenteeism, inadequate lesson preparation, and poor communication skills. Overall, the continuous low performance of students in this school mirrors the vicious circle of multiple negative conditions present within and outside of the school. The complexity of factors associated with the underperformance of Grade 12 students in this school calls for a multi-dimensional intervention from government and stakeholders. One important intervention should be the placement of over-aged students and grade-repeaters in suitable educational institutions for the benefit of other students.

Keywords: Inner context, outer context, over-aged students, vicious circle.

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Authors: Aliya Isaeva, Anar Sultaniarova

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The report focuses on such an important indicator of the nature and direction of development of ethnic and cultural processes in the Republic of Kazakhstan, as ethno linguistic situation. It is shown that, in essence, on the one hand, expresses the degree of the actual propagation and the level of use of the languages of the various ethnic communities. On the other hand, reflects the important patterns, trends and prospects of ethno-cultural and ethnodemographic processes in the Republic. It is important to note that the ethno linguistic situation in different regions of Kazakhstan, due to its more dynamic and much more difficult to demonstrate a much greater variety of options when compared with the ethnic situation in the country. For the two major ethnic groups of the republic – Kazakh and Russian language ethno differentiating retains its value, while for the other ethnic groups observed decline in the importance of this indicator. As you know, the language of international communication in the country is Russian. As the censuses of population, the Russian language in many areas of Northern, Central and Eastern Kazakhstan becomes a means of ethno linguistic development for most of the non-Russian population. This is most clearly illustrated by the Germans, and the Slavic ethnic groups. In this case, the Russian language is not just a means of international communication for a number of ethnic groups, and ethnic groups, it becomes a factor of ethnic self-expression. The value of the Kazakh language as their mother tongue for the other groups of the population is small. More clearly it can be traced only to the Turkic-speaking population of the republic – Uzbeks, Uighurs, Tatars, Turks, etc. The state Kazakh language is a means of international communication in the Western and Southern Kazakhstan, with a predominance of the Kazakh population. The report shows that the most important factor in the development of ethno-linguistic and ethno-cultural processes is bilingualism. Comparative analysis of materials census shows, first, on the increase of the proportion of bilingual population among Kazakhs and Russian, and second, to reduce the proportion of bilingual population of other ethnic groups living in Kazakhstan, and third, a higher proportion bilingual population among residents than rural residents, regardless of their ethnicity. Bilingualism is mainly of a "national Kazakh", "national Russian" or "Kazakh-national" or "Russian-national" character. The President N.A. Nazarbayev said that the Kazakh language is the most important factor in the consolidation of the people of Kazakhstan. He therefore called on government and other state and local representative bodies fully develop the state language, to create all the necessary organizational, material and technical conditions for free and open learning the state language by all citizens of the Republic of Kazakhstan.

Keywords: Ethnos, ethno cultural processes, ethnolinguistic situation, mother tongue, bilingualism.

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Authors: Asad Hanif, Pavithra Parthasarathy, Zongjin Li

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Thermal insulating composites help to reduce the total power consumption in a building by creating a barrier between external and internal environment. Such composites can be used in the roofing tiles or wall panels for exterior surfaces. This study purposes to develop lightweight cement-based composites for thermal insulating applications. Waste materials like silica fume (an industrial by-product) and fly ash cenosphere (FAC) (hollow micro-spherical shells obtained as a waste residue from coal fired power plants) were used as partial replacement of cement and lightweight filler, respectively. Moreover, aerogel, a nano-porous material made of silica, was also used in different dosages for improved thermal insulating behavior, while poly vinyl alcohol (PVA) fibers were added for enhanced toughness. The raw materials including binders and fillers were characterized by X-Ray Diffraction (XRD), X-Ray Fluorescence spectroscopy (XRF), and Brunauer–Emmett–Teller (BET) analysis techniques in which various physical and chemical properties of the raw materials were evaluated like specific surface area, chemical composition (oxide form), and pore size distribution (if any). Ultra-lightweight cementitious composites were developed by varying the amounts of FAC and aerogel with 28-day unit weight ranging from 1551.28 kg/m³ to 1027.85 kg/m³. Excellent mechanical and thermal insulating properties of the resulting composites were obtained ranging from 53.62 MPa to 8.66 MPa compressive strength, 9.77 MPa to 3.98 MPa flexural strength, and 0.3025 W/m-K to 0.2009 W/m-K as thermal conductivity coefficient (QTM-500). The composites were also tested for peak temperature difference between outer and inner surfaces when subjected to heating (in a specially designed experimental set-up) by a 275W infrared lamp. The temperature difference up to 16.78 ^oC was achieved, which indicated outstanding properties of the developed composites to act as a thermal barrier for building envelopes. Microstructural studies were carried out by Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) and Energy Dispersive X-ray Spectroscopy (EDS) for characterizing the inner structure of the composite specimen. Also, the hydration products were quantified using the surface area mapping and line scale technique in EDS. The microstructural analyses indicated excellent bonding of FAC and aerogel in the cementitious system. Also, selective reactivity of FAC was ascertained from the SEM imagery where the partially consumed FAC shells were observed. All in all, the lightweight fillers, FAC, and aerogel helped to produce the lightweight composites due to their physical characteristics, while exceptional mechanical properties, owing to FAC partial reactivity, were achieved.

Keywords: Sustainable development, fly ash cenosphere, aerogel, lightweight, cement, composite.

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Authors: A. K. M. De Paula, R. Tenorio

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The 20th century has brought much development to the practice of Architecture worldwide, and technology has bridged inhabitation limits in many regions of the world with high levels of comfort and conveniences, most times at high costs to the environment. Throughout the globe, the tropical countries are being urbanized at an unprecedented rate and housing has become a major issue worldwide, in light of increased demand and lack of appropriate infra-structure and planning. Buildings and urban spaces designed in tropical cities have mainly adopted external concepts that in most cases do not fit the needs of the inhabitants living in such harsh climatic environment, and when they do, do so at high financial, environmental and cultural costs. Traditional architectural practices can provide valuable understanding on how self-reliance and autonomy of construction can be reinforced in rural-urban tropical environments. From traditional housing knowledge, it is possible to derive lessons for the development of new construction materials that are affordable, environmentally friendly, culturally acceptable and accesible to all.Specifically to the urban context, such solutions are of outmost importance, given the needs to a more democratic society, where access to housing is considered high in the agenda for development. Traditional or rural constructions are also ongoing through extensive changes eventhough they have mostly adopted climate-responsive building practices relying on local resources (with minimum embodied energy) and energy (for comfort and quality of life). It is important to note that many of these buildings can actually be called zero-energy, and hold potential answers to enable transition from high energy, high cost, low comfort urban habitations to zero/low energy habitations with high quality urban livelihood. Increasing access to modern urban lifestyels have also an effect on the aspirations from people in terms of performance, comfort and convenience in terms of their housing and the way it is produced and used. These aspirations are resulting in transitions from localresource dependent habitations- to non-local resource based highenergy urban style habitations. And such transitions are resulting in the habitations becoming increasingly unsuited to the local climatic conditions with increasing discomfort, ill-health, and increased CO2 emissions and local environmental disruption. This research studies one specific transition group in the context of 'water communities' in tropical-equatorial regions: Ribeirinhos housing typology (Amazonas, Brazil). The paper presents the results of a qualitative sustainability assessment of the housing typologies under transition, found at the Ribeirinhos communities.

Keywords: Vernacuilar and Tropical Architecture, SustainableHousing Design, Urban-rural Housing, Living Transitions

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Authors: Shekhar Parajulee

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Nepal practiced a centralized unitary governing system for long and has gone through the federal system after the promulgation of the new constitution on 20 September 2015. There is a big paradigm shift in terms of governance after it. Now, there are three levels of governments, one federal government in the center, seven provincial governments and 753 local governments. Federalism refers to a political governing system with multiple tiers of government working together with coordination. It is preferred for self and shared rule. Though it has opened the door for rights of the people, political stability, state restructuring, and sustainable peace and development, there are many prospects and challenges for its proper implementation. This research analyzes the discourses of federalism implementation in Nepal with special reference to one of seven provinces, Gandaki. Federalism is a new phenomenon in Nepali politics and informed debates on it are required for its right evolution. This research will add value in this regard. Moreover, tracking its evolution and the exploration of the attitudes and behaviors of key actors and stakeholders in a new experiment of a new governing system is also important. The administrative and political system of Gandaki province in terms of service delivery and development will critically be examined. Besides demonstrating the performances of the provincial government and assembly, it will analyze the inter-governmental relation of Gandaki with the other two tiers of government. For this research, people from provincial and local governments (elected representatives and government employees), provincial assembly members, academicians, civil society leaders and journalists are being interviewed. The interview findings will be analyzed by supplementing with published documents. Just going into the federal structure is not the solution. As in the case of other provincial governments, Gandaki also had to start from scratch. It gradually took a shape of government and has been functioning sluggishly. The provincial government has many challenges ahead, which has badly hindered its plans and actions. Additionally, fundamental laws, infrastructures and human resources are found to be insufficient at the sub-national level. Lack of clarity in the jurisdiction is another main challenge. The Nepali Constitution assumes cooperation, coexistence and coordination as the fundamental principles of federalism which, unfortunately, appear to be lacking among the three tiers of government despite their efforts. Though the devolution of power to sub-national governments is essential for the successful implementation of federalism, it has apparently been delayed due to the centralized mentality of bureaucracy as well as a political leader. This research will highlight the reasons for the delay in the implementation of federalism. There might be multiple underlying reasons for the slow pace of implementation of federalism and identifying them is very tough. Moreover, the federal spirit is found to be absent in the main players of today's political system, which is a big irony. So, there are some doubts about whether the federal system in Nepal is just a keepsake or a substantive achievement.

Keywords: federalism, inter-governmental relations, Nepal, provincial government

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Authors: Mehmet Altınöz

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This study focuses on bureau management technologies and information systems in developing countries. Developing countries use such systems which facilitate executive and organizational functions through the utilization of bureau management technologies and provide the executive staff with necessary information. The concepts of data and information differ from each other in developing countries, and thus the concepts of data processing and information processing are different. Symbols represent ideas, objects, figures, letters and numbers. Data processing system is an integrated system which deals with the processing of the data related to the internal and external environment of the organization in order to make decisions, create plans and develop strategies; it goes without saying that this system is composed of both human beings and machines. Information is obtained through the acquisition and the processing of data. On the other hand, data are raw communicative messages. Within this framework, data processing equals to producing plausible information out of raw data. Organizations in developing countries need to obtain information relevant to them because rapid changes in the organizational arena require rapid access to accurate information. The most significant role of the directors and managers who work in the organizational arena is to make decisions. Making a correct decision is possible only when the directors and managers are equipped with sound ideas and appropriate information. Therefore, acquisition, organization and distribution of information gain significance. Today-s organizations make use of computer-assisted “Management Information Systems" in order to obtain and distribute information. Decision Support System which is closely related to practice is an information system that facilitates the director-s task of making decisions. Decision Support System integrates human intelligence, information technology and software in order to solve the complex problems. With the support of the computer technology and software systems, Decision Support System produces information relevant to the decision to be made by the director and provides the executive staff with supportive ideas about the decision. Artificial Intelligence programs which transfer the studies and experiences of the people to the computer are called expert systems. An expert system stores expert information in a limited area and can solve problems by deriving rational consequences. Bureau management technologies and information systems in developing countries create a kind of information society and information economy which make those countries have their places in the global socio-economic structure and which enable them to play a reasonable and fruitful role; therefore it is of crucial importance to make use of information and management technologies in order to work together with innovative and enterprising individuals and it is also significant to create “scientific policies" based on information and technology in the fields of economy, politics, law and culture.

Keywords: Bureau Management, Information Systems.

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Authors: Pongthep Bunrueng

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This action research accentuates the outcome of a development in English pronunciation, using principles of phonetics for English major students at Loei Rajabhat University. The research is split into 5 separate modules: 1) Organs of Speech and How to Produce Sounds, 2) Monopthongs, 3) Diphthongs, 4) Consonant sounds, and 5) Suprasegmental Features. Each module followed a 4 step action research process, 1) Planning, 2) Acting, 3) Observing, and 4) Reflecting. The research targeted 2nd year students who were majoring in English Education at Loei Rajabhat University during the academic year of 2011. A mixed methodology employing both quantitative and qualitative research was used, which put theory into action, taking segmental features up to suprasegmental features. Multiple tools were employed which included the following documents: pre-test and post-test papers, evaluation and assessment papers, group work assessment forms, a presentation grading form, an observation of participants form and a participant self-reflection form.

All 5 modules for the target group showed that results from the post-tests were higher than those of the pre-tests, with 0.01 statistical significance. All target groups attained results ranging from low to moderate and from moderate to high performance. The participants who attained low to moderate results had to re-sit the second round. During the first development stage, participants attended classes with group participation, in which they addressed planning through mutual co-operation and sharing of responsibility. Analytic induction of strong points for this operation illustrated that learner cognition, comprehension, application, and group practices were all present whereas the participants with weak results could be attributed to biological differences, differences in life and learning, or individual differences in responsiveness and self-discipline.

Participants who were required to be re-treated in Spiral 2 received the same treatment again. Results of tests from the 5 modules after the 2^nd treatment were that the participants attained higher scores than those attained in the pre-test. Their assessment and development stages also showed improved results. They showed greater confidence at participating in activities, produced higher quality work, and correctly followed instructions for each activity. Analytic induction of strong and weak points for this operation remains the same as for Spiral 1, though there were improvements to problems which existed prior to undertaking the second treatment.

Keywords: Action research, English pronunciation, phonetics, segmental features, suprasegmental features.

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Authors: M. Shukry

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According to the United Nations Declaration of Human Rights in 1948, every human being is entitled to rights in life that should be respected by others and protected by the state and community. Such rights are inherent regardless of colour, ethnicity, gender, religion or otherwise, and it is expected that all humans alike have the right to live without discrimination of any sort. However, that has not been the case with Aborigines in Australia. Over a long period of time, the governments of the State and the Territories and the Australian Commonwealth denied the Aboriginal and Indigenous inhabitants of the Torres Strait Islands such rights. Past Australian governments set policies and laws that enabled them to forcefully remove Indigenous children from their parents, which resulted in creating lost generations living the trauma of the loss of cultural identity, alienation and even their own selfhood. Intending to reduce that population of natives and their Aboriginal culture while, on the other hand, assimilate them into mainstream society, they gave themselves the right to remove them from their families with no hope of return. That practice has led to tragic consequences due to the trauma that has affected those children, an experience that is depicted by Jane Harrison in her play Stolen. The drama is the outcome of a six-year project on lost children and which was first performed in 1997 in Melbourne. Five actors only appear on the stage, playing the role of all the different characters, whether the main protagonists or the remaining cast, present or non-present ones as voices. The play outlines the life of five children who have been taken from their parents at an early age, entailing a disastrous negative impact that differs from one to the other. Unknown to each other, what connects between them is being put in a children’s home. The purpose of this paper is to analyse the play’s text in light of the 1948 Declaration of Human Rights, using it as a lens that reflects the atrocities practiced against the Aborigines. It highlights how such practices formed an outrageous violation of those natives’ rights as human beings. Harrison’s dramatic technique in conveying the children’s experiences is through a non-linear structure, fluctuating between past and present that are linked together within each of the five characters, reflecting their suffering and pain to create an emotional link between them and the audience. Her dramatic handling of the issue by fusing tragedy with humour as well as symbolism is a successful technique in revealing the traumatic memory of those children and their present life. The play has made a difference in commencing to address the problem of the right of all children to be with their families, which renders the real meaning of having a home and an identity as people.

Keywords: Aboriginal, audience, Australia, children, culture, drama, home, human rights, identity, indigenous, Jane Harrison, memory, scenic effects, setting, stage, stage directions, Stolen, trauma.

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Authors: Xiangtuo Chen, Paul-Henry Cournéde

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Crop yield prediction is a paramount issue in agriculture. The main idea of this paper is to find out efficient way to predict the yield of corn based meteorological records. The prediction models used in this paper can be classified into model-driven approaches and data-driven approaches, according to the different modeling methodologies. The model-driven approaches are based on crop mechanistic modeling. They describe crop growth in interaction with their environment as dynamical systems. But the calibration process of the dynamic system comes up with much difficulty, because it turns out to be a multidimensional non-convex optimization problem. An original contribution of this paper is to propose a statistical methodology, Multi-Scenarios Parameters Estimation (MSPE), for the parametrization of potentially complex mechanistic models from a new type of datasets (climatic data, final yield in many situations). It is tested with CORNFLO, a crop model for maize growth. On the other hand, the data-driven approach for yield prediction is free of the complex biophysical process. But it has some strict requirements about the dataset. A second contribution of the paper is the comparison of these model-driven methods with classical data-driven methods. For this purpose, we consider two classes of regression methods, methods derived from linear regression (Ridge and Lasso Regression, Principal Components Regression or Partial Least Squares Regression) and machine learning methods (Random Forest, k-Nearest Neighbor, Artificial Neural Network and SVM regression). The dataset consists of 720 records of corn yield at county scale provided by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) and the associated climatic data. A 5-folds cross-validation process and two accuracy metrics: root mean square error of prediction(RMSEP), mean absolute error of prediction(MAEP) were used to evaluate the crop prediction capacity. The results show that among the data-driven approaches, Random Forest is the most robust and generally achieves the best prediction error (MAEP 4.27%). It also outperforms our model-driven approach (MAEP 6.11%). However, the method to calibrate the mechanistic model from dataset easy to access offers several side-perspectives. The mechanistic model can potentially help to underline the stresses suffered by the crop or to identify the biological parameters of interest for breeding purposes. For this reason, an interesting perspective is to combine these two types of approaches.

Keywords: Crop yield prediction, crop model, sensitivity analysis, paramater estimation, particle swarm optimization, random forest.

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Authors: E. Cenderelli, E. Bruno, G. Iacoviello, A. Lazzini

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The financial sector is exposed to the risk of cyber-attacks like any other industrial sector. Furthermore, the topic of CybeRisk (cyber risk) has become particularly relevant given that Information Technology (IT) attacks have increased drastically in recent years, and cannot be stopped by single organizations requiring a response at international and national level. IT risk is never a matter purely for the IT manager, although he clearly plays a key role. A bank's risk management function requires a thorough understanding of the evolving risks as well as the tools and practical techniques available to address them. Upon the request of European and national legislation regarding CybeRisk in the financial system, banks are therefore called upon to strengthen the operational model for CybeRisk management. This will require an important change with a more intense collaboration with the structures that deal with information security for the development of an ad hoc system for the evaluation and control of this type of risk. The aim of the work is to propose a framework for the management and control of CybeRisk that will bridge the gap in the literature regarding the understanding and consideration of CybeRisk as an integral part of business management. The IT function has a strong relevance in the management of CybeRisk, which is perceived mainly as operational risk, but with a positive tendency on the part of risk management to the identification of CybeRisk assessment methods that are increasingly complete, quantitative and able to better describe the possible impacts on the business. The paper provides answers to the research questions: Is it possible to define a CybeRisk governance structure able to support the comparison between risk and security? How can the relationships between IT assets be integrated into a cyberisk assessment framework to guarantee a system of protection and risks control? From a methodological point of view, this research uses a case study approach. The choice of “Monte dei Paschi di Siena” was determined by the specific features of one of Italy’s biggest lenders. It is chosen to use an intensive research strategy: an in-depth study of reality. The case study methodology is an empirical approach to explore a complex and current phenomenon that develops over time. The use of cases has also the advantage of allowing the deepening of aspects concerning the "how" and "why" of contemporary events, on which the scholar has little control. The research bases on quantitative data and qualitative information obtained through semi-structured interviews of an open-ended nature and questionnaires to directors, members of the audit committee, risk, IT and compliance managers, and those responsible for internal audit function and anti-money laundering. The added value of the paper can be seen in the development of a framework based on a mapping of IT assets from which it is possible to identify their relationships for purposes of a more effective management and control of cyber risk.

Keywords: Bank, CybeRisk, information technology, risk management.

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Authors: A. Kourou, S. Kyriakopoulos, N. Anyfanti

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A lot of children under the age of five spend their daytime hours away from their home, in a kindergarten. Caring for children is a serious subject, and their safety in case of earthquake is the first priority. Being aware of earthquakes helps to prioritize the needs and take the appropriate actions to limit the effects. Earthquakes occurring anywhere at any time require emergency planning. Earthquake planning is a cooperative effort and childcare providers have unique roles and responsibilities. Greece has high seismicity and Ionian Islands Region has the highest seismic activity of the country. Earthquake Planning and Protection Organization (EPPO) is a national organization in Greece. The mission of EPPO is the seismic risk reduction by designing an earthquake management program of mitigation and preparedness. Among other actions EPPO has analyzed the needs and requirements of kindergartens on earthquake protection issues and has designed specific activities to familiarize the day care centers staff being prepared for earthquakes.  This research presents the results of a survey that detects the level of earthquake preparedness of kindergartens in all over the country and Ionian Islands too. A closed-form questionnaire of 20 main questions was developed for the survey in order to detect the aspects of participants concerning the earthquake preparedness actions at individual, family and day care environment level. 2668 questionnaires were gathered from March 2014 to May 2019, and analyzed by EPPO’s Department of Education. Moreover, this paper presents the EPPO’s educational activities targeted to the Ionian Islands Region that implemented in the framework of “Telemachus” Project. To provide safe environment for children to learn, and staff to work is the foremost goal of any State, community and kindergarten. This project is funded under the Priority Axis “Environmental Protection and Sustainable Development” of Operational Plan “Ionian Islands 2014-2020”. It is increasingly accepted that emergency preparedness should be thought of as an ongoing process rather than a one-time activity. Creating an earthquake safe daycare environment that facilitates learning is a challenging task. Training, drills, and update of emergency plan should take place throughout the year at kindergartens to identify any gaps and to ensure the emergency procedures. EPPO will continue to work closely with regional and local authorities to actively address the needs of children and kindergartens before, during and after earthquakes.

Keywords: Child care centers, education on earthquake issues, emergency planning, Ionian Islands Region of Greece, kindergartens, preparedness.

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Authors: Pavana Manvikar, G K Purohit

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The functional performance of machined components, often, depends on surface topography, hardness, nature of stress and strain induced on the surface, etc. Invariably, surfaces of metallic components obtained by turning, milling, etc., consist of irregularities such as machining marks are responsible for the above. Surface finishing/coating processes used to produce improved surface quality/textures are classified as chip-removal and chip-less processes. Burnishing is chip-less cold working process carried out to improve surface finish, hardness and resistance to fatigue and corrosion; not obtainable by other surface coating and surface treatment processes. It is a very simple, but effective method which improves surface characteristics and is reported to introduce compressive stresses.

Of late, considerable attention is paid to post-machining, finishing operations, such as burnishing. During burnishing the micro-irregularities start to deform plastically, initially the crests are gradually flattened and zones of reduced deformation are formed. When all the crests are deformed, the valleys between the micro-irregularities start moving in the direction of the newly formed surface. The grain structure is then condensed, producing a smoother and harder surface with superior load-carrying and wear-resistant capabilities.

Burnishing can be performed on a lathe with a highly polished ball or roller type tool which is traversed under force over a rotating/stationary work piece. Often, several passes are used to obtain the work piece surface with the desired finish and hardness.

This paper presents the findings of an experimental investigation on the effect of ball burnishing parameters such as, burnishing speed, feed, force and number of passes; on surface roughness (Ra) and micro-hardness (Hv) of a 60/40 copper/zinc alloy, using a 2-level fractional factorial design of experiments (DoE). Mathematical models were developed to predict surface roughness and hardness generated by burnishing in terms of the above process parameters. A ball-type tool, designed and constructed from a high chrome steel material (HR_C=63 and Ra=0.012 µm), was used for burnishing of fine-turned cylindrical bars (0.68-0.78µm and 145Hv). They are given by,

 

Ra= 0.305-0.005X₁ - 0.0175X₂ + 0.0525X₄ + 0.0125X₁X₄ -0.02X₂X₄ - 0.0375X₃X₄

 

Hv=160.625 -2.37 5X₁ + 5.125X₂ + 1.875X₃ + 4.375X₄ - 1.625X₁X₄ + 4.375X₂X₄ - 2.375X₃X₄

 

High surface microhardness (175H_V) was obtained at 400rpm, 2passes, 0.05mm/rev and 15kgf., and high surface finish (0.20µm) was achieved at 30kgf, 0.1mm/rev, 112rpm and single pass. In other words, surface finish improved by 350% and microhardness improved by 21% compared to as machined conditions.

Keywords: Ball burnishing, surface roughness, micro-hardness.

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Authors: Tanima Bhattacharya, Joy Sen

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To transform a space into a better livable and sustainable zone, United Nations Summit in New York 2015, has decided upon 17 sustainable development goals (SDGs) that approach directly to achieve inclusive, people-centric, sustainable developments. Though sustainability has been majorly constructed by four pillars, namely, Ecological, Economic, Social and Cultural, but it is essentially reduced to economic and ecological consideration in the context of developing countries. Therefore, in most cases planning has reduced its ambit to concentrate around the tangible infrastructure, ignoring the fundamentals of socio-cultural heritage. With the accentuating hype of infrastructural augmentation, lack of emphasis of traditional concerns like ethnicity and social connection have further diluted the situation, disintegrating cultural continuity. As cultural continuity lacks its cohesion, it’s growing absence increasingly acts as a catalyst to degrade the heritage structures, spaces around and linking these structures, and the ability of stakeholders in identifying themselves rooted in that particular space. Hence, this paper will argue that sustainability depends on the people and their interaction with their surroundings, their culture and livelihood. The interaction between people and their surroundings strengthen community building and social interaction that abides by stakeholders reverting back to their roots. To assess the socio-cultural sustainability of the city of Kolkata, two study areas are selected, namely, an old settlement from the northern part of the city of Kolkata (KMA), imbued with social connection, age-old cultural and ethnic bonding and, another cluster of new high-rises coming up in the Newtown area having portions of planned city extension on the eastern side of the city itself. Whereas, Newtown prioritizes the surging post-industrial trends of economic aspiration and ecological aspects of urban sustainability; the former settlements of northern Kolkata still continue to represent the earliest community settlement of the British-colonial-cum native era and even the pre-colonial era, permeated with socio-cultural reciprocation. Thus, to compare and assess the inlayed organizational structure of both the spaces in the two cases, selected areas have been surveyed to portray their current imageability. The argument of this paper is structured in 5parts. First, an introduction of the idea has been forwarded, Secondly, a literature review has been conducted to ground the proposed ideas, Thirdly, methodology has been discussed and appropriate case study areas have been selected, Fourthly, surveys and analyses has been forwarded and lastly, the paper has arrived at a set of conclusions by suggesting a threefold development to create happy, healthy and sustainable community.

Keywords: Art innovation, current scenario assessment, heritage, imageability, socio-cultural sustainability.

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Authors: Hajar Mohammadpour Kachlami , Ghasem Javadzadeh Moghtader , Habib Mohammadpour Kachlami

Abstract:

Nowadays due to globalization of economy and competition environment, innovation and technology plays key role at creation of wealth and economic growth of countries. In fact prompt growth of practical and technologic knowledge may results in social benefits for countries when changes into effective innovation. Considering the importance of innovation for the development of countries, this study addresses the radical technological innovation introduced by nanopapers at different stages of producing paper including stock preparation, using authorized additives, fillers and pigments, using retention, calender, stages of producing conductive paper, porous nanopaper and Layer by layer self-assembly. Research results show that in coming years the jungle related products will lose considerable portion of their market share, unless embracing radical innovation. Although incremental innovations can make this industry still competitive in mid-term, but to have economic growth and competitive advantage in long term, radical innovations are necessary. Radical innovations can lead to new products and materials which their applications in packaging industry can produce value added. However application of nanotechnology in this industry can be costly, it can be done in cooperation with other industries to make the maximum use of nanotechnology possible. Therefore this technology can be used in all the production process resulting in the mass production of simple and flexible papers with low cost and special properties such as facility at shape, form, easy transportation, light weight, recovery and recycle marketing abilities, and sealing. Improving the resistance of the packaging materials without reducing the performance of packaging materials enhances the quality and the value added of packaging. Improving the cellulose at nano scale can have considerable electron optical and magnetic effects leading to improvement in packaging and value added. Comparing to the specifications of thermoplastic products and ordinary papers, nanopapers show much better performance in terms of effective mechanical indexes such as the modulus of elasticity, tensile strength, and strain-stress. In densities lower than 640 kgm -3, due to the network structure of nanofibers and the balanced and randomized distribution of NFC in flat space, these specifications will even improve more. For nanopapers, strains are 1,4Gpa, 84Mpa and 17%, 13,3 Gpa, 214Mpa and 10% respectively. In layer by layer self assembly method (LbL) the tensile strength of nanopaper with Tio3 particles and Sio2 and halloysite clay nanotube are 30,4 ±7.6Nm/g and 13,6 ±0.8Nm/g and 14±0.3,3Nm/g respectively that fall within acceptable range of similar samples with virgin fiber. The usage of improved brightness and porosity index in nanopapers can create more competitive advantages at packaging industry.

Keywords: Innovation; NanoPaper; Nanofiber; Packaging

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Authors: Amparo Camacho

Abstract:

ABET accredited programs must assess the development of student learning outcomes (SOs) in engineering programs. Different institutions implement different strategies for this assessment, and they are usually designed “in house.” This paper presents a proposal for including standardized tests to complement the ABET assessment model in an engineering college made up of six distinct engineering programs. The engineering college formulated a model of quality assurance in education to be implemented throughout the six engineering programs to regularly assess and evaluate the achievement of SOs in each program offered. The model uses diverse techniques and sources of data to assess student performance and to implement actions of improvement based on the results of this assessment. The model is called “Assessment Process Model” and it includes SOs A through K, as defined by ABET. SOs can be divided into two categories: “hard skills” and “professional skills” (soft skills). The first includes abilities, such as: applying knowledge of mathematics, science, and engineering and designing and conducting experiments, as well as analyzing and interpreting data. The second category, “professional skills”, includes communicating effectively, and understanding professional and ethnical responsibility. Within the Assessment Process Model, various tools were used to assess SOs, related to both “hard” as well as “soft” skills. The assessment tools designed included: rubrics, surveys, questionnaires, and portfolios. In addition to these instruments, the Engineering College decided to use tools that systematically gather consistent quantitative data. For this reason, an in-house exam was designed and implemented, based on the curriculum of each program. Even though this exam was administered during various academic periods, it is not currently considered standardized. In 2017, the Engineering College included three standardized tests: one to assess mathematical and scientific reasoning and two more to assess reading and writing abilities. With these exams, the college hopes to obtain complementary information that can help better measure the development of both hard and soft skills of students in the different engineering programs. In the first semester of 2017, the three exams were given to three sample groups of students from the six different engineering programs. Students in the sample groups were either from the first, fifth, and tenth semester cohorts. At the time of submission of this paper, the engineering college has descriptive statistical data and is working with various statisticians to have a more in-depth and detailed analysis of the sample group of students’ achievement on the three exams. The overall objective of including standardized exams in the assessment model is to identify more precisely the least developed SOs in order to define and implement educational strategies necessary for students to achieve them in each engineering program.

Keywords: Assessment, hard skills, soft skills, standardized tests.

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Authors: A. A. Purohit, A. Basu, K. A. Chavan, M. D. Kudale

Abstract:

Many estuarine harbours in the world are facing the problem of siltation in docks, channel entrances, etc. The harbours in India are not an exception and require maintenance dredging to achieve navigable depths for keeping them operable. Hence, dredging is inevitable and is a costly affair. The heavy siltation in docks in well mixed tide dominated estuaries is mainly due to settlement of cohesive sediments in suspension. As such there is a need to have a permanent solution for minimising the siltation in such docks to alter the hydrodynamic flow field responsible for siltation by constructing structures outside the dock. One of such docks on the west coast of India, wherein siltation of about 2.5-3 m/annum prevails, was considered to understand the hydrodynamic flow field responsible for siltation. The dock is situated in such a region where macro type of semi-diurnal tide (range of about 5m) prevails. In order to change the flow field responsible for siltation inside the dock, suitability of Current Deflecting Wall (CDW) outside the dock was studied, which will minimise the sediment exchange rate and siltation in the dock. The well calibrated physical tidal model was used to understand the flow field during various phases of tide for the existing dock in Mumbai harbour. At the harbour entrance where the tidal flux exchanges in/out of the dock, measurements on water level and current were made to estimate the sediment transport capacity. The distorted scaled model (1:400 (H) & 1:80 (V)) of Mumbai area was used to study the tidal flow phenomenon, wherein tides are generated by automatic tide generator. Hydraulic model studies carried out under the existing condition (without CDW) reveal that, during initial hours of flood tide, flow hugs the docks breakwater and part of flow which enters the dock forms number of eddies of varying sizes inside the basin, while remaining part of flow bypasses the entrance of dock. During ebb, flow direction reverses, and part of the flow re-enters the dock from outside and creates eddies at its entrance. These eddies do not allow water/sediment-mass to come out and result in settlement of sediments in dock both due to eddies and more retention of sediment. At latter hours, current strength outside the dock entrance reduces and allows the water-mass of dock to come out. In order to improve flow field inside the dockyard, two CDWs of length 300 m and 40 m were proposed outside the dock breakwater and inline to Pier-wall at dock entrance. Model studies reveal that, during flood, major flow gets deflected away from the entrance and no eddies are formed inside the dock, while during ebb flow does not re-enter the dock, and sediment flux immediately starts emptying it during initial hours of ebb. This reduces not only the entry of sediment in dock by about 40% but also the deposition by about 42% due to less retention. Thus, CDW is a promising solution to significantly reduce siltation in dock.

Keywords: Current deflecting wall, eddies, hydraulic model, macro tide, siltation.

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