Search results for: performance factors

Authors: Stella Y. Ng, John B. Peacock, Kay Chuan Tan

Abstract:

This paper discusses the use of a computerized test to measure the decision-making abilities of teenage basketball players in Singapore. There are five sections in this test – Competitive state anxiety inventory-2 (CSAI-2) questionnaire (measures player’s cognitive anxiety, somatic anxiety and self-confidence), Corsi block-tapping task (measures player’s short-term spatial memory), situation awareness global assessment technique (SAGAT) (measures players’ situation awareness in a basketball game), multiple choice questions on basketball knowledge (measures players’ knowledge of basketball rules and concepts), and lastly, a learning test that requires participants to recall and recognize basketball set plays (measures player’s ability to learn and recognize set plays). A total of 25 basketball players, aged 14 to 16 years old, from three secondary school teams participated in this experiment. The results that these basketball players obtained from this cognitive test were then used to compare with their physical fitness and basketball performance.

Keywords: Basketball, cognitive abilities, computerized test, decision-making.

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Authors: P. Vijaya Laxmi, V. Goswami, V. Suchitra

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This paper presents a finite buffer renewal input single working vacation and vacation interruption queue with state dependent services and state dependent vacations, which has a wide range of applications in several areas including manufacturing, wireless communication systems. Service times during busy period, vacation period and vacation times are exponentially distributed and are state dependent. As a result of the finite waiting space, state dependent services and state dependent vacation policies, the analysis of these queueing models needs special attention. We provide a recursive method using the supplementary variable technique to compute the stationary queue length distributions at pre-arrival and arbitrary epochs. An efficient computational algorithm of the model is presented which is fast and accurate and easy to implement. Various performance measures have been discussed. Finally, some special cases and numerical results have been depicted in the form of tables and graphs. 

Keywords: State Dependent Service, Vacation Interruption, Supplementary Variable, Single Working Vacation, Blocking Probability.

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Authors: Hakan Işık, Esra Saraçoğlu

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In this study, a comparison of two control methods, Proportional Control (PC) and Fuzzy Logic Control (FLC), which have been used to develop an ideal thermoelectric renal hypothermia system in order to use in renal surgery, has been carried out. Since the most important issues in long-lasting parenchymatous renal surgery are to provide an operation medium free of blood and to prevent renal dysfunction in the postoperative period, control of the temperature has become very important in renal surgery. The final product is seriously affected from the changes in temperature, therefore, it is necessary to reach some desired temperature points quickly and avoid large overshoot. PIC16F877 microcontroller has been used as controller for both of these two methods. Each control method can simply ensure extra renal hypothermia in the targeted way. But investigation of advantages and disadvantages of every control method to each other is aimed and carried out by the experimental implementations. Shortly, investigation of the most appropriate method to use for development of system and that can be applied to people safely in the future, has been performed. In this sense, experimental results show that fuzzy logic control gives out more reliable responses and efficient performance.

Keywords: renal hypothermia, renal cooling, temperature control, proportional control fuzzy logic control

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Authors: J. P. Méreaux, E. Lamy, J. C. Lopez

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In the face of new regulations related to waste management, it has become essential to understand the organizational process that accompanies this change. Through an experiment on the sorting of food waste in the community of Grand Reims, this research explores the acceptability, the behavior and the tools needed to manage the change. Our position within a private company, SUEZ, a key player in the waste management sector, has allowed us to set up a driven team with concerned public organizations. The research was conducted through a theoretical study combined with semi-structured interviews. This qualitative method allowed us to conduct exchanges with users to assess the motivations and obstacles linked to the sorting of bio-waste. The results revealed the action levers necessary for the project's sustainability. Making the sorting gestures accessible and simplified makes it possible to target all populations. Playful communication adapted to each type of persona allows the user and stakeholders to be placed at the heart of the strategy. These recommendations are spotlighted thanks to the combination of theoretical and operational contributions, with the aim of facilitating the new public management and inducing the notion of performance while providing an example of added value.

Keywords: Bio-waste, Corporate Social Responsibility, CSR, stakeholders, public policies.

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Authors: H. Ahmed, A. Schlenkhoff

Abstract:

Recently, permeable breakwaters have been suggested to overcome the disadvantages of fully protection breakwaters. These protection structures have minor impacts on the coastal environment and neighboring beaches where they provide a more economical protection from waves and currents. For regular waves, a numerical model is used (FLOW-3D, VOF) to investigate the hydraulic performance of a permeable breakwater. The model of permeable breakwater consists of a pair of identical vertical slotted walls with an impermeable upper and lower part, where the draft is a decimal multiple of the total depth. The middle part is permeable with a porosity of 50%. The second barrier is located at distant of 0.5 and 1.5 of the water depth from the first one. The numerical model is validated by comparisons with previous laboratory data and semi-analytical results of the same model. A good agreement between the numerical results and both laboratory data and semi-analytical results has been shown and the results indicate the applicability of the numerical model to reproduce most of the important features of the interaction. Through the numerical investigation, the friction factor of the model is carefully discussed.

Keywords: Coastal structures, permeable breakwater, slotted wall, numerical model, energy dissipation coefficient.

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Authors: Fasil Endalamaw

Abstract:

Digital magnitude comparators based on Gate Diffusion Input (GDI) implementation technique are high speed and area-efficient, and they consume less power as compared to other implementation techniques. However, they are less efficient for some logic gates and have no full voltage swing. In this paper, we made a performance comparison between the GDI implementation technique and other implementation methods, such as Static CMOS, Pass Transistor Logic (PTL), and Transmission Gate (TG) in 90 nm, 120 nm, and 180 nm CMOS technologies using BSIM4 MOS model. We proposed a methodology (hybrid implementation) of implementing digital magnitude comparators which significantly improved the power, speed, area, and voltage swing requirements. Simulation results revealed that the hybrid implementation of digital magnitude comparators show a 10.84% (power dissipation), 41.6% (propagation delay), 47.95% (power-delay product (PDP)) improvement compared to the usual GDI implementation method. We used Microwind & Dsch Version 3.5 as well as the Tanner EDA 16.0 tools for simulation purposes.

Keywords: Efficient, gate diffusion input, high speed, low power, CMOS.

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Authors: V. Sudha, D. Sriram Kumar

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Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) has been used in many advanced wireless communication systems due to its high spectral efficiency and robustness to frequency selective fading channels. However, the major concern with OFDM system is the high peak-to-average power ratio (PAPR) of the transmitted signal. Some of the popular techniques used for PAPR reduction in OFDM system are conventional partial transmit sequences (CPTS) and clipping. In this paper, a parallel combination/hybrid scheme of PAPR reduction using clipping and CPTS algorithms is proposed. The proposed method intelligently applies both the algorithms in order to reduce both PAPR as well as computational complexity. The proposed scheme slightly degrades bit error rate (BER) performance due to clipping operation and it can be reduced by selecting an appropriate value of the clipping ratio (CR). The simulation results show that the proposed algorithm achieves significant PAPR reduction with much reduced computational complexity.

Keywords: CCDF, OFDM, PAPR, PTS.

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Authors: Njiri J. G., Ikua B. W., Nyakoe G. N.

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Optimization of cutting parameters important in precision machining in regards to efficiency and surface integrity of the machined part. Usually productivity and precision in machining is limited by the forces emanating from the cutting process. Due to the inherent varying nature of the workpiece in terms of geometry and material composition, the peak cutting forces vary from point to point during machining process. In order to increase productivity without compromising on machining accuracy, it is important to control these cutting forces. In this paper a fuzzy logic control algorithm is developed that can be applied in the control of peak cutting forces in milling of spherical surfaces using ball end mills. The controller can adaptively vary the feedrate to maintain allowable cutting force on the tool. This control algorithm is implemented in a computer numerical control (CNC) machine. It has been demonstrated that the controller can provide stable machining and improve the performance of the CNC milling process by varying feedrate.

Keywords: Ball-end mill, feedrate, fuzzy logic controller, machining optimization, spherical surface.

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Authors: Chayanon Hansapinyo

Abstract:

This paper presents experimental investigation and finite element analysis on buckling behavior of irregular section coldformed steel columns under axially concentric loading. For the experimental study, four different sections of columns were tested to investigate effect of stiffening and width-to-thickness ratio on buckling behavior. For each of the section, three lengths of 230, 950 and 1900 mm. were studied representing short, intermediate long and long columns, respectively. Then, nonlinear finite element analyses of the tested columns were performed. The comparisons in terms of load-deformation response and buckling mode show good agreement and hence the FEM models were validated. Parametric study of stiffening element and thickness of 1.0, 1.15, 1.2, 1.5, 1.6 and 2.0 mm. was analyzed. The test results showed that stiffening effect pays a large contribution to prevent distortional mode. The increase in wall thickness enhanced buckling stress beyond the yielding strength in short and intermediate columns, but not for the long columns.

Keywords: Buckling behavior, Irregular section, Cold-formed steel, Concentric loading.

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Authors: Rashid Slaheldinn Elhaj Mohammed

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The design of high performance combustion chambers for turbojet engines is considered as one of the most challenges that face gas turbine designers, since the design approach depends on empirical correlations of data derived from the previous design experiences. The objective of this paper is to design a combustion chamber that suits the requirements of a micro-turbojet engine with 400 N output thrust and operates with kerosene as fuel. In this paper, only preliminary calculations related to the annular type of combustion chamber are explained in details. These calculations will cover the evaluation of reference quantities, calculation of required dimensions, calculation of air distribution and pressure drop, estimation of number and diameters for air admission holes, as well as aerodynamic considerations. The design process is then accompanied by analytical procedure using commercial CFD ANALYSIS tool; ANSYS 16 CFX software. After conducting CFD analysis, the design process will be then iterated in order to gain satisfactory results. It should be noted that the design of the fuel preparation and installation systems is beyond the scope of this work, and it will be discussed separately in another work.  

Keywords: Annular combustion chamber, micro-turbojet engine, CFD ANALYSIS, pressure drop.

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Authors: Rinlee Butch M. Cervera, Princess Stephanie P. Llanos

Abstract:

Lithium iron phosphate (LiFePO₄) is a potential cathode material for lithium-ion batteries due to its promising characteristics. In this study, pure LiFePO₄ (LFP) and carbon-coated nanograined LiFePO₄ (LFP-C) is synthesized and characterized for its microstructural properties. X-ray diffraction patterns of the synthesized samples can be indexed to an orthorhombic LFP structure with about 63 nm crystallite size as calculated by using Scherrer’s equation. Agglomerated particles that range from 200 nm to 300 nm are observed from scanning electron microscopy images. Transmission electron microscopy images confirm the crystalline structure of LFP and coating of amorphous carbon layer. Elemental mapping using energy dispersive spectroscopy analysis revealed the homogeneous dispersion of the compositional elements. In addition, galvanostatic charge and discharge measurements were investigated for the cathode performance of the synthesized LFP and LFP-C samples. The results showed that the carbon-coated sample demonstrated the highest capacity of about 140 mAhg^-1 as compared to non-coated and micrograined sized commercial LFP.

Keywords: Ceramics, microstructure, electrochemical measurements, energy storage, transmission electron microscope.

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Authors: Mohamed El Morsy, Gabriela Achtenová

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Research on damage of gears and gear pairs using vibration signals remains very attractive, because vibration signals from a gear pair are complex in nature and not easy to interpret. Predicting gear pair defects by analyzing changes in vibration signal of gears pairs in operation is a very reliable method. Therefore, a suitable vibration signal processing technique is necessary to extract defect information generally obscured by the noise from dynamic factors of other gear pairs.This article presents the value of cepstrum analysis in vehicle gearbox fault diagnosis. Cepstrum represents the overall power content of a whole family of harmonics and sidebands when more than one family of sidebands is present at the same time. The concept for the measurement and analysis involved in using the technique are briefly outlined. Cepstrum analysis is used for detection of an artificial pitting defect in a vehicle gearbox loaded with different speeds and torques. The test stand is equipped with three dynamometers; the input dynamometer serves asthe internal combustion engine, the output dynamometers introduce the load on the flanges of the output joint shafts. The pitting defect is manufactured on the tooth side of a gear of the fifth speed on the secondary shaft. Also, a method for fault diagnosis of gear faults is presented based on order Cepstrum. The procedure is illustrated with the experimental vibration data of the vehicle gearbox. The results show the effectiveness of Cepstrum analysis in detection and diagnosis of the gear condition.

Keywords: Cepstrum analysis, fault diagnosis, gearbox.

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Authors: O. V. Missioura

Abstract:

MC (Management Control)& IC (Internal Control) – what is the relationship? (an empirical study into the definitions between MC and IC) based on the wider considerations of Internal Control and Management Control terms, attention is focused not only on the financial aspects but also more on the soft aspects of the business, such as culture, behaviour, standards and values. The limited considerations of Management Control are focused mainly in the hard, financial aspects of business operation. The definitions of Management Control and Internal Control are often used interchangeably and the results of this empirical study reveal that Management Control is part of Internal Control, there is no causal link between the two concepts. Based on the interpretation of the respondents, the term Management Control has moved from a broad term to a more limited term with the soft aspects of the influencing of behaviour, performance measurements, incentives and culture. This paper is an exploratory study based on qualitative research and on a qualitative matrix method analysis of the thematic definition of the terms Management Control and Internal Control.

Keywords: Management Control (MC), Internal Control (IC), definition, causal link, COSO 1992/2004, CoCo (Canadian Institute of Chartered Accountants), Russian CG code (КОДЕКС) , limited and broad concepts MC and IC.

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Authors: Alpesh Adeshara, Rajendrasinh Jadeja, Praghnesh Bhatt

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Implementation of advanced technologies requires sophisticated instruments that deal with the operation, control, restoration and protection of rapidly growing power system network under normal and abnormal conditions. Presently, the applications of Phasor Measurement Unit (PMU) are widely found in real time operation, monitoring, controlling and analysis of power system network as it eliminates the various limitations of supervisory control and data acquisition system (SCADA) conventionally used in power system. The use of PMU data is very rapidly increasing its importance for online and offline analysis. Wide area measurement system (WAMS) is developed as new technology by use of multiple PMUs in power system. The present paper proposes a model of Matlab based PMU using Discrete Fourier Transform (DFT) algorithm and evaluation of its operation under different contingencies. In this paper, PMU based two bus system having WAMS network is presented as a case study.

Keywords: DFT-Discrete Fourier Transform, GPS-Global Positioning System, PMU-Phasor Measurement System, WAMS-Wide Area Monitoring System.

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Authors: M. Owlia, M. H. Azarsa, M. Khabbazan, A. Mirbagheri

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Proprioceptive neuromuscular facilitation exercises are a series of stretching techniques that are commonly used in rehabilitation and exercise therapy. Assessment of these exercises for true maneuvering requires extensive experience in this field and could not be down with patients themselves. In this paper, we developed software that uses Microsoft Kinect sensor, a spherical color marker, and real-time image processing methods to evaluate patient’s performance in generating true patterns of movements. The software also provides the patient with a visual feedback by showing his/her avatar in a Virtual Reality environment along with the correct path of moving hand, wrist and marker. Primary results during PNF exercise therapy of a patient in a room environment shows the ability of the system to identify any deviation of maneuvering path and direction of the hand from the one that has been performed by an expert physician.

Keywords: Image processing, Microsoft Kinect, proprioceptive neuromuscular facilitation, upper extremities assessment, virtual reality.

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Authors: Jefrey Pilusa, Tumisang Seodigeng

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This research discusses a South African case study for the potential of utilizing refuse-derived fuel (RDF) obtained from non-burn treatment of health care risk waste (HCRW) as potential feedstock for green energy production. This specific waste stream can be destroyed via non-burn treatment technology involving high-speed mechanical shredding followed by steam or chemical injection to disinfect the final product. The RDF obtained from this process is characterised by a low moisture, low ash, and high calorific value which means it can be potentially used as high-value solid fuel. Due to the raw feed of this RDF being classified as hazardous, the final RDF has been reported to be non-infectious and can blend with other combustible wastes such as rubber and plastic for waste to energy applications. This study evaluated non-burn treatment technology as a possible solution for on-site destruction of HCRW in South African private and public health care centres. Waste generation quantities were estimated based on the number of registered patient beds, theoretical bed occupancy. Time and motion study was conducted to evaluate the logistics viability of on-site treatment. Non-burn treatment technology for HCRW is a promising option for South Africa, and successful implementation of this method depends upon the initial capital investment, operational cost and environmental permitting of such technology; there are other influencing factors such as the size of the waste stream, product off-take price as well as product demand.

Keywords: Autoclave, disposal, fuel, incineration, medical waste.

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Authors: Kuo-Cheng Liu

Abstract:

Effective estimation of just noticeable distortion (JND) for images is helpful to increase the efficiency of a compression algorithm in which both the statistical redundancy and the perceptual redundancy should be accurately removed. In this paper, we design a DCT-based model for estimating JND profiles of color images. Based on a mathematical model of measuring the base detection threshold for each DCT coefficient in the color component of color images, the luminance masking adjustment, the contrast masking adjustment, and the cross masking adjustment are utilized for luminance component, and the variance-based masking adjustment based on the coefficient variation in the block is proposed for chrominance components. In order to verify the proposed model, the JND estimator is incorporated into the conventional JPEG coder to improve the compression performance. A subjective and fair viewing test is designed to evaluate the visual quality of the coding image under the specified viewing condition. The simulation results show that the JPEG coder integrated with the proposed DCT-based JND model gives better coding bit rates at visually lossless quality for a variety of color images.

Keywords: Just-noticeable distortion (JND), discrete cosine transform (DCT), JPEG.

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Authors: Ilham Benali, Nasser Hajji, Nawfal Acha

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Given the fact that the pharmaceutical industry is a commonly studied sector in the context of innovation, the majority of innovation research is devoted to the developed markets known by high research and development (R&D) assets and intensive innovation. In contrast, in developing countries where R&D assets are very low, there is relatively little research to mention in the area of pharmaceutical sector innovation, characterized mainly by two principal elements which are the presence of foreign-owned firms and licensed manufacturing agreements between local firms and multinationals. With the scarcity of research in this field, this paper attempts to study the effect of these two elements on the firms’ innovation tendencies. Other traditional factors that influence innovation, which are the age and the size of the firm, the R&D activities and the market structure, revealed in the literature review, will be included in the study in order to try to make this work more exhaustive. The study starts by examining innovation tendency in pharmaceutical firms located in developing countries before analyzing the effect of foreign-owned firms and licensed manufacturing agreements between local firms and multinationals on technological, organizational and marketing innovation. Based on the related work and on the theoretical framework developed, there is a probability that foreign-owned firms and licensed manufacturing agreements between local firms and multinationals have a negative influence on technological innovation. The opposite effect is possible in the case of organizational and marketing innovation.

Keywords: Developing countries, foreign owned firms, innovation, licensed manufacturing agreements, pharmaceutical industry.

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Authors: Dilip Kumar S.M, Vijaya Kumar B.P.

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The decisions made by admission control algorithms are based on the availability of network resources viz. bandwidth, energy, memory buffers, etc., without degrading the Quality-of-Service (QoS) requirement of applications that are admitted. In this paper, we present an energy-aware admission control (EAAC) scheme which provides admission control for flows in an ad hoc network based on the knowledge of the present and future residual energy of the intermediate nodes along the routing path. The aim of EAAC is to quantify the energy that the new flow will consume so that it can be decided whether the future residual energy of the nodes along the routing path can satisfy the energy requirement. In other words, this energy-aware routing admits a new flow iff any node in the routing path does not run out of its energy during the transmission of packets. The future residual energy of a node is predicted using the Multi-layer Neural Network (MNN) model. Simulation results shows that the proposed scheme increases the network lifetime. Also the performance of the MNN model is presented.

Keywords: Ad hoc networks, admission control, energy-aware routing, Quality-of-Service, future residual energy, neural network.

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Authors: Arash Azizi Mazreah, Mohammad T. Manzuri Shalmani, Hamid Barati, Ali Barati, Ali Sarchami

Abstract:

This paper proposes a low power SRAM based on five transistor SRAM cell. Proposed SRAM uses novel word-line decoding such that, during read/write operation, only selected cell connected to bit-line whereas, in conventional SRAM (CV-SRAM), all cells in selected row connected to their bit-lines, which in turn develops differential voltages across all bit-lines, and this makes energy consumption on unselected bit-lines. In proposed SRAM memory array divided into two halves and this causes data-line capacitance to reduce. Also proposed SRAM uses one bit-line and thus has lower bit-line leakage compared to CV-SRAM. Furthermore, the proposed SRAM incurs no area overhead, and has comparable read/write performance versus the CV-SRAM. Simulation results in standard 0.25μm CMOS technology shows in worst case proposed SRAM has 80% smaller dynamic energy consumption in each cycle compared to CV-SRAM. Besides, energy consumption in each cycle of proposed SRAM and CV-SRAM investigated analytically, the results of which are in good agreement with the simulation results.

Keywords: SRAM, write Operation, read Operation, capacitances, dynamic energy consumption.

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Authors: Robert H¨ottger, Lukas Krawczyk, Burkhard Igel

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This paper introduces novel approaches to partitioning and mapping in terms of model-based embedded multicore system engineering and further discusses benefits, industrial relevance and features in common with existing approaches. In order to assess and evaluate results, both approaches have been applied to a real industrial application as well as to various prototypical demonstrative applications, that have been developed and implemented for different purposes. Evaluations show, that such applications improve significantly according to performance, energy efficiency, meeting timing constraints and covering maintaining issues by using the AMALTHEA platform and the implemented approaches. Furthermore, the model-based design provides an open, expandable, platform independent and scalable exchange format between OEMs, suppliers and developers on different levels. Our proposed mechanisms provide meaningful multicore system utilization since load balancing by means of partitioning and mapping is effectively performed with regard to the modeled systems including hardware, software, operating system, scheduling, constraints, configuration and more data.

Keywords: Partitioning, mapping, distributed systems, scheduling, embedded multicore systems, model-based, system analysis.

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Authors: Ashraf Pirasteh, Alireza Hidarnia, Ali Asghari, Soghrate Faghihzadeh, Fazlollah Ghofranipour

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Background: Regular physical activity contributes positively to physical and psychological health. In the present study, the stages of change of physical activity and the total physical Aims: The aim of this study was to investigate the proportion of adolescent girls in each stages of change and the causative factors associated with physical activity such as the related social support and self efficacy in a sample of the high school students. Methods: In this study, Social Cognitive Theory (SCT) and the Transtheorical Model (TTM) guided instrument development. The data regarding the demographics, psychosocial determinants of physical activity, stage of change and physical activity was gathered by questionnaires. Several measures of psychosocial determinants of physical activity were translated from English into Persian using the back-translation technique. These translated measures were administered to 512 ninth and tenth-grade Iranian high school students for factor analysis. Results: The distribution of the stage of change for physical activity was as follow: 18/5% in precontemplation, 23.4% in contemplation, 38.2% in preparation, 4.6% in action and 15.3% in maintenance. They were in 80.1% pre-adoption stages (precontemplation stage, contemplation stage and preparation stage) and 19.9% post-adoption stages (action stage and maintenance stage) of physical activity. There was a significant relate between age and physical activity in adolescent girls (age-related decline of physical activity) p<0001. Conclusion: The findings of the present study can contribute to improve health behaviors and for administration of health promotion programs in the adolescent populations.

Keywords: Adolescent, Iranian girls, Physical activity, Stages of change

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Authors: Sachin Vrajlal Rajani, Vivek Pandya, Ankit Suvariya

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Green and renewable energy is getting extraordinary consideration today, because of ecological concerns made by blazing of fossil powers. Photovoltaic and wind power generation are the basic decisions for delivering power in this respects. Producing power by the sun based photovoltaic systems is known to the world, yet control makers may get confounded to pick between on-grid and off-grid systems. In this exploration work, an endeavor is made to compare the off-grid (stand-alone) and on-grid (grid-connected) frameworks. The work presents relative examination, between two distinctive PV frameworks situated at V.V.P. Engineering College, Rajkot. The first framework is 100 kW remain solitary and the second is 60 kW network joined. The real-time parameters compared are; output voltage, load current, power in-flow, power output, performance ratio, yield factor, and capacity factor. The voltage changes and the power variances in both frameworks are given exceptional consideration and the examination is made between the two frameworks to judge the focal points and confinements of both the frameworks.

Keywords: Standalone PV systems, grid connected PV systems, comparison, real time data analysis.

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Authors: P. Subha Karuvelam, M. Rajaram

Abstract:

Brushless DC motors (BLDC) are widely used in industrial areas. The BLDC motors are driven either by indirect ACAC converters or by direct AC-AC converters. Direct AC-AC converters i.e. matrix converters are used in this paper to drive the three phase BLDC motor and it eliminates the bulky DC link energy storage element. A matrix converter converts the AC power supply to an AC voltage of variable amplitude and variable frequency. A control technique is designed to generate the switching pulses for the three phase matrix converter. For the control of speed of the BLDC motor a separate PI controller and Fuzzy Logic Controller (FLC) are designed and a hysteresis current controller is also designed for the control of motor torque. The control schemes are designed and tested separately. The simulation results of both the schemes are compared and contrasted in this paper. The results show that the fuzzy logic control scheme outperforms the PI control scheme in terms of dynamic performance of the BLDC motor. Simulation results are validated with the experimental results.

Keywords: Fuzzy logic controller, matrix converter, permanent magnet brushless DC motor, PI controller.

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Authors: Bohsiu Wu

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Among serious crimes, child homicide is a rather rare event. However, the killing of children stirs up a special type of emotion in society that pales other criminal acts. This study examines the relevancy of three possible community-level explanations for child homicide: social deprivation, female empowerment, and social isolation. The social deprivation hypothesis posits that child homicide results from lack of resources in communities. The female empowerment hypothesis argues that a higher female status translates into a higher level of capability to prevent child homicide. Finally, the social isolation hypothesis regards child homicide as a result of lack of social connectivity. Child homicide data, aggregated by US postal ZIP codes in California from 1990 to 1999, were analyzed with a negative binomial regression. The results of the negative binomial analysis demonstrate that social deprivation is the most salient and consistent predictor among all other factors in explaining child homicide victimization at the ZIP-code level. Both social isolation and female labor force participation are weak predictors of child homicide victimization across communities. Further, results from the negative binomial regression show that it is the communities with a higher, not lower, degree of female labor force participation that are associated with a higher count of child homicide. It is possible that poor communities with a higher level of female employment have a lesser capacity to provide the necessary care and protection for the children. Policies aiming at reducing social deprivation and strengthening female empowerment possess the potential to reduce child homicide in the community.

Keywords: Child homicide, deprivation, empowerment, isolation.

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Authors: Siti Norfazlina Yusoff, Noorlailahusna Mohd Yusof

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The aging of the workforce is occurring globally and has significant impact on organizations. The Malaysian population is ageing. Although, not as quickly as the populations of a number of Asian nations, or of parts of Europe; the rate is sufficient to cause a concern. The life expectancy of Malaysians has increased in year 2012 with an average of 73.8 years or equal to 71.1 years for males and 76.7 years for females. The birth and death rates are 26.05 births/1,000 population and 5.29 deaths/1,000 population respectively. These figures have placed a greater liability on the government’s shoulder, and have become a push factor for the country to revise a new retirement age for the public servants. The ‘aged population’ impinged on the new challenges faced by the Malaysian government, which had to deal with an unproductive aged workforce. A new retirement age from 58 to 60 years old has been introduced and this could have a positive effect on this cohort, in maintaining financial security. However, keeping older employees might affect organizations’ performance and productivity. The organizations need to pay more attention on them, since they are less effective and might be affected by numerous health problems. An innovative culture should be introduced and this could be a good indicator for organizations that deal with these ‘expensive’ workers.

Keywords: Aged workforce, financial relief, innovative culture retirement policy.

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Authors: Mohammad Tipu Sultan, Farzana Sharmin, Ke Xue

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Social media create a better opportunity for travelers to search for travel information, select destination and share their personal experiences of the travel. This study proposes a framework which describes the relationships between social media, and positive or negative tourism experience sharing impact on destination choice. To find out new trends of travelers behavioral intention, we propose an extended theoretical model, the Theory of Reasoned Action (TRA). We conducted a survey to analyze three external factors, subjective norms, and positive and negative experience influence on travel destination choice. Structural questionnaire analysis was employed to confirm the proposed research hypothesis within the relationship between consumer influences on the shared experience of social media. The results of the study confirm that sharing positive experiences influence the positive effect of destination choice, while negative experiences decrease the destination selection option. The results indicate that attitudes, subjective norms are passively influenced by shared experience. Moreover, we find that sharing live pictures of travel experiences through social media helps to reduce negative perceptions of the destination brand. This research contribution is useable to the research field as a new determination factor and the findings could be used by destination organization management (DMO) to enhancing their tourism promotion through social media.

Keywords: Destination choice, tourism experience sharing, Theory of Reasoned Action, social media.

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Authors: Manay E., Sahin B., Yilmaz M., Gelis K.

Abstract:

In the present study, the pressure drop and laminar convection heat transfer characteristics of nanofluids in microchannel heat sink with square duct are numerically investigated. The water based nanofluids created with Al2O3 and CuO particles in four different volume fractions of 0%, 0.5%, 1%, 1.5% and 2% are used to analyze their effects on heat transfer and the pressure drop. Under the laminar, steady-state flow conditions, the finite volume method is used to solve the governing equations of heat transfer. Mixture Model is considered to simulate the nanofluid flow. For verification of used numerical method, the results obtained from numerical calculations were compared with the results in literature for both pure water and the nanofluids in different volume fractions. The distributions of the particles in base fluid are assumed to be uniform. The results are evaluated in terms of Nusselt number, the pressure drop and heat transfer enhancement. Analysis shows that the nanofluids enhance heat transfer while the Reynolds number and the volume fractions are increasing. The best overall enhancement was obtained at φ=%2 and Re=100 for CuO-water nanofluid.

Keywords: Microchannel Heat Sink, Nanofluid, Heat transfer enhancement, pressure drop

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Authors: J. Alamelu Mangai, Satej Wagle, V. Santhosh Kumar

Abstract:

The exponential increase in the volume of medical image database has imposed new challenges to clinical routine in maintaining patient history, diagnosis, treatment and monitoring. With the advent of data mining and machine learning techniques it is possible to automate and/or assist physicians in clinical diagnosis. In this research a medical image classification framework using data mining techniques is proposed. It involves feature extraction, feature selection, feature discretization and classification. In the classification phase, the performance of the traditional kNN k nearest neighbor classifier is improved using a feature weighting scheme and a distance weighted voting instead of simple majority voting. Feature weights are calculated using the interestingness measures used in association rule mining. Experiments on the retinal fundus images show that the proposed framework improves the classification accuracy of traditional kNN from 78.57 % to 92.85 %.

Keywords: Medical Image Mining, Data Mining, Feature Weighting, Association Rule Mining, k nearest neighbor classifier.

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Authors: Yuchih Lin, Chung-Liang Chang, Hong-Yi Cao, Sheng-Hsuan Hsiao

Abstract:

Cu-mesoporous TiO2 is developed for removal acid odor cooperated with ozone assistance and online- regeneration system with/without UV irradiation (all weather) in study. The results showed that Cu-mesoporous TiO2 present the desirable adsorption efficiency of acid odor without UV irradiation, due to the larger surface area, pore sizeand the additional absorption ability provided by Cu. In the photocatalysis process, the material structure also benefits Cu-mesoporous TiO2 to perform the more outstanding efficiency on degrading acid odor. Cu also postponed the recombination of electron-hole pairs excited from TiO2 to enhance photodegradation ability. Cu-mesoporous TiO2 could gain the conspicuous increase on photocatalysis ability from ozone assistance, but without any benefit on adsorption. In addition, the online regeneration procedure could process the used Cu-mesoporous TiO2 to reinstate the adsorption ability and maintain the photodegradtion performance, depended on scrubbing, desorping acid odor and reducing Cu to metal state.

Keywords: mesoporous material, photocatalyst, adsorption, regeneration usage, photocatalytic ozonation

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