Search results for: non-reference quality measures

Authors: Himali N. Balasooriya, Kithsiri B. Dassanayake, Saman Seneweera, Said Ajlouni

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Increase in atmospheric CO₂ concentration [CO₂] and ambient temperature associated with changing climatic conditions will have significant impacts on agriculture crop productivity and quality. Independent effects of the above two environmental variables on the growth, yield and quality of strawberry were well documented. Higher temperatures over the optimum range (20-25ºC) lead to crop failures, while elevated [CO₂] stimulated plant growth and yield but compromised the physical quality of fruits. However, there is very limited understanding of the interaction between these variables on the plant growth, yield and quality. Therefore, this study was designed to investigate the interactive effect of high temperature and elevated [CO₂] on growth, yield and quality of strawberries. Strawberry cultivars ‘Albion’ and ‘San Andreas’ were grown under six different combinations of two temperatures (25 and 30ºC) and three [CO₂] (400, 650 and 950 µmol mol^-1) in controlled-environmental growth chambers. Plant growth measurements such as plant height, canopy area, number of flowers, and fruit yield were measured during phonological development. Photosynthesis and transpiration, the ratio of intercellular to atmospheric [CO₂] (Ci/Ca) were measured to estimate the physiological adjustment to climate stress. The impact of temperature and [CO₂] interaction on growth and yield of strawberry was significant (p < 0.05). Across both cultivars, highest fruit yields were observed at 650 µmol mol^-1 [CO₂], which was particularly clear at 25°C. The fruit yield gradually decreased at 30°C under all the treatment combinations. However, photosynthesis rates were highest at 650 µmol mol^-1 [CO₂] but no increment was found at 900 µmol mol^-1 [CO₂]. Interestingly, Ci/Ca ratio increased with increasing atmospheric [CO₂] which was predominant at high temperature. Similarly, fruit yield was substantially reduced at high [CO₂] under high temperature. Our findings suggest that increased Ci/Ca ratio at high temperature is likely reduces the photosynthesis and thus yield response to elevated [CO₂].

Keywords: Atmospheric [CO2], fruit yield, strawberry, temperature.

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Authors: Anton A. Bykov, Irina O. Glot, Igor N. Shardakov, Alexey P. Shestakov

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This paper presents the results of experimental and theoretical investigations of the mechanisms of crack formation in reinforced concrete beams subjected to quasi-static bending. The boundary-value problem has been formulated in the framework of brittle fracture mechanics and has been solved by using the finite-element method. Numerical simulation of the vibrations of an uncracked beam and a beam with cracks of different size serves to determine the pattern of changes in the spectrum of eigenfrequencies observed during crack evolution. Experiments were performed on the sequential quasistatic four-point bending of the beam leading to the formation of cracks in concrete. At each loading stage, the beam was subjected to an impulse load to induce vibrations. Two stages of cracking were detected. At the first stage the conservative process of deformation is realized. The second stage is an active cracking, which is marked by a sharp change in eingenfrequencies. The boundary of a transition from one stage to another is well registered. The vibration behavior was examined for the beams strengthened by carbon-fiber sheet before loading and at the intermediate stage of loading after the grouting of initial cracks. The obtained results show that the vibrodiagnostic approach is an effective tool for monitoring of cracking and for assessing the quality of measures aimed at strengthening concrete structures.

Keywords: Crack formation. experiment. mathematical modeling. reinforced concrete. vibrodiagnostics.

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Authors: M. C. Proença

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The tools described in this paper enable the location of burned areas where took place the annihilation of natural habitats and establishes a baseline for major changes in forest ecosystems during recovery. Moreover, the result allows the follow up of the surface fuel loading, allowing the evaluation and guidance of restoration measures to remote areas by phased time planning. This case study implements the evaluation of burned areas that suffered successive wildfires in Portugal mainland during the summer of 2017, killing more than 60 people. The goal is to show that this evaluation can be done with remote sense data free of charges in a simple laptop, with open-source software, describing the not-so-simple methodology step by step, to make it accessible for local workers in the areas attained, where the availability of information is essential for the immediate planning of mitigation measures, such as restoring road access, allocate funds for the recovery of human dwellings and assess further needs for restoration of the ecological system. Wildfires also devastate forest ecosystems having a direct impact on vegetation cover and killing or driving away the animal population, besides loss of all crops in rural areas that are essential as local resources. The economic interests are also attained, as the pinewood burned becomes useless for the noblest applications, so its value decreases, and resin extraction ends for several years.

Keywords: Image processing, remote sensing, wildfires, burned areas, SENTINEL-2.

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Authors: M. I. Aida Isma, Azni Idris, Rozita Omar, A. R. Putri Razreena

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40L of hollow fiber membrane bioreactor with solids retention times (SRT) of 30, 15 and 4 days were setup for treating synthetic wastewater at hydraulic retention times (HRT) of 12, 8 and 4 hours. The objectives of the study were to investigate the effects of SRT and HRT on membrane fouling. A comparative analysis was carried out for physiochemical quality parameters (turbidity, suspended solids, COD, NH₃-N and PO₄^3-). Scanning electron microscopy (SEM), energy diffusive X-ray (EDX) analyzer and particle size distribution (PSD) were used to characterize the membrane fouling properties. The influence of SRT on the quality of effluent, activated sludge quality, and membrane fouling were also correlated. Lower membrane fouling and slower rise in trans-membrane pressure (TMP) were noticed at the longest SRT and HRT of 30d and 12h, respectively. Increasing SRT results in noticeable reduction of dissolved organic matters. The best removal efficiencies of COD, TSS, NH₃-N and PO₄^3- were 93%, 98%, 80% and 30% respectively. The high HRT with shorter SRT induced faster fouling rate. The main fouling resistance was cake layer. The most severe membrane fouling was observed at SRT and HRT of 4 and 12, respectively with thickness cake layer of 17mm as reflected by higher TMP, lower effluent removal and thick sludge cake layer.

 

Keywords: Membrane bioreactor, SRT, HRT, membrane fouling.

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Authors: I. Krasnova, L. Dukalska, D. Seglina, K. Juhnevica, E. Sne, D. Karklina

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Experiments were carried out at the Latvia State Institute of Fruit-Growing in 2011. Fresh-cut minimally processed apple and pear mixed salad were packed by passive modified atmosphere (MAP) in PP containers, which were hermetically sealed by breathable conventional BOPP PropafreshTM P2GAF, and Amcor Agrifresh films. Biodegradable NatureFlexTM NVS INNOVIA Films and VC999 BioPack PLA films coated with a barrier of pure silicon oxide (SiOx) were used to compare the fresh-cut produce quality with this packed in conventional packaging films. Samples were cold stored at temperature +4.0±0.5 °C up to 10 days. The quality of salad was evaluated by physicochemical properties – weight losses, moisture, firmness, the effect of packaging modes on the colour, dynamics in headspace atmosphere concentration (CO2 and O2), titratable acidity values, as well as by microbiological contamination (yeasts, moulds and total bacteria count) of salads, analyzing before packaging and after 2, 4, 6, 8, and 10 storage days.

Keywords: Biodegradable packaging, conventional, fresh-cut fruit salad

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Authors: V. Masilamani, C. Vanniarajan, Kamala Krithivasan

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As the Computed Tomography(CT) requires normally hundreds of projections to reconstruct the image, patients are exposed to more X-ray energy, which may cause side effects such as cancer. Even when the variability of the particles in the object is very less, Computed Tomography requires many projections for good quality reconstruction. In this paper, less variability of the particles in an object has been exploited to obtain good quality reconstruction. Though the reconstructed image and the original image have same projections, in general, they need not be the same. In addition to projections, if a priori information about the image is known, it is possible to obtain good quality reconstructed image. In this paper, it has been shown by experimental results why conventional algorithms fail to reconstruct from a few projections, and an efficient polynomial time algorithm has been given to reconstruct a bi-level image from its projections along row and column, and a known sub image of unknown image with smoothness constraints by reducing the reconstruction problem to integral max flow problem. This paper also discusses the necessary and sufficient conditions for uniqueness and extension of 2D-bi-level image reconstruction to 3D-bi-level image reconstruction.

Keywords: Discrete Tomography, Image Reconstruction, Projection, Computed Tomography, Integral Max Flow Problem, Smooth Binary Image.

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Authors: W. Kongnoo, J. Loysongkroa, S. Chotivichien, N. Viriyautsahakul, N. Saiwongse

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Obesity, stunting and wasting problems among Thai school-aged children are increasing due to inappropriate food consumption behavior and poor environments for desirable nutritional behavior. Because of a low school lunch budget of only 0.40 USD per person per day, food quality is not up to nutritional standards. Therefore, the Health Department with the Education Ministry and the Thai Health Promotion Foundation have developed a quality school lunch project during 2009–2013. The program objectives were development and management of public policy to increase school lunch budget. The methods used a healthy public policy motivation process and movement in 241 local administrative organizations and 538 schools. The problem and solution research was organized to study school food and nutrition management, create a best practice policy mobilization model and hold a public hearing to motivate an increase of school meal funding. The results showed that local public policy has been motivated during 2009-2011 to increase school meal budget using local budgets. School children with best food consumption behavior and exercise increased from 13.2% in 2009 to 51.6% in 2013 and stunting decreased from 6.0% in 2009 to 4.7% in 2013. As the result of national policy motivation (2012-2013), the cabinet meeting on October 22, 2013 has approved an increase of school lunch budget from 0.40 USD to 0.62 USD per person per day. Thus, 5,800,469 school children nationwide have benefited from the budget increase.

Keywords: Public policy, Quality school lunch, Thailand.

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Authors: Ilias A. Makris

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In this work, we attempt to associate firm characteristics with innovative activity. We collect microdata from listed firms of selected Eurozone Country-members, after the beginning of 2007 financial crisis. The following literature, several indicators of growth and performance were selected and tested for their ability to interpret innovative activity. The main scope is to examine the possible differences in performance and growth between innovative and non-innovative firms, during a severe recession. Additionally to that, a special focus will be held on whether macroeconomic performance and national innovation system, determines the extent of innovators' performance. Preliminary findings, through correlation matrices and non-parametric tests, strongly indicate the positive relation between innovative activity and most of the measures used (profitability, size, employment), confirming that even during a recessionary period, innovative firms not only survive but also seem to succeed better economic results in almost all indexes relative to non-innovative. However, even though innovators seem to perform better in all economies examined, the extent of that performance seems to be strongly affected by the supportive mechanisms (financial and structural) that their country provides. Thus, it is clear, that the technologically intensive 'gap' between European South and North, during the economic crisis, became chaotic, due to the harsh austerity measures and reduced budgets in those countries, even in sectors with high potentials in economic activity and employment, impairing the effects of crisis and enhancing the vicious circle of recession.

Keywords: Eurozone, innovative activity, development, firm performance, non-parametric tests.

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Authors: Yoshiaki Shikata

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Performance of a limited Round-Robin (RR) rule is studied in order to clarify the characteristics of a realistic sharing model of a processor. Under the limited RR rule, the processor allocates to each request a fixed amount of time, called a quantum, in a fixed order. The sum of the requests being allocated these quanta is kept below a fixed value. Arriving requests that cannot be allocated quanta because of such a restriction are queued or rejected. Practical performance measures, such as the relationship between the mean sojourn time, the mean number of requests, or the loss probability and the quantum size are evaluated via simulation. In the evaluation, the requested service time of an arriving request is converted into a quantum number. One of these quanta is included in an RR cycle, which means a series of quanta allocated to each request in a fixed order. The service time of the arriving request can be evaluated using the number of RR cycles required to complete the service, the number of requests receiving service, and the quantum size. Then an increase or decrease in the number of quanta that are necessary before service is completed is reevaluated at the arrival or departure of other requests. Tracking these events and calculations enables us to analyze the performance of our limited RR rule. In particular, we obtain the most suitable quantum size, which minimizes the mean sojourn time, for the case in which the switching time for each quantum is considered.

Keywords: Limited RR rule, quantum, processor sharing, sojourn time, performance measures, simulation, loss probability.

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Authors: Mmapula Petunia Tsweleng

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This qualitative study presents an exploration and findings thereof the quality of primary caregiving relationships between adolescents orphaned through Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) and their grandmothers. This exploration was based on in-depth narratives of six stakeholders who provided community-based psychosocial support services to children and families affected by AIDS. The narratives show that grandmothers provided high-quality parental care and support to the orphans. Furthermore, stakeholders categorised grandmother caregiving as genuine. Findings also show that the orphans thrived emotionally, socially, and cognitively and performed well academically. However, it was also identified that grandmothers’ caregiving had elements of overprotectiveness as well as susceptibility to manipulation -which appeared to be a threat to the positive development of the orphans. Relevant interventions, with a special focus on strengthening grandmother caregiving, are needed. Special attention should be on equipping grandmothers with a better understanding of adolescent behaviours and abilities to provide appropriate monitoring and supervision.

Keywords: Adolescent orphans, AIDS, caregiving relationships, grandmothers.

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Authors: Meng Wang, Qi-rui Han

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Because of excellent properties, people has paid more attention to SPIHI algorithm, which is based on the traditional wavelet transformation theory, but it also has its shortcomings. Combined the progress in the present wavelet domain and the human's visual characteristics, we propose an improved algorithm based on human visual characteristics of SPIHT in the base of analysis of SPIHI algorithm. The experiment indicated that the coding speed and quality has been enhanced well compared to the original SPIHT algorithm, moreover improved the quality of the transmission cut off.

Keywords: Lifted wavelet transform, SPIHT, Human Visual Characteristics.

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Authors: Z. Mortezaie, H. Hassanpour, S. Asadi Amiri

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Captured images may suffer from Gaussian blur due to poor lens focus or camera motion. Unsharp masking is a simple and effective technique to boost the image contrast and to improve digital images suffering from Gaussian blur. The technique is based on sharpening object edges by appending the scaled high-frequency components of the image to the original. The quality of the enhanced image is highly dependent on the characteristics of both the high-frequency components and the scaling/gain factor. Since the quality of an image may not be the same throughout, we propose an adaptive unsharp masking method in this paper. In this method, the gain factor is computed, considering the gradient variations, for individual pixels of the image. Subjective and objective image quality assessments are used to compare the performance of the proposed method both with the classic and the recently developed unsharp masking methods. The experimental results show that the proposed method has a better performance in comparison to the other existing methods.

Keywords: Unsharp masking, blur image, sub-region gradient, image enhancement.

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Authors: Sakol Udomsiri, Masahiro Iwahashi

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This paper presents comparative study on recent integer DCTs and a new method to construct a low sensitive structure of integer DCT for colored input signals. The method refers to sensitivity of multiplier coefficients to finite word length as an indicator of how word length truncation effects on quality of output signal. The sensitivity is also theoretically evaluated as a function of auto-correlation and covariance matrix of input signal. The structure of integer DCT algorithm is optimized by combination of lower sensitive lifting structure types of IRT. It is evaluated by the sensitivity of multiplier coefficients to finite word length expression in a function of covariance matrix of input signal. Effectiveness of the optimum combination of IRT in integer DCT algorithm is confirmed by quality improvement comparing with existing case. As a result, the optimum combination of IRT in each integer DCT algorithm evidently improves output signal quality and it is still compatible with the existing one.

Keywords: DCT, sensitivity, lossless, wordlength.

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Authors: Eugenie A. Kachvoryan, Astghik Z. Pepoyan, Maria V. Harutyunova, Anahit M. Manvelyan

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Taking into account the importance of Lake Sevan and Lake Sevan basin-s rivers for Armenian economy, the main goals of our investigations were the documentation of water quality and the biodiversity of invertebrates developed in Lake Sevan basin-s rivers and selected tributaries. Moderately satisfied ecological condition for the biodiversity of Lake Sevan basin-s rivers has been established, and the changes in species- composition of zoobenthos in Lake Sevan were detected. A growing tendency of antibiotic resistance among E. coli isolates in water resources has been shown.

Keywords: Biodiversity, ecosystem, Lake Sevan, water-quality, zoobenthos.

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Authors: Odón R. Sánchez-Ccoyllo, Elizabeth Ayma-Choque, Alan Llacza

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Sulphur dioxide (SO₂) and surface-ozone (O₃) concentrations are associated with diseases. The objective of this research is to evaluate the effectiveness of the air-quality Weather Research and Forecasting model coupled to Chemistry (WRF-Chem) model with a horizontal resolution of 5 km x 5 km. For this purpose, the measurements of the hourly SO₂ and O₃ concentrations available in three air quality monitoring stations in Lima, Peru were used for the purpose of validating the simulations of the SO₂ and O₃ concentrations obtained with the WRF-Chem model in February 2018. For the quantitative evaluation of the simulations of these gases, statistical techniques were implemented, such as the average of the simulations; the average of the measurements; the Mean Bias (MeB); the Mean Error (MeE); and the Root Mean Square Error (RMSE). The results of these statistical metrics indicated that the simulated SO₂ and O₃ values over-predicted the SO₂ and O₃ measurements. For the SO₂ concentration, the MeB values varied from 0.58 to 26.35 µg/m³; the MeE values varied from 8.75 to 26.5 µg/m³; the RMSE values varied from 13.3 to 31.79 µg/m³; while for O₃ concentrations the statistical values of the MeB varied from 37.52 to 56.29 µg/m³; the MeE values varied from 37.54 to 56.70 µg/m³; the RMSE values varied from 43.05 to 69.56 µg/m³.

Keywords: Ground-ozone, Lima, Sulphur dioxide, WRF-Chem.

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Authors: Azhar Rauf, Sareer Badshah, Shah Khusro

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This paper analyzes different techniques of the fine grained security of relational databases for the two variables-data accessibility and inference. Data accessibility measures the amount of data available to the users after applying a security technique on a table. Inference is the proportion of information leakage after suppressing a cell containing secret data. A row containing a secret cell which is suppressed can become a security threat if an intruder generates useful information from the related visible information of the same row. This paper measures data accessibility and inference associated with row, cell, and column level security techniques. Cell level security offers greatest data accessibility as it suppresses secret data only. But on the other hand, there is a high probability of inference in cell level security. Row and column level security techniques have least data accessibility and inference. This paper introduces cell plus innocent security technique that utilizes the cell level security method but suppresses some innocent data to dodge an intruder that a suppressed cell may not necessarily contain secret data. Four variations of the technique namely cell plus innocent 1/4, cell plus innocent 2/4, cell plus innocent 3/4, and cell plus innocent 4/4 respectively have been introduced to suppress innocent data equal to 1/4, 2/4, 3/4, and 4/4 percent of the true secret data inside the database. Results show that the new technique offers better control over data accessibility and inference as compared to the state-of-theart security techniques. This paper further discusses the combination of techniques together to be used. The paper shows that cell plus innocent 1/4, 2/4, and 3/4 techniques can be used as a replacement for the cell level security.

Keywords: Fine Grained Security, Data Accessibility, Inference, Row, Cell, Column Level Security.

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Authors: Dipen A. Mistry, Bhupelly Dheeraj, Ravit Gautam, Manmohan Singh Meena, Suresh Mikkili

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In recent years the large scale use of the power electronic equipment has led to an increase of harmonics in the power system. The harmonics results into a poor power quality and have great adverse economical impact on the utilities and customers. Current harmonics are one of the most common power quality problems and are usually resolved by using shunt active filter (SHAF). The main objective of this work is to develop PI and Fuzzy logic controllers (FLC) to analyze the performance of Shunt Active Filter for mitigating current harmonics under balanced and unbalanced sinusoidal source voltage conditions for normal load and increased load. When the supply voltages are ideal (balanced), both PI and FLC are converging to the same compensation characteristics. However, the supply voltages are non-ideal (unbalanced), FLC offers outstanding results. Simulation results validate the superiority of FLC with triangular membership function over the PI controller.

Keywords: DC link voltage, Fuzzy logic controller, Harmonics, PI controller, Shunt Active Filter.

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Authors: Sajid Abbas, Joon Pyo Hong, Jung-Ryun Lee, Seungryong Cho

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Computed tomography and laminography are heavily investigated in a compressive sensing based image reconstruction framework to reduce the dose to the patients as well as to the radiosensitive devices such as multilayer microelectronic circuit boards. Nowadays researchers are actively working on optimizing the compressive sensing based iterative image reconstruction algorithm to obtain better quality images. However, the effects of the sampled data’s properties on reconstructed the image’s quality, particularly in an insufficient sampled data conditions have not been explored in computed laminography. In this paper, we investigated the effects of two data properties i.e. sampling density and data incoherence on the reconstructed image obtained by conventional computed laminography and a recently proposed method called spherical sinusoidal scanning scheme. We have found that in a compressive sensing based image reconstruction framework, the image quality mainly depends upon the data incoherence when the data is uniformly sampled.

Keywords: Computed tomography, Computed laminography, Compressive sending, Low-dose.

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Authors: Marichela Sepe

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The sustainability of a place depends on a series of factors which contribute to the quality of life, sense of place and recognition of identity. An activity like walking, which in itself is obviously ''sustainable'', can become non sustainable if the context in which it is carried out does not meet the conditions for an adequate quality of life. This work is aimed at proposing the analytical method of Place Maker to identify the elements that do not feature in traditional mapping and which constitute the contemporary identity of the places, and the relative complex map to represent those elements and support sustainable urban identity design. The method's potential for areas with a predominantly pedestrian vocation is illustrated by means of the case study of the Ramblas in Barcelona.

Keywords: Place-identity, PlaceMaker, sustainability, walkability.

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Authors: Paiboon Jeamponk, Tasanee Ponglaa, Patchapon Srisanguan

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The aim of this research paper was based on an examination of sources of water supply and water quality for local consumption, conducted at eco- tourism villages of Suan Luang Sub- District Municipality of Amphawa District, Samut Songkram Province. The study incorporated both questionnaire and field work of water testing as the research tool and method. The sample size of 288 households was based on the population of the district, whereas the selected sample water sources were from 60 households: 30 samples were ground water and another 30 were surface water. Degree of heavy metal contamination in the water including copper, iron, manganese, zinc, cadmium and lead was investigated utilizing the Atomic Absorption- Direct Aspiration method. The findings unveiled that 96.0 percent of household water consumption was based on water supply, while the rest on canal, river and rain water. The household behavior of consumption revealed that 47.2 percent of people routinely consumed water without boiling or filtering prior to consumption. The investigation of water supply quality found that the degree of heavy metal contamination including metal, lead, iron, copper, manganese and cadmium met the standards of the Department of Health.

Keywords: Sources of water supply, water quality, water supply.

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Authors: R. Bourziza, W. El Khoumsi, I. Mghabbar, I. Rahou

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The flood-risk zones called Merjas are lowlands that are flooded during the rainy season. Indeed, these depressed areas were reclaimed to dry them out in order to exploit their agricultural potential. Thus, farmers were able to start exploiting these drained lands. As the development of modern agriculture in Morocco progressed, farmers began to practice irrigated agriculture. In a context of vulnerability to floods and the need for optimal exploitation of the agricultural potential of the flood-risk zones, the question of how farmers are adapting to this context and the degree of exploitation of this potential arises. It is in these circumstances that this work was initiated, aiming at the characterization of irrigation practices in the flood-risk zones of the Ghareb lowland (Morocco). This characterization is based on two main axes: the characterization of irrigation techniques used, as well as the management of irrigation in these areas. In order to achieve our objective, two complementary approaches have been adopted; the first one is based on interviews with administrative agents and on farmer surveys, and the second one is based on field measurements of a few parameters, such as flow rate, pressure, uniformity coefficient of drippers and salinity. The results of this work led to conclude that the choice of the practiced crop (crop resistant to excess water in winter and vegetable crops during other seasons) and the availability and nature of water resources are the main criteria that determine the choice of the irrigation system. Even if irrigation management is imprecise, farmers are able to achieve agricultural yields that are comparable to those recorded in the entire irrigated perimeter. However, agricultural yields in these areas are still threatened by climate change, since these areas play the role of water retaining basins during floods by protecting the downstream areas, which can also damage the crops there instilled during the autumn. This work has also noted that the predominance of private pumping in flood-risk zones in the coastal zone creates a risk of marine intrusion, which risks endangering the groundwater table. Thus, this work enabled us to understand the functioning and the adaptation measures of these vulnerable zones for the sustainability of the Merjas and a better valorization of these marginalized lowlands.

Keywords: Flood-risk zones, irrigation practices, climate change, adaptation measures.

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Authors: C. Kridtayopas, W. Danvilai, P. Sopannarath, A. Kayan, W. Loongyai

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Both Betong chicken (KU Line) and Thai Native chickens were the high quality of the meat and low carcass fat compared to broiler chickens. The objective of this study was to determine the growth performance, carcass characteristic, meat quality and association of polymorphism in the ApoVLDL-II gene with fat accumulation in the female broiler, Thai Native and Betong (KU line) chickens at 4-14 weeks. The chickens were used and reared under the same environment and management (100 chicks per breed). The results showed that body weight (BW) of broiler chickens was significantly higher than Thai Native and Betong (KU line) chickens (P < 0.01) through all the experiment. At 4-8 weeks of age, feed conversion ratio (FCR) of broiler chickens was significantly better than Thai Native and Betong (KU line) chickens (P < 0.01), then increased at week 8-14. The percentage of breast, abdominal fat and subcutaneous fat of broiler chickens was significantly greater than Thai Native and Betong (KU line) chickens (P < 0.01). However, Thai Native chickens showed the highest percentage of liver (P < 0.01) when compared to other breeds. In addition, the percentage of wing of Thai Native and Betong (KU line) chickens were significantly (P < 0.01) higher than broiler chickens. Meat quality was also determined and found that, pH of breast meat left from slaughter 45 minutes (pH45) and 24 hours (pH24) of broiler was significantly higher than Thai Native and Betong (KU line) (P < 0.01) whereas the percentage of drip loss, thawing loss, cooking loss and shear force was not significantly different between breeds. The polymerase chain reaction-restriction fragment length polymorphism (PCR-RFLP) technique was used to genotype the polymorphism in the ApoVLDL-II gene in the broiler, Thai Native and Betong (KU line) chickens. The results found that, the polymorphism in the ApoVLDL-II gene at VLDL6 loci was not associated with fat accumulation in those studied population.

Keywords: ApoVLDL-II Gene, Betong (KU line) chickens, broiler chickens, carcass characteristic, growth performance, meat quality, Thai Native Chickens.

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Authors: T. Prommi, P. Thamsenanupap

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The influence of physicochemical water quality parameters on the abundance and diversity of caddisfly larvae was studied in seven sampling stations in Mae Tao and Mae Ku watersheds, Mae Sot District, Tak Province, northern Thailand. The streams: MK2 and MK8 as reference site, and impacted streams (MT1-MT5) were sampled bi-monthly during July 2011 to May 2012. A total of 4,584 individual of caddisfly larvae belonging to 10 family and 17 genera were found. The larvae of family Hydropsychidae were the most abundance, followed by Philopotamidae, Odontoceridae, and Leptoceridae, respectively. The genus Cheumatopsyche, Hydropsyche, and Chimarra were the most abundance genera in this study. Results of CCA ordination showed the total dissolved solids, sulfate, water temperature, dissolved oxygen and pH were the most important physicochemical factors to affect distribution of caddisflies communities. Changes in the caddisfly fauna may indicate changes in physicochemical factors owing to agricultural pollution, urbanization, or other human activities. Results revealed that the order Trichoptera, identified to species or genus, can be potentially used to assess environmental water quality status in freshwater ecosystems.

Keywords: Caddisfly larvae, environmental variables, diversity, streams.

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Authors: Mohammad Reza Karami Nejad

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A hybrid learning automata-genetic algorithm (HLGA) is proposed to solve QoS routing optimization problem of next generation networks. The algorithm complements the advantages of the learning Automato Algorithm(LA) and Genetic Algorithm(GA). It firstly uses the good global search capability of LA to generate initial population needed by GA, then it uses GA to improve the Quality of Service(QoS) and acquiring the optimization tree through new algorithms for crossover and mutation operators which are an NP-Complete problem. In the proposed algorithm, the connectivity matrix of edges is used for genotype representation. Some novel heuristics are also proposed for mutation, crossover, and creation of random individuals. We evaluate the performance and efficiency of the proposed HLGA-based algorithm in comparison with other existing heuristic and GA-based algorithms by the result of simulation. Simulation results demonstrate that this paper proposed algorithm not only has the fast calculating speed and high accuracy but also can improve the efficiency in Next Generation Networks QoS routing. The proposed algorithm has overcome all of the previous algorithms in the literature.

Keywords: Routing, Quality of Service, Multicaset, Learning Automata, Genetic, Next Generation Networks.

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Authors: Nadezhda Nikolaeva, Tatyana Alexandrova, Alexandr Alexandrov

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Processing of high-silicon bauxite on the base of the traditional clinkering method is related to high power consumption and capital investments, which makes production of alumina from those ores non-competitive in terms of basic economic showings. For these reasons, development of technological solutions enabling to process bauxites with various chemical and mineralogical structures efficiently with low level of thermal power consumption is important. Flow sheet of the studies on washability of ores from the Timanskoe and the Severo-Onezhskoe deposits is on the base of the flotation method.

Keywords: Low-quality bauxite, resource-saving technology, optimization, aluminum, conditioning of composition, separation characteristics.

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Authors: Brian H. Marsh

Abstract:

Nitrogen fertilizer is the most used and often the most mismanaged nutrient input. Nitrogen management has tremendous implications on crop productivity, quality and environmental stewardship. Sufficient nitrogen is needed to optimum yield and quality. Soil and in-season plant tissue testing for nitrogen status are a time consuming and expensive process. Real time sensing of plant nitrogen status can be a useful tool in managing nitrogen inputs. The objectives of this project were to assess the reliability of remotely sensed non-destructive plant nitrogen measurements compared to wet chemistry data from sampled plant tissue, develop in-season nitrogen recommendations based on remotely sensed data for improved nitrogen use efficiency and assess the potential for determining yield and quality from remotely sensed data. Very good correlations were observed between early-season remotely sensed crop nitrogen status and plant nitrogen concentrations and subsequent in-season fertilizer recommendations. The transmittance/absorbance type meters gave the most accurate readings. Early in-season fertilizer recommendation would be to apply 40 kg nitrogen per hectare plus 15 kg nitrogen per hectare for each unit difference measured with the SPAD meter between the crop and reference area or 25 kg plus 13 kg per hectare for each unit difference measured with the CCM 200. Once the crop was sufficiently fertilized meter readings became inconclusive and were of no benefit for determining nitrogen status, silage yield and quality and grain yield and protein.

Keywords: Wheat, nitrogen fertilization, chlorophyll meter.

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Authors: Mohamed Asaad Abdelrazek, Amir Taher El-Sheikh, M. Zayan, A.M. Elhady

Abstract:

The successful realization of complex systems is dependent not only on the technology issues and the process for implementing them, but on the management issues as well. Managing the systems development lifecycle requires technical management. Systems engineering management is the technical management. Systems engineering management is accomplished by incorporating many activities. The three major activities are development phasing, systems engineering process and lifecycle integration. Systems engineering management activities are performed across the system development lifecycle. Due to the ever-increasing complexity of systems as well the difficulty of managing and tracking the development activities, new ways to achieve systems engineering management activities are required. This paper presents a systematic approach used as a design management tool applied across systems engineering management roles. In this approach, Transdisciplinary System Development Lifecycle (TSDL) Model has been modified and integrated with Quality Function Deployment. Hereinafter, the name of the systematic approach is the Transdisciplinary Quality System Development Lifecycle (TQSDL) Model. The QFD translates the voice of customers (VOC) into measurable technical characteristics. The modified TSDL model is based on Axiomatic Design developed by Suh which is applicable to all designs: products, processes, systems and organizations. The TQSDL model aims to provide a robust structure and systematic thinking to support the implementation of systems engineering management roles. This approach ensures that the customer requirements are fulfilled as well as satisfies all the systems engineering manager roles and activities.

Keywords: Axiomatic design, quality function deployment, systems engineering management, system development lifecycle.

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Authors: Tadatsugu Kitamoto

Abstract:

Recently, a quality of motors is inspected by human ears. In this paper, I propose two systems using a method of speech recognition for automation of the inspection. The first system is based on a method of linear processing which uses K-means and Nearest Neighbor method, and the second is based on a method of non-linear processing which uses neural networks. I used motor sounds in these systems, and I successfully recognize 86.67% of motor sounds in the linear processing system and 97.78% in the non-linear processing system.

Keywords: Acoustical diagnosis, Neural networks, K-means, Short-time Fourier transformation

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Authors: A. A. Ghanim

Abstract:

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) is heading towards a severe and rapidly expanding water crisis, which can have negative impacts on the country’s environment and economy. Of the total water consumption in KSA, the agricultural sector accounts for nearly 87% of the total water use and, therefore, any attempt that overlooks this sector will not help in improving the sustainability of the country’s water resources. KSA Vision 2030 gives priority of water use in the agriculture sector for the regions that have natural renewable water resources. It means that there is little concern for making reuse of municipal wastewater for irrigation purposes in any region in general and in water-scarce regions in particular. The use of treated wastewater is very limited in Saudi Arabia, but it has very considerable potential for future expansion due its numerous beneficial uses. This study reviews the current situation of water resources in Saudi Arabia, providing more highlights on agriculture and wastewater reuse. The reviewed study is proposing some corrective measures for development and better management of water resources in the Kingdom. Suggestions also include consideration of treated water as an alternative source for irrigation in some regions of the country. The study concluded that a sustainable solution for the water crisis in KSA requires implementation of multiple measures in an integrated manner. The integrated solution plan should focus on two main directions: first, improving the current management practices of the existing water resources; second, developing new water supplies from both conventional and non-conventional sources.

Keywords: Saudi Arabia, water resources, water crisis, treated wastewater.

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Authors: S. Y. Choi, Y. H. Na, J. H. Kim

Abstract:

In this work, thermoelastic damping effect on the hemi- spherical shells is investigated. The material is selected silicon, and heat conduction equation for thermal flow is solved to obtain the temperature profile in which bending approximation with inextensional assumption of the model. Using the temperature profile, eigen-value analysis is performed to get the natural frequencies of hemispherical shells. Effects of mode numbers, radii and radial thicknesses of the model on the natural frequencies are analyzed in detail. Furthermore, the quality factor (Q-factor) is defined, and discussed for the ring and hemispherical shell.

Keywords: Thermoelastic damping, hemispherical shell, quality factor

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