Search results for: Area Control Error (ACE)

Authors: Radha Krishan, Deepak Khare, Bhaskar R. Nikam, Ayush Chandrakar

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Every irrigation project is planned considering long-term historical climatic conditions; however, the prompt climatic shift and change has come out with such circumstances which were inconceivable in the past. Considering this fact, scrutiny of rainfall and temperature trend has been carried out over the command area of Eastern Ganga Canal project for pre-climate shift period and post-climate shift periods in the present study. Non-parametric Mann-Kendall and Sen’s methods have been applied to study the trends in annual rainfall, seasonal rainfall, annual rainy day, monsoonal rainy days, average annual temperature and seasonal temperature. The results showed decreasing trend of 48.11 to 42.17 mm/decade in annual rainfall and 79.78 tSo 49.67 mm/decade in monsoon rainfall in pre-climate to post-climate shift periods, respectively. The decreasing trend of 1 to 4 days/decade has been observed in annual rainy days from pre-climate to post-climate shift period. Trends in temperature revealed that there were significant decreasing trends in annual (-0.03 ºC/yr), Kharif (-0.02 ºC/yr), Rabi (-0.04 ºC/yr) and summer (-0.02 ºC/yr) season temperature during pre-climate shift period, whereas the significant increasing trend (0.02 ºC/yr) has been observed in all the four parameters during post climate shift period. These results will help project managers in understanding the climate shift and lead them to develop alternative water management strategies.

Keywords: Climate shift, Rainfall trend, temperature trend, Mann-Kendall test, Sen slope estimator, Eastern Ganga Canal command.

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Authors: Lo Kar Yin, Law Ka Mei

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Architectural, engineering, construction and operations (AECO) industry practitioners have been well adapting to the dynamic construction market from the fundamental training of its disciplines. As further triggered by the pandemic since 2019, great steps are taken in virtual environment and the best collaboration is strived with project teams without boundaries. With adoption of Building Information Modeling-based approach and qualitative analysis, this paper is to review quantity take-off (QTO) and cost estimation process through modeling techniques in liaison with suppliers, fabricators, subcontractors, contractors, designers, consultants and services providers in the construction industry value chain for automatic project cost budgeting, project cost control and cost evaluation on design options of in-situ reinforced-concrete construction and Modular Integrated Construction (MiC) at design stage, variation of works and cash flow/spending analysis at construction stage as far as practicable, with a view to sharing the findings for enhancing mutual trust and co-operation among AECO industry practitioners. It is to foster development through a common prototype of design and build project delivery method in NEC4 Engineering and Construction Contract (ECC) Options A and C.

Keywords: Building Information Modeling, cost estimation, quantity take-off, modeling techniques.

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Authors: S. Aneeka, S.M. Phyoe, R. Guo, Z.W. Zhong

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Arrival flights tend to spend long waiting times at holding stacks if the arrival airport is congested. However, the waiting time spent in the air in the vicinity of the arrival airport may be reduced if the delays are distributed to the cruising phase of the arrival flights by means of speed control. Here, a case study was conducted for the flights arriving at Changi Airport. The flights that were assigned holdings were simulated to fly at a reduced speed during the cruising phase. As the study involves a single airport and is limited to imposing speed constraints to arrivals within 200 NM from its location, the simulation setup in this study could be considered as an application of the Extended Arrival Management (E-AMAN) technique, which is proven to result in considerable fuel savings and more efficient management of delays. The objective of this experiment was to quantify the benefits of imposing cruise speed constraints to arrivals at Changi Airport and to assess the effects on controllers’ workload. The simulation results indicated considerable fuel savings, reduced aircraft emissions and reduced controller workload.

Keywords: Aircraft emissions, air traffic flow management, controller workload, fuel consumption.

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Authors: Xiaoming Jiang, Jinqiao Shi, Qingfeng Tan, Wentao Zhang, Xuebin Wang, Muqian Chen

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Nowadays, big companies such as Google, Microsoft, which have adequate proxy servers, have perfectly implemented their web crawlers for a certain website in parallel. But due to lack of expensive proxy servers, it is still a puzzle for researchers to crawl large amounts of information from a single website in parallel. In this case, it is a good choice for researchers to use free public proxy servers which are crawled from the Internet. In order to improve efficiency of web crawler, the following two issues should be considered primarily: (1) Tasks may fail owing to the instability of free proxy servers; (2) A proxy server will be blocked if it visits a single website frequently. In this paper, we propose Proxisch, an optimization approach of large-scale unstable proxy servers scheduling, which allow anyone with extremely low cost to run a web crawler efficiently. Proxisch is designed to work efficiently by making maximum use of reliable proxy servers. To solve second problem, it establishes a frequency control mechanism which can ensure the visiting frequency of any chosen proxy server below the website’s limit. The results show that our approach performs better than the other scheduling algorithms.

Keywords: Proxy server, priority queue, optimization approach, distributed web crawling.

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Authors: Udeme O. Ini, Edikan E. Akpanibah

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This paper studies the optimal investment strategies for a plan member (PM) in a defined contribution (DC) pension scheme with transaction cost, taxes on invested funds and couple risky assets (stocks) under the Ornstein-Uhlenbeck (O-U) process. The PM’s portfolio is assumed to consist of a risk-free asset and two risky assets where the two risky assets are driven by the O-U process. The Legendre transformation and dual theory is use to transform the resultant optimal control problem which is a nonlinear partial differential equation (PDE) into linear PDE and the resultant linear PDE is then solved for the explicit solutions of the optimal investment strategies for PM exhibiting constant absolute risk aversion (CARA) using change of variable technique. Furthermore, theoretical analysis is used to study the influences of some sensitive parameters on the optimal investment strategies with observations that the optimal investment strategies for the two risky assets increase with increase in the dividend and decreases with increase in tax on the invested funds, risk averse coefficient, initial fund size and the transaction cost.

Keywords: Ornstein-Uhlenbeck process, portfolio management, Legendre transforms, CARA utility.

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Authors: A. Benaiche

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In the current situation, the automobile has become the main means of locomotion. It allows traveling long distances, encouraging urban sprawl. To counteract this trend, the train is often proposed as an alternative to the car. Simultaneously, the favoring of urban development around public transport nodes such as railway stations is one of the main issues of the coordination between urban planning and transportation and the keystone of the sustainable urban development implementation. In this context, this paper focuses on the study of the spatial structuring dynamics around the railway. Specifically, it is a question of studying the demographic dynamics in rail corridors of Nantes, Angers and Le Mans (Western France) basing on the radiation of railway stations. Consequently, the methodology is concentrated on the knowledge of demographic weight and gains of these corridors, the index of urban intensity and the mobility behaviors (workers’ travels, scholars' travels, modal practices of travels). The perimeter considered to define the rail corridors includes the communes of urban area which have a railway station and communes with an access time to the railway station is less than fifteen minutes by car (time specified by the Regional Transport Scheme of Travelers). The main tools used are the statistical data from the census of population, the basis of detailed tables and databases on mobility flows. The study reveals that the population is not tightened along rail corridors and train use is minimal despite the presence of a nearby railway station. These results lead to propose guidelines to make the train, a real vector of mobility across the rail corridors.

Keywords: Coordination between urban planning and transportation, Rail corridors, Railway stations, Travels.

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Authors: Tamanna Siddiqui, M. Afshar Alam

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Automated discovery of Rule is, due to its applicability, one of the most fundamental and important method in KDD. It has been an active research area in the recent past. Hierarchical representation allows us to easily manage the complexity of knowledge, to view the knowledge at different levels of details, and to focus our attention on the interesting aspects only. One of such efficient and easy to understand systems is Hierarchical Production rule (HPRs) system. A HPR, a standard production rule augmented with generality and specificity information, is of the following form: Decision If < condition> Generality Specificity . HPRs systems are capable of handling taxonomical structures inherent in the knowledge about the real world. This paper focuses on the issue of mining Quantified rules with crisp hierarchical structure using Genetic Programming (GP) approach to knowledge discovery. The post-processing scheme presented in this work uses Quantified production rules as initial individuals of GP and discovers hierarchical structure. In proposed approach rules are quantified by using Dempster Shafer theory. Suitable genetic operators are proposed for the suggested encoding. Based on the Subsumption Matrix(SM), an appropriate fitness function is suggested. Finally, Quantified Hierarchical Production Rules (HPRs) are generated from the discovered hierarchy, using Dempster Shafer theory. Experimental results are presented to demonstrate the performance of the proposed algorithm.

Keywords: Knowledge discovery in database, quantification, dempster shafer theory, genetic programming, hierarchy, subsumption matrix.

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Authors: Kwok Tak Kit

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The construction industry plays an important role in environmental and carbon emissions as it consumes a huge amount of natural resources and energy. Sustainable engineering involves the process of planning, design, procurement, construction and delivery in which the whole building and construction process resulting from building and construction can be effectively and sustainability managed to achieve the use of natural resources. Implementation of sustainable technology development and innovation, adoption of the advanced construction process and facilitate the facilities management to implement the energy and waste control more accurately and effectively. Study and research in the relationship of BIM and environment assessment tools lack a clear discussion. In this paper, we will focus on the synergy of BIM technology and sustainable engineering in the AEC industry and outline the key factors which enhance the use of advanced innovation, technology and method and define the role of stakeholders to achieve zero-carbon emission toward the Paris Agreement to limit global warming to well below 2°C above pre-industrial levels. A case study of the adoption of Building Information Modeling (BIM) and environmental assessment tools in Hong Kong will be discussed in this paper.

Keywords: sustainability, sustainable engineering, BIM, LEED

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Authors: Beatrix Faragó, Zsolt Szakály, Ágnes Kovácsné Tóth, Csaba Konczos, Norbert Kovács, Zsófia Pápai, Tamás Kertész

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The future of the nation is the embodiment of a healthy society. A key segment of government policy is the development of health and a health-oriented environment. As a result, sport as an activator of health is an important area for development. In Hungary, sport is a strategic sector with the aim of developing a sports nation. The function of sport in the global society is multifaceted, which is manifested in both social and economic terms. The economic importance of sport is gaining ground in the world, with implications for Central and Eastern Europe. Smaller states, such as Hungary, cannot ignore the economic effects of exploiting the effects of sport. The relationship between physical activity and health is driven by the health economy towards the nation's economic factor. In our research, we analyzed sport as a national strategy sector and its impact on age groups. By presenting the current state of health behavior, we get an idea of the directions where development opportunities require even more intervention. The foundation of the health of a nation is the young age group, whose shaping of health will shape the future generation. Our research was attended by university students from the Faculty of Health and Sports Sciences who will be experts in the field of health in the future. The other group is the elderly, who are a growing social group due to demographic change and are a key segment of the labor market and consumer society. Our study presents the health behavior of the two age groups, their differences, and similarities. The survey also identifies gaps in the development of a health management strategy that national strategies should take into account.

Keywords: Competitiveness, health behavior, health economy, health management, sports nation.

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Authors: Dehpour A. A., Eslami B., Rezaie S., Hashemian S. F., Shafie F., Kiaie M.

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The aims of study were investigation on chemical composition essential oil and the effect of extract of Coronilla varia on antimicrobial and cytotoxicity activity. The essential oils of Coronilla varia is obtained by hydrodistillation and analyzed by (GC/MS) for determining their chemical composition and identification of their components. Antibacterial activity of plant extract was determined by disc diffusion method and anticancer activity measured by MTT assay. The major components in essential oil were Caryophyllene Oxide (60.19%), Alphacadinol (4.13%) and Homoadantaneca Robexylic Acid (3.31%). The extracts from Coronilla varia had interesting activity against Proteus mirabilis in the concentration of 700 μg/disc and did not show any activity against Staphylococus aureus, Bacillus subtillis, Klebsiella pneumonia and Entrobacter cloacae. The positive control, Ampicillin, Chloramphenicol and Cenphalothin had shown zone of inhibition resistant all bacteria. The ethanol extract of Corohilla varia inhibited on MCF7 cell lines. IC50 0.6(mg/ml) was the optimum concentration of extract from Coronilla varia inhibition of cell line growth. The MCF7 cancer cell line and Proteus mirabilis were more sensitive to Coronilla varia ethanol extract.

Keywords: Coronilla varia, Essential oil, Antibacterial, Anticancer, HeLa cell line.

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Authors: Farbod Behnaminia, Saeed Samet

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The COVID-19 pandemic has paralyzed many lives until a vaccine has been available, which caused the so-called "new normal". COVID-19 is an infectious disease. It can cause significant illness or death in anyone. Governments and health officials tried to impose rules and regulations to avoid and slow down transmission. Therefore, software engineers worldwide developed applications to trace and track patients’ movements and notify others, mainly using Bluetooth. In this way, everyone could be informed whether they came in close contact with someone who has COVID-19 and take proper safety precautions. Because most of the applications use technologies that can potentially reveal the user’s identity and location, researchers have debated privacy preservation and how to improve user privacy during such pandemics. We conducted a comprehensive evaluation of the literature by looking for papers in the relevant field and dividing them into pre- and post-pandemic systems. Additionally, we discussed the many uses of blockchain technology in pandemic control. We found that two major obstacles facing blockchain implementation across many healthcare systems are scalability and privacy. The Polkadot platform is presented, along with a review of its efficacy in tackling current concerns. A more scalable healthcare system is achievable in near future using Polkadot as well as a much more privacy-preserving environment.

Keywords: Blockchain, Electronic Record Management, EHR, Privacy-Preserving, patient tracking, COVID-19, trust and confidence, Polkadot.

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Authors: Omaima N. Ahmad AL-Allaf

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Over communication networks, images can be easily copied and distributed in an illegal way. The copyright protection for authors and owners is necessary. Therefore, the digital watermarking techniques play an important role as a valid solution for authority problems. Digital image watermarking techniques are used to hide watermarks into images to achieve copyright protection and prevent its illegal copy. Watermarks need to be robust to attacks and maintain data quality. Therefore, we discussed in this paper two approaches for image watermarking, first is based on Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO) and the second approach is based on Genetic Algorithm (GA). Discrete wavelet transformation (DWT) is used with the two approaches separately for embedding process to cover image transformation. Each of PSO and GA is based on co-relation coefficient to detect the high energy coefficient watermark bit in the original image and then hide the watermark in original image. Many experiments were conducted for the two approaches with different values of PSO and GA parameters. From experiments, PSO approach got better results with PSNR equal 53, MSE equal 0.0039. Whereas GA approach got PSNR equal 50.5 and MSE equal 0.0048 when using population size equal to 100, number of iterations equal to 150 and 3×3 block. According to the results, we can note that small block size can affect the quality of image watermarking based PSO/GA because small block size can increase the search area of the watermarking image. Better PSO results were obtained when using swarm size equal to 100.

Keywords: Image watermarking, genetic algorithm, particle swarm optimization, discrete wavelet transform.

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Authors: Y. Abdelrazig, R. Moses

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Roadway planning and design is a very complex process involving five key phases before a project is completed; planning, project development, final design, right-of-way, and construction. The planning phase for a new roadway transportation project is a very critical phase as it greatly affects all latter phases of the project. A location study is usually performed during the preliminary planning phase in a new roadway project. The objective of the location study is to develop alignment alternatives that are cost efficient considering land acquisition and construction costs. This paper describes a methodology to develop optimal preliminary roadway alignments utilizing spatial-data. Four optimization criteria are taken into consideration; roadway length, land cost, land slope, and environmental impacts. The basic concept of the methodology is to convert the proposed project area into a grid, which represents the search space for an optimal alignment. The aforementioned optimization criteria are represented in each of the grid’s cells. A spatial-data optimization technique is utilized to find the optimal alignment in the search space based on the four optimization criteria. Two case studies for new roadway projects in Duval County in the State of Florida are presented to illustrate the methodology. The optimization output alignments are compared to the proposed Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) alignments. The comparison is based on right-of-way costs for the alignments. For both case studies, the right-of-way costs for the developed optimal alignments were found to be significantly lower than the FDOT alignments.

Keywords: Optimization, planning, roadway alignment, FDOT.

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Authors: Majid Toghyani, Abbas Ali Gheisari, Ali Khodami, Mehdi Toghyani, Mohammad Mohammadrezaei, Ramin Bahadoran

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This experiment was conducted to investigate the effect of different levels of dietary chromium yeast (Cr-yeast) on thigh meat quality of broiler chicks reared under heat stress condition. Two hundred and forty Ross male chickens in heat stress condition (33±3°C) were allocated to five treatments in a completely randomized design. Treatments were supplemented with 0 (control), 200, 400, 800 and 1200 μg kg-1 Cr in the form of Cr yeast. Twelve chicks from each treatment were slaughtered at 42 d, to evaluate moisture, protein, lipid, pH and lipid oxidation of thigh meat. Protein, moisture, lipid and pH of thigh meat were not affected by supplemental Cr. Thigh meat lipid tended to decrease in broilers received 1200 μg kg-1. Storage time increased lipid oxidation of meat (P<0.01). Lipid oxidation of thigh muscle for two days of storage were affected by supplemental Cr and decreased (P<0.05). Results of this study showed that dietary Cr-yeast supplementation improved the thigh meat quality of broiler chicks in heat stress condition.

Keywords: Broiler, Heat stress, Chromium yeast, Thigh meat quality.

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Authors: Haydar Kepekçi, Baha Zafer, Hasan Rıza Güven

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Noise disturbance is one of the major factors considered in the fast development of aircraft technology. This paper reviews the flow field, which is examined on the 2D NACA0015 and 3D NACA0012 blade profile using SST k-ω turbulence model to compute the unsteady flow field. We inserted the time-dependent flow area variables in Ffowcs-Williams and Hawkings (FW-H) equations as an input and Sound Pressure Level (SPL) values will be computed for different angles of attack (AoA) from the microphone which is positioned in the computational domain to investigate effect of augmentation of unsteady 2D and 3D airfoil region noise level. The computed results will be compared with experimental data which are available in the open literature. As results; one of the calculated Cp is slightly lower than the experimental value. This difference could be due to the higher Reynolds number of the experimental data. The ANSYS Fluent software was used in this study. Fluent includes well-validated physical modeling capabilities to deliver fast, accurate results across the widest range of CFD and multiphysics applications. This paper includes a study which is on external flow over an airfoil. The case of 2D NACA0015 has approximately 7 million elements and solves compressible fluid flow with heat transfer using the SST turbulence model. The other case of 3D NACA0012 has approximately 3 million elements.

Keywords: Aeroacoustics, Ffowcs-Williams and Hawkings equations, SST k-ω turbulence model, Noise Disturbance, 3D Blade Profile, 2D Blade Profile.

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Authors: Vishal Awasthi, Tanya Soni, Vigya Awasthi, Swati Singh, Shivali Verma

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There is a growing demand for a network that grants a high level of data security and confidentiality. For this reason, the semantic web was introduced, which allows data to be shared and reused across applications while safeguarding users privacy and user’s will grab back control of their data. The earlier Web 1.0 and Web 2.0 versions were built on client-server architecture, in  which there was the risk of data theft and unconsented sale of user data. A decentralized version, Known as Web 3.0, that is mostly built on blockchain technology was interjected to resolve these issues. The recent research focuses on blockchain technology, deals with privacy, security, transparency, and innovation of decentralized applications (DApps), e.g. a Twitter Clone, Whatsapp clone. In this paper the Twitter Alike built on the Ethereum blockchain will replace traditional techniques with improved latency, throughput, and data ownership. The central principle of this DApp is smart contract implemented using Solidity which is an object- oriented and highlevel language. Consequently, this will provide a better Quality Services, high data security, and integrity for both present and future internet technologies.

Keywords: Blockchain, DApps, Ethereum, Semantic Web, Smart Contract, Solidity.

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Authors: S. Pushkar, O. Verbitsky

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Currently, green rating systems are mainly utilized for correctly sizing mechanical and electrical systems, which have short lifetime expectancies. In these systems, passive solar and bio-climatic architecture, which have long lifetime expectancies, are neglected. Urban rating systems consider buildings and services in addition to neighborhoods and public transportation as integral parts of the built environment. The main goal of this study was to develop a more consistent point allocation system for urban building standards by using six different lifetime shearing layers: Site, Structure, Skin, Services, Space, and Stuff, each reflecting distinct environmental damages. This shearing-layer concept was applied to internationally well-known rating systems: Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) for Neighborhood Development, BRE Environmental Assessment Method (BREEAM) for Communities and Comprehensive Assessment System for Building Environmental Efficiency (CASBEE) for Urban Development. The results showed that LEED for Neighborhood Development and BREEAM for Communities focused on long-lifetime-expectancy building designs, whereas CASBEE for Urban Development gave equal importance to the Building and Service Layers. Moreover, although this rating system was applied using a building-scale assessment, “Urban Area + Buildings” focuses on a short-lifetime-expectancy system design, neglecting to improve the architectural design by considering bioclimatic and passive solar aspects.

Keywords: Green rating system, passive solar architecture, shearing-layer concept, urban community.

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Authors: K. Saravanan

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An electrical power system has some negative aspects such as flickering and deviations of voltage/power. This can be eliminated using energy storage devices that will provide a backup energy at the time of voltage/power deviations. Energy-storage devices get charging when system voltage/power is higher than reference value and discharging when system voltage/power is lower than reference value, it is acting as catalysts to provide energy boost. In this paper, a dynamic control of Unified Power Flow Controller (UPFC) integrated with superconducting magnetic energy storage (SMES) is developed to improve the power quality, power oscillation damping, and dynamic voltage stability through the transmission line. UPFC inter-connected to SMES through an interface with DC-DC chopper. This inter-connected system is capable of injecting (absorbing) the real and reactive power into (from) the system at the beginning of stability problems. In this paper, the simulation results of UPFC integrated with SMES and UPFC integrated with fuel cells (FCs) are compared using MATLAB/Simulink software package.

Keywords: UPFC, SMES, power system stability, flexible ac transmission systems, fuel cells, chopper.

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Authors: M. Toghyani, A. Ghasemi, S. A. Tabeidian

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The present study was carried out to evaluate the effect of different levels of dietary seed and extract of Harmal (Peganum harmala L.) on immunity of broiler chicks. A total of 350 one-day old broiler chicks (Ross 308) were randomly allocated to five dietary treatments with four replicates pen of 14 birds each. Dietary treatments consisted of control, 1 and 2 g/kg Harmal seed in diet, 100 and 200 mg/L Harmal seed extract in water. Broilers received dietary treatments from 1 to 42 d. Two birds from each pen were randomly weighed and sacrificed at 42 d of age, the relative weight of lymphoid organs (bursa of Fabercius and spleen) to live weight were calculated. Antibody titers against Newcastle and influenza viruses and sheep red blood cell were measured at 30 d of age. Results showed that the relative weights of lymphoid organs were not affected by dietary treatments. Furthermore, antibody titer against Newcastle and influenza viruses as well as sheep red blood cell antigen were significantly (P<0.05) enhanced by feeding Harmal seed and extract. In conclusion, the results indicated that dietary inclusion of Harmal seed and extract enhanced immunological responses in broiler chicks.

Keywords: Broiler chicks, Harmal, immunity.

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Authors: Ang Ling Weay, Mona Masood

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This paper discusses the potential benefits of an interactive multimedia information representation in enhancing students’ critical thinking aligned with history reasoning in learning history amongst Secondary School students in Malaysia. Two modes of multimedia information representation were implemented; chronologic and thematic information representations. A qualitative study of an unstructured interview was conducted among two history teachers, one history education lecturer, two i-think experts, and five students from Form Four secondary school. The interview was to elicit their opinions on the implementation of thinking maps and interactive multimedia information representation in history learning. The key elements of the interactive multimedia (e.g. multiple media, user control, interactivity and use of timelines and concept maps) were then considered to improve the learning process. Findings of the preliminary investigation reveal that the interactive multimedia information representations have the potential benefits to be implemented as an instructional resource in enhancing students’ higher order thinking skills (HOTs). This paper concludes by giving suggestions for future work.

Keywords: Multimedia Information Representation, Critical Thinking, History Reasoning, Chronological and Thematic Information Representation.

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Authors: N. V. Toan, S. Sangu, T. Saitoh, N. Inomata, T. Ono

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This paper presents the design and fabrication of an optical window for an optical modulator toward image sensing applications. An optical window consists of micrometer-order SiO2 capillaries (porous solid) that can modulate transmission light intensity by moving the liquid in and out of porous solid. A high optical transmittance of the optical window can be achieved due to refractive index matching when the liquid is penetrated into the porous solid. Otherwise, its light transmittance is lower because of light reflection and scattering by air holes and capillary walls. Silicon capillaries fabricated by deep reactive ion etching (DRIE) process are completely oxidized to form the SiO2 capillaries. Therefore, high aspect ratio SiO2 capillaries can be achieved based on silicon capillaries formed by DRIE technique. Large compressive stress of the oxide causes bending of the capillary structure, which is reduced by optimizing the design of device structure. The large stress of the optical window can be released via thin supporting beams. A 7.2 mm x 9.6 mm optical window area toward a fully integrated with the image sensor format is successfully fabricated and its optical transmittance is evaluated with and without inserting liquids (ethanol and matching oil). The achieved modulation range is approximately 20% to 35% with and without liquid penetration in visible region (wavelength range from 450 nm to 650 nm).

Keywords: Thermal oxidation process, SiO2 capillaries, optical window, light transmittance, image sensor, liquid penetration.

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Authors: Muhammad Farhan, Sayed Faruque, Amr Mohammed, Sami Osman, Omar Al-Jabari, Abdul Almojil

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Saudi Arabia in recent years has seen drastic increase in traffic related crashes. With population of over 29 million, Saudi Arabia is considered as a fast growing and emerging economy. The rapid population increase and economic growth has resulted in rapid expansion of transportation infrastructure, which has led to increase in road crashes. Saudi Ministry of Interior reported more than 7,000 people killed and 68,000 injured in 2011 ranking Saudi Arabia to be one of the worst worldwide in traffic safety. The traffic safety issues in the country also result in distress to road users and cause and economic loss exceeding 3.7 billion Euros annually. Keeping this in view, the researchers in Saudi Arabia are investigating ways to improve traffic safety conditions in the country. This paper presents a multilevel approach to collect traffic safety related data required to do traffic safety studies in the region. Two highway corridors including King Fahd Highway 39 kilometre and Gulf Cooperation Council Highway 42 kilometre long connecting the cities of Dammam and Khobar were selected as a study area. Traffic data collected included traffic counts, crash data, travel time data, and speed data. The collected data was analysed using geographic information system to evaluate any correlation. Further research is needed to investigate the effectiveness of traffic safety related data when collected in a concerted effort.

Keywords: Crash Data, Data Collection, Traffic Safety.

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Authors: O. E. Okafor, L. U. S. Ezeanyika, C. G. Nkwonta, C. J. Okonkwo

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The effect of processing on plasma lipid profile and atherogenic indices of rats fed Artocarpus heterophyllus seed diets at different concentrations were investigated. Fifty five rats were used for this study, they were divided into eleven groups of five rats each (one control group and ten test groups), the test groups were fed raw, boiled, roasted, fermented and soaked diets at 10% and 40% concentrations. The study lasted for thirty five days. The diets led to significant decrease (p<0.05) in plasma cholesterol and triacylglycerol of rats fed 10% and 40% concentrations of the diets, and a significant increase (p<0.05) in high density lipoprotein (HDL) levels at 40% concentrations of the test diets. The diets also produced decrease in low density lipoprotein (LDL), very low density lipoprotein (VLDL), cardiac risk ratio (CRR), atherogenic index of plasma (AIP) and atherogenic coefficient (AC) at 40% concentrations except the soaked group that showed slight elevation of LDL, CRR, AC and AIP at 40% concentration. Artocarpus heterophyllus seeds could be beneficial to health because of its ability to increase plasma HDL and reduce plasma LDL, VLDL, cholesterol, triglycerides and atherogenic indices at higher diet concentration.

Keywords: Artocarpus heterophyllus, atherogenic indices, concentrations, lipid profile.

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Authors: A. Rajesh Kanna, G. Suresh Kumar, Sathyanaryana N. Gummadi

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There are various sources of energies available worldwide and among them, crude oil plays a vital role. Oil recovery is achieved using conventional primary and secondary recovery methods. In-order to recover the remaining residual oil, technologies like Enhanced Oil Recovery (EOR) are utilized which is also known as tertiary recovery. Among EOR, Microbial enhanced oil recovery (MEOR) is a technique which enables the improvement of oil recovery by injection of bio-surfactant produced by microorganisms. Bio-surfactant can retrieve unrecoverable oil from the cap rock which is held by high capillary force. Bio-surfactant is a surface active agent which can reduce the interfacial tension and reduce viscosity of oil and thereby oil can be recovered to the surface as the mobility of the oil is increased. Research in this area has shown promising results besides the method is echo-friendly and cost effective compared with other EOR techniques. In our research, on laboratory scale we produced bio-surfactant using the strain Pseudomonas putida (MTCC 2467) and injected into designed simple sand packed column which resembles actual petroleum reservoir. The experiment was conducted in order to determine the efficiency of produced bio-surfactant in oil recovery. The column was made of plastic material with 10 cm in length. The diameter was 2.5 cm. The column was packed with fine sand material. Sand was saturated with brine initially followed by oil saturation. Water flooding followed by bio-surfactant injection was done to determine the amount of oil recovered. Further, the injection of bio-surfactant volume was varied and checked how effectively oil recovery can be achieved. A comparative study was also done by injecting Triton X 100 which is one of the chemical surfactant. Since, bio-surfactant reduced surface and interfacial tension oil can be easily recovered from the porous sand packed column.

Keywords: Bio-surfactant, Bacteria, Interfacial tension, Sand column.

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Authors: Jun Wang, Tingcun Wei

Abstract:

The digital pulse width modulator (DPWM) is the crucial building block for digitally-controlled DC-DC switching converter, which converts the digital duty ratio signal into its analog counterpart to control the power MOSFET transistors on or off. With the increase of switching frequency of digitally-controlled DC-DC converter, the DPWM with higher time resolution is required. In this paper, a 15-bits DPWM with three-level hybrid structure is presented; the first level is composed of a7-bits counter and a comparator, the second one is a 5-bits delay line, and the third one is a 3-bits digital dither. The presented DPWM is designed and implemented using the PLL megafunction of FPGA (Field Programmable Gate Arrays), and the required frequency of clock signal is 128 times of switching frequency. The simulation results show that, for the switching frequency of 2 MHz, a DPWM which has the time resolution of 15 ps is achieved using a maximum clock frequency of 256MHz. The designed DPWM in this paper is especially useful for high-frequency digitally-controlled DC-DC switching converters.

Keywords: DPWM, PLL megafunction, FPGA, time resolution, digitally-controlled DC-DC switching converter.

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Authors: Selma Sbit, Mohamed Bechir Dadi, Belgacem Chibani Rhaimi

Abstract:

Incorporating Home eNodeB (HeNB) in cellular networks, e.g. Long Term Evolution Advanced (LTE-A), is beneficial for extending coverage and enhancing capacity at low price especially within the non-line-of sight (NLOS) environments such as homes. HeNB or femtocell is a small low powered base station which provides radio coverage to the mobile users in an indoor environment. This deployment results in a heterogeneous network where the available spectrum becomes shared between two layers. Therefore, a problem of Inter Cell Interference (ICI) appears. This issue is the main challenge in LTE-A. To deal with this challenge, various techniques based on frequency, time and power control are proposed. This paper deals with the impact of carrier aggregation and higher order MIMO (Multiple Input Multiple Output) schemes on the LTE-Advanced performance. Simulation results show the advantages of these schemes on the system capacity (4.10⁹ b/s/Hz when bandwidth B=100 MHz and when applying MIMO 8x8 for SINR=30 dB), maximum theoretical peak data rate (more than 4 Gbps for B=100 MHz and when MIMO 8x8 is used) and spectral efficiency (15 b/s/Hz and 30b/s/Hz when MIMO 4x4 and MIMO 8x8 are applying respectively for SINR=30 dB).

Keywords: LTE-Advanced, carrier aggregation, MIMO, capacity, peak data rate, spectral efficiency.

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Authors: Kazuhisa Koda, Tsutomu Kobayashi, Rebecca Lorennji, Alington Robert, Halston DeBrum, Julious Lucky, Paul Paul

Abstract:

Atolls are low-lying small islands with highly permeable ground that does not allow rivers and lakes to develop. As the water resources on these atolls basically rely on precipitation, groundwater becomes a very important water resource during droughts. Freshwater lenses develop as groundwater on relatively large atoll islands and play a key role in the stable water supply. Atoll islands in the Pacific Ocean sometimes suffer from drought due to El Nino. The global warming effects are noticeable, particularly on atoll islands. The Republic of the Marshall Islands in Oceania is burdened with the problems common to atoll islands. About half of its population lives in the capital, Majuro, and securing water resources for these people is a crucial issue. There is a freshwater lens on the largest, Laura Island, which serves as a water source for the downtown area. A serious drought that occurred in 1998 resulted in excessive water intake from the freshwater lens on Laura Island causing up-coning. Up-coning mixes saltwater into groundwater pumped from water-intake wells. Because up-coning makes the freshwater lens unusable, there was a need to investigate the freshwater lens on Laura Island. In this study, we observed the electrical conductivities of the groundwater at different depths in existing monitoring wells to determine the total storage volume of the freshwater lens on Laura Island from 2010 to 2013. Our results indicated that most of the groundwater that seeped into the freshwater lens had flowed out into the sea.

Keywords: Atoll islands, drought, El-Nino, freshwater lens, groundwater observation.

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Authors: Abdolghani Ebrahimi, Diego Klabjan, Chenxi Ge, Daniela Ladner, Parker Stride

Abstract:

In this work, we use machine learning and data analysis techniques to predict the one-year mortality of cirrhotic patients. Data from 2,322 patients with liver cirrhosis are collected at a single medical center. Different machine learning models are applied to predict one-year mortality. A comprehensive feature space including demographic information, comorbidity, clinical procedure and laboratory tests is being analyzed. A temporal pattern mining technic called Frequent Subgraph Mining (FSM) is being used. Model for End-stage liver disease (MELD) prediction of mortality is used as a comparator. All of our models statistically significantly outperform the MELD-score model and show an average 10% improvement of the area under the curve (AUC). The FSM technic itself does not improve the model significantly, but FSM, together with a machine learning technique called an ensemble, further improves the model performance. With the abundance of data available in healthcare through electronic health records (EHR), existing predictive models can be refined to identify and treat patients at risk for higher mortality. However, due to the sparsity of the temporal information needed by FSM, the FSM model does not yield significant improvements. Our work applies modern machine learning algorithms and data analysis methods on predicting one-year mortality of cirrhotic patients and builds a model that predicts one-year mortality significantly more accurate than the MELD score. We have also tested the potential of FSM and provided a new perspective of the importance of clinical features.

Keywords: machine learning, liver cirrhosis, subgraph mining, supervised learning

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Authors: Cornelia-Eugenia Munteanu

Abstract:

From a psychological perspective, psychopathology is the area of clinical psychology that has at its core psychological assessment and psychotherapy. In day-to-day clinical practice, psychodiagnosis and psychotherapy are used independently, according to their intended purpose and their specific methods of application. The paper explores how the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory-2 (MMPI-2) and Mini Mental State Examination-2 (MMSE-2) psychological tools contribute to enhancing the effectiveness of cognitive behavioral psychotherapy (CBT). This combined approach, psychotherapy in conjunction with assessment of personality and cognitive functions, is illustrated by two cases, a severe depressive episode with psychotic symptoms and a mixed anxiety-depressive disorder. The order in which CBT, MMPI-2, and MMSE-2 were used in the diagnostic and therapeutic process was determined by the particularities of each case. In the first case, the sequence started with psychotherapy, followed by the administration of blue form MMSE-2, MMPI-2, and red form MMSE-2. In the second case, the cognitive screening with blue form MMSE-2 led to a personality assessment using MMPI-2, followed by red form MMSE-2; reapplication of the MMPI-2 due to the invalidation of the first profile, and finally, psychotherapy. The MMPI-2 protocols gathered useful information that directed the steps of therapeutic intervention: a detailed symptom picture of potentially self-destructive thoughts and behaviors otherwise undetected during the interview. The memory loss and poor concentration were confirmed by MMSE-2 cognitive screening. This combined approach, psychotherapy with psychological assessment, aligns with the trend of adaptation of the psychological services to the everyday life of contemporary man and paves the way for deepening and developing the field.

Keywords: Assessment, cognitive behavioral psychotherapy, MMPI-2, MMSE-2, psychopathology.

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Authors: L. Krpalkova, N. O' Mahony, A. Carvalho, S. Campbell, G. Corkery, E. Broderick, J. Walsh

Abstract:

Farm management and operations will drastically change due to access to real-time data, real-time forecasting and tracking of physical items in combination with Internet of Things (IoT) developments to further automate farm operations. Dairy farms have embraced technological innovations and procured vast amounts of permanent data streams during the past decade; however, the integration of this information to improve the whole farm decision-making process does not exist. It is now imperative to develop a system that can collect, integrate, manage, and analyze on-farm and off-farm data in real-time for practical and relevant environmental and economic actions. The developed systems, based on machine learning and artificial intelligence, need to be connected for useful output, a better understanding of the whole farming issue and environmental impact. Evolutionary Computing (EC) can be very effective in finding the optimal combination of sets of some objects and finally, in strategy determination. The system of the future should be able to manage the dairy farm as well as an experienced dairy farm manager with a team of the best agricultural advisors. All these changes should bring resilience and sustainability to dairy farming as well as improving and maintaining good animal welfare and the quality of dairy products. This review aims to provide an insight into the state-of-the-art of big data applications and EC in relation to smart dairy farming and identify the most important research and development challenges to be addressed in the future. Smart dairy farming influences every area of management and its uptake has become a continuing trend.

Keywords: Big data, evolutionary computing, cloud, precision technologies

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