Search results for: early mild cognitive impairment

Authors: M. M. Hossain, M. Z. Hasan, M. Alauddin, S. Akhter

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Climate change has become a major concern across the world as the intensity along with quantity of the rainfall, mean surface temperature and other climatic parameters have been changed not only in Bangladesh but also in the entire globe. Bangladesh has already experienced many natural hazards. Among them changing of rainfall pattern, erratic and heavy rainfalls are very common. But changes of rainfall pattern and its amount is still in question to some extent. This study aimed to unfold how the historical rainfalls varied over time and how would be their future trends. In this context, historical rainfall data (1975-2014) were collected from Bangladesh Metrological Department (BMD) and then a time series model was developed using Box-Jenkins algorithm in IBM SPSS to forecast the future rainfall. From the historical data analysis, this study revealed that the amount of rainfall decreased over the time and shifted to the post monsoons. Forecasted rainfall shows that the pre-monsoon and early monsoon will get drier in future whereas late monsoon and post monsoon will show huge fluctuations in rainfall magnitudes with temporal variations which means Bangladesh will get comparatively drier seasons in future which may be a serious problem for the country as it depends on agriculture.

Keywords: Monsoon, Pre-monsoon, rainfall, pattern, variations, IBM-SPSS.

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Authors: Nisha Harry

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The study discussed in this article sought to assess whether a sense of professional efficacy mediates the relationship between personal factors and career adaptability. A quantitative cross-sectional survey approach was followed. A non–probability sample of (N = 409) of which predominantly early career and permanently employed black females in call centres in Africa participated in this study. In order to assess personal factors, the participants completed sense of meaningfulness and emotional intelligence measures. Measures of professional efficacy and career adaptability were also completed. The results of the mediational analysis revealed that professional efficacy significantly mediates the meaningfulness (sense of coherence) and career adaptability relationship, but not the emotional intelligence–career adaptability relationship. Call centre agents with professional efficacy are likely to be more work engaged as a result of their sense of meaningfulness and emotional intelligence.

Keywords: Call centre, professional efficacy, career adaptability, emotional intelligence.

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Authors: W. Rowan, Y. O’Connor, L. Lynch, C. Heavin

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Situation Awareness can offer the potential for conscious dynamic reflection. In an era of online health data sharing, it is becoming increasingly important that users of health social networks (HSNs) have the information necessary to make informed decisions as part of the registration process and in the provision of eConsent. This research aims to leverage an adapted Situation Awareness (SA) model to explore users’ decision making processes in the provision of eConsent. A HSN platform was used to investigate these behaviours. A mixed methods approach was taken. This involved the observation of registration behaviours followed by a questionnaire and focus group/s. Early results suggest that users are apt to automatically accept eConsent, and only later consider the long-term implications of sharing their personal health information. Further steps are required to continue developing knowledge and understanding of this important eConsent process. The next step in this research will be to develop a set of guidelines for the improved presentation of eConsent on the HSN platform.

Keywords: eConsent, health social network, mixed methods, situation awareness.

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Authors: Karoliina Nisula, Samuli Pekkola

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Business education has been criticized for being too theoretical and distant from business life. Different types of experiential learning environments ranging from manual role-play to computer simulations and enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems have been used to introduce the realistic and practical experience into business learning. Each of these learning environments approaches business learning from a different perspective. The implementations tend to be individual exercises supplementing the traditional courses. We suggest combining them into a business skills laboratory resembling an actual workplace. In this paper, we present a concrete implementation of an ERP-supported business learning environment that is used throughout the first year undergraduate business curriculum. We validate the implementation by evaluating the learning outcomes through the different domains of Bloom’s taxonomy. We use the role-play oriented practice enterprise model as a comparison group. Our findings indicate that using the ERP simulation improves the poor and average students’ lower-level cognitive learning. On the affective domain, the ERP-simulation appears to enhance motivation to learn as well as perceived acquisition of practical hands-on skills.

Keywords: Business simulations, experiential learning, ERP systems, learning environments.

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Authors: M.Bilal Bagbanci, Ozlem Koprulu Bagbanci

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Bursa, since the establishment of the Ottoman Empire, being on the important trade roads and having a capital accumulation as a result of silk production, was one of the first cities of modernization activities applied. Bursa maintained its importance even during the Republican Period and became one of the most important cities of the country and today is the fourth biggest and the industrialized city in Turkey. Social, political, economical and cultural changes occured with the reforms starting with the 1839 Edict of Tanzimat that aimed at modernizing the society and the government and centralizing the political power began in the Ottoman Empire. After the Tanzimat Reforms transformation of the city changed and planning processes began in Bursa according to the vision of Governors. The theresholds of the city are very important data for a sustainable planning for the city planners. Main aim of this study is to investigate the changes and transformations of the city according to the changes in the socio-economical and cultural properties for the city planners.

Keywords: Transportation, urbanization, Tanzimat reforms, modernization.

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Authors: Fatiha Teklal, Bachir Kacimi, Arezki Djebbar

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The study and application of composite materials are a truly interdisciplinary endeavor that has been enriched by contributions from chemistry, physics, materials science, mechanics and manufacturing engineering. The understanding of the interface (or interphase) in composites is the central point of this interdisciplinary effort. From the early development of composite materials of various nature, the optimization of the interface has been of major importance. Even more important, the ideas linking the properties of composites to the interface structure are still emerging. In our study, we need a direct characterization of the interface; the micromechanical tests we are addressing seem to meet this objective and we chose to use two complementary tests simultaneously. The microindentation test that can be applied to real composites and the drop test, preferred to the pull-out because of the theoretical possibility of studying systems with high adhesion (which is a priori the case with our systems). These two tests are complementary because of the principle of the model specimen used for both the first "compression indentation" and the second whose fiber is subjected to tensile stress called the drop test. Comparing the results obtained by the two methods can therefore be rewarding.

Keywords: Interface, micromechanics, pull-out, composite, fiber, matrix.

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Authors: Chih-Chun Tang

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Nostalgia, to some people, may seem foolhardy in a way. However, nostalgia is a completely and intensely private but social, collective emotion. It has continuing consequence and outgrowth for our lives as social actions. It leads people to hunt and explore remembrance of persons and places of our past in an effort to confer meaning of persons and places of present. In the ‘Poems of 1912-13’ Thomas Hardy, a British poet, composed a series of poems after the unexpected death of his long-disaffected wife, Emma. The series interprets the cognitive and emotional concussion of Emma’s death on Hardy, concerning his mind and real visit to the landscape in Cornwall, England. Both spaces perform the author’s innermost in thought to his late wife and to the landscape. They present an apparent counterpart of the poet and his afflicted conscience. After Emma had died, Hardy carried her recollections alive by roaming about in the real visit and whimsical land (space) they once had drifted and meandered. This paper highlights the nostalgias and feds that seem endlessly to crop up.

Keywords: Thomas Hardy, remembrance, psychological, poems 1912-13, Fred Davis, nostalgia.

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Authors: Ebrahim Farahmand, Ali Mahani

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Wireless sensor networks (WSNs) can facilitate continuous monitoring of patients and increase early detection of emergency conditions and diseases. High density WSNs helps us to accurately monitor a remote environment by intelligently combining the data from the individual nodes. Due to energy capacity limitation of sensors, enhancing the lifetime and the reliability of WSNs are important factors in designing of these networks. The clustering strategies are verified as effective and practical algorithms for reducing energy consumption in WSNs and can tackle WSNs limitations. In this paper, an Energy-efficient weight-based Clustering Protocol (EWCP) is presented. Artificial retina is selected as a case study of WSNs applied in body sensors. Cluster heads’ (CHs) selection is equipped with energy efficient parameters. Moreover, cluster members are selected based on their distance to the selected CHs. Comparing with the other benchmark protocols, the lifetime of EWCP is improved significantly.

Keywords: Clustering of WSNs, healthcare monitoring, weight-based clustering, wireless sensor networks.

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Authors: Zakaria Hamdi, Mariyamni Awang

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For the past decades, CO₂ flooding has been used as a successful method for enhanced oil recovery (EOR). However, high mobility ratio and fingering effect are considered as important drawbacka of this process. Low temperature injection of CO₂ into high temperature reservoirs may improve the oil recovery, but simulating multiphase flow in the non-isothermal medium is difficult, and commercial simulators are very unstable in these conditions. Furthermore, to best of authors’ knowledge, no experimental work was done to verify the results of the simulations and to understand the pore-scale process. In this paper, we present results of investigations on injection of low temperature CO₂ into a high-pressure high-temperature micromodel with injection temperature range from 34 to 75 °F. Effect of temperature and saturation changes of different fluids are measured in each case. The results prove the proposed method. The injection of CO₂ at low temperatures increased the oil recovery in high temperature reservoirs significantly. Also, CO₂ rich phases available in the high temperature system can affect the oil recovery through the better sweep of the oil which is initially caused by penetration of LCO₂ inside the system. Furthermore, no unfavorable effect was detected using this method. Low temperature CO₂ is proposed to be used as early as secondary recovery.

Keywords: Enhanced oil recovery, CO2 flooding, micromodel studies, miscible flooding.

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Authors: Tlou J. Ramabu

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Programming is one of the challenging subjects in the field of computing. In the higher education sphere, some programming novices’ performance, retention rate, and success rate are not improving. Most of the time, the problem is caused by the slow pace of learning, difficulty in grasping the syntax of the programming language and poor logical skills. More importantly, programming forms part of major subjects within the field of computing. As a result, specialized pedagogical methods and innovation are highly recommended. Little research has been done on the potential productivity of the WhatsApp platform as part of a blended learning model. In this article, the authors discuss the WhatsApp group as a part of blended learning model incorporated for a group of programming novices. We discuss possible administrative activities for productive utilisation of the WhatsApp group on the blended learning overview. The aim is to take advantage of the popularity of WhatsApp and the time students spend on it for their educational purpose. We believe that blended learning featuring a WhatsApp group may ease novices’ cognitive load and strengthen their foundational programming knowledge and skills. This is a work in progress as the proposed blended learning model with WhatsApp incorporated is yet to be implemented.

Keywords: Blended learning, higher education, WhatsApp, programming, novices, lecturers.

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Authors: Rujira Kongnuy, Puntani Pongsumpun, I-Ming Tang

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Dengue fever is an important human arboviral disease. Outbreaks are now reported quite often from many parts of the world. The number of cases involving pregnant women and infant cases are increasing every year. The illness is often severe and complications may occur. Deaths often occur because of the difficulties in early diagnosis and in the improper management of the diseases. Dengue antibodies from pregnant women are passed on to infants and this protects the infants from dengue infections. Antibodies from the mother are transferred to the fetus when it is still in the womb. In this study, we formulate a mathematical model to describe the transmission of this disease in pregnant women. The model is formulated by dividing the human population into pregnant women and non-pregnant human (men and non-pregnant women). Each class is subdivided into susceptible (S), infectious (I) and recovered (R) subclasses. We apply standard dynamical analysis to our model. Conditions for the local stability of the equilibrium points are given. The numerical simulations are shown. The bifurcation diagrams of our model are discussed. The control of this disease in pregnant women is discussed in terms of the threshold conditions.

Keywords: Dengue disease, local stability, mathematical model, pregnancy.

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Authors: Ahmed Abdulla Ashlam, Atta Badii, Frederic Stahl

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In recent years, SQL injection attacks have been identified as being prevalent against web applications. They affect network security and user data, which leads to a considerable loss of money and data every year. This paper presents the use of classification algorithms in machine learning using a method to classify the login data filtering inputs into "SQLi" or "Non-SQLi,” thus increasing the reliability and accuracy of results in terms of deciding whether an operation is an attack or a valid operation. A method as a Web-App is developed for auto-generated data replication to provide a twin of the targeted data structure. Shielding against SQLi attacks (WebAppShield) that verifies all users and prevents attackers (SQLi attacks) from entering and or accessing the database, which the machine learning module predicts as "Non-SQLi", has been developed. A special login form has been developed with a special instance of the data validation; this verification process secures the web application from its early stages. The system has been tested and validated, and up to 99% of SQLi attacks have been prevented.

Keywords: SQL injection, attacks, web application, accuracy, database, WebAppShield.

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Authors: E. K. A. Ogunshile

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This paper is aimed at creating an Automatic Java X-Machine testing tool for software development. The nature of software development is changing; thus, the type of software testing tools required is also changing. Software is growing increasingly complex and, in part due to commercial impetus for faster software releases with new features and value, increasingly in danger of containing faults. These faults can incur huge cost for software development organisations and users; Cambridge Judge Business School’s research estimated the cost of software bugs to the global economy is $312 billion. Beyond the cost, faster software development methodologies and increasing expectations on developers to become testers is driving demand for faster, automated, and effective tools to prevent potential faults as early as possible in the software development lifecycle. Using X-Machine theory, this paper will explore a new tool to address software complexity, changing expectations on developers, faster development pressures and methodologies, with a view to reducing the huge cost of fixing software bugs.

Keywords: Conformance testing, finite state machine, software testing, X-Machine.

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Authors: Alexander V. Libin, Manon Schladen, Assya Pascalev, Nawar Shara, Miriam Philmon, Yuri Millo, Joseph Verbalis

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Chronic conditions carry with them strong emotions and often lead to charged relationships between patients and their health providers and, by extension, patients and health researchers. Persons are both autonomous and relational and a purely cognitive model of autonomy neglects the social and relational basis of chronic illness. Ensuring genuine informed consent in research requires a thorough understanding of how participants perceive a study and their reasons for participation. Surveys may not capture the complexities of reasoning that underlies study participation. Contradictory reasons for participation, for instance an initial claim of altruism as rationale and a subsequent claim of personal benefit (therapeutic misconception), affect the quality of informed consent. Individuals apply principles through the filter of personal values and lived experience. Authentic autonomy, and hence authentic consent to research, occurs within the context of patients- unique life narratives and illness experiences.

Keywords: ethical dilemmas, open source technology, patient education, psychology of decision making

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Authors: Daniel Puciato, Piotr Oleśniewicz, Julita Markiewicz-Patkowska, Krzysztof Widawski, Michał Rozpara, Władysław Mynarski, Agnieszka Gawlik, Małgorzata Dębska, Soňa Jandová

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Physical activity as a part of people’s everyday life reduces the risk of many diseases, including those induced by lifestyle, e.g. obesity, type 2 diabetes, osteoporosis, coronary heart disease, degenerative arthritis, and certain types of cancer. That refers particularly to professionally active people, including the early senior group working on non-manual positions. The aim of the study is to evaluate the relationship between physical activity and the socio-economic status of non-manual workers from Wroclaw—one of the biggest cities in Poland, a model setting for such investigations in this part of Europe. The crucial problem in the research is to find out the percentage of respondents who meet the health-related recommendations of the World Health Organization (WHO) concerning the volume, frequency, and intensity of physical activity, as well as to establish if the most important socio-economic factors, such as gender, age, education, marital status, per capita income, savings and debt, determine the compliance with the WHO physical activity recommendations. During the research, conducted in 2013, 1,170 people (611 women and 559 men) aged 21–60 years were examined. A diagnostic poll method was applied to collect the data. Physical activity was measured with the use of the short form of the International Physical Activity Questionnaire with extended socio-demographic questions, i.e. concerning gender, age, education, marital status, income, savings or debts. To evaluate the relationship between physical activity and selected socio-economic factors, logistic regression was used (odds ratio statistics). Statistical inference was conducted on the adopted ex ante probability level of p<0.05. The majority of respondents met the volume of physical effort recommended for health benefits. It was particularly noticeable in the case of the examined men. The probability of compliance with the WHO physical activity recommendations was highest for workers aged 21–30 years with secondary or higher education who were single, received highest incomes and had savings. The results indicate the relations between physical activity and socio-economic status in the examined women and men. People with lower socio-economic status (e.g. manual workers) are physically active primarily at work, whereas those better educated and wealthier implement physical effort primarily in their leisure time. Among the investigated subjects, the youngest group of non-manual workers have the best chances to meet the WHO standards of physical activity. The study also confirms that secondary education has a positive effect on the public awareness on the role of physical activity in human life. In general, the analysis of the research indicates that there is a relationship between physical activity and some socio-economic factors of the respondents, such as gender, age, education, marital status, income per capita, and the possession of savings. Although the obtained results cannot be applied for the general population, they show some important trends that will be verified in subsequent studies conducted by the authors of the paper.

Keywords: International physical activity questionnaire, non-manual workers, physical activity, socio-economic factors, WHO.

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Authors: Somtop Keawchuer

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This research aims to study (1) the relationship between competency-based learning and learning efficiency of new media communication students at Suan Sunandha University (2) the demographic factor effect on learning efficiency of students at Suan Sunandha University. This research method will use quantitative research; data was collected by questionnaires distributed to students from new media communication in management science faculty of Suan Sunandha Rajabhat University for 1340 sample by purposive sampling method. Data was analyzed by descriptive statistic including percentage, mean, standard deviation and inferential statistic including T-test, ANOVA and Pearson correlation for hypothesis testing. The results showed that the competency-based learning in term of ability to communicate, ability to think and solve the problem, life skills and ability to use technology has a significant relationship with learning efficiency in term of the cognitive domain, psychomotor domain and affective domain at the 0.05 level and which is in harmony with the research hypotheses.

Keywords: Competency-based learning, learning efficiency, new media communication students, Suan Sunandha Rajabhat University.

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Authors: Pradeep Singh, Shrish Verma

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Software fault prediction models are created by using the source code, processed metrics from the same or previous version of code and related fault data. Some company do not store and keep track of all artifacts which are required for software fault prediction. To construct fault prediction model for such company, the training data from the other projects can be one potential solution. Earlier we predicted the fault the less cost it requires to correct. The training data consists of metrics data and related fault data at function/module level. This paper investigates fault predictions at early stage using the cross-project data focusing on the design metrics. In this study, empirical analysis is carried out to validate design metrics for cross project fault prediction. The machine learning techniques used for evaluation is Naïve Bayes. The design phase metrics of other projects can be used as initial guideline for the projects where no previous fault data is available. We analyze seven datasets from NASA Metrics Data Program which offer design as well as code metrics. Overall, the results of cross project is comparable to the within company data learning.

Keywords: Software Metrics, Fault prediction, Cross project, Within project.

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Authors: Morteza Zahedi, Philippe Dreuw, Thomas Deselaers, Hermann Ney

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Sign language is used by the deaf and hard of hearing people for communication. Automatic sign language recognition is a challenging research area since sign language often is the only way of communication for the deaf people. Sign language includes different components of visual actions made by the signer using the hands, the face, and the torso, to convey his/her meaning. To use different aspects of signs, we combine the different groups of features which have been extracted from the image frames recorded directly by a stationary camera. We combine the features in two levels by employing three techniques. At the feature level, an early feature combination can be performed by concatenating and weighting different feature groups, or by concatenating feature groups over time and using LDA to choose the most discriminant elements. At the model level, a late fusion of differently trained models can be carried out by a log-linear model combination. In this paper, we investigate these three combination techniques in an automatic sign language recognition system and show that the recognition rate can be significantly improved.

Keywords: American sign language, appearance-based features, Feature combination, Sign language recognition

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Authors: Nisar Ahmed Memon, Anwar Majid Mirza, S.A.M. Gilani

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Segmentation is an important step in medical image analysis and classification for radiological evaluation or computer aided diagnosis. The CAD (Computer Aided Diagnosis ) of lung CT generally first segment the area of interest (lung) and then analyze the separately obtained area for nodule detection in order to diagnosis the disease. For normal lung, segmentation can be performed by making use of excellent contrast between air and surrounding tissues. However this approach fails when lung is affected by high density pathology. Dense pathologies are present in approximately a fifth of clinical scans, and for computer analysis such as detection and quantification of abnormal areas it is vital that the entire and perfectly lung part of the image is provided and no part, as present in the original image be eradicated. In this paper we have proposed a lung segmentation technique which accurately segment the lung parenchyma from lung CT Scan images. The algorithm was tested against the 25 datasets of different patients received from Ackron Univeristy, USA and AGA Khan Medical University, Karachi, Pakistan.

Keywords: Computer Aided Diagnosis, Medical ImageProcessing, Region Growing, Segmentation, Thresholding,

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Authors: Agni Stylianou-Georgiou, Eliza Pitri

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This study is a design narrative that discusses researchers’ new learning based on changes made in pedagogies and learning opportunities in the context of a Cognitive Psychology and an Art History undergraduate course. The purpose of this study was to investigate how to encourage creative problem-based play in tertiary education engaging instructors and student-teachers in designing educational games. Course instructors modified content to encourage flexible thinking during game design problem-solving. Qualitative analyses of data sources indicated that Thinking Birds’ questions could encourage flexible thinking as instructors engaged in creative problem-based play. However, student-teachers demonstrated weakness in adopting flexible thinking during game design problem solving. Further studies of student-teachers’ shifting perspectives during different instructional design tasks would provide insights for developing the Thinking Birds’ questions as tools for creative problem solving.

Keywords: Creative problem-based play, educational games, flexible thinking, tertiary education.

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Authors: Nouri Sabrina, Benzeghiba Mohamed, Ghezal Abderrahmane

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Numerical parametric study is conducted to study the effects of ampoule rotation on the flows and the dopant segregation in vertical bridgman (vb) crystal growth. Calculations were performed in unsteady state. The extended darcy model, which includes the time derivative and coriolis terms, has been employed in the momentum equation. It’s found that the convection, and dopant segregation can be affected significantly by ampoule rotation, and the effect is similar to that by an axial magnetic field. Ampoule rotation decreases the intensity of convection and stretches the flow cell axially. When the convection is weak, the flow can be suppressed almost completely by moderate ampoule rotation and the dopant segregation becomes diffusion-controlled. For stronger convection, the elongated flow cell by ampoule rotation may bring dopant mixing into the bulk melt reducing axial segregation at the early stage of the growth. However, if the cellular flow cannot be suppressed completely, ampoule rotation may induce larger radial segregation due to poor mixing.

Keywords: Numerical Simulation, Heat and mass transfer, vertical solidification, chemical segregation.

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Authors: Nurul Zahirah M.A., N. Zainul Abidin, Azlan Raofuddin Nuruddin

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Despite all the hype about green building, many developers are still resistant to the idea of building green due to the common perception that green building construction is expensive. This contradicts with scholarly findings that identify only a marginal cost premium or none at all given that green design is considered during the design process and planning stage. Nevertheless, cost implications continue to become an issue when deciding to build green. The planning stage is of strategic importance as decisions made at this early stage would influence the project cost thereafter. Using analysis of existing literature, the paper identifies six elements of soft cost that are considered in the planning stage. The elements include consultants, green building consultant, certification, commissioning, market, and tax. Out of the six elements, commissioning represents the bulk of soft cost for buildings seeking green certification. The study concluded that, although hard cost may have a bigger impact on the project cost, but soft cost is the hidden cost which people tend to ignore. Poor consideration of soft cost during planning stage may lead to over-realistic expectations and ultimately, overlooked cost additions.

Keywords: Green building, cost element, soft cost, developer decision.

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Authors: C Hisham, K Komal, Amit K Mishra

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Full search block matching algorithm is widely used for hardware implementation of motion estimators in video compression algorithms. In this paper we are proposing a new architecture, which consists of a 2D parallel processing unit and a 1D unit both working in parallel. The proposed architecture reduces both data access power and computational power which are the main causes of power consumption in integer motion estimation. It also completes the operations with nearly the same number of clock cycles as compared to a 2D systolic array architecture. In this work sum of absolute difference (SAD)-the most repeated operation in block matching, is calculated in two steps. The first step is to calculate the SAD for alternate rows by a 2D parallel unit. If the SAD calculated by the parallel unit is less than the stored minimum SAD, the SAD of the remaining rows is calculated by the 1D unit. Early termination, which stops avoidable computations has been achieved with the help of alternate rows method proposed in this paper and by finding a low initial SAD value based on motion vector prediction. Data reuse has been applied to the reference blocks in the same search area which significantly reduced the memory access.

Keywords: Sum of absolute difference, high speed DSP.

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Authors: K. Adu Michael, K. Alese Boniface

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Developing a reliable and sustainable software products is today a big challenge among up–coming software developers in Nigeria. The inability to develop a comprehensive problem statement needed to execute proper requirements engineering process is missing. The need to describe the ‘what’ of a system in one document, written in a natural language is a major step in the overall process of Software Engineering. Requirements Engineering is a process use to discover, analyze and validate system requirements. This process is needed in reducing software errors at the early stage of the development of software. The importance of each of the steps in Requirements Engineering is clearly explained in the context of using detailed problem statement from client/customer to get an overview of an existing system along with expectations from the new system. This paper elicits inadequate Requirements Engineering principle as the major cause of poor software development in developing nations using a case study of final year computer science students of a tertiary-education institution in Nigeria.

Keywords: Client/Customer, Problem Statement, Requirements Engineering, Software Developers.

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Authors: Sajjad Ahmed, Knut Hinkelmann, Flavio Corradini

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Fake news detection research is still in the early stage as this is a relatively new phenomenon in the interest raised by society. Machine learning helps to solve complex problems and to build AI systems nowadays and especially in those cases where we have tacit knowledge or the knowledge that is not known. We used machine learning algorithms and for identification of fake news; we applied three classifiers; Passive Aggressive, Naïve Bayes, and Support Vector Machine. Simple classification is not completely correct in fake news detection because classification methods are not specialized for fake news. With the integration of machine learning and text-based processing, we can detect fake news and build classifiers that can classify the news data. Text classification mainly focuses on extracting various features of text and after that incorporating those features into classification. The big challenge in this area is the lack of an efficient way to differentiate between fake and non-fake due to the unavailability of corpora. We applied three different machine learning classifiers on two publicly available datasets. Experimental analysis based on the existing dataset indicates a very encouraging and improved performance.

Keywords: Fake news detection, types of fake news, machine learning, natural language processing, classification techniques.

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Authors: Karina Ruse, Martins Sabovics, Tatjana Rakcejeva, Lija Dukalska, Ruta Galoburda, Laima Berzina

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the research was accomplished on fresh in Latvia wild growing cranberries and cranberry cultivars. The aim of the study was to evaluate effect of pretreatment method and drying conditions on the volatile compounds composition in cranberries. Berries pre-treatment methods were: perforation, halving and steam-blanching. The berries before drying in a cabinet drier were pre-treated using all three methods, in microwave vacuum drier – using a steam-blanching and halving. Volatile compounds in cranberries were analysed using GC-MS of extracts obtained by SPME. During present research 21 various volatile compounds were detected in fresh cranberries: the cultivar 'Steven' - 15, 'Bergman' and 'Early black' – 13, 'Ben Lear' and 'Pilgrim' – 11 and wild cranberries – 14 volatile compounds. In dried cranberries 20 volatile compounds were detected. Mathematical data processing allows drawing a conclusion that there exists the significant influence of cranberry cultivar, pre-treatment method and drying condition on volatile compounds in berries and new volatile compound formation.

Keywords: volatile compounds, cranberries, convective drier, microwave-vacuum drier

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Authors: L. S. Godlevsky, N. V. Kresyun, V. P. Martsenyuk, K. S. Shakun, T. V. Tatarchuk, K. O. Prybolovets, L. F. Kalinichenko, M. Karpinski, T. Gancarczyk

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Structures of eye bottom were extracted using multiscale texture gradient method and color characteristics of macular zone and vessels were verified in CIELAB scale. The difference of average values of L*, a* and b* coordinates of CIE (International Commision of Illumination) scale in patients with diabetes and healthy volunteers was compared. The average value of L* in diabetic patients exceeded such one in the group of practically healthy persons by 2.71 times (P < 0.05), while the value of a* index was reduced by 3.8 times when compared with control one (P < 0.05). b* index exceeded such one in the control group by 12.4 times (P < 0.05). The integrated index on color difference (ΔE) exceeded control value by 2.87 times (P < 0.05). More pronounced differences with ΔE were followed by a shorter period of MA appearance with a correlation level at -0.56 (P < 0.05). The specificity of diagnostics raised by 2.17 times (P < 0.05) and negative prognostic index exceeded such one determined with the expert method by 2.26 times (P < 0.05).

Keywords: Diabetic retinopathy, multiscale texture gradient, color spectrum analysis.

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Authors: David Goldblum, Lesley S. Rigg

Abstract:

To simulate expected climate change, we implemented a two-factor (temperature and soil moisture) field design in a forest in Ontario, Canada. To manipulate moisture input, we erected rain-exclusion structures. Under each structure, plots were watered with one of three treatments and thermally controlled with three heat treatments to simulate changes in air temperature and rainfall based on the climate model (GCM) predictions for the study area. Environmental conditions (including untreated controls) were monitored tracking air temperature, soil temperature, soil moisture, and photosynthetically active radiation. We measured rainfall and relative humidity at the site outside the rain-exclusion structures. Analyses of environmental conditions demonstrates that the temperature manipulation was most effective at maintaining target temperature during the early part of the growing season, but it was more difficult to keep the warmest treatment at 5º C above ambient by late summer. Target moisture regimes were generally achieved however incoming solar radiation was slightly attenuated by the structures.

Keywords: Acer saccharum, climate change, forest, environmental manipulation.

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Authors: Kevin Moustapha

Abstract:

Psychopathic disorders are taking an important part in judge sentencing, especially in Canada. First, we will see how this phenomenon can be illustrated by the high proportion of psychopath offenders incarcerated in North American prisons. Many decisions in Canadians courtrooms seem to point out that psychopathy is often used as a strong argument by the judges to preserve public safety. The fact that psychopathy is often associated with violence, recklessness and recidivism, could explain why many judges consider psychopathic disorders as an aggravating factor. Generally, the judge reasoning is based on Article 753 of Canadian Criminal Code related to dangerous offenders, which is used for individuals who show a pattern of repetitive and persistent aggressive behaviour. Then we will show how, with cognitive neurosciences, the psychopath’s situation in courtrooms would probably change. Cerebral imaging and news data provided by the neurosciences show that emotional and volitional functions in psychopath’s brains are impaired. Understanding these new issues could enable some judges to recognize psychopathic disorders as a mitigating factor. Finally, two important questions ought to be raised in this article: can exploring psychopaths ‘brains really change the judge sentencing in Canadian courtrooms? If yes, can judges consider psychopathy more as a mitigating factor than an aggravating factor?

Keywords: Criminal law, judges sentencing, neurosciences, psychopathy.

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Authors: Carole A. El Raheb, Hassan K. Abdel-Salam, Ingi Elcherif

Abstract:

An architect carrying the design process alone is the main reason for the deterioration of the quality of the architectural product as the complexity of the projects makes it a multi-disciplinary work; then, the Integrative Design Process (IDP) must be applied in the architectural firm especially from the early design phases to improve the product’s quality and to eliminate the ignorance of the principles of design causing the occurrence of low-grade buildings. The research explores the Integrative Design (ID) principles that fit in the architectural practice. Constraints facing this application are presented with strategies and solutions to overcome them. A survey questionnaire was conducted to collect data from a number of recognized Egyptian Architecture, Engineering and Construction (AEC) firms that explores their opinions on using the IDP. This survey emphasizes the importance of the IDP in firms and presents the reasons preventing the firms from applying the IDP. The aim here is to investigate the potentials of integrating this approach into architectural firms emphasizing the importance of this application which ensures the realization of the project’s goal and eliminates the reduction in the project’s quality.

Keywords: Application, architectural firms, integrative design principles, integrative design process, the project quality.

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