Search results for: regular term

Authors: Holger Keitel

Abstract:

The prediction of long-term deformations of concrete and reinforced concrete structures has been a field of extensive research and several different creep models have been developed so far. Most of the models were developed for constant concrete stresses, thus, in case of varying stresses a specific superposition principle or time-integration, respectively, is necessary. Nowadays, when modeling concrete creep the engineering focus is rather on the application of sophisticated time-integration methods than choosing the more appropriate creep model. For this reason, this paper presents a method to quantify the uncertainties of creep prediction originating from the selection of creep models or from the time-integration methods. By adapting variance based global sensitivity analysis, a methodology is developed to quantify the influence of creep model selection or choice of time-integration method. Applying the developed method, general recommendations how to model creep behavior for varying stresses are given.

Keywords: Concrete creep models, time-integration methods, sensitivity analysis, prediction uncertainty.

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Authors: K. Sudprasert, M. Precharattana, N. Nuttavut, D. Triampo, B. Pattanasiri, Y. Lenbury, W. Triampo

Abstract:

The study of non-equilibrium systems has attracted increasing interest in recent years, mainly due to the lack of theoretical frameworks, unlike their equilibrium counterparts. Studying the steady state and/or simple systems is thus one of the main interests. Hence in this work we have focused our attention on the driven lattice gas model (DLG model) consisting of interacting particles subject to an external field E. The dynamics of the system are given by hopping of particles to nearby empty sites with rates biased for jumps in the direction of E. Having used small two dimensional systems of DLG model, the stochastic properties at nonequilibrium steady state were analytically studied. To understand the non-equilibrium phenomena, we have applied the analytic approach via master equation to calculate probability function and analyze violation of detailed balance in term of the fluctuation-dissipation theorem. Monte Carlo simulations have been performed to validate the analytic results.

Keywords: Non-equilibrium, lattice gas, stochastic process

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Authors: Aman Patidar, Dipankar Sarkar, Manish Pal

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Due to rapid development, increase in the traffic load, higher traffic volume and seasonal variation in temperature, asphalt pavement shows distresses like rutting, fatigue and thermal cracking etc. because of this pavement fails during service life so that bitumen needs to be modified with some additive. In this study VG30 grade bitumen modify with addition of nanosilica with 1% to 5% (increment of 1%) by weight of bitumen. Hot mix asphalt (HMA) have higher mixing, laying and rolling temperatures which leads to higher consumption of fuel. To address this issue, a nano material named ZycoTherm which is chemical warm mix asphalt (WMA) additive is added to bitumen. Nanosilica modification (NSMB) results in the increase in stability compared to unmodified bitumen (UMB). WMA modified mix shows slightly higher stability than UMB and NSMB in a lower bitumen content. The Retained stability and tensile strength ratio (TSR) is more than 75% and 80% respectively for both mixes. Nanosilica with WMA has more resistant to temperature susceptibility, moisture susceptibility and short term aging than NSMB.

Keywords: HMA, nanosilica, NSMB, temperature, TSR, UMB, WMA.

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Authors: Umberto Di Staso, Marco Soave, Alessio Giori, Federico Prandi, Raffaele De Amicis

Abstract:

The increasing availability of information about earth surface elevation (Digital Elevation Models DEM) generated from different sources (remote sensing, Aerial Images, Lidar) poses the question about how to integrate and make available to the most than possible audience this huge amount of data. In order to exploit the potential of 3D elevation representation the quality of data management plays a fundamental role. Due to the high acquisition costs and the huge amount of generated data, highresolution terrain surveys tend to be small or medium sized and available on limited portion of earth. Here comes the need to merge large-scale height maps that typically are made available for free at worldwide level, with very specific high resolute datasets. One the other hand, the third dimension increases the user experience and the data representation quality, unlocking new possibilities in data analysis for civil protection, real estate, urban planning, environment monitoring, etc. The open-source 3D virtual globes, which are trending topics in Geovisual Analytics, aim at improving the visualization of geographical data provided by standard web services or with proprietary formats. Typically, 3D Virtual globes like do not offer an open-source tool that allows the generation of a terrain elevation data structure starting from heterogeneous-resolution terrain datasets. This paper describes a technological solution aimed to set up a so-called “Terrain Builder”. This tool is able to merge heterogeneous-resolution datasets, and to provide a multi-resolution worldwide terrain services fully compatible with CesiumJS and therefore accessible via web using traditional browser without any additional plug-in.

Keywords: Terrain builder, WebGL, virtual globe, CesiumJS, tiled map service, TMS, height-map, regular grid, Geovisual analytics, DTM.

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Authors: Dewi Fatmaningrum, Ade Wiradnyani

Abstract:

Optimal feeding, including optimal micronutrient intake, becomes one of the ways to overcome the long-term consequences of undernutrition. Macronutrient and micronutrient intake were important to a rapid growth and development of young children. The study objective was to assess macro and micronutrient intake and its adequacy in children aged 12-23 months. This survey was a cross-sectional study, involving 83 caregivers with children aged 12-23 months old in Senen Sub-district, Central Jakarta selected through simple random sampling. Data on nutrient intake was obtained through interview using single 24-hour recall. Repeated 24- hour recall to sub-sample was done to estimate the proportion of nutrient inadequacy. The highest prevalence of nutrient inadequacy was iron (52.4%), followed by vitamin C (30.9%) and zinc (28.8%). Almost 12% children had inadequate energy intake. More than half of children (62.6%) were anemic (25.3% were severely anemic). Micronutrient inadequacy, especially iron, was more problematic than macronutrient inadequacy in the study area.

Keywords: Micronutrient, macronutrient, children under five, urban setting.

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Authors: Mohammed Erritali

Abstract:

The growth in the volume of text data such as books and articles in libraries for centuries has imposed to establish effective mechanisms to locate them. Early techniques such as abstraction, indexing and the use of classification categories have marked the birth of a new field of research called "Information Retrieval". Information Retrieval (IR) can be defined as the task of defining models and systems whose purpose is to facilitate access to a set of documents in electronic form (corpus) to allow a user to find the relevant ones for him, that is to say, the contents which matches with the information needs of the user. This paper presents a new semantic indexing approach of a documentary corpus. The indexing process starts first by a term weighting phase to determine the importance of these terms in the documents. Then the use of a thesaurus like Wordnet allows moving to the conceptual level. Each candidate concept is evaluated by determining its level of representation of the document, that is to say, the importance of the concept in relation to other concepts of the document. Finally, the semantic index is constructed by attaching to each concept of the ontology, the documents of the corpus in which these concepts are found.

Keywords: Semantic, indexing, corpora, WordNet, ontology.

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Authors: O. Wright, N. Perkins, M. Donn, M. Halstead

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This research responded to anecdotal evidence that suggested inefficiencies within the Architect and Acoustician relationship may lead to ineffective acoustic design decisions.  The acoustician spoken to believed that he was approached too late in the design phase. The approached architect valued acoustical qualities, yet, struggled to interpret common measurement parameters. The preliminary investigation of these opinions indicated a gap in the current New Zealand Architectural discourse and currently informs the creation of a 2016 Master of Architecture (Prof) thesis research. Little meaningful information about acoustic intervention in the early design phase could be found from past literature. In the information that was sourced, authors focus on software as an incorporation tool without investigating why the flaws in the relationship originally exist. To further explore this relationship, a survey was designed. It underwent three phases to ensure its consistency, and was delivered to a group of 51 acousticians from one international Acoustics company. The results were then separated between New Zealand and off-shore to identify trends. The survey results suggest that 75% of acousticians meet the architect less than 5 times per project. Instead of regular contact, a mediated method is adopted though a mix of telecommunication and written reports. Acousticians tend to be introduced later into New Zealand building project than the corresponding off-shore building. This delay corresponds to an increase in remedial action for each of the building types in the survey except Auditoria and Office Buildings. 31 participants have had their specifications challenged by an architect. Furthermore, 71% of the acousticians believe that architects do not have the knowledge to understand why the acoustic specifications are in place. The issues raised in this investigation align to the colloquial evidence expressed by the two consultants. It identifies a larger gap in the industry were acoustics is remedially treated rather than identified as a possible design driver. Further research through design is suggested to understand the role of acoustics within architectural design and potential tools for its inclusion during, not after, the design process.

Keywords: Architectural acoustics, early-design, interdisciplinary communication, remedial response.

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Authors: M.Hosseinghadiry, H. Mohammadi, M.Nadisenejani

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with increasing circuits- complexity and demand to use portable devices, power consumption is one of the most important parameters these days. Full adders are the basic block of many circuits. Therefore reducing power consumption in full adders is very important in low power circuits. One of the most powerconsuming modules in full adders is XOR/XNOR circuit. This paper presents two new full adders based on two new logic approaches. The proposed logic approaches use one XOR or XNOR gate to implement a full adder cell. Therefore, delay and power will be decreased. Using two new approaches and two XOR and XNOR gates, two new full adders have been implemented in this paper. Simulations are carried out by HSPICE in 0.18μm bulk technology with 1.8V supply voltage. The results show that the ten-transistors proposed full adder has 12% less power consumption and is 5% faster in comparison to MB12T full adder. 9T is more efficient in area and is 24% better than similar 10T full adder in term of power consumption. The main drawback of the proposed circuits is output threshold loss problem.

Keywords: Full adder, XNOR, Low power, High performance, Very Large Scale Integrated Circuit.

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Authors: W. S. Hsu, Y. Chiang, Y. S. Tseng, J. R. Wang, C. Shih, S. W. Chen

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Kuosheng nuclear power plant (NPP) is a BWR/6 plant in Taiwan. There is more concern for the safety of NPPs in Taiwan after Japan Fukushima NPP disaster occurred. Hence, in order to estimate the safety of Kuosheng NPP spent fuel pool (SFP), by using TRACE, MELCOR, and SNAP codes, the safety analysis of Kuosheng NPP SFP was performed. There were two main steps in this research. First, the Kuosheng NPP SFP models were established. Second, the transient analysis of Kuosheng SFP was done by TRACE and MELCOR under the cooling system failure condition (Fukushima-like condition). The results showed that the calculations of MELCOR and TRACE were very similar in this case, and the fuel uncover happened roughly at 4^th day after the failure of cooling system. The above results indicated that Kuosheng NPP SFP may be unsafe in the case of long-term SBO situation. In addition, future calculations were needed to be done by the other codes like FRAPTRAN for the cladding calculations.

Keywords: TRACE, MELCOR, SNAP, spent fuel pool.

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Authors: Mouataz Zreika, Maria Estela Varua

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Stock investment decisions are often made based on current events of the global economy and the analysis of historical data. Conversely, visual representation could assist investors’ gain deeper understanding and better insight on stock market trends more efficiently. The trend analysis is based on long-term data collection. The study adopts a hybrid method that combines the Clustering algorithm and Force-directed algorithm to overcome the scalability problem when visualizing large data. This method exemplifies the potential relationships between each stock, as well as determining the degree of strength and connectivity, which will provide investors another understanding of the stock relationship for reference. Information derived from visualization will also help them make an informed decision. The results of the experiments show that the proposed method is able to produced visualized data aesthetically by providing clearer views for connectivity and edge weights.

Keywords: Clustering, force-directed, graph drawing, stock investment analysis.

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Authors: Orestis Κ. Efthymiou, Stavros T. Ponis

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In the last decade, a new industrial revolution seems to be emerging, supported -once again- by the rapid advancements of Information Technology in the areas of Machine-to-Machine (M2M) communication permitting large numbers of intelligent devices, e.g. sensors to communicate with each other and take decisions without any or minimum indirect human intervention. The advent of these technologies have triggered the emergence of a new category of hybrid (cyber-physical) manufacturing systems, combining advanced manufacturing techniques with innovative M2M applications based on the Internet of Things (IoT), under the umbrella term Industry 4.0. Even though the topic of Industry 4.0 has attracted much attention during the last few years, the attempts of providing a systematic literature review of the subject are scarce. In this paper, we present the authors’ initial study of the field with a special focus on the use and applications of Industry 4.0 principles in material handling automations and in-house logistics. Research shows that despite the vivid discussion and attractiveness of the subject, there are still many challenges and issues that have to be addressed before Industry 4.0 becomes standardized and widely applicable.

Keywords: Industry 4.0, internet of things, manufacturing systems, material handling, logistics.

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Authors: Y. A. Chan, H. J. Liu, K. C. Tseng, T. C. Kuo

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Green propellants used for satellite-level propulsion system become attractive in recent years because the non-toxicity and lower requirements of safety protection. One of the green propellants, high-concentration hydrogen peroxide H2O2 solution (≥70% w/w, weight concentration percentage), often known as high-test peroxide (HTP), is considered because it is ITAR-free, easy to manufacture and the operating temperature is lower than traditional monopropellant propulsion. To establish satellite propulsion technology, the National Space Organization (NSPO) in Taiwan has initialized a long-term cooperation project with the National Cheng Kung University to develop compatible tank and thruster. An experimental propulsion payload has been allocated for the future self-reliant satellite to perform orbit transfer and maintenance operations. In the present research, an 1-Newton thruster prototype is designed and the thrusting force is measured by a pendulum-type platform. The preliminary hot-firing test at ambient environment showed the generated thrust and the specific impulse are about 0.7 Newton and 102 seconds, respectively.

Keywords: Hydrogen peroxide, propulsion, RCS, satellite.

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Authors: Pelin Yildiz

Abstract:

The term interactive education indicates the meaning related with multidisciplinary aspects of distance education following contemporary means around a common basis with different functional requirements. The aim of this paper is to reflect the new techniques in education with the new methods and inventions. These methods are better supplied by interactivity. The integration of interactive facilities in the discipline of education with distance learning is not a new concept but in addition the usage of these methods on design issue is newly being adapted to design education. In this paper the general approach of this method and after the analysis of different samples, the advantages and disadvantages of these approaches are being identified. The method of this paper is to evaluate the related samples and then analyzing the main hypothesis. The main focus is to mention the formation processes of this education. Technological developments in education should be filtered around the necessities of the design education and the structure of the system could then be formed or renewed. The conclusion indicates that interactive methods of education in design issue is a meaning capturing not only technical and computational intelligence aspects but also aesthetical and artistic approaches coming together around the same purpose.

Keywords: Interactive education, distance learning, designeducation, computational intelligence.

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Authors: Ingy N. Bkrey, Ahmed A. Moniem

Abstract:

We succeeded to produce a high performance and flexible graphene/Manganese dioxide (G/MnO₂) electrode coated on flexible polyethylene terephthalate (PET) substrate. The graphene film is initially synthesized by drop-casting the graphene oxide (GO) solution on the PET substrate, followed by simultaneous reduction and patterning of the dried film using carbon dioxide (CO₂) laser beam with power of 1.8 W. Potentiostatic Anodic Deposition method was used to deposit thin film of MnO₂ with different loading mass 10 – 50 and 100 μg.cm^-2 on the pre-prepared graphene film. The electrodes were fully characterized in terms of structure, morphology, and electrochemical performance. A maximum specific capacitance of 973 F.g^-1 was attributed when depositing 50μg.cm^-2 MnO₂ on the laser reduced graphene oxide rGO (or G/50MnO₂) and over 92% of its initial capacitance was retained after 1000 cycles. The good electrochemical performance and long-term cycling stability make our proposed approach a promising candidate in the supercapacitor applications.

Keywords: Electrode Deposition, Flexible, Graphene oxide, Graphene, High Power CO2 Laser, MnO2.

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Authors: Hamoud Al-Hadrami, Hossein Emadi, Athar Hussain

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Green hydrogen is quickly emerging as a new source of the renewable energy for the world. Hydrogen production using water electrolysis is deemed as an environmentally friendly and safe source of energy for transportation and other industries. However, storing high volumes of hydrogen seems to be a significant challenge. Abandoned hydrocarbon reservoirs are considered as viable hydrogen storage options because of the availability of the required infrastructure such as wells and surface facilities. However, long-term wellbore integrity in these wells could be a serious challenge. The aim of this research is to investigate the effect of stored hydrogen on the wellbore integrity such as casing cement. The methodology is to experimentally expose hydrogen to wet and dry cement and measure the impact on cement rheological and mechanical properties. Hydrogen reduces the compressive strength of a set cement if it gets in contact with the cement slurry. Also, mixing hydrogen with cement slurry slightly increases its density and rheological properties which need to be considered to have a successful primary cementing operation.

Keywords: Green hydrogen, underground storage, wellbore integrity, cement, compressive strength.

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Authors: Ayedh Alqahtani, Andrew Whyte

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Life Cycle Cost (LCC) is one of the goals and key pillars of the construction management science because it comprises many of the functions and processes necessary, which assist organisations and agencies to achieve their goals. It has therefore become important to design and control assets during their whole life cycle, from the design and planning phase through to disposal phase. LCCA is aimed to improve the decision making system in the ownership of assets by taking into account all the cost elements including to the asset throughout its life. Current application of LCC approach is impractical during misunderstanding of the advantages of LCC. This main objective of this research is to show a different relationship between capital cost and long-term running costs. One hundred and thirty eight actual building projects in United Kingdom (UK) were used in order to achieve and measure the above-mentioned objective of the study. The result shown that LCC is one of the most significant tools should be considered on the decision making process.

Keywords: Building projects, Capital cost, Life cycle cost, Maintenance costs, Operation costs.

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Authors: Sherif. S. Nafee, Ameer. K. Al-Ramady, Salem. A. Shaheen

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The analytical prediction of the decay heat results from the fast neutron fission of actinides was initiated under a project, 10-MAT1134-3, funded by king Abdulaziz City of Science and Technology (KASCT), Long-Term Comprehensive National Plan for Science, Technology and Innovations, managed by a team from King Abdulaziz University (KAU), Saudi Arabia, and supervised by Argonne National Laboratory (ANL) has collaborated with KAU's team to assist in the computational analysis. In this paper, the numerical solution of coupled linear differential equations that describe the decays and buildups of minor fission product MFA, has been used to predict the total decay heat and its components from the fast neutron fission of 235U and 239Pu. The reliability of the present approach is illustrated via systematic comparisons with the measurements reported by the University of Tokyo, in YAYOI reactor.

Keywords: Decay heat, fast neutron fission, and Numerical Solution of Linear Differential Equations.

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Authors: Dwi Puspita Sari, Gulnur Baltabayeva, Nadia Salman, Maxut Toleuov, Vijay Kanabar

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Technology era drives people to use mobile phone to support their daily life activities. Technology development has a rapid phase which pushes the IT company to adjust any technology changes in order to fulfill customer’s satisfaction. As a result of that, many companies in the USA emerged from systematics software development approach to agile software development approach in developing systems and applications to develop many mobile phone applications in a short phase to fulfill user’s needs. As a systematic approach is considered as time consuming, costly, and too risky, agile software development has become a more popular approach to use for developing software including mobile applications. This paper reflects a short-term project to develop a diet tracker mobile application using agile software development that focused on applying scrum framework in the development process.

Keywords: Agile software development, scrum, diet tracker, mobile application.

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Authors: Yiyang Su, Jörg Neumann, Jan Wetzlich, Florian Thiel

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Smart grid is a term used to describe the next generation power grid. New challenges such as integration of renewable and decentralized energy sources, the requirement for continuous grid estimation and optimization, as well as the use of two-way flows of energy have been brought to the power gird. In order to achieve efficient, reliable, sustainable, as well as secure delivery of electric power more and more information and communication technologies are used for the monitoring and the control of power grids. Consequently, the need for cybersecurity is dramatically increased and has converged into several standards which will be presented here. These standards for the smart grid must be designed to satisfy both performance and reliability requirements. An in depth investigation of the effect of retrospectively embedded security in existing grids on it’s dynamic behavior is required. Therefore, a retrofitting plan for existing meters is offered, and it’s performance in a test low voltage microgrid is investigated. As a result of this, integration of security measures into measurement architectures of smart grids at the design phase is strongly recommended.

Keywords: Cyber security, performance, protocols, security standards, smart grid.

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Authors: El Youssfi L., Choukr-Allah R., Zaafrani M., Mediouni T., Sarr F, Hirich A.

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An experiment was implemented in a filed in the south of Morocco to evaluate the effects of domestic treated wastewater use for irrigation of amaranth crop under semi-arid conditions. Three varieties (A0020, A0057 & A211) were tested and irrigated using domestic treated wastewater EC1 (0,92 dS/m) as control, EC3 (3dS/m) and EC6 (6dS/m) obtained by adding sea water. In term of growth, an increase of the EC level of applied irrigation water reduced significantly the plant-s height, leaf area, fresh and dry weight measured at vegetative, flowering and maturity stage for all varieties. Even with the application of the EC6, yields were relatively higher in comparison with the once obtained in normal cultivation conditions. A significant accumulation of nitrate, chloride and sodium in soil layers during the crop cycle was noted. The use of treated waste water for its irrigation is proved to be possible. The variety A211 had showed to be less sensitive to salinity stress and it could be more promising its introduction to study area.

Keywords: Amaranth, salinity, semi-arid, treated waste water.

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Authors: Y. Egercioglu, S. Yalciner

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With the development of technology, the growing trend of fast and safe passenger transport, air pollution, traffic congestion, increase in problems such as the increasing population and the high cost of private vehicle usage made many cities around the world with a population of more or less, start to build rail systems as a means of urban transport in order to ensure the economic and environmental sustainability and more efficient use of land in the city. The implementation phase of rail systems costs much more than other public transport systems. However, social and economic returns in the long term made these systems the most popular investment tool for planned and developing cities. In our country, the purpose, goals and policies of transportation plans are away from integrity, and the problems are not clearly detected. Also, not defined and incomplete assessment of transportation systems and insufficient financial analysis are the most important cause of failure. Rail systems and other transportation systems to be addressed as a whole is seen as the main factor in increasing efficiency in applications that are not integrated yet in our country to come to this point has led to the problem.

Keywords: Urban Transportation Projects, Urban Light Rail Systems, Urbanization, Izmir.

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Authors: Drago Jakovcevic, Mihovil Andelinovic, Igor Husak

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The aim of this paper is to explore the economic circumstances in which the selective credit policy, the least used instrument of four types of instruments on disposal to central banks, should be used. The most significant example includes the use of selective credit policies in response to the emergence of the global financial crisis by the FED. Specifics of the potential use of selective credit policies as the instigator of economic growth in Croatia, a small open economy, are determined by high euroization of financial system, fixed exchange rate and long-term trend growth of external debt that is related to the need to maintain high levels of foreign reserves. In such conditions, the classic forms of selective credit policies are unsuitable for the introduction. Several alternative approaches to implement selective credit policies are examined in this paper. Also, thorough analysis of distribution of selective monetary policy loans among economic sectors in Croatia is conducted in order to minimize the risk of investing funds and maximize the return, in order to influence the GDP growth.

Keywords: Global crisis, Selective credit policy, Small open economy.

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Authors: T. Ganesan, M. S. Aris, I. Elamvazuthi, Momen Kamal Tageldeen

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Terms set in power purchase agreements (PPA) challenge power utility companies in balancing between the returns (from maximizing power production) and securing long term supply contracts at capped production. The production limitation set in the PPA has driven efforts to maximize profits through efficient and economic power production. In this paper, a combined industrial-scale gas turbine (GT) - absorption chiller (AC) system is considered to cool the GT air intake for reducing the plant’s heat rate (HR). This GT-AC system is optimized while considering power output limitations imposed by the PPA. In addition, the proposed formulation accounts for uncertainties in the ambient temperature using Type-2 fuzzy programming. Using the enhanced chaotic differential evolution (CEDE), the Pareto frontier was constructed and the optimization results are analyzed in detail.

Keywords: Absorption chillers, turbine inlet air cooling, power purchase agreement, multiobjective optimization, type-2 fuzzy programming, chaotic differential evolution.

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Authors: Sultan Daud, John P. Forth, Nikolaos Nikitas

Abstract:

The current study aims to highlight the loading characteristics impact on the time evolution (focusing particularly on long term effects) of the deformation of realized reinforced concrete beams. Namely the tension stiffening code provisions (i.e. within Eurocode 2) are reviewed with a clear intention to reassess their operational value and predicting capacity. In what follows the experimental programme adopted along with some preliminary findings and numerical modeling attempts are presented. For a range of long slender reinforced concrete simply supported beams (4200 mm) constant static sustained and repeated cyclic loadings were applied mapping the time evolution of deformation. All experiments were carried out at the Heavy Structures Lab of the University of Leeds. During tests the mid-span deflection, creep coefficient and shrinkage strains were monitored for duration of 90 days. The obtained results are set against the values predicted by Eurocode 2 and the tools within an FE commercial package (i.e. Midas FEA) to yield that existing knowledge and practise is at times over-conservative.

Keywords: Eurocode2, midas fea, repeated, sustained loading.

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Authors: Khalid Obaed Mahmod, Mesut Cevik

Abstract:

The term smart city has appeared recently and was accompanied by many definitions and concepts, but as a simplified and clear definition, it can be said that the smart city is a geographical location that has gained efficiency and flexibility in providing public services to citizens through its use of technological and communication technologies, and this is what distinguishes it from other cities. Smart cities connect the various components of the city through the main and sub networks in addition to a set of applications, and thus are able to collect data that is the basis for providing technological solutions to manage resources and provide services. The basis of the work of the smart city is the use of artificial intelligence (AI) and the technology of the Internet of Things (IoT). The work presents the concept of smart cities, the pillars, standards and evaluation indicators on which smart cities depend, and the reasons that prompted the world to move towards its establishment. It also provides a simplified hypothetical way to measure the ideal smart city model by defining some indicators and key pillars, simulating them with logic circuits and testing them to determine if the city can be considered an ideal smart city or not.

Keywords: Evaluation indicators, logic gates, performance factors, pillars, smart city.

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Authors: Ong Sing Goh, C. Ardil, Wilson Wong, Chun Che Fung

Abstract:

The evaluation of conversational agents or chatterbots question answering systems is a major research area that needs much attention. Before the rise of domain-oriented conversational agents based on natural language understanding and reasoning, evaluation is never a problem as information retrieval-based metrics are readily available for use. However, when chatterbots began to become more domain specific, evaluation becomes a real issue. This is especially true when understanding and reasoning is required to cater for a wider variety of questions and at the same time to achieve high quality responses. This paper discusses the inappropriateness of the existing measures for response quality evaluation and the call for new standard measures and related considerations are brought forward. As a short-term solution for evaluating response quality of conversational agents, and to demonstrate the challenges in evaluating systems of different nature, this research proposes a blackbox approach using observation, classification scheme and a scoring mechanism to assess and rank three example systems, AnswerBus, START and AINI.

Keywords: Evaluation, conversational agents, Response Quality, chatterbots

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Authors: Nasim Ullah, Shaoping Wang

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ELS is an important ground based hardware in the loop simulator used for aerodynamics torque loading experiments of the actuators under test. This work focuses on improvement of the transient response of torque controller with parameters uncertainty of Electrical Load Simulator (ELS).The parameters of load simulator are estimated online and the model is updated, eliminating the model error and improving the steady state torque tracking response of torque controller. To improve the Transient control performance the gain of robust term of SMC is updated online using fuzzy logic system based on the amount of uncertainty in parameters of load simulator. The states of load simulator which cannot be measured directly are estimated using luenberger observer with update of new estimated parameters. The stability of the control scheme is verified using Lyapunov theorem. The validity of proposed control scheme is verified using simulations.

Keywords: ELS, Observer, Transient Performance, SMC, Extra Torque, Fuzzy Logic.

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Authors: P. P. Chandrasekera, P. B. Hewavithana, S. Rosario, M. H. M. N. Hearth, D. M. R. D. Mirihella

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Periventricular Leukomalacia (PVL) is a White Matter Injury (WMI) of preterm neonatal brain. Objectives of the study were to assess the neuro-developmental outcome at one year of age and to determine a good protocol of cranial ultrasonography to detect PVL. Two hundred and sixty four preterm neonates were included in the study. Series of cranial ultrasound scans were done by using a dedicated neonatal head probe 4-10 MHz of Logic e portable ultrasound scanner. Clinical history of seizures, abnormal head growth (hydrocephalus or microcephaly) and developmental milestones were assessed and neurological examinations were done until one year of age. Among live neonates, 57% who had cystic PVL (Grades 2 and 3) manifested as cerebral palsy. In conclusion cystic PVL has permanent neurological disabilities like cerebral palsy. Good protocol of real time cranial ultrasonography to detect PVL is to perform scans at least once a week until one month and at term (40 weeks of gestation).

Keywords: Cerebral palsy, cranial ultrasonography, Periventricular Leukomalacia (PVL), preterm neonates.

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Authors: R. H. Khawaja, T. R. Blackburn, M. Rehan Arif

Abstract:

The power transformer is the most expensive, indispensable and arguably the most important equipment item in a power system Insulation failure in transformers can cause long term interruption to supply and loss of revenue and the condition assessment of the insulation is thus an important maintenance procedure. Oil-impregnated transformer insulation consists of mainly organic materials including mineral oil and cellulose-base paper and pressboard. The operating life of cellulose-based insulation, as with most organic insulation, depends heavily on its operating temperature rise above ambient. This paper reports results of a laboratory-based experimental investigation of partial discharge (PD) activity at high temperature in oil-impregnated insulation. The experiments reported here are part an on-going programme aimed at investigating the way in which insulation deterioration can be monitored and quantified by use of partial discharge diagnostics. Partial discharge patterns were recorded and analysed during increasing and decreasing phases of the temperature. The effect of ageing of the insulation on the PD patterns in oil and oil-impregnated insulation are also considered.

Keywords: Ageing, high temperature, PD, oil-impregnated insulation.

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Authors: J. Elbl, J. K. Friedel, J. Záhora, L. Plošek, A. Kintl, J. Přichystalová, J. Hynšt, L. Dostálová, K. Zákoutská

Abstract:

This work presents the first results from the long-term experiment, which is focused on the impact of intensive rainfall and long period of drought on microbial activities in soil. Fifteen lysimeters were prepared in the area of our interest. This area is a protection zone of underground source of drinking water. These lysimeters were filed with topsoil and subsoil collected in this area and divided into two groups. These groups differ in fertilization and amount of water received during the growing season. Amount of microbial biomass and leaching of mineral nitrogen and phosphates were chosen as main indicators of microbial activities in soil. Content of mineral nitrogen and phosphates was measured in soil solution, which was collected from each lysimeters. Amount of microbial biomass was determined in soil samples that were taken from the lysimeters before and after the long period of drought and intensive rainfall.

Keywords: Mineral nitrogen, Phosphates, Microbial activities, Drought, Precipitation.

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