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Authors: Leila Azadbakht, Maedeh Moradi, Mohammad Reza Merasi, Farzaneh Jahangir

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Maternal dietary intake during lactation might affect the growth rate of an exclusive breastfed infant. The present study was conducted to evaluate the effect of maternal dietary patterns and quality during lactation on the growth of the exclusive breastfed infant. Methods: 484 healthy lactating mothers with their infant were enrolled in this study. Only exclusive breastfed infants were included in this study which was conducted in Iran. Dietary intake of lactating mothers was assessed using a validated and reliable semi-quantitative food frequency questionnaire. Diet quality indices such as alternative Healthy eating index (HEI), Dietary energy density (DED), and adherence to Mediterranean dietary pattern score, Nordic and dietary approaches to stop hypertension (DASH) eating pattern were created. Anthropometric features of infant (weight, height, and head circumference) were recorded at birth, two and four months. Results: Weight, length, weight for height and head circumference of infants at two months and four months age were mostly in the normal range among those that mothers adhered more to the HEI in lactation period (normal weight: 61%; normal height: 59%). The prevalence of stunting at four months of age among those whose mothers adhered more to the HEI was 31% lower than those with the least adherence to HEI. Mothers in the top tertiles of HEI score had the lowest frequency of having underweight infants (18% vs. 33%; P=0.03). Odds ratio of being overweight or obese at four months age was the lowest among those infants whose mothers adhered more to the HEI (OR: 0.67 vs 0.91; Ptrend=0.03). However, there was not any significant association between adherence of mothers to Mediterranean diet as well as DASH diet and Nordic eating pattern and the growth of infants (none of weight, height or head circumference). Infant weight, length, weight for height and head circumference at two months and four months did not show significant differences among different tertile categories of mothers’ DED. Conclusions: Higher diet quality indices and more adherence of lactating mother to HEI (as an indicator of diet quality) may be associated with better growth indices of the breastfed infant. However, it seems that DED of the lactating mother does not affect the growth of the breastfed infant. Adherence to the different dietary patterns such as Mediterranean, DASH or Nordic among mothers had no different effect on the growth indices of the infants. However, higher diet quality indices and more adherence of lactating mother to HEI may be associated with better growth indices of the breastfed infant. Breastfeeding is a complete way that is not affected much by the dietary patterns of the mother. However, better diet quality might be associated with better growth.

Keywords: Breastfeeding, growth, infant, maternal diet.

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Authors: Kari Björn

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Introduction of games has expanded the application area of computer-aided learning tools to wide variety of age groups of learners. Serious games engage the learners into a real-world -type of simulation and potentially enrich the learning experience. Institutional background of a Bachelor’s level engineering program in Information and Communication Technology is introduced, with detailed focus on one of its majors, Health Technology. As part of a Customer Oriented Software Application thematic semester, one particular course of “eHealth Business and Solutions” is described and reflected in a gamified framework. Learning a consistent view into vast literature of business management, strategies, marketing and finance in a very limited time enforces selection of topics relevant to the industry. Health Technology is a novel and growing industry with a growing sector in consumer wearable devices and homecare applications. The business sector is attracting new entrepreneurs and impatient investor funds. From engineering education point of view the sector is driven by miniaturizing electronics, sensors and wireless applications. However, the market is highly consumer-driven and usability, safety and data integrity requirements are extremely high. When the same technology is used in analysis or treatment of patients, very strict regulatory measures are enforced. The paper introduces a course structure using gamification as a tool to learn the most essential in a new market: customer value proposition design, followed by a market entry game. Students analyze the existing market size and pricing structure of eHealth web-service market and enter the market as a steering group of their company, competing against the legacy players and with each other. The market is growing but has its rules of demand and supply balance. New products can be developed with an R&D-investment, and targeted to market with unique quality- and price-combinations. Product cost structure can be improved by investing to enhanced production capacity. Investments can be funded optionally by foreign capital. Students make management decisions and face the dynamics of the market competition in form of income statement and balance sheet after each decision cycle. The focus of the learning outcome is to understand customer value creation to be the source of cash flow. The benefit of gamification is to enrich the learning experience on structure and meaning of financial statements. The paper describes the gamification approach and discusses outcomes after two course implementations. Along the case description of learning challenges, some unexpected misconceptions are noted. Improvements of the game or the semi-gamified teaching pedagogy are discussed. The case description serves as an additional support to new game coordinator, as well as helps to improve the method. Overall, the gamified approach has helped to engage engineering student to business studies in an energizing way.

Keywords: Engineering education, integrated curriculum, learning experience, learning outcomes.

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Authors: Mayank Singh, O. P. Singh ‘Vatsa’, M. P. Singh

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Present paper deals with an evaluation of magnitude of changes in biomass and net primary productivity at ‘Gujar Tal’ sloppy lake margin at Jaunpur in tropical semi-arid region of eastern U.P. (India). The study site abandoned or neglected lands (50 ×125 m) was divided into two zones, i.e. upper zone (up-land) and lower zone (low-land). Maximum biomass in the upper zone of dominant weed Desmostachya bipinnata (L.) Stapf. was 207.47 g m-2 and ‘rest weeds’ was 457.45 g m-2 both in the month of September. In contrast, the peak biomass value in the lower zone of dominant weed Oryza rufipogon Griff. was 1571.44 g m-2 in October and ‘rest weeds’ 270.65 g m-2 in February. Among the two zones, the peak total community biomass was observed 1655.62 g m-2 (October) in the lower zone while its peak value for the upper zone 457.45 g m-2 (September) was comparatively low. Maximum percentage contribution of dominant weeds (D. bipinnata and O. rufipogon) in the respective upper and lower zones and ‘rest weeds’ in both the zones varied in different months in the total community biomass. The peak net primary productivity of dominant weed (D. bipinnata) was 2.09g m-2 day-1 (September) and ‘rest weeds’ was 2.37 g m-2 day-1 (August) in the upper zone, while the lower zone for O. rufipogon was 5.25 g m-2 day-1 (June) as this zone was inundated later and ‘rest weeds’ was 2.08 g m-2 day-1 (January, 2009). The annual net production of total community at site I was highest, 409.58 g m-2 yr-1 in the upper zone followed by 395.58 g m-2 per eight month in the lower zone as this zone was flooded with water during rainy season. The site significance of variations in biomass in relation to plant species was tested by analysis of variance. It was significant between months in all the two zones (p<0.01 and p<0.05).

Keywords: Biomass, Neglected Lake Margin, Productivity, Vegetation.

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Authors: Kulin Dave, Kapil Mohan

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Earthquakes are considered to be the most destructive rapid-onset disasters human beings are exposed to. The amount of loss it brings in is sufficient to take careful considerations for designing of structures and facilities. Seismic Hazard Analysis is one such tool which can be used for earthquake resistant design. Ground Response Analysis is one of the most crucial and decisive steps for seismic hazard analysis. Rapar district of Kutch, Gujarat falls in Zone 5 of earthquake zone map of India and thus has high seismicity because of which it is selected for analysis. In total 8 bore-log data were studied at different locations in and around Rapar district. Different soil engineering properties were analyzed and relevant empirical correlations were used to calculate maximum shear modulus (Gmax) and shear wave velocity (Vs) for the soil layers. The soil was modeled using Pressure-Dependent Modified Kodner Zelasko (MKZ) model and the reference curve used for fitting was Seed and Idriss (1970) for sand and Darendeli (2001) for clay. Both Equivalent linear (EL), as well as Non-linear (NL) ground response analysis, has been carried out with Masing Hysteretic Re/Unloading formulation for comparison. Commercially available DEEPSOIL v. 7.0 software is used for this analysis. In this study an attempt is made to quantify ground response regarding generated acceleration time-history at top of the soil column, Response spectra calculation at 5 % damping and Fourier amplitude spectrum calculation. Moreover, the variation of Peak Ground Acceleration (PGA), Maximum Displacement, Maximum Strain (in %), Maximum Stress Ratio, Mobilized Shear Stress with depth is also calculated. From the study, PGA values estimated in rocky strata are nearly same as bedrock motion and marginal amplification is observed in sandy silt and silty clays by both analyses. The NL analysis gives conservative results of maximum displacement as compared to EL analysis. Maximum strain predicted by both studies is very close to each other. And overall NL analysis is more efficient and realistic because it follows the actual hyperbolic stress-strain relationship, considers stiffness degradation and mobilizes stresses generated due to pore water pressure.

Keywords: DEEPSOIL v 7.0, Ground Response Analysis, Pressure-Dependent Modified KodnerZelasko (MKZ) model, Response Spectra, Shear wave velocity.

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Authors: Ambika Roy Bardhan

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Kolkata, the City of Joy, is a greying metropolis not only in respect of its concrete jungle but also because of the largest population of 60-plus residents that it shelters among all other cities in India. Declining birth and death rates and a negative growth of population indicate that the city has reached the last stage of demographic transition. Thus, the obvious consequence has been the ageing of its population. With this background, the present paper attempts to study the demographic and socio-economic status of the elderly population in Kolkata. Analysis and findings have been based on secondary data obtained from Census of India of various years, Sample Registration System Reports and reports by HelpAge India. Findings show that the elderly population is increasing continuously. With respect to gender, the male elderly outnumbers the female elderly population. The percentage of households having one elderly member is more in the city due to the emergence of the nuclear families and erosion of joint family system. With respect to socio-economic status, those elderly who are the heads of the family are lower in percentages than those in the other age groups. Also, male elderly as head of the family are greater in percentage than female elderly. Elderly in the category of currently married records the highest percentage followed by widowed, never married and lastly, separated or divorced. Male elderly outnumber the female elderly as currently married, while female elderly outnumbers the male elderly in the category of widowed. In terms of living status, the percentage of elderly who are living alone is highest in Kolkata and the reason for staying alone as no support from children also happens to be highest in this city. The literacy rate and higher level of education is higher among the male than female elderly. Higher percentages of female elderly have been found to be with disability. Disability in movement and multiple disabilities have been found to be more common among the elderly population in Kolkata. Percentages of male literate pensioners are highest than other categories. Also, in terms of levels of education male elderly who are graduate and above other than technical degree are the highest receivers of pension. Also, in terms of working status, elderly as non-workers are higher in percentages with the population of elderly females outnumbering the males. The old age dependency ratio in the city is increasing continuously and the ratio is higher among females than male. Thus, it can be stated that Kolkata is witnessing continuous and rapid ageing of its population. Increasing dependency ratio is likely to create pressure on the working population, available civic, social and health amenities. This requires intervention in the form of planning, formulation and implementation of laws, policies, programs and measures to safeguard and improve the conditions of the elderly in Kolkata.

Keywords: Demographic, Elderly, Population, Socio-economic.

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Authors: Ibtisam A. Abbas Al-Darkazly

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In this study, the mechanical properties of alginate hydrogel material for self-standing 3D scaffold architecture with proper shape fidelity are investigated. In-lab built 3D bio-printer extrusion-based technology is utilized to fabricate 3D alginate scaffold constructs. The pressure, needle speed and stage speed are varied using a computer-controlled system. The experimental result indicates that the concentration of alginate solution, calcium chloride (CaCl₂) cross-linking concentration and cross-linking ratios lead to the formation of alginate hydrogel with various gelation states. Besides, the gelling conditions, such as cross-linking reaction time and temperature also have a significant effect on the mechanical properties of alginate hydrogel. Various experimental tests such as the material gelation, the material spreading and the printability test for filament collapse as well as the swelling test were conducted to evaluate the fabricated 3D scaffold constructs. The result indicates that the fabricated 3D scaffold from composition of 3.5% wt alginate solution, that is prepared in DI water and 1% wt CaCl₂ solution with cross-linking ratios of 7:3 show good printability and sustain good shape fidelity for more than 20 days, compared to alginate hydrogel that is prepared in a phosphate buffered saline (PBS). The fabricated self-standing 3D scaffold constructs measured 30 mm × 30 mm and consisted of 4 layers (n = 4) show good pore geometry and clear grid structure after printing. In addition, the percentage change of swelling degree exhibits high swelling capability with respect to time. The swelling test shows that the geometry of 3D alginate-scaffold construct and of the macro-pore are rarely changed, which indicates the capability of holding the shape fidelity during the incubation period. This study demonstrated that the mechanical and physical properties of alginate hydrogel could be tuned for a 3D bio-printing extrusion-based system to fabricate self-standing 3D scaffold soft structures. This 3D bioengineered scaffold provides a natural microenvironment present in the extracellular matrix of the tissue, which could be seeded with the biological cells to generate the desired 3D live tissue model for in vitro and in vivo tissue engineering applications.

Keywords: Biomaterial, calcium chloride, 3D bio-printing, extrusion, scaffold, sodium alginate, tissue engineering.

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

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

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

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

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Authors: N. Hadhoum, B. Guerfi, T. M. Sider, Z. Yassa, T. Djerboua, M. Boursouti, M. Mamou, F. Z. Hadjadj Aoul, L. R. Mekacher

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Introduction and objectives: Chlorobutanol is a raw material, mainly used as an antiseptic and antimicrobial preservative in injectable and ophthalmic preparations. The main objective of our study was the synthesis and evaluation of the antimicrobial activity of chlorobutanol hemihydrates. Material and methods: Chlorobutanol was synthesized according to the nucleophilic addition reaction of chloroform to acetone, identified by an infrared absorption using Spectrum One FTIR spectrometer, melting point, Scanning electron microscopy and colorimetric reactions. The dosage of carvedilol active substance was carried out by assaying the degradation products of chlorobutanol in a basic solution. The chlorobutanol obtained was subjected to bacteriological tests in order to study its antimicrobial activity. The antibacterial activity was evaluated against strains such as Escherichia coli (ATCC 25 922), Staphylococcus aureus (ATCC 25 923) and Pseudomonas aeroginosa (ATCC = American type culture collection). The antifungal activity was evaluated against human pathogenic fungal strains, such as Candida albicans and Aspergillus niger provided by the parasitology laboratory of the Hospital of Tizi-Ouzou, Algeria. Results and discussion: Chlorobutanol was obtained in an acceptable yield. The characterization tests of the product obtained showed a white and crystalline appearance (confirmed by scanning electron microscopy), solubilities (in water, ethanol and glycerol), and a melting temperature in accordance with the requirements of the European pharmacopoeia. The colorimetric reactions were directed towards the presence of a trihalogenated carbon and an alcohol function. The spectral identification (IR) showed the presence of characteristic chlorobutanol peaks and confirmed the structure of the latter. The microbiological study revealed an antimicrobial effect on all strains tested (Sataphylococcus aureus (MIC = 1250 µg/ml), E. coli (MIC = 1250 µg/ml), Pseudomonas aeroginosa (MIC = 1250 µg/ml), Candida albicans (MIC =2500 µg/ml), Aspergillus niger (MIC =2500 µg/ml)) with MIC values close to literature data. Conclusion: Thus, on the whole, the synthesized chlorobutanol satisfied the requirements of the European Pharmacopoeia, and possesses antibacterial and antifungal activity; nevertheless, it is necessary to insist on the purification step of the product in order to eliminate the maximum impurities.

Keywords: Antimicrobial agent, bacterial and fungal strains, chlorobutanol, MIC.

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Authors: H. Nadia, G. Bahdja, S. Thili Malha, Y. Zahoua, D. Taoufik, B. Mourad, M. Marzouk, F. Z. Hadjadj Aoul, L. R. Mekacher

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Introduction and objectives: Chlorobutanol is a raw material, mainly used as an antiseptic and antimicrobial preservative in injectable and ophthalmic preparations. The main objective of our study was the synthesis and evaluation of the antimicrobial activity of chlorobutanol hemihydrates. Material and methods: Chlorobutanol was synthesized according to the nucleophilic addition reaction of chloroform to acetone, identified by an infrared absorption using Spectrum One FTIR spectrometer, melting point, Scanning electron microscopy and colorimetric reactions. The dosage of Carvedilol active substance was carried out by assaying the degradation products of chlorobutanol in a basic solution. The chlorobutanol obtained was subjected to bacteriological tests in order to study its antimicrobial activity. The antibacterial activity was evaluated against strains such as Escherichia coli (ATCC 25 922), Staphylococcus aureus (ATCC 25 923) and Pseudomonas aeroginosa (ATCC = American type culture collection). The antifungal activity was evaluated against human pathogenic fungal strains, such as Candida albicans and Aspergillus niger provided by the parasitology laboratory of the Hospital of Tizi-Ouzou, Algeria. Results and discussion: Chlorobutanol was obtained in an acceptable yield. The characterization tests of the product obtained showed a white and crystalline appearance (confirmed by scanning electron microscopy), solubilities (in water, ethanol and glycerol), and a melting temperature in accordance with the requirements of the European pharmacopoeia. The colorimetric reactions were directed towards the presence of a trihalogenated carbon and an alcohol function. The spectral identification (IR) showed the presence of characteristic chlorobutanol peaks and confirmed the structure of the latter. The microbiological study revealed an antimicrobial effect on all strains tested (Sataphylococcus aureus (MIC = 1250 µg/ml), E. coli (MIC = 1250 µg/ml), Pseudomonas aeroginosa (MIC = 1250 µg/ml), Candida albicans (MIC =2500 µg/ml), Aspergillus niger (MIC =2500 µg/ml)) with MIC values close to literature data. Conclusion: Thus, on the whole, the synthesized chlorobutanol satisfied the requirements of the European Pharmacopoeia, and possesses antibacterial and antifungal activity; nevertheless it is necessary to insist on the purification step of the product in order to eliminate the maximum impurities.

Keywords: Antimicrobial agent, bacterial and fungal strains, chlorobutanol, MIC.

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Authors: Shima Nabinejad, Holger Schüttrumpf

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Farmers who are living in flood-prone areas such as coasts are exposed to storm surges increased due to climate change. Crop cultivation is the most important economic activity of farmers, and in the time of flooding, agricultural lands are subject to inundation. Additionally, overflow saline water causes more severe damage outcomes than riverine flooding. Agricultural crops are more vulnerable to salinity than other land uses for which the economic damages may continue for a number of years even after flooding and affect farmers’ decision-making for the following year. Therefore, it is essential to assess what extent the agricultural areas are flooded and how much the associated flood damage to each individual farmer is. To address these questions, we integrated farmers’ decision-making at farm-scale with flood risk management. The integrated model includes identification of hazard scenarios, failure analysis of structural measures, derivation of hydraulic parameters for the inundated areas and analysis of the economic damages experienced by each farmer. The present study has two aims; firstly, it attempts to investigate the flooded cropland and potential crop damages for the whole area. Secondly, it compares them among farmers’ field for three flood scenarios, which differ in breach locations of the flood protection structure. To achieve its goal, the spatial distribution of fields and cultivated crops of farmers were fed into the flood risk model, and a 100-year storm surge hydrograph was selected as the flood event. The study area was Pellworm Island that is located in the German Wadden Sea National Park and surrounded by North Sea. Due to high salt content in seawater of North Sea, crops cultivated in the agricultural areas of Pellworm Island are 100% destroyed by storm surges which were taken into account in developing of depth-damage curve for analysis of consequences. As a result, inundated croplands and economic damages to crops were estimated in the whole Island which was further compared for six selected farmers under three flood scenarios. The results demonstrate the significance and the flexibility of the proposed model in flood risk assessment of flood-prone areas by integrating flood risk management and decision-making.

Keywords: Crop damages, flood risk analysis, individual farmer, inundated cropland, Pellworm Island, storm surges.

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Authors: Xuan Li, Weian Huang, Jinsheng Sun, Fuhao Zhao, Zhiyuan Wang, Jintang Wang

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Natural gas hydrates (NGHs) as promising alternative energy sources have gained increasing attention. Hydrate-bearing formation in marine areas is highly unconsolidated formation and is fragile, which is composed of weakly cemented sand-clay and silty sediments. During the drilling process, the invasion of drilling fluid can easily lead to excessive water content in the formation. It will change the soil liquid plastic limit index, which significantly affects the formation quality, leading to wellbore instability due to the metastable character of hydrate-bearing sediments. Therefore, controlling the filtrate loss into the formation in the drilling process has to be highly regarded for protecting the stability of the wellbore. In this study, the temperature-sensitive nanogel of P(NIPAM-co-AMPS-co-tBA) was prepared by soap-free emulsion polymerization, and the temperature-sensitive behavior was employed to achieve self-adaptive plugging in hydrate sediments. First, the effects of additional amounts of 2-acrylamido-2-methyl-1-propanesulfonic acid (AMPS), tert-butyl acrylate (tBA), and methylene-bis-acrylamide (MBA) on the microgel synthesis process and temperature-sensitive behaviors were investigated. Results showed that, as a reactive emulsifier, AMPS can not only participate in the polymerization reaction but also act as an emulsifier to stabilize micelles and enhance the stability of nanoparticles. The volume phase transition temperature (VPTT) of nanogels gradually decreased with the increase of the contents of hydrophobic monomer tBA. An increase in the content of the cross-linking agent MBA can lead to a rise in the coagulum content and instability of the emulsion. The plugging performance of nanogel was evaluated in a core sample with a pore size distribution range of 100-1000 nm. The temperature-sensitive nanogel can effectively improve the microfiltration performance of drilling fluid. Since a combination of a series of nanogels could have a wide particle size distribution at any temperature, around 200 nm to 800 nm, the self-adaptive plugging capacity of nanogels for the hydrate sediments was revealed. Thermosensitive nanogel is a potential intelligent plugging material for drilling operations in NGH-bearing sediments.

Keywords: Temperature-sensitive nanogel, NIPAM, self-adaptive plugging performance, drilling operations, hydrate-bearing sediments.

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Authors: Adewale O. Adegbenjo, Elsie Nsiah-Baafi, Mxolisi B. Shongwe, Mercy Ramakokovhu, Peter A. Olubambi

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The sintering step in powder metallurgy (P/M) processes is very sensitive as it determines to a large extent the properties of the final component produced. Spark plasma sintering over the past decade has been extensively used in consolidating a wide range of materials including metallic alloy powders. This novel, non-conventional sintering method has proven to be advantageous offering full densification of materials, high heating rates, low sintering temperatures, and short sintering cycles over conventional sintering methods. Ti6Al4V has been adjudged the most widely used α+β alloy due to its impressive mechanical performance in service environments, especially in the aerospace and automobile industries being a light metal alloy with the capacity for fuel efficiency needed in these industries. The P/M route has been a promising method for the fabrication of parts made from Ti6Al4V alloy due to its cost and material loss reductions and the ability to produce near net and intricate shapes. However, the use of this alloy has been largely limited owing to its relatively poor hardness and wear properties. The effect of sintering temperature on the densification, hardness, and wear behaviors of spark plasma sintered Ti6Al4V powders was investigated in this present study. Sintering of the alloy powders was performed in the 650–850°C temperature range at a constant heating rate, applied pressure and holding time of 100°C/min, 50 MPa and 5 min, respectively. Density measurements were carried out according to Archimedes’ principle and microhardness tests were performed on sectioned as-polished surfaces at a load of 100gf and dwell time of 15 s. Dry sliding wear tests were performed at varied sliding loads of 5, 15, 25 and 35 N using the ball-on-disc tribometer configuration with WC as the counterface material. Microstructural characterization of the sintered samples and wear tracks were carried out using SEM and EDX techniques. The density and hardness characteristics of sintered samples increased with increasing sintering temperature. Near full densification (99.6% of the theoretical density) and Vickers’ micro-indentation hardness of 360 HV were attained at 850°C. The coefficient of friction (COF) and wear depth improved significantly with increased sintering temperature under all the loading conditions examined, except at 25 N indicating better mechanical properties at high sintering temperatures. Worn surface analyses showed the wear mechanism was a synergy of adhesive and abrasive wears, although the former was prevalent.

Keywords: Hardness, powder metallurgy, Spark plasma sintering, wear.

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Authors: Philip Semaha, Zhongfang Lei, Ziwen Zhao, Sen Liu, Zhenya Zhang, Kazuya Shimizu

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The increasing generation of saline wastewater through various industrial activities is becoming a global concern for activated sludge (AS) based biological treatment which is widely applied in wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs). As for the AS process, an increase in wastewater salinity has negative impact on its overall performance. The advent of conventional aerobic granular sludge (AGS) or bacterial AGS biotechnology has gained much attention because of its superior performance. The development of algal-bacterial AGS could enhance better nutrients removal, potentially reduce aeration cost through symbiotic algae-bacterial activity, and thus, can also reduce overall treatment cost. Nonetheless, the potential of salt stress to decrease biomass growth, microbial activity and nutrient removal exist. Up to the present, little information is available on saline wastewater treatment by algal-bacterial AGS. To the authors’ best knowledge, a comparison of the two AGS systems has not been done to evaluate nutrients removal capacity in the context of salinity increase. This study sought to figure out the impact of salinity on the algal-bacterial AGS system in comparison to bacterial AGS one, contributing to the application of AGS technology in the real world of saline wastewater treatment. In this study, the salt concentrations tested were 0 g/L, 1 g/L, 5 g/L, 10 g/L and 15 g/L of NaCl with 24-hr artificial illuminance of approximately 97.2 µmol m¯²s¯¹, and mature bacterial and algal-bacterial AGS were used for the operation of two identical sequencing batch reactors (SBRs) with a working volume of 0.9 L each, respectively. The results showed that salinity increase caused no apparent change in the color of bacterial AGS; while for algal-bacterial AGS, its color was progressively changed from green to dark green. A consequent increase in granule diameter and fluffiness was observed in the bacterial AGS reactor with the increase of salinity in comparison to a decrease in algal-bacterial AGS diameter. However, nitrite accumulation peaked from 1.0 mg/L and 0.4 mg/L at 1 g/L NaCl in the bacterial and algal-bacterial AGS systems, respectively to 9.8 mg/L in both systems when NaCl concentration varied from 5 g/L to 15 g/L. Almost no ammonia nitrogen was detected in the effluent except at 10 g/L NaCl concentration, where it averaged 4.2 mg/L and 2.4 mg/L, respectively, in the bacterial and algal-bacterial AGS systems. Nutrients removal in the algal-bacterial system was relatively higher than the bacterial AGS in terms of nitrogen and phosphorus removals. Nonetheless, the nutrient removal rate was almost 50% or lower. Results show that algal-bacterial AGS is more adaptable to salinity increase and could be more suitable for saline wastewater treatment. Optimization of operation conditions for algal-bacterial AGS system would be important to ensure its stably high efficiency in practice.

Keywords: Algal-bacterial aerobic granular sludge, bacterial aerobic granular sludge, nutrients removal, saline wastewater, sequencing batch reactor.

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Authors: Marine Shavlakadze

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Hydroponic greenhouses systems (production of the artificial substrate without soil) are becoming popular in the world. Mostly the system is used to grow vegetables and berries. Different countries are taking action to participate in the development of hydroponic technology and solutions such as EU members, Turkey, Australia, New Zealand, Israel, Scandinavian countries, etc. Many vegetables and berries are grown by hydroponics in Europe. As a result of our research, we have obtained material containing manganese and nitrogen. It became possible to produce this fertilizer by means of one-stage thermal processing, using industrial waste containing manganese (ores and sludges) and mineral substance (ammonium nitrate) that exist in Georgia. The received material is usable as a micro-fertilizer with economic efficiency. It became possible to turn practically water-insoluble manganese dioxide substance into the soluble condition from industrial waste in an indirect way. The ability to use the material as a fertilizer is predetermined by its chemical and phase composition, as the amount of the active component of the material in relation to manganese is 30%. At the same time, the active component elements presented non-ballast sustained action compounds. The studies implemented in Poland and in Georgia by us have shown that the manganese-containing micro-fertilizer- Mn(NO₃)₂ can provide the plant with nitrate nitrogen, which is a form that can be used for plants, providing the economy and simplicity of the application of fertilizers. Given the fact that the application of the manganese-containing micro-fertilizers significantly increases the productivity and improves the quality of the big number of agricultural products, it is necessary to mention that it is recommended to introduce the manganese containing fertilizers into the following cultures: sugar beet, corn, potato, vegetables, vine grape, fruit, berries, and other cultures. Also, as a result of the study, it was established that the material obtained is the predominant fertilizer for vegetable cultures in the soil. Based on the positive results of the research, we consider it expedient to conduct research in hydroponic systems, which will enable us to provide plants the required amount of manganese; we also introduce nitrogen in solution and regulate the solution of pH, which is one of the main problems in hydroponic production. The findings of our research will be used in hydroponic greenhouse farms to increase the fertility of vegetable crops and, consequently, to get bountiful and high-quality harvests, which will promote the development of hydroponic greenhouses in Georgia as well as abroad.

Keywords: Hydroponics, micro-fertilizers, manganese ore, chemical amelioration.

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Authors: Mohammed El Raey, Moustafa Osman Mohammed

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The spatial-ecological modeling is relating sustainable dispersions with social development. Sustainability with spatial-ecological model gives attention to urban environments in the design review management to comply with Earth’s system. Naturally exchanged patterns of ecosystems have consistent and periodic cycles to preserve energy flows and materials in Earth’s system. The Probabilistic Risk Assessment (PRA) technique is utilized to assess the safety of an industrial complex. The other analytical approach is the Failure-Safe Mode and Effect Analysis (FMEA) for critical components. The plant safety parameters are identified for engineering topology as employed in assessment safety of industrial ecology. In particular, the most severe accidental release of hazardous gaseous is postulated, analyzed and assessment in industrial region. The IAEA-safety assessment procedure is used to account the duration and rate of discharge of liquid chlorine. The ecological model of plume dispersion width and concentration of chlorine gas in the downwind direction is determined using Gaussian Plume Model in urban and rural areas and presented with SURFER®. The prediction of accident consequences is traced in risk contour concentration lines. The local greenhouse effect is predicted with relevant conclusions. The spatial-ecological model is predicted for multiple factors distribution schemes of multi-criteria analysis. The input–output analysis is explored from the spillover effect, and we conducted Monte Carlo simulations for sensitivity analysis. Their unique structure is balanced within “equilibrium patterns”, such as the composite index for biosphere with collective structure of many distributed feedback flows. These dynamic structures are related to have their physical and chemical properties and enable a gradual and prolonged incremental pattern. While this spatial model structure argues from ecology, resource savings, static load design, financial and other pragmatic reasons, the outcomes are not decisive in an artistic/architectural perspective. The hypothesis is deployed to unify analytic and analogical spatial structure in development urban environments using optimization loads as an example of integrated industrial structure where the process is based on engineering topology of systems ecology.

Keywords: Spatial-ecological modeling, spatial structure orientation impact, composite structure, industrial ecology.

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Authors: Abduladim Maitieg, Kevin Lynch, Mark Johnson

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The goal of the Libyan Environmental General Authority (EGA) and National Oil Corporation (Department of Health, Safety & Environment) during the last 5 years has been to adopt a common approach to coastal and marine spatial planning. Protection and planning of the coastal zone is a significant for Libya, due to the length of coast and, the high rate of oil export, and spills’ potential negative impacts on coastal and marine habitats. Coastal resource scenarios constitute an important tool for exploring the long-term and short-term consequences of oil spill impact and available response options that would provide an integrated perspective on mitigation. To investigate that, this paper reviews the Misratah coastal parameters to present the physical and human controls and attributes of coastal habitats as the first step in understanding how they may be damaged by an oil spill. This paper also investigates costal resources, providing a better understanding of the resources and factors that impact the integrity of the ecosystem. Therefore, the study described the potential spatial distribution of oil spill risk and the coastal resources value, and also created spatial maps of coastal resources and their vulnerability to oil spills along the coast. This study proposes an analysis of coastal resources condition at a local level in the Misratah region of the Mediterranean Sea, considering the implementation of coastal and marine spatial planning over time as an indication of the will to manage urban development. Oil spill contamination analysis and their impact on the coastal resources depend on (1) oil spill sequence, (2) oil spill location, (3) oil spill movement near the coastal area. The resulting maps show natural, socio-economic activity, environmental resources along of the coast, and oil spill location. Moreover, the study provides significant geodatabase information which is required for coastal sensitivity index mapping and coastal management studies. The outcome of study provides the information necessary to set an Environmental Sensitivity Index (ESI) for the Misratah shoreline, which can be used for management of coastal resources and setting boundaries for each coastal sensitivity sectors, as well as to help planners measure the impact of oil spills on coastal resources. Geographic Information System (GIS) tools were used in order to store and illustrate the spatial convergence of existing socio-economic activities such as fishing, tourism, and the salt industry, and ecosystem components such as sea turtle nesting area, Sabkha habitats, and migratory birds feeding sites. These geodatabases help planners investigate the vulnerability of coastal resources to an oil spill.

Keywords: Coastal and marine spatial planning advancement training, GIS mapping, human uses, ecosystem components, Misratah coast, Libyan, oil spill.

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Authors: B. Lefranc, C. Aufauvre-Poupon, C. Martin-Krumm, M. Trousselard

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Isolated and confined environments (ICE) present several challenges which may adversely affect human’s psychology and physiology. Submariners in Sub-Surface Ballistic Nuclear (SSBN) mission exposed to these environmental constraints must be able to perform complex tasks as part of their normal duties, as well as during crisis periods when emergency actions are required or imminent. The operational and environmental constraints they face contribute to challenge human adaptability. The impact of such a constrained environment has yet to be explored. Establishing a knowledge framework is a determining factor, particularly in view of the next long space travels. Ensuring that the crews are maintained in optimal operational conditions is a real challenge because the success of the mission depends on them. This study focused on the evaluation of the impact of stress on mental health and sensory degradation of submariners during a mission on SSBN using cardiac biosignal (heart rate variability, HRV) clustering. This is a pragmatic exploratory study of a prospective cohort included 19 submariner volunteers. HRV was recorded at baseline to classify by clustering the submariners according to their stress level based on parasympathetic (Pa) activity. Impacts of high Pa (HPa) versus low Pa (LPa) level at baseline were assessed on emotional state and sensory perception (interoception and exteroception) as a cardiac biosignal during the patrol and at a recovery time one month after. Whatever the time, no significant difference was found in mental health between groups. There are significant differences in the interoceptive, exteroceptive and physiological functioning during the patrol and at recovery time. To sum up, compared to the LPa group, the HPa maintains a higher level in psychosensory functioning during the patrol and at recovery but exhibits a decrease in Pa level. The HPa group has less adaptable HRV characteristics, less unpredictability and flexibility of cardiac biosignals while the LPa group increases them during the patrol and at recovery time. This dissociation between psychosensory and physiological adaptation suggests two treatment modalities for ICE environments. To our best knowledge, our results are the first to highlight the impact of physiological differences in the HRV profile on the adaptability of submariners. Further studies are needed to evaluate the negative emotional and cognitive effects of ICEs based on the cardiac profile. Artificial intelligence offers a promising future for maintaining high level of operational conditions. These future perspectives will not only allow submariners to be better prepared, but also to design feasible countermeasures that will help support analog environments that bring us closer to a trip to Mars.

Keywords: Adaptation, exteroception, HRV, ICE, interoception, SSBN.

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Authors: Jung-Hong Hong, Jing-Cen Yang, Cai-Yu Ou

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The analysis of geographic inequality heavily relies on the use of location-enabled statistical data and quantitative measures to present the spatial patterns of the selected phenomena and analyze their differences. To protect the privacy of individual instance and link to administrative units, point-based datasets are spatially aggregated to area-based statistical datasets, where only the overall status for the selected levels of spatial units is used for decision making. The partition of the spatial units thus has dominant influence on the outcomes of the analyzed results, well known as the Modifiable Areal Unit Problem (MAUP). A new spatial reference framework, the Taiwan Geographical Statistical Classification (TGSC), was recently introduced in Taiwan based on the spatial partition principles of homogeneous consideration of the number of population and households. Comparing to the outcomes of the traditional township units, TGSC provides additional levels of spatial units with finer granularity for presenting spatial phenomena and enables domain experts to select appropriate dissemination level for publishing statistical data. This paper compares the results of respectively using TGSC and township unit on the mortality data and examines the spatial characteristics of their outcomes. For the mortality data between the period of January 1^st, 2008 and December 31^st, 2010 of the Taitung County, the all-cause age-standardized death rate (ASDR) ranges from 571 to 1757 per 100,000 persons, whereas the 2^nd dissemination area (TGSC) shows greater variation, ranged from 0 to 2222 per 100,000. The finer granularity of spatial units of TGSC clearly provides better outcomes for identifying and evaluating the geographic inequality and can be further analyzed with the statistical measures from other perspectives (e.g., population, area, environment.). The management and analysis of the statistical data referring to the TGSC in this research is strongly supported by the use of Geographic Information System (GIS) technology. An integrated workflow that consists of the tasks of the processing of death certificates, the geocoding of street address, the quality assurance of geocoded results, the automatic calculation of statistic measures, the standardized encoding of measures and the geo-visualization of statistical outcomes is developed. This paper also introduces a set of auxiliary measures from a geographic distribution perspective to further examine the hidden spatial characteristics of mortality data and justify the analyzed results. With the common statistical area framework like TGSC, the preliminary results demonstrate promising potential for developing a web-based statistical service that can effectively access domain statistical data and present the analyzed outcomes in meaningful ways to avoid wrong decision making.

Keywords: Mortality map, spatial patterns, statistical area, variation.

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Authors: Rangrong Yoksan, Amporn Sane, Nattaporn Khanoonkon, Chanakorn Yokesahachart, Narumol Noivoil, Khanh Minh Dang

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Polylactic acid (PLA) is the most commercially available bio-based and biodegradable plastic at present. PLA has been used in plastic related industries including single-used containers, disposable and environmentally friendly packaging owing to its renewability, compostability, biodegradability, and safety. Although PLA demonstrates reasonably good optical, physical, mechanical and barrier properties comparable to the existing petroleum-based plastics, its brittleness and mold shrinkage as well as its price are the points to be concerned for the production of rigid and semi-rigid packaging. Blending PLA with other bio-based polymers including thermoplastic starch (TPS) is an alternative not only to achieve a complete bio-based plastic, but also to reduce the brittleness, shrinkage during molding and production cost of the PLA-based products. TPS is a material produced mainly from starch which is cheap, renewable, biodegradable, compostable, and nontoxic. It is commonly prepared by a plasticization of starch under applying heat and shear force. Although glycerol has been reported as one of the most plasticizers used for preparing TPS, its migration caused the surface stickiness of the TPS products. In some cases, mixed plasticizers or natural fibers have been applied to impede the retrogradation of starch or reduce the migration of glycerol. The introduction of fibers into TPS-based materials could reinforce the polymer matrix as well. Therefore, the objective of the present research is to study the effect of starch type (i.e. native starch and phosphate starch), plasticizer type (i.e. glycerol and xylitol with a weight ratio of glycerol to xylitol of 100:0, 75:25, 50:50, 25:75 and 0:100) and fiber content (i.e. in the range of 1-25 %wt) on properties of PLA/TPS blend and composite. PLA/TPS blends and composites were prepared using a twin-screw extruder and then converted into dumbbell-shaped specimens using an injection molding machine. The PLA/TPS blends prepared by using phosphate starch showed higher tensile strength and stiffness than the blends prepared by using native one. In contrast, the blends from native starch exhibited higher extensibility and heat distortion temperature (HDT) than those from the modified starch. Increasing xylitol content resulted in enhanced tensile strength, stiffness and water resistance, but decreased extensibility and HDT of the PLA/TPS blend. Tensile properties and hydrophobicity of the blend could be improved by incorporating silane treated-jute fibers.

Keywords: Polylactic acid, Thermoplastic starch, Jute fiber, Composite, Blend.

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Authors: Wenhsuan Lee, Yachi Chang, Yingyih Shih

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In clinical practices, it is common that while facing the unknown progress of their disease, palliative care patients may easily feel anxious and depressed. These types of reactions are a cause of psychosomatic diseases and may also influence treatment results. However, the purpose of palliative care is to provide relief from all kinds of pains. Therefore, how to make patients more comfortable is an issue worth studying. This study adopted the “bio-psycho-social model” proposed by Engel and applied spontaneous breathing training, in the hope of seeing patients’ psychological state changes caused by their physiological state changes, improvements in their anxious conditions, corresponding adjustments of their cognitive functions, and further enhancement of their social functions and the social support system. This study will be a one-year study. Palliative care outpatients will be recruited and assigned to the experimental group or the control group for six outpatient visits (once a month), with 80 patients in each group. The patients of both groups agreed that this study can collect their physiological quantitative data using an HRV device before the first outpatient visit. They also agreed to answer the “Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI)”, the “Taiwanese version of the WHOQOL-BREF questionnaire” before the first outpatient visit, to fill a self-report questionnaire after each outpatient visit, and to answer the “Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI)”, the “Taiwanese version of the WHOQOL-BREF questionnaire” after the last outpatient visit. The patients of the experimental group agreed to receive the breathing training under HRV monitoring during the first outpatient visit of this study. Before each of the following three outpatient visits, they were required to fill a self-report questionnaire regarding their breathing practices after going home. After the outpatient visits, they were taught how to practice breathing through an HRV device and asked to practice it after going home. Later, based on the results from the HRV data analyses and the pre-tests and post-tests of the “Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI)”, the “Taiwanese version of the WHOQOL-BREF questionnaire”, the influence of the breathing training in the bio, psycho, and social aspects were evaluated. The data collected through the self-report questionnaires of the patients of both groups were used to explore the possible interfering factors among the bio, psycho, and social changes. It is expected that this study will support the “bio-psycho-social model” proposed by Engel, meaning that bio, psycho, and social supports are closely related, and that breathing training helps to transform palliative care patients’ psychological feelings of anxiety and depression, to facilitate their positive interactions with others, and to improve the quality medical care for them.

Keywords: Palliative care, breathing training, bio-psycho-social Model, heart rate variability.

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Authors: M. H. Arslan, U. K. Sahin, H. Acikgoz-Tufan, I. Gocek, I. Erdem

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Various exterior factors have perpetual effects on textile materials during wear, use and laundering in everyday life. In accordance with their frequency of use, textile materials are required to be laundered at certain intervals. The medium in which the laundering process takes place have inevitable detrimental physical and chemical effects on textile materials caused by the unique parameters of the process inherently existing. Connatural structures of various textile materials result in many different physical, chemical and mechanical characteristics. Because of their specific structures, these materials have different behaviors against several exterior factors. By modeling the behavior of commercial and test textiles as group-wise against laundering process, it is possible to disclose the relation in between these two groups of materials, which will lead to better understanding of their behaviors in terms of similarities and differences against the washing parameters of the laundering. Thus, the goal of the current research is to examine the behavior of two groups of textile materials as commercial textiles and as test textiles towards the main washing machine parameters during laundering process such as temperature, load quantity, mechanical action and level of water amount by concentrating on shrinkage, pilling, sewing defects, collar abrasion, the other defects other than sewing, whitening and overall properties of textiles. In this study, cotton fabrics were preferred as commercial textiles due to the fact that garments made of cotton are the most demanded products in the market by the textile consumers in daily life. Full factorial experimental set-up was used to design the experimental procedure. All profiles always including all of the commercial and the test textiles were laundered for 20 cycles by commercial home laundering machine to investigate the effects of the chosen parameters. For the laundering process, a modified version of ‘‘IEC 60456 Test Method’’ was utilized. The amount of detergent was altered as 0.5% gram per liter depending on varying load quantity levels. Datacolor 650®, EMPA Photographic Standards for Pilling Test and visual examination were utilized to test and characterize the textiles. Furthermore, in the current study the relation in between commercial and test textiles in terms of their performance was deeply investigated by the help of statistical analysis performed by MINITAB® package program modeling their behavior against the parameters of the laundering process. In the experimental work, the behaviors of both groups of textiles towards washing machine parameters were visually and quantitatively assessed in dry state.

Keywords: Behavior against washing machine parameters, performance evaluation of textiles, statistical analysis, commercial and test textiles.

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Authors: Bishnupriya Sahoo, Prasad K. Bhaskaran

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Tropical cyclone is one among the worst natural hazards that results in a trail of destruction causing enormous damage to life, property, and coastal infrastructures. In a global perspective, the Indian Ocean is considered as one of the cyclone prone basins in the world. Specifically, the frequency of cyclogenesis in the Bay of Bengal is higher compared to the Arabian Sea. Out of the four maritime states in the East coast of India, Odisha is highly susceptible to tropical cyclone landfall. Historical records clearly decipher the fact that the frequency of cyclones have reduced in this basin. However, in the recent decades, the intensity and size of tropical cyclones have increased. This is a matter of concern as the risk and vulnerability level of Odisha coast exposed to high wind speed and gusts during cyclone landfall have increased. In this context, there is a need to assess and evaluate the severity of coastal risk, area of exposure under risk, and associated vulnerability with a higher dimension in a multi-risk perspective. Changing climate can result in the emergence of a new hazard and vulnerability over a region with differential spatial and socio-economic impact. Hence there is a need to have coastal vulnerability projections in a changing climate scenario. With this motivation, the present study attempts to estimate the destructiveness of tropical cyclones based on Power Dissipation Index (PDI) for those cyclones that made landfall along Odisha coast that exhibits an increasing trend based on historical data. The study also covers the futuristic scenarios of integral coastal vulnerability based on the trends in PDI for the Odisha coast. This study considers 11 essential and important parameters; the cyclone intensity, storm surge, onshore inundation, mean tidal range, continental shelf slope, topo-graphic elevation onshore, rate of shoreline change, maximum wave height, relative sea level rise, rainfall distribution, and coastal geomorphology. The study signifies that over a decadal scale, the coastal vulnerability index (CVI) depends largely on the incremental change in variables such as cyclone intensity, storm surge, and associated inundation. In addition, the study also performs a critical analysis on the modulation of PDI on storm surge and inundation characteristics for the entire coastal belt of Odisha State. Interestingly, the study brings to light that a linear correlation exists between the storm-tide with PDI. The trend analysis of PDI and its projection for coastal Odisha have direct practical applications in effective coastal zone management and vulnerability assessment.

Keywords: Bay of Bengal, coastal vulnerability index, power dissipation index, tropical cyclone.

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Authors: A. M. Tarola, R. Preti, A. M. Girelli, P. Campana

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Goat dairy products are gaining popularity worldwide. In developing countries, but also in many marginal regions of the Mediterranean area, goats represent a great part of the economy and ensure food security. In fact, these small ruminants are able to convert efficiently poor weedy plants and small trees into traditional products of high nutritional quality, showing great resilience to different climatic and environmental conditions. In developed countries, goat milk is appreciated for the presence of health-promoting compounds, bioactive compounds such as conjugated linoleic acids, oligosaccharides, sphingolipids and polyammines. This paper focuses on the recent advances in literature on the nutritional properties of goat milk and on innovative techniques to improve its quality as to become a promising functional food. The environmental sustainability of different methodologies of production has also been examined. Goat milk is valued today as a food of high nutritional value and functional properties as well as small environmental footprint. It is widely consumed in many countries due to high nutritional value, lower allergenic potential, and better digestibility when compared to bovine milk, that makes this product suitable for infants, elderly or sensitive patients. The main differences in chemical composition between a cow and goat milk rely on fat globules that in goat milk are smaller and in fatty acids that present a smaller chain length, while protein, fat, and lactose concentration are comparable. Milk nutritional properties have demonstrated to be strongly influenced by animal diet, genotype, and welfare, but also by season and production systems. Furthermore, there is a growing interest in the dairy industry in goat milk for its relatively high concentration of prebiotics and a good amount of probiotics, which have recently gained importance for their therapeutic potential. Therefore, goat milk is studied as a promising matrix to develop innovative functional foods. In addition to the economic and nutritional value, goat milk is considered a sustainable product for its small environmental footprint, as they require relatively little water and land, and less medical treatments, compared to cow, these characteristics make its production naturally vocated to organic farming. Organic goat milk production has becoming more and more interesting both for farmers and consumers as it can answer to several concerns like environment protection, animal welfare and economical sustainment of rural populations living in marginal lands. These evidences make goat milk an ancient food with novel properties and advantages to be valorized and exploited.

Keywords: Goat milk, nutritional quality, bioactive compounds, sustainable production.

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Authors: Jaeyoung Lee

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Autonomous driving systems require high reliability to provide people with a safe and comfortable driving experience. However, despite the development of a number of vehicle sensors, it is difficult to always provide high perceived performance in driving environments that vary from time to season. The image segmentation method using deep learning, which has recently evolved rapidly, provides high recognition performance in various road environments stably. However, since the system controls a vehicle in real time, a highly complex deep learning network cannot be used due to time and memory constraints. Moreover, efficient networks are optimized for GPU environments, which degrade performance in embedded processor environments equipped simple hardware accelerators. In this paper, a semantic segmentation network, matrix multiplication accelerator network (MMANet), optimized for matrix multiplication accelerator (MMA) on Texas instrument digital signal processors (TI DSP) is proposed to improve the recognition performance of autonomous driving system. The proposed method is designed to maximize the number of layers that can be performed in a limited time to provide reliable driving environment information in real time. First, the number of channels in the activation map is fixed to fit the structure of MMA. By increasing the number of parallel branches, the lack of information caused by fixing the number of channels is resolved. Second, an efficient convolution is selected depending on the size of the activation. Since MMA is a fixed, it may be more efficient for normal convolution than depthwise separable convolution depending on memory access overhead. Thus, a convolution type is decided according to output stride to increase network depth. In addition, memory access time is minimized by processing operations only in L3 cache. Lastly, reliable contexts are extracted using the extended atrous spatial pyramid pooling (ASPP). The suggested method gets stable features from an extended path by increasing the kernel size and accessing consecutive data. In addition, it consists of two ASPPs to obtain high quality contexts using the restored shape without global average pooling paths since the layer uses MMA as a simple adder. To verify the proposed method, an experiment is conducted using perfsim, a timing simulator, and the Cityscapes validation sets. The proposed network can process an image with 640 x 480 resolution for 6.67 ms, so six cameras can be used to identify the surroundings of the vehicle as 20 frame per second (FPS). In addition, it achieves 73.1% mean intersection over union (mIoU) which is the highest recognition rate among embedded networks on the Cityscapes validation set.

Keywords: Edge network, embedded network, MMA, matrix multiplication accelerator and semantic segmentation network.

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Authors: Benjamin Osei Tutu, Sharon Annison

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On 21^st November, 2016, an outbreak of foodborne illness occurred after a buffet lunch served during a stakeholders’ consultation meeting held in Accra. An investigation was conducted to characterise the affected people, determine the etiologic food, the source of contamination and the etiologic agent and to implement appropriate public health measures to prevent future occurrences. A retrospective cohort study was conducted via telephone interviews, using a structured questionnaire developed from the buffet menu. A case was defined as any person suffering from symptoms of foodborne illness e.g. diarrhoea and/or abdominal cramps after eating food served during the stakeholder consultation meeting in Accra on 21^st November, 2016. The exposure status of all the members of the cohort was assessed by taking the food history of each respondent during the telephone interview. The data obtained was analysed using Epi Info 7. An environmental risk assessment was conducted to ascertain the source of the food contamination. Risks of foodborne infection from the foods eaten were determined using attack rates and odds ratios. Data was obtained from 54 people who consumed food served during the stakeholders’ meeting. Out of this population, 44 people reported with symptoms of food poisoning representing 81.45% (overall attack rate). The peak incubation period was seven hours with a minimum and maximum incubation periods of four and 17 hours, respectively. The commonly reported symptoms were diarrhoea (97.73%, 43/44), vomiting (84.09%, 37/44) and abdominal cramps (75.00%, 33/44). From the incubation period, duration of illness and the symptoms, toxin-mediated food poisoning was suspected. The environmental risk assessment of the implicated catering facility indicated a lack of time/temperature control, inadequate knowledge on food safety among workers and sanitation issues. Limited number of food samples was received for microbiological analysis. Multivariate analysis indicated that illness was significantly associated with the consumption of the snacks served (OR 14.78, P < 0.001). No stool and blood or samples of etiologic food were available for organism isolation; however, the suspected etiologic agent was Staphylococcus aureus or Clostridium perfringens. The outbreak could probably be due to the consumption of unwholesome snack (tuna sandwich or chicken. The contamination and/or growth of the etiologic agent in the snack may be due to the breakdown in cleanliness, time/temperature control and good food handling practices. Training of food handlers in basic food hygiene and safety is recommended.

Keywords: Accra, buffet, C. perfringens, cohort study, food poisoning, gastroenteritis, office workers, Staphylococcus aureus.

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Authors: Mike Climstein, Joe Walsh, John Best, Ian Timothy Heazlewood, Stephen Burke, Jyrki Kettunen, Kent Adams, Mark DeBeliso

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Recently, the health of retired National Football League players, particularly lineman has been investigated. A number of studies have reported increased cardiometabolic risk, premature cardiovascular disease and incidence of type 2 diabetes. Rugby union players have somatotypes very similar to National Football League players which suggests that rugby players may have similar health risks. The International Golden Oldies World Rugby Festival (GORF) provided a unique opportunity to investigate the demographics of veteran rugby players. METHODOLOGIES: A cross-sectional, observational study was completed using an online web-based questionnaire that consisted of medical history and physiological measures. Data analysis was completed using a one sample t-test (<50yrs versus >50yrs) and Chi-square test. RESULTS: A total of 216 veteran rugby competitors (response rate = 6.8%) representing 10 countries, aged 35-72 yrs (mean 51.2, S.D. ±8.0), participated in the online survey. As a group, the incidence of current smokers was low at 8.8% (avg 72.4 cigs/wk) whilst the percentage consuming alcohol was high (93.1% (avg 11.2 drinks/wk). Competitors reported the following top six chronic diseases/disorders; hypertension (18.6%), arthritis (OA/RA, 11.5%), asthma (9.3%), hyperlipidemia (8.2%), diabetes (all types, 7.5%) and gout (6%), there were significant differences between groups with regard to cancer (all types) and migraines. When compared to the Australian general population (Australian Bureau of Statistics data, n=18,000), GORF competitors had a significantly lower incidence of anxiety (p<0.01), arthritis (p<0.06), depression (p<.01) however, a significantly higher incidence of diabetes (p<0.03) and hypertension (p<0.01). The GORF competitors also reported taking the following prescribed medications; antihypertensive (13%), hypolipidemics (8%), non-steroidal anti-inflammatory (6%), and anticoagulants (4%). Significant differences between groups were observed in antihypertensives, anticoagulants and hypolipidemics. There were significant (p<0.05) differences between groups (<50yrs versus >50yrs) with regard to height (180 vs 177cm), weight (97.6 vs 93.1Kg-s), BMI (30 vs 29.7kg/m2) and waist circumference (85.7 vs 93.1cm) however, there were no differences in subsequent parameters of systolic blood pressure, diastolic blood pressure, total cholesterol, HDL-C, LDL-C, triglycerides-C or fasting plasma glucose. CONCLUSIONS: This represents the first collection of demographics on this cohort. GORF participants demonstrated increased cardiometabolic risk with regard to the incidence of hypercholesterolemia, hypertension and type 2 diabetes. Preventative strategies should be developed to reduce this risk with education of these risks for future participants.

Keywords: Masters athlete, rugby union, risk factors, chronic disease

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Authors: J. R. Büttler, T. Pham

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Basic understanding of interfacial mechanisms is of importance for the development of polymer composites. For this purpose, we need techniques to analyze the quality of interphases, their chemical and physical interactions and their strength and fracture resistance. In order to investigate the interfacial phenomena in detail, advanced characterization techniques are favorable. Dynamic mechanical thermal analysis (DMTA) using a rheological system is a sensitive tool. T-peel tests were performed with this system, to investigate the temperature-dependent peel behavior of woven textile composites. A model system was made of polyamide (PA) woven fabric laminated with films of polypropylene (PP) or PP modified by grafting with maleic anhydride (PP-g-MAH). Firstly, control measurements were performed with solely PP matrixes. Polymer melt investigations, as well as the extensional stress, extensional viscosity and extensional relaxation modulus at -10°C, 100 °C and 170 °C, demonstrate similar viscoelastic behavior for films made of PP-g-MAH and its non-modified PP-control. Frequency sweeps have shown that PP-g-MAH has a zero phase viscosity of around 1600 Pa·s and PP-control has a similar zero phase viscosity of 1345 Pa·s. Also, the gelation points are similar at 2.42*104 Pa (118 rad/s) and 2.81*104 Pa (161 rad/s) for PP-control and PP-g-MAH, respectively. Secondly, the textile composite was analyzed. The extensional stress of PA66 fabric laminated with either PP-control or PP-g-MAH at -10 °C, 25 °C and 170 °C for strain rates of 0.001 – 1 s^-1 was investigated. The laminates containing the modified PP need more stress for T-peeling. However, the strengthening effect due to the modification decreases by increasing temperature and at 170 °C, just above the melting temperature of the matrix, the difference disappears. Independent of the matrix used in the textile composite, there is a decrease of extensional stress by increasing temperature. It appears that the more viscous is the matrix, the weaker the laminar adhesion. Possibly, the measurement is influenced by the fact that the laminate becomes stiffer at lower temperatures. Adhesive lap-shear testing at room temperature supports the findings obtained with the T-peel test. Additional analysis of the textile composite at the microscopic level ensures that the fibers are well embedded in the matrix. Atomic force microscopy (AFM) imaging of a cross section of the composite shows no gaps between the fibers and matrix. Measurements of the water contact angle show that the MAH grafted PP is more polar than the virgin-PP, and that suggests a more favorable chemical interaction of PP-g-MAH with PA, compared to the non-modified PP. In fact, this study indicates that T-peel testing by DMTA is a technique to achieve more insights into polymeric textile composites.

Keywords: Dynamic mechanical thermal analysis, interphase, polyamide, polypropylene, textile composite, T-peel test.

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Authors: Sayem Zafar, Mahmood Rahi

Abstract:

Rigorous international maritime regulations are in place to limit boat and ship hydrocarbon emissions. The global sustainability goals are reducing the fuel consumption and minimizing the emissions from the ships and boats. These maritime sustainability goals have attracted a lot of research interest. Energy harvesting and storage system is designed in this study based on hybrid renewable and conventional energy systems. This energy harvesting and storage system is designed for marine applications, such as, boats and small ships. These systems can be utilized for mobile use or off-grid remote electrification. This study analyzed the use of micro power generation for boats and small ships. The energy harvesting and storage system has two distinct systems i.e. dockside shore-based system and on-board system. The shore-based system consists of a small wind turbine, photovoltaic (PV) panels, small gas turbine, hydrogen generator and high-pressure hydrogen storage tank. This dockside system is to provide easy access to the boats and small ships for supply of hydrogen. The on-board system consists of hydrogen storage tanks and fuel cells. The wind turbine and PV panels generate electricity to operate electrolyzer. A small gas turbine is used as a supplementary power system to contribute in case the hybrid renewable energy system does not provide the required energy. The electrolyzer performs the electrolysis on distilled water to produce hydrogen. The hydrogen is stored in high-pressure tanks. The hydrogen from the high-pressure tank is filled in the low-pressure tanks on-board seagoing vessels to operate the fuel cell. The boats and small ships use the hydrogen fuel cell to provide power to electric propulsion motors and for on-board auxiliary use. For shore-based system, a small wind turbine with the total length of 4.5 m and the disk diameter of 1.8 m is used. The small wind turbine dimensions make it big enough to be used to charge batteries yet small enough to be installed on the rooftops of dockside facility. The small dimensions also make the wind turbine easily transportable. In this paper, PV, sizing and solar flux are studied parametrically. System performance is evaluated under different operating and environmental conditions. The parametric study is conducted to evaluate the energy output and storage capacity of energy storage system. Results are generated for a wide range of conditions to analyze the usability of hybrid energy harvesting and storage system. This energy harvesting method significantly improves the usability and output of the renewable energy sources. It also shows that small hybrid energy systems have promising practical applications.

Keywords: Energy harvesting, fuel cell, hybrid energy system, hydrogen, wind turbine.

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Authors: M. Arun, A. Kannan

Abstract:

Textile industries cater to varied customer preferences and contribute substantially to the economy. However, these textile industries also produce a considerable amount of effluents. Prominent among these are the azo dyes which impart considerable color and toxicity even at low concentrations. Azo dyes are also used as coloring agents in food and pharmaceutical industry. Despite their applications, azo dyes are also notorious pollutants and carcinogens. Popular techniques like photo-degradation, biodegradation and the use of oxidizing agents are not applicable for all kinds of dyes, as most of them are stable to these techniques. Chemical coagulation produces a large amount of toxic sludge which is undesirable and is also ineffective towards a number of dyes. Most of the azo dyes are stable to UV-visible light irradiation and may even resist aerobic degradation. Adsorption has been the most preferred technique owing to its less cost, high capacity and process efficiency and the possibility of regenerating and recycling the adsorbent. Adsorption is also most preferred because it may produce high quality of the treated effluent and it is able to remove different kinds of dyes. However, the adsorption process is influenced by many variables whose inter-dependence makes it difficult to identify optimum conditions. The variables include stirring speed, temperature, initial concentration and adsorbent dosage. Further, the internal diffusional resistance inside the adsorbent particle leads to slow uptake of the solute within the adsorbent. Hence, it is necessary to identify optimum conditions that lead to high capacity and uptake rate of these pollutants. In this work, commercially available activated carbon was chosen as the adsorbent owing to its high surface area. A typical azo dye found in textile effluent waters, viz. the monoazo Acid Orange 10 dye (CAS: 1936-15-8) has been chosen as the representative pollutant. Adsorption studies were mainly focused at obtaining equilibrium and kinetic data for the batch adsorption process at different process conditions. Studies were conducted at different stirring speed, temperature, adsorbent dosage and initial dye concentration settings. The Full Factorial Design was the chosen statistical design framework for carrying out the experiments and identifying the important factors and their interactions. The optimum conditions identified from the experimental model were validated with actual experiments at the recommended settings. The equilibrium and kinetic data obtained were fitted to different models and the model parameters were estimated. This gives more details about the nature of adsorption taking place. Critical data required to design batch adsorption systems for removal of Acid Orange 10 dye and identification of factors that critically influence the separation efficiency are the key outcomes from this research.

Keywords: Acid Orange 10, Activated carbon, Optimum conditions, Statistical design.

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Authors: Tomas Makaras, Gintaras Svecevičius

Abstract:

Landfill waste is a common problem as it has an economic and environmental impact even if it is closed. Landfill waste contains a high density of various persistent compounds such as heavy metals, organic and inorganic materials. As persistent compounds are slowly-degradable or even non-degradable in the environment, they often produce sublethal or even lethal effects on aquatic organisms. The aims of the present study were to estimate sublethal effects of the Kairiai landfill (WGS: 55°55‘46.74“, 23°23‘28.4“) leachate on the locomotor activity of rainbow trout Oncorhynchus mykiss juveniles using the original system package developed in our laboratory for automated monitoring, recording and analysis of aquatic organisms’ activity, and to determine patterns of fish behavioral response to sublethal effects of leachate. Four different concentrations of leachate were chosen: 0.125; 0.25; 0.5 and 1.0 mL/L (0.0025; 0.005; 0.01 and 0.002 as part of 96-hour LC50, respectively). Locomotor activity was measured after 5, 10 and 30 minutes of exposure during 1-minute test-periods of each fish (7 fish per treatment). The threshold-effect-concentration amounted to 0.18 mL/L (0.0036 parts of 96-hour LC50). This concentration was found to be even 2.8-fold lower than the concentration generally assumed to be “safe” for fish. At higher concentrations, the landfill leachate solution elicited behavioral response of test fish to sublethal levels of pollutants. The ability of the rainbow trout to detect and avoid contaminants occurred after 5 minutes of exposure. The intensity of locomotor activity reached a peak within 10 minutes, evidently decreasing after 30 minutes. This could be explained by the physiological and biochemical adaptation of fish to altered environmental conditions. It has been established that the locomotor activity of juvenile trout depends on leachate concentration and exposure duration. Modeling of these parameters showed that the activity of juveniles increased at higher leachate concentrations, but slightly decreased with the increasing exposure duration. Experiment results confirm that the behavior of rainbow trout juveniles is a sensitive and rapid biomarker that can be used in combination with the system for fish behavior monitoring, registration and analysis to determine sublethal concentrations of pollutants in ambient water. Further research should be focused on software improvement aimed to include more parameters of aquatic organisms’ behavior and to investigate the most rapid and appropriate behavioral responses in different species. In practice, this study could be the basis for the development and creation of biological early-warning systems (BEWS).

Keywords: Fish behavior biomarker, landfill leachate, locomotor activity, rainbow trout juveniles, sublethal effects.

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