Search results for: User cost
Commenced in January 2007
Frequency: Monthly
Edition: International
Paper Count: 3176

Search results for: User cost

2636 Accelerating Integer Neural Networks On Low Cost DSPs

Authors: Thomas Behan, Zaiyi Liao, Lian Zhao, Chunting Yang

Abstract:

In this paper, low end Digital Signal Processors (DSPs) are applied to accelerate integer neural networks. The use of DSPs to accelerate neural networks has been a topic of study for some time, and has demonstrated significant performance improvements. Recently, work has been done on integer only neural networks, which greatly reduces hardware requirements, and thus allows for cheaper hardware implementation. DSPs with Arithmetic Logic Units (ALUs) that support floating or fixed point arithmetic are generally more expensive than their integer only counterparts due to increased circuit complexity. However if the need for floating or fixed point math operation can be removed, then simpler, lower cost DSPs can be used. To achieve this, an integer only neural network is created in this paper, which is then accelerated by using DSP instructions to improve performance.

Keywords: Digital Signal Processor (DSP), Integer Neural Network(INN), Low Cost Neural Network, Integer Neural Network DSPImplementation.

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2635 How Team Efficacy Beliefs Impact Project Performance: An Empirical Investigation of Team Potency in Capital Projects in the Process Industries

Authors: C. Scott-Young, D. Samson

Abstract:

Team efficacy beliefs show promise in enhancing team performance. Using a model-based quantitative research design, we investigated the antecedents and performance consequences of generalized team efficacy (potency) in a sample of 56 capital projects executed by 15 Fortune 500 companies in the process industries. Empirical analysis of our field survey identified that generalized team efficacy beliefs were positively associated with an objective measure of project cost performance. Regression analysis revealed that team competence, empowering leadership, and performance feedback all predicted generalized team efficacy beliefs. Tests of mediation revealed that generalized team efficacy fully mediated between these three inputs and project cost performance.

Keywords: Team efficacy, Potency, Leadership, Feedback, Project cost.

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2634 Investigating Feed Mix Problem Approaches: An Overview and Potential Solution

Authors: Rosshairy Abd Rahman, Chooi-Leng Ang, Razamin Ramli

Abstract:

Feed is one of the factors which play an important role in determining a successful development of an aquaculture industry. It is always critical to produce the best aquaculture diet at a minimum cost in order to trim down the operational cost and gain more profit. However, the feed mix problem becomes increasingly difficult since many issues need to be considered simultaneously. Thus, the purpose of this paper is to review the current techniques used by nutritionist and researchers to tackle the issues. Additionally, this paper introduce an enhance algorithm which is deemed suitable to deal with all the issues arise. The proposed technique refers to Hybrid Genetic Algorithm which is expected to obtain the minimum cost diet for farmed animal, while satisfying nutritional requirements. Hybrid GA technique with artificial bee algorithm is expected to reduce the penalty function and provide a better solution for the feed mix problem.

Keywords: Artificial bee algorithm, feed mix problem, hybrid genetic algorithm.

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2633 Intelligent Multi-Agent Middleware for Ubiquitous Home Networking Environments

Authors: Minwoo Son, Seung-Hun Lee, Dongkyoo Shin, Dongil Shin

Abstract:

The next stage of the home networking environment is supposed to be ubiquitous, where each piece of material is equipped with an RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) tag. To fully support the ubiquitous environment, home networking middleware should be able to recommend home services based on a user-s interests and efficiently manage information on service usage profiles for the users. Therefore, USN (Ubiquitous Sensor Network) technology, which recognizes and manages a appliance-s state-information (location, capabilities, and so on) by connecting RFID tags is considered. The Intelligent Multi-Agent Middleware (IMAM) architecture was proposed to intelligently manage the mobile RFID-based home networking and to automatically supply information about home services that match a user-s interests. Evaluation results for personalization services for IMAM using Bayesian-Net and Decision Trees are presented.

Keywords: Intelligent Agents, Home Network, Mobile RFID, Intelligent Middleware.

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2632 A Survey on Requirements and Challenges of Internet Protocol Television Service over Software Defined Networking

Authors: Esmeralda Hysenbelliu

Abstract:

Over the last years, the demand for high bandwidth services, such as live (IPTV Service) and on-demand video streaming, steadily and rapidly increased. It has been predicted that video traffic (IPTV, VoD, and WEB TV) will account more than 90% of global Internet Protocol traffic that will cross the globe in 2016. Consequently, the importance and consideration on requirements and challenges of service providers faced today in supporting user’s requests for entertainment video across the various IPTV services through virtualization over Software Defined Networks (SDN), is tremendous in the highest stage of attention. What is necessarily required, is to deliver optimized live and on-demand services like Internet Protocol Service (IPTV Service) with low cost and good quality by strictly fulfill the essential requirements of Clients and ISP’s (Internet Service Provider’s) in the same time. The aim of this study is to present an overview of the important requirements and challenges of IPTV service with two network trends on solving challenges through virtualization (SDN and Network Function Virtualization). This paper provides an overview of researches published in the last five years.

Keywords: Challenges, IPTV Service, Requirements, Software Defined Networking.

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2631 Decimation Filter Design Toolbox for Multi-Standard Wireless Transceivers using MATLAB

Authors: Shahana T. K., Babita R. Jose, K. Poulose Jacob, Sreela Sasi

Abstract:

The demand for new telecommunication services requiring higher capacities, data rates and different operating modes have motivated the development of new generation multi-standard wireless transceivers. A multi-standard design often involves extensive system level analysis and architectural partitioning, typically requiring extensive calculations. In this research, a decimation filter design tool for wireless communication standards consisting of GSM, WCDMA, WLANa, WLANb, WLANg and WiMAX is developed in MATLAB® using GUIDE environment for visual analysis. The user can select a required wireless communication standard, and obtain the corresponding multistage decimation filter implementation using this toolbox. The toolbox helps the user or design engineer to perform a quick design and analysis of decimation filter for multiple standards without doing extensive calculation of the underlying methods.

Keywords: Decimation filter, MATLAB® toolbox, Multistandard transceivers, Sigma-delta A/D converter.

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2630 The Techno-Economic and Environmental Assessments of Grid-Connected Photovoltaic Systems in Bhubaneswar, India

Authors: A. K. Pradhan, M. K. Mohanty, S. K. Kar

Abstract:

The power system utility has started to think about the green power technology in order to have an eco-friendly environment. The green power technology utilizes renewable energy sources for reduction of GHG emissions. Odisha state (India) is very rich in potential of renewable energy sources especially in solar energy (about 300 solar days), for installation of grid connected photovoltaic system. This paper focuses on the utilization of photovoltaic systems in an Institute building of Bhubaneswar city, Odisha. Different data like solar insolation (kW/m2/day), sunshine duration has been collected from metrological stations for Bhubaneswar city. The required electrical power and cost are calculated for daily load of 1.0 kW. The HOMER (Hybrid Optimization Model of Electric Renewable) software is used to estimate system size and its performance analysis. The simulation result shows that the cost of energy (COE) is $ 0.194/kWh, the Operating cost is $63/yr and the net present cost (NPC) is $3,917. The energy produced from PV array is 1,756kWh/yr and energy purchased from grid is 410kWh/yr. The AC primary load consumption is 1314 kWh/yr and the Grid sales are 746 kWh/yr. One battery is connected in parallel with 12V DC Bus and the usable nominal capacity 2.4 kWh with 9.6 h autonomy capacity.

Keywords: Economic assessment, HOMER, Optimization, Photovoltaic (PV), Renewable energy.

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2629 Location Management in Cellular Networks

Authors: Bhavneet Sidhu, Hardeep Singh

Abstract:

Cellular networks provide voice and data services to the users with mobility. To deliver services to the mobile users, the cellular network is capable of tracking the locations of the users, and allowing user movement during the conversations. These capabilities are achieved by the location management. Location management in mobile communication systems is concerned with those network functions necessary to allow the users to be reached wherever they are in the network coverage area. In a cellular network, a service coverage area is divided into smaller areas of hexagonal shape, referred to as cells. The cellular concept was introduced to reuse the radio frequency. Continued expansion of cellular networks, coupled with an increasingly restricted mobile spectrum, has established the reduction of communication overhead as a highly important issue. Much of this traffic is used in determining the precise location of individual users when relaying calls, with the field of location management aiming to reduce this overhead through prediction of user location. This paper describes and compares various location management schemes in the cellular networks.

Keywords: Cellular Networks, Location Area, MobilityManagement, Paging.

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2628 Optimum Radio Capacity Estimation of a Single-Cell Spread Spectrum MIMO System under Rayleigh Fading Conditions

Authors: P. Varzakas

Abstract:

In this paper, the problem of estimating the optimal radio capacity of a single-cell spread spectrum (SS) multiple-inputmultiple- output (MIMO) system operating in a Rayleigh fading environment is examined. The optimisation between the radio capacity and the theoretically achievable average channel capacity (in the sense of information theory) per user of a MIMO single-cell SS system operating in a Rayleigh fading environment is presented. Then, the spectral efficiency is estimated in terms of the achievable average channel capacity per user, during the operation over a broadcast time-varying link, and leads to a simple novel-closed form expression for the optimal radio capacity value based on the maximization of the achieved spectral efficiency. Numerical results are presented to illustrate the proposed analysis.

Keywords: Channel capacity, MIMO systems, Radio capacity, Rayleigh fading, Spectral efficiency.

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2627 Assessing Mobile Robotic Telepresence Based On Measures of Social Telepresence

Authors: A. Bagherzadhalimi, E. Di Maria

Abstract:

The feedbacks obtained regarding the sense of presence from pilot users operating a Mobile Robotic presence (MRP) system to visit a simulated museum are reported in this paper. The aim is to investigate how much the perception of system’s usefulness and ease of use is affected by operators’ sense of social telepresence (presence) in the remote location. Therefore, scenarios of visiting a museum are simulated and the user operators are supposed to perform some regular tasks inside the remote environment including interaction with local users, navigation and visiting the artworks. Participants were divided into two groups, those who had previous experience of operation and interaction with a MRP system and those who never had experience. Based on the results, both groups provided different feedbacks. Moreover, there was a significant association between user’s sense of presence and their perception of system usefulness and ease of use.

Keywords: Mobile Robotic Telepresence, Museum, Social Telepresence, Usability test.

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2626 Transmitter Design for LMS-MIMO-MCCDMA Systems with Pilot Channel Estimates and Zero Forcing Equalizer

Authors: S.M. Bahri, F.T. Bendimerad

Abstract:

We propose a downlink multiple-input multipleoutput (MIMO) multi-carrier code division multiple access (MCCDMA) system with adaptive beamforming algorithm for smart antennas. The algorithm used in this paper is based on the Least Mean Square (LMS), with pilot channel estimation (PCE) and the zero forcing equalizer (ZFE) in the receiver, requiring reference signal and no knowledge channel. MC-CDMA is studied in a multiple antenna context in order to efficiently exploit robustness against multipath effects and multi-user flexibility of MC-CDMA and channel diversity offered by MIMO systems for radio mobile channels. Computer simulations, considering multi-path Rayleigh Fading Channel, interference inter symbol and interference are presented to verify the performance. Simulation results show that the scheme achieves good performance in a multi-user system.

Keywords: Adaptive Beamforming, LMS Algorithm, MCCDMA, MIMO System, Smart Antenna.

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2625 An Adaptive Virtual Desktop Service in Cloud Computing Platform

Authors: Shuen-Tai Wang, Hsi-Ya Chang

Abstract:

Cloud computing is becoming more and more matured over the last few years and consequently the demands for better cloud services is increasing rapidly. One of the research topics to improve cloud services is the desktop computing in virtualized environment. This paper aims at the development of an adaptive virtual desktop service in cloud computing platform based on our previous research on the virtualization technology. We implement cloud virtual desktop and application software streaming technology that make it possible for providing Virtual Desktop as a Service (VDaaS). Given the development of remote desktop virtualization, it allows shifting the user’s desktop from the traditional PC environment to the cloud-enabled environment, which is stored on a remote virtual machine rather than locally. This proposed effort has the potential to positively provide an efficient, resilience and elastic environment for online cloud service. Users no longer need to burden the platform maintenances and drastically reduces the overall cost of hardware and software licenses. Moreover, this flexible remote desktop service represents the next significant step to the mobile workplace, and it lets users access their desktop environments from virtually anywhere.

Keywords: Cloud Computing, Virtualization, Virtual Desktop, VDaaS.

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2624 Joint Microstatistic Multiuser Detection and Cancellation of Nonlinear Distortion Effects for the Uplink of MC-CDMA Systems Using Golay Codes

Authors: Peter Drotar, Juraj Gazda, Pavol Galajda, Dusan Kocur

Abstract:

The study in this paper underlines the importance of correct joint selection of the spreading codes for uplink of multicarrier code division multiple access (MC-CDMA) at the transmitter side and detector at the receiver side in the presence of nonlinear distortion due to high power amplifier (HPA). The bit error rate (BER) of system for different spreading sequences (Walsh code, Gold code, orthogonal Gold code, Golay code and Zadoff-Chu code) and different kinds of receivers (minimum mean-square error receiver (MMSE-MUD) and microstatistic multi-user receiver (MSF-MUD)) is compared by means of simulations for MC-CDMA transmission system. Finally, the results of analysis will show, that the application of MSF-MUD in combination with Golay codes can outperform significantly the other tested spreading codes and receivers for all mostly used models of HPA.

Keywords: HPA, MC-CDMA, microstatistic filter, multi-user receivers, PAPR.

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2623 Development of a Serial Signal Monitoring Program for Educational Purposes

Authors: Jungho Moon, Lae-Jeong Park

Abstract:

This paper introduces a signal monitoring program developed with a view to helping electrical engineering students get familiar with sensors with digital output. Because the output of digital sensors cannot be simply monitored by a measuring instrument such as an oscilloscope, students tend to have a hard time dealing with digital sensors. The monitoring program runs on a PC and communicates with an MCU that reads the output of digital sensors via an asynchronous communication interface. Receiving the sensor data from the MCU, the monitoring program shows time and/or frequency domain plots of the data in real time. In addition, the monitoring program provides a serial terminal that enables the user to exchange text information with the MCU while the received data is plotted. The user can easily observe the output of digital sensors and configure the digital sensors in real time, which helps students who do not have enough experiences with digital sensors. Though the monitoring program was programmed in the Matlab programming language, it runs without the Matlab since it was compiled as a standalone executable.

Keywords: Digital sensor, MATLAB, MCU, signal monitoring program.

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2622 Efficacy of Polyfluoroalkyl Substances Filtration with Low-Cost Organic Fiber Filter

Authors: Gautham Das, Edward Morrone, Erik Treble, Clinton Binder

Abstract:

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the efficacy of a low-cost filter regarding per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS). PFAS is a commonly used man-made chemical that can be found in a variety of household and industrial products with deleterious effects on humans. The filter consists of a combination of low-cost materials which could be locally procured. Water testing results for 4 different PFAS contaminants indicated that for Perfluorooctane sulfonic acid (PFOS), the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry (ATSDR) regulation is 7 ppt, the initial concentration was 15 ppt, and the final concentration was 3.9 ppt. For Perfluorononanoic acid (PFNA), the ATSDR regulation is 10.5 ppt, the initial concentration was 15 ppt, and the final concentration was 3.9 ppt. For Perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA), the ATSDR regulation is 11 ppt, the initial concentration was 15 ppt, and the final concentration was 3.9 ppt. For Perfluorohexane sulfonic acid (PFHxS), the ATSDR regulation is 70 ppt, the initial concentration was 15 ppt, and the final concentration was 3.9 ppt. The results indicated a 74% reduction in PFAS concentration in filtered samples. Statistical data through regression analysis showed 0.9 validity of the sample data. Initial tests show the efficiency of the proposed filter described could be far greater if tested at a greater scale. It is highly recommended further testing to be conducted to validate the data for an innovative solution to a ubiquitous problem.

Keywords: PFAS, PFOS, PFOA, PFHxS, low-cost filter.

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2621 Solving a New Mixed-Model Assembly LineSequencing Problem in a MTO Environment

Authors: N. Manavizadeh, M. Hosseini, M. Rabbani

Abstract:

In the last decades to supply the various and different demands of clients, a lot of manufacturers trend to use the mixedmodel assembly line (MMAL) in their production lines, since this policy make possible to assemble various and different models of the equivalent goods on the same line with the MTO approach. In this article, we determine the sequence of (MMAL) line, with applying the kitting approach and planning of rest time for general workers to reduce the wastages, increase the workers effectiveness and apply the sector of lean production approach. This Multi-objective sequencing problem solved in small size with GAMS22.2 and PSO meta heuristic in 10 test problems and compare their results together and conclude that their results are very similar together, next we determine the important factors in computing the cost, which improving them cost reduced. Since this problem, is NPhard in large size, we use the particle swarm optimization (PSO) meta-heuristic for solving it. In large size we define some test problems to survey it-s performance and determine the important factors in calculating the cost, that by change or improved them production in minimum cost will be possible.

Keywords: Mixed-Model Assembly Line, particle swarmoptimization, Multi-objective sequencing problem, MTO system, kitto-assembly, rest time

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2620 Ramp Rate and Constriction Factor Based Dual Objective Economic Load Dispatch Using Particle Swarm Optimization

Authors: Himanshu Shekhar Maharana, S. K .Dash

Abstract:

Economic Load Dispatch (ELD) proves to be a vital optimization process in electric power system for allocating generation amongst various units to compute the cost of generation, the cost of emission involving global warming gases like sulphur dioxide, nitrous oxide and carbon monoxide etc. In this dissertation, we emphasize ramp rate constriction factor based particle swarm optimization (RRCPSO) for analyzing various performance objectives, namely cost of generation, cost of emission, and a dual objective function involving both these objectives through the experimental simulated results. A 6-unit 30 bus IEEE test case system has been utilized for simulating the results involving improved weight factor advanced ramp rate limit constraints for optimizing total cost of generation and emission. This method increases the tendency of particles to venture into the solution space to ameliorate their convergence rates. Earlier works through dispersed PSO (DPSO) and constriction factor based PSO (CPSO) give rise to comparatively higher computational time and less good optimal solution at par with current dissertation. This paper deals with ramp rate and constriction factor based well defined ramp rate PSO to compute various objectives namely cost, emission and total objective etc. and compares the result with DPSO and weight improved PSO (WIPSO) techniques illustrating lesser computational time and better optimal solution. 

Keywords: Economic load dispatch, constriction factor based particle swarm optimization, dispersed particle swarm optimization, weight improved particle swarm optimization, ramp rate and constriction factor based particle swarm optimization.

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2619 Emission Constrained Economic Dispatch for Hydrothermal Coordination

Authors: Md. Sayeed Salam

Abstract:

This paper presents an efficient emission constrained economic dispatch algorithm that deals with nonlinear cost function and constraints. It is then incorporated into the dynamic programming based hydrothermal coordination program. The program has been tested on a practical utility system having 32 thermal and 12 hydro generating units. Test results show that a slight increase in production cost causes a substantial reduction in emission.

Keywords: Emission constraint, Hydrothermal coordination, and Economic dispatch algorithm.

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2618 Possible Number of Dwelling Units Using Waste Plastic Bottle for Construction

Authors: Dibya Jivan Pati, Kazuhisa Iki, Riken Homma

Abstract:

Unlike other metro cities of India, Bhubaneswar–the capital city of Odisha, is expected to reach 1-million-mark population by now. The demands of dwelling unit requirement mostly among urban poor belonging to Economically Weaker section (EWS) and Low Income groups (LIG) is becoming a challenge due to high housing cost and rents. As a matter of fact, it’s also noted that, with increase in population, the solid waste generation also increases subsequently affecting the environment due to inefficiency in collection of waste by local government bodies. Methods of utilizing Solid Waste - especially in form of Plastic bottles, Glass bottles and Metal cans (PGM) are now widely used as an alternative material for construction of low-cost building by Non-Government Organizations (NGOs) in developing countries like India to help the urban poor afford a shelter. The application of disposed plastic bottle used in construction of single dwelling significantly reduces the overall cost of construction to as much as 14% compared to traditional construction material. Therefore, considering its cost-benefit result, it’s possible to provide housing to EWS and LIGs at an affordable price. In this paper, we estimated the quantity of plastic bottles generated in Bhubaneswar which further helped to estimate the possible number of single dwelling unit that can be constructed on yearly basis so as to refrain from further housing shortage. The estimation results will be practically used for planning and managing low-cost housing business by local government and NGOs.

Keywords: Construction, dwelling unit, plastic bottle, solid waste generation, groups.

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2617 What the Future Holds for Social Media Data Analysis

Authors: P. Wlodarczak, J. Soar, M. Ally

Abstract:

The dramatic rise in the use of Social Media (SM) platforms such as Facebook and Twitter provide access to an unprecedented amount of user data. Users may post reviews on products and services they bought, write about their interests, share ideas or give their opinions and views on political issues. There is a growing interest in the analysis of SM data from organisations for detecting new trends, obtaining user opinions on their products and services or finding out about their online reputations. A recent research trend in SM analysis is making predictions based on sentiment analysis of SM. Often indicators of historic SM data are represented as time series and correlated with a variety of real world phenomena like the outcome of elections, the development of financial indicators, box office revenue and disease outbreaks. This paper examines the current state of research in the area of SM mining and predictive analysis and gives an overview of the analysis methods using opinion mining and machine learning techniques.

Keywords: Social Media, text mining, knowledge discovery, predictive analysis, machine learning.

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2616 A Novel, Cost-effective Design to Harness Ocean Energy in the Developing Countries

Authors: S. Ayub, S.N. Danish, S.R. Qureshi

Abstract:

The world's population continues to grow at a quarter of a million people per day, increasing the consumption of energy. This has made the world to face the problem of energy crisis now days. In response to the energy crisis, the principles of renewable energy gained popularity. There are much advancement made in developing the wind and solar energy farms across the world. These energy farms are not enough to meet the energy requirement of world. This has attracted investors to procure new sources of energy to be substituted. Among these sources, extraction of energy from the waves is considered as best option. The world oceans contain enough energy to meet the requirement of world. Significant advancements in design and technology are being made to make waves as a continuous source of energy. One major hurdle in launching wave energy devices in a developing country like Pakistan is the initial cost. A simple, reliable and cost effective wave energy converter (WEC) is required to meet the nation-s energy need. This paper will present a novel design proposed by team SAS for harnessing wave energy. This paper has three major sections. The first section will give a brief and concise view of ocean wave creation, propagation and the energy carried by them. The second section will explain the designing of SAS-2. A gear chain mechanism is used for transferring the energy from the buoy to a rotary generator. The third section will explain the manufacturing of scaled down model for SAS-2 .Many modifications are made in the trouble shooting stage. The design of SAS-2 is simple and very less maintenance is required. SAS-2 is producing electricity at Clifton. The initial cost of SAS-2 is very low. This has proved SAS- 2 as one of the cost effective and reliable source of harnessing wave energy for developing countries.

Keywords: Clean Energy, Wave energy

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2615 Evaluation of Top-down and Bottom-up Leadership Development Programs in a Finnish Company

Authors: Kati Skarp, Keijo Varis, Juha Kettunen

Abstract:

The purpose of this paper is to examine and evaluate the top-down and bottom-up leadership development programs focused on human capital that improve the performance of a company. This study reports on the external top-down leadership development program supported by a consulting company and the internal participatory action research of the bottom-up program. The sickness rate and the lost time incident failure rate decreased and the ideas produced for cost savings improved, leading to increased earnings during the top-down program. The estimated cost savings potential of the bottom-up program was 3.8 million euro based on the cost savings of meeting habits, maintenance practices and the way of working in production. The results of this study are useful for those who plan and evaluate leadership development and human capital productivity consultation programs to improve the performance of a company.

Keywords: Leadership, development, human resources, company, indicators, evaluation.

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2614 Emission Constrained Hydrothermal Scheduling Algorithm

Authors: Sayeed Salam

Abstract:

This paper presents an efficient emission constrained hydrothermal scheduling algorithm that deals with nonlinear functions such as the water discharge characteristics, thermal cost, and transmission loss. It is then incorporated into the hydrothermal coordination program. The program has been tested on a practical utility system having 32 thermal and 12 hydro generating units. Test results show that a slight increase in production cost causes a substantial reduction in emission.

Keywords: Emission constraint, Hydrothermal coordination, and Hydrothermal scheduling algorithm.

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2613 Semantic Indexing Approach of a Corpora Based On Ontology

Authors: Mohammed Erritali

Abstract:

The growth in the volume of text data such as books and articles in libraries for centuries has imposed to establish effective mechanisms to locate them. Early techniques such as abstraction, indexing and the use of classification categories have marked the birth of a new field of research called "Information Retrieval". Information Retrieval (IR) can be defined as the task of defining models and systems whose purpose is to facilitate access to a set of documents in electronic form (corpus) to allow a user to find the relevant ones for him, that is to say, the contents which matches with the information needs of the user. This paper presents a new semantic indexing approach of a documentary corpus. The indexing process starts first by a term weighting phase to determine the importance of these terms in the documents. Then the use of a thesaurus like Wordnet allows moving to the conceptual level. Each candidate concept is evaluated by determining its level of representation of the document, that is to say, the importance of the concept in relation to other concepts of the document. Finally, the semantic index is constructed by attaching to each concept of the ontology, the documents of the corpus in which these concepts are found.

Keywords: Semantic, indexing, corpora, WordNet, ontology.

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2612 A Framework for Evaluating the QoS and Cost of Web Services Based on Its Functional Performance

Authors: M. Mohemmed Sha, T. Manesh, A. Mohamed Mustaq Ahmed

Abstract:

In this corporate world, the technology of Web services has grown rapidly and its significance for the development of web based applications gradually rises over time. The success of Business to Business integration rely on finding novel partners and their services in a global business environment. However, the selection of the most suitable Web service from the list of services with the identical functionality is more vital. The satisfaction level of the customer and the provider’s reputation of the Web service are primarily depending on the range it reaches the customer’s requirements. In most cases, the customer of the Web service feels that he is spending for the service which is undelivered. This is because the customer always thinks that the real functionality of the web service is not reached. This will lead to change of the service frequently. In this paper, a framework is proposed to evaluate the Quality of Service (QoS) and its cost that makes the optimal correlation between each other. In addition, this research work proposes some management decision against the functional deviancy of the web service that is guaranteed at time of selection.

Keywords: Web service, service level agreement, quality of a service, cost of a service, QoS, CoS, SOA, WSLA, WsRF.

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2611 Methods for Analyzing the Energy Efficiencyand Cost Effectiveness of Evaporative Cooling Air Conditioning

Authors: A Fouda, Z. Melikyan

Abstract:

Air conditioning systems of houses consume large quantity of electricity. To reducing energy consumption for air conditioning purposes it is becoming attractive the use of evaporative cooling air conditioning which is less energy consuming compared to air chillers. But, it is obvious that higher energy efficiency of evaporative cooling is not enough to judge whether evaporative cooling economically is competitive with other types of cooling systems. To proving the higher energy efficiency and cost effectiveness of the evaporative cooling competitive analysis of various types of cooling system should be accomplished. For noted purpose optimization mathematical model for each system should be composed based on system approach analysis. In this paper different types of evaporative cooling-heating systems are discussed and methods for increasing their energy efficiency and as well as determining of their design parameters are developed. The optimization mathematical models for each of them are composed with help of which least specific costs for each of them are reviled. The comparison of specific costs proved that the most efficient and cost effective is considered the “direct evaporating" system if it is applicable for given climatic conditions. Next more universal and applicable for many climatic conditions system providing least cost of heating and cooling is considered the “direct evaporating" system.

Keywords: air, conditioning, system, evaporative cooling, mathematical model, optimization, thermoeconomic.

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2610 Numerical Model of Low Cost Rubber Isolators for Masonry Housing in High Seismic Regions

Authors: Ahmad B. Habieb, Gabriele Milani, Tavio Tavio, Federico Milani

Abstract:

Housings in developing countries have often inadequate seismic protection, particularly for masonry. People choose this type of structure since the cost and application are relatively cheap. Seismic protection of masonry remains an interesting issue among researchers. In this study, we develop a low-cost seismic isolation system for masonry using fiber reinforced elastomeric isolators. The elastomer proposed consists of few layers of rubber pads and fiber lamina, making it lower in cost comparing to the conventional isolators. We present a finite element (FE) analysis to predict the behavior of the low cost rubber isolators undergoing moderate deformations. The FE model of the elastomer involves a hyperelastic material property for the rubber pad. We adopt a Yeoh hyperelasticity model and estimate its coefficients through the available experimental data. Having the shear behavior of the elastomers, we apply that isolation system onto small masonry housing. To attach the isolators on the building, we model the shear behavior of the isolation system by means of a damped nonlinear spring model. By this attempt, the FE analysis becomes computationally inexpensive. Several ground motion data are applied to observe its sensitivity. Roof acceleration and tensile damage of walls become the parameters to evaluate the performance of the isolators. In this study, a concrete damage plasticity model is used to model masonry in the nonlinear range. This tool is available in the standard package of Abaqus FE software. Finally, the results show that the low-cost isolators proposed are capable of reducing roof acceleration and damage level of masonry housing. Through this study, we are also capable of monitoring the shear deformation of isolators during seismic motion. It is useful to determine whether the isolator is applicable. According to the results, the deformations of isolators on the benchmark one story building are relatively small.

Keywords: Masonry, low cost elastomeric isolator, finite element analysis, hyperelasticity, damped non-linear spring, concrete damage plasticity.

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2609 Micro-Hydrokinetic for Remote Rural Electrification

Authors: S. P. Koko, K. Kusakana, H. J. Vermaak

Abstract:

Standalone micro-hydrokinetic river (MHR) system is one of the promising technologies to be used for remote rural electrification. It simply requires the flow of water instead of elevation or head, leading to expensive civil works. This paper demonstrates an economic benefit offered by a standalone MHR system when compared to the commonly used standalone systems such as solar, wind and diesel generator (DG) at the selected study site in Kwazulu Natal. Wind speed and solar radiation data of the selected rural site have been taken from national aeronautics and space administration (NASA) surface meteorology database. The hybrid optimization model for electric renewable (HOMER) software was used to determine the most feasible solution when using MHR, solar, wind or DG system to supply 5 rural houses. MHR system proved to be the best cost-effective option to consider at the study site due to its low cost of energy (COE) and low net present cost (NPC).

Keywords: Economic analysis, Micro-hydrokinetic system, Rural-electrification, Stand-alone system.

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2608 The Economic Cost of Health and Safety in Work Places: An Approach on the Costs Calculating Model

Authors: Efat Lali Dastjerdi, Hassan Sadeghi Naeini, Hadi Sanjari

Abstract:

One of the important steps in a safety and risk management system is the economical evaluation of occupational accident and diseases costs in order to decrease accidents from reoccurring in the workplace. This study proposed a plausible method for calculating occupational accident costs and illnesses in work place. This method design for cost estimation takes into account both the personnel, organizational level as well as the community level especially intended for an Iranian work place. The research indicates that a using systematic method for calculating costs which also provides risk evaluation can help managers to plan correctly the investment in health and safety measures. Using this method is that not only is it comprehensive, easy and practical and could be applied in practice by a manager within a short period of time but it also shows the importance of accident costs as well as calculates the real cost of an accident and illnesses.

Keywords: ost calculating model, Economics of health and Safety.

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2607 Air Cargo Overbooking Model under Stochastic Weight and Volume Cancellation

Authors: N. Phumchusri, K. Roekdethawesab, M. Lohatepanont

Abstract:

Overbooking is an approach of selling more goods or services than available capacities because sellers anticipate that some buyers will not show-up or may cancel their bookings. At present, many airlines deploy overbooking strategy in order to deal with the uncertainty of their customers. Particularly, some airlines sell more cargo capacity than what they have available to freight forwarders with beliefs that some of them will cancel later. In this paper, we propose methods to find the optimal overbooking level of volume and weight for air cargo in order to minimize the total cost, containing cost of spoilage and cost of offloaded. Cancellations of volume and weight are jointly random variables with a known joint distribution. Heuristic approaches applying the idea of weight and volume independency is considered to find an appropriate answer to the full problem. Computational experiments are used to explore the performance of approaches presented in this paper, as compared to a naïve method under different scenarios.

Keywords: Air cargo overbooking, offloaded capacity, optimal overbooking level, revenue management, spoilage capacity.

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