Search results for: high performance concrete

Authors: Bremananth R, Nithya B, Saipriya R

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The proposed system identifies the species of the wood using the textural features present in its barks. Each species of a wood has its own unique patterns in its bark, which enabled the proposed system to identify it accurately. Automatic wood recognition system has not yet been well established mainly due to lack of research in this area and the difficulty in obtaining the wood database. In our work, a wood recognition system has been designed based on pre-processing techniques, feature extraction and by correlating the features of those wood species for their classification. Texture classification is a problem that has been studied and tested using different methods due to its valuable usage in various pattern recognition problems, such as wood recognition, rock classification. The most popular technique used for the textural classification is Gray-level Co-occurrence Matrices (GLCM). The features from the enhanced images are thus extracted using the GLCM is correlated, which determines the classification between the various wood species. The result thus obtained shows a high rate of recognition accuracy proving that the techniques used in suitable to be implemented for commercial purposes.

Keywords: Correlation, Grey Level Co-Occurrence Matrix, ProbabilityDensity Function, Wood Recognition.

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Authors: Tejeet Singh, Harmanjit Singh

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Creep behavior of thick-walled functionally graded cylinder consisting of AlSiC and subjected to internal pressure and high temperature has been analyzed. The functional relationship between strain rate with stress can be described by the well known threshold stress based creep law with a stress exponent of five. The effect of imposing non-linear particle gradient on the distribution of creep stresses in the thick-walled functionally graded composite cylinder has been investigated. The study revealed that for the assumed non-linear particle distribution, the radial stress decreases throughout the cylinder, whereas the tangential, axial and effective stresses have averaging effect. The strain rates in the functionally graded composite cylinder could be reduced to significant extent by employing non-linear gradient in the distribution of reinforcement.

Keywords: Functionally Graded Material, Pressure, Steady State Creep, Thick-Cylinder.

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Authors: Wann-Ming Wey

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The link between urban planning and design principles and the built environment of an urban renewal area is of interest to the field of urban studies. During the past decade, there has also been increasing interest in urban planning and design; this interest is motivated by the possibility that design policies associated with the built environment can be used to control, manage, and shape individual activity and behavior. However, direct assessments and design techniques of the links between how urban planning design policies influence individuals are still rare in the field. Recent research efforts in urban design have focused on the idea that land use and design policies can be used to increase the quality of design projects for an urban renewal area-s built environment. The development of appropriate design techniques for the built environment is an essential element of this research. Quality function deployment (QFD) is a powerful tool for improving alternative urban design and quality for urban renewal areas, and for procuring a citizen-driven quality system. In this research, we propose an integrated framework based on QFD and an Analytic Network Process (ANP) approach to determine the Alternative Technical Requirements (ATRs) to be considered in designing an urban renewal planning and design alternative. We also identify the research designs and methodologies that can be used to evaluate the performance of urban built environment projects. An application in an urban renewal built environment planning and design project evaluation is presented to illustrate the proposed framework.

Keywords: Analytic Network Process, Built Environment, Quality Function Deployment, Urban Design, Urban Renewal.

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Authors: Sorayya Malek, Mogeeb Mosleh, Sharifah M. Syed

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In this study, Support Vector Machine (SVM) technique was applied to predict the dichotomized value of Dissolved oxygen (DO) from two freshwater lakes namely Chini and Bera Lake (Malaysia). Data sample contained 11 parameters for water quality features from year 2005 until 2009. All data parameters were used to predicate the dissolved oxygen concentration which was dichotomized into 3 different levels (High, Medium, and Low). The input parameters were ranked, and forward selection method was applied to determine the optimum parameters that yield the lowest errors, and highest accuracy. Initial results showed that pH, Water Temperature, and Conductivity are the most important parameters that significantly affect the predication of DO. Then, SVM model was applied using the Anova kernel with those parameters yielded 74% accuracy rate. We concluded that using SVM models to predicate the DO is feasible, and using dichotomized value of DO yields higher prediction accuracy than using precise DO value.

Keywords: Dissolved oxygen, Water quality, predication DO, Support Vector Machine.

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Authors: Abdur Rosyid, Mohamed El-Madany, Mohanad Alata

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Due to simplicity and low cost, rotordynamic system is often modeled by using lumped parameters. Recently, finite elements have been used to model rotordynamic system as it offers higher accuracy. However, it involves high degrees of freedom. In some applications such as control design, this requires higher cost. For this reason, various model reduction methods have been proposed. This work demonstrates the quality of model reduction of rotor-bearing-support system through substructuring. The quality of the model reduction is evaluated by comparing some first natural frequencies, modal damping ratio, critical speeds, and response of both the full system and the reduced system. The simulation shows that the substructuring is proven adequate to reduce finite element rotor model in the frequency range of interest as long as the number and the location of master nodes are determined appropriately. However, the reduction is less accurate in an unstable or nearly-unstable system.

Keywords: Finite element model, rotordynamic system, model reduction, substructuring.

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Authors: M. Nageswara Rao, V. S. N. K. Chaitanya, P. Vijaya Haritha

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Insulators are one of the most significant equipment in power system. The insulators’ operation may affect the power flow, line loss and reliability. The electrical parameters that influence the performance of insulator are surface leakage current, corona and dry band arcing. Electric field stresses on the insulator surface will degrade the insulating properties and lead to puncture. Electric filed stresses can be analyzed by numerical methods and experimental evaluation. As per economic aspects, evaluation by numerical methods are best. In outdoor insulation, a hydrophobic surface can facilitate to prevent water film formation on the insulation surface, which is decisive for diminishing leakage currents and partial discharge (PD) under heavy polluted environments and harsh weather conditions. Polymer materials like silicone rubber have an outstanding hydrophobic property among general insulation materials. In this paper, electrical field intensity of 220 kV porcelain and polymer double tension insulator strings at critical regions are analyzed and compared by using Finite Element Method. Hydrophobic conditions of polymer insulator with equal and unequal water molecule conditions are verified by using finite element method.

Keywords: Porcelain insulator, polymer insulator, electric field analysis, EFA, finite element method, FEM, hydrophobicity, FEMM-2D.

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Authors: R. Sahraian, A. Karampour Haghighi, E. Ghasemi

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Process planning and production scheduling play important roles in manufacturing systems. In this paper a multiobjective mixed integer linear programming model is presented for the integrated planning and scheduling of multi-product. The aim is to find a set of high-quality trade-off solutions. This is a combinatorial optimization problem with substantially large solution space, suggesting that it is highly difficult to find the best solutions with the exact search method. To account for it, a PSO-based algorithm is proposed by fully utilizing the capability of the exploration search and fast convergence. To fit the continuous PSO in the discrete modeled problem, a solution representation is used in the algorithm. The numerical experiments have been performed to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm.

Keywords: Integrated process planning and scheduling, multi objective, MILP, Particle swarm optimization

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Authors: Jayashree Ramana

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An alarming emergence of multidrug-resistant strains of the tuberculosis pathogen Mycobacterium tuberculosis and continuing high worldwide incidence of tuberculosis has invigorated the search for novel drug targets. The enzyme glutamate racemase (MurI) in bacteria catalyzes the stereoconversion of L-glutamate to D-glutamate which is a component of the peptidoglycan cell wall of the bacterium. The inhibitors targeted against MurI from several bacterial species have been patented and are advocated as promising antibacterial agents. However there are none available against MurI from Mycobacterium tuberculosis, due to the lack of its threedimensional structure. This work accomplished two major objectives. First, the tertiary structure of MtMurI was deduced computationally through homology modeling using the templates from bacterial homologues. It is speculated that like in other Gram-positive bacteria, MtMurI exists as a dimer and many of the protein interactions at the dimer interface are also conserved. Second, potent candidate inhibitors against MtMurI were identified through docking against already known inhibitors in other organisms.

Keywords: Glutamate racemase, homology modeling, docking, drug resistance.

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Authors: Guang-Ho Cha

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This paper presents a context-sensitive media similarity search algorithm. One of the central problems regarding media search is the semantic gap between the low-level features computed automatically from media data and the human interpretation of them. This is because the notion of similarity is usually based on high-level abstraction but the low-level features do not sometimes reflect the human perception. Many media search algorithms have used the Minkowski metric to measure similarity between image pairs. However those functions cannot adequately capture the aspects of the characteristics of the human visual system as well as the nonlinear relationships in contextual information given by images in a collection. Our search algorithm tackles this problem by employing a similarity measure and a ranking strategy that reflect the nonlinearity of human perception and contextual information in a dataset. Similarity search in an image database based on this contextual information shows encouraging experimental results.

Keywords: Context-sensitive search, image search, media search, similarity ranking, similarity search.

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Authors: N. Georgoulopoulos, A. Hatzopoulos, K. Karamitsios, K. Kotrotsios, A. I. Metsai

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Current server systems are responsible for critical applications that run in different infrastructures, such as the cloud, physical machines, and virtual machines. A common challenge that these systems face are the various hardware faults that may occur due to the high load, among other reasons, which translates to errors resulting in malfunctions or even server downtime. The most important hardware parts, that are causing most of the errors, are the CPU, RAM, and the hard drive - HDD. In this work, we investigate selected CPU, RAM, and HDD errors, observed or simulated in kernel ring buffer log files from GNU/Linux servers. Moreover, a severity characterization is given for each error type. Understanding these errors is crucial for the efficient analysis of kernel logs that are usually utilized for monitoring servers and diagnosing faults. In addition, to support the previous analysis, we present possible ways of simulating hardware errors in RAM and HDD, aiming to facilitate the testing of methods for detecting and tackling the above issues in a server running on GNU/Linux.

Keywords: hardware errors, Kernel logs, GNU/Linux servers, RAM, HDD, CPU

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Authors: C. Guven, M. Tufekci, E. Bayik, O. Gedik, M. Tas

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A sliding door system is used in commercial vehicles and passenger cars to allow a larger unobstructed access to the interior for loading and unloading. The movement of a sliding door on vehicle body is ensured by mechanisms and tracks having special cross-section which is manufactured by roll forming and stretch bending process. There are three tracks and three mechanisms which are called upper, central and lower on a sliding door system. There are static requirements as strength on different directions, rigidity for mechanisms, door drop off, door sag; dynamic requirements as high energy slam opening-closing and durability requirement to validate these products. In addition, there is a kinematic requirement to find out force values from door handle during manual operating. In this study, finite element analysis and physical test results which are realized for sliding door systems will be shared comparatively.

Keywords: Finite element analysis, sliding door, experimental, verification, vehicle tests.

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Authors: Wei Lu

Abstract:

With the development of information technology in China, network consumption is becoming more and more popular. As a special group, college students have a high degree of education and distinct opinions and personalities. In the future, the key groups of network consumption have gradually become the focus groups of network consumption. Studying college students’ online consumption behavior has important theoretical significance and practical value. Based on the Stimulus-Organism-Response (SOR) driving model and the structural equation model, this paper establishes the influencing factors model of College students’ online consumption behavior, evaluates and amends the model by using SPSS and AMOS software, analyses and determines the positive factors of marketing college students’ consumption, and provides an effective basis for guiding and promoting college student consumption.

Keywords: College students, online consumption, stimulus-organism-response driving model, structural equation model.

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Authors: Luísa P. Cruz-Lopes, Artur Figueirinha, Isabel Brás, Bruno Esteves

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Portugal is an important wine and olive oil producer, activities which generate a high quantity of residues commonly called grape stalks and olive cake, respectively. In this work grape stalks and olive cake were used as lignocellulosic adsorbents for wastewater containing lead treatment. To attain a better knowledge of the factors that could influence the quality of the treated wastewater, a chemical characterization of the materials used in the treatment was done. To access the ecotoxicological safety of the treated wastewater, several tests were performed.

The results of the toxicity test show that the samples leachate has a mild effect on the living models tested. The tests performed in lemna and bacteria were the most sensible to toxicity effects of the samples. The results obtained in this work evidenced the importance of use of simple and fast toxicity tests to predict impacts in the environment.

Keywords: Chemical composition, ecotoxicological, lignocellulosic residues, safety.

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Authors: Konstantinos Sotiriadis, Radosław Mróz

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In the present work the internal sulfate attack on pastes made from pure clinker phases was studied. Two binders were produced: (a) a binder with 2% C3A and 18% C4AF content; (b) a binder with 10% C3A and C4AF content each. Gypsum was used as the sulfate bearing compound, while calcium carbonate added to differentiate the binders produced. The phases formed were identified by XRD analysis. The results showed that ettringite was the deterioration phase detected in the case of the low C3A content binder. Carbonation occurred in the specimen without calcium carbonate addition, while portlandite was observed in the one containing calcium carbonate. In the case of the high C3A content binder, traces of thaumasite were detected when calcium carbonate was not incorporated in the binder. A solid solution of thaumasite and ettringite was found when calcium carbonate was added. The amount of C3A had not fully reacted with sulfates, since its corresponding peaks were detected.

Keywords: Tricalcium aluminate, calcium aluminate ferrite, sulfate attack, calcium carbonate, low temperature.

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Authors: Wei Yee Teoh, Chee Wei Tan

Abstract:

The issue of unintentional islanding in PV grid interconnection still remains as a challenge in grid-connected photovoltaic (PV) systems. This paper discusses the overview of popularly used anti-islanding detection methods, practically applied in PV grid-connected systems. Anti-islanding methods generally can be classified into four major groups, which include passive methods, active methods, hybrid methods and communication base methods. Active methods have been the preferred detection technique over the years due to very small non-detected zone (NDZ) in small scale distribution generation. Passive method is comparatively simpler than active method in terms of circuitry and operations. However, it suffers from large NDZ that significantly reduces its performance. Communication base methods inherit the advantages of active and passive methods with reduced drawbacks. Hybrid method which evolved from the combination of both active and passive methods has been proven to achieve accurate anti-islanding detection by many researchers. For each of the studied anti-islanding methods, the operation analysis is described while the advantages and disadvantages are compared and discussed. It is difficult to pinpoint a generic method for a specific application, because most of the methods discussed are governed by the nature of application and system dependent elements. This study concludes that the setup and operation cost is the vital factor for anti-islanding method selection in order to achieve minimal compromising between cost and system quality.

Keywords: Active method, hybrid method, islanding detection, passive method, photovoltaic (PV), utility method

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Authors: Hany Alashwal, Safaai Deris, Razib M. Othman

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The protein domain structure has been widely used as the most informative sequence feature to computationally predict protein-protein interactions. However, in a recent study, a research group has reported a very high accuracy of 94% using hydrophobicity feature. Therefore, in this study we compare and verify the usefulness of protein domain structure and hydrophobicity properties as the sequence features. Using the Support Vector Machines (SVM) as the learning system, our results indicate that both features achieved accuracy of nearly 80%. Furthermore, domains structure had receiver operating characteristic (ROC) score of 0.8480 with running time of 34 seconds, while hydrophobicity had ROC score of 0.8159 with running time of 20,571 seconds (5.7 hours). These results indicate that protein-protein interaction can be predicted from domain structure with reliable accuracy and acceptable running time.

Keywords: Bioinformatics, protein-protein interactions, support vector machines, protein features.

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Authors: Peyman Honarmandi, Mazen Alhirsh

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Banner towing is a major form of advertisement. It consists of a banner showing a logo or a selection of words or letters being towed by an aircraft. Traditionally bush planes have been used to tow banners given their high thrust capabilities, however, with the development of Remote-Controlled (RC) aircraft, they could be a good replacement as RC planes mitigate the risk of human life and can be easier to operate. This paper studies the best banner design to be towed by an RC aircraft. This is done by conducting wind tunnel testing on an array of banners with different materials and designs. A pull gauge is used to record the drag force during testing which is then used to calculate the coefficient of drag, Cd. The testing results show that the best banner design would be a hybrid design with a solid and mesh material. The design with the lowest Cd of 0.082 was a half ripstop nylon half polyester mesh design. On the other hand, the design with highest Cd of 0.305 involved incorporating a tail chute to decrease fluttering.

Keywords: Aerodynamics of banner, banner design, banner towing, drag coefficients of banner, RC aircraft banner.

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Authors: L. Grinis, V. Haslavsky

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Stuck-pipe in drilling operations is one of the most pressing and expensive problems in the oil industry. This paper describes a computational simulation and an experimental study of the hydrodynamic vibrator, which may be used for liquidation of stuck-pipe problems during well drilling. The work principle of the vibrator is based upon the known phenomena of Vortex Street of Karman and the resulting generation of vibrations. We will discuss the computational simulation and experimental investigations of vibrations in this device. The frequency of the vibration parameters has been measured as a function of the wide range Reynolds Number. The validity of the computational simulation and of the assumptions on which it is based has been proved experimentally. The computational simulation of the vibrator work and its effectiveness was carried out using FLUENT software. The research showed high degree of congruence with the results of the laboratory tests and allowed to determine the effect of the granular material features upon the pipe vibration in the well. This study demonstrates the potential of using the hydrodynamic vibrator in a well drilling system.

Keywords: Drilling, stuck-pipe, vibration, vortex shedding.

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Authors: Deniz Deryakulu, Şener Büyüköztürk Hüseyin Özçınar

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The main purpose of this study was to determine the predictors of academic achievement of student Information and Communications Technologies (ICT) teachers with different learning styles. Participants were 148 student ICT teachers from Ankara University. Participants were asked to fill out a personal information sheet, the Turkish version of Kolb-s Learning Style Inventory, Weinstein-s Learning and Study Strategies Inventory, Schommer's Epistemological Beliefs Questionnaire, and Eysenck-s Personality Questionnaire. Stepwise regression analyses showed that the statistically significant predictors of the academic achievement of the accommodators were attitudes and high school GPAs; of the divergers was anxiety; of the convergers were gender, epistemological beliefs, and motivation; and of the assimilators were gender, personality, and test strategies. Implications for ICT teaching-learning processes and teacher education are discussed.

Keywords: Academic achievement, student ICT teachers, Kolb learning styles, experiential learning.

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Authors: C. Chaiyaraksa, T. Khamko

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This study investigated the influence of limestone and sepiolite on heavy metals accumulation in the soil and soybean. The soil was synthesized to contaminate with zinc 150 mg/kg, copper 100 mg/kg, and cadmium 1 mg/kg. The contaminated soil was mixed with limestone and sepiolite at the ratio of 1:0, 0:1, 1:1, and 2:1. The amount of soil modifier added to soil was 0.2%, 0.4%, and 0.8%. The metals determination was performed on soil both before and after soybean planting and in the root, shoot, and seed of soybean after harvesting. The study was also on metal translocate from root to seed and on bioaccumulation factor. Using of limestone and sepiolite resulted in a reduction of metals accumulated in soybean. For soil containing a high concentration of copper, cadmium, and zinc, a mixture of limestone and sepiolite (1:1) was recommended to mix with soil with the amount of 0.2%. Zinc could translocate from root to seed more than copper, and cadmium. From studying the movement of metals from soil to accumulate in soybean, the result was that soybean could absorb the highest amount of cadmium, followed by zinc, and copper, respectively.

Keywords: Heavy metals, limestone, sepiolite, soil, soybean.

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Authors: Ali Shirazi, Robert A. Taylor, Stephen D. White, Graham L. Morrison

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In this paper, a detailed simulation model of a solar-powered triple-effect LiBr–H₂O absorption chiller is developed to supply both cooling and heating demand of a large-scale building, aiming to reduce the fossil fuel consumption and greenhouse gas emissions in building sector. TRNSYS 17 is used to simulate the performance of the system over a typical year. A combined energetic-economic-environmental analysis is conducted to determine the system annual primary energy consumption and the total cost, which are considered as two conflicting objectives. A multi-objective optimization of the system is performed using a genetic algorithm to minimize these objectives simultaneously. The optimization results show that the final optimal design of the proposed plant has a solar fraction of 72% and leads to an annual primary energy saving of 0.69 GWh and annual CO₂ emissions reduction of ~166 tonnes, as compared to a conventional HVAC system. The economics of this design, however, is not appealing without public funding, which is often the case for many renewable energy systems. The results show that a good funding policy is required in order for these technologies to achieve satisfactory payback periods within the lifetime of the plant.

Keywords: Economic, environmental, multi-objective optimization, solar air-conditioning, triple-effect absorption chiller.

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Authors: D. Salari, A. Niaei, P. Chitsaz Yazdi, M. Derakhshani, S. R. Nabavi

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This work aims to test the application of computational fluid dynamics (CFD) modeling to fixed bed catalytic cracking reactors. Studies of CFD with a fixed bed design commonly use a regular packing with N=2 to define bed geometry. CFD allows us to obtain a more accurate view of the fluid flow and heat transfer mechanisms present in fixed bed equipment. Naphtha was used as feedstock and the reactor length was 80cm. It is divided in three sections that catalyst bed packed in the middle section of the reactor. The reaction scheme was involved one primary reaction and 24 secondary reactions. Because of high CPU times in these simulations, parallel processing have been used. In this study the coke formation process in fixed bed and empty tube reactor was simulated and coke in these reactors are compared. In addition, the effect of steam ratio and feed flow rate on coke formation was investigated.

Keywords: Coke Formation, CFD Simulation, Fixed Bed, Catalyitic Cracking.

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Authors: Natta Changchutoe

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This research aimed to study employees- perceptions and expectations toward their organization-s corporate social responsibility (CSR), to study the differences between employees- personal factors and level of perceptions and expectations toward CSR, and to study the relationship between employees- perceptions and expectations toward CSR. Purposive sampling and questionnaire were applied to collect information from 400 private company employees in Bangkok metropolitan area. The results revealed that employees had “high" level of perceptions and expectations toward CSR, of which the highest level were given on the area of “corporate governance and transparency". It was found that there was different level of expectations of employees with different period of employment, position and employment (by listed and non-listed companies). Employees of different age and period of employment also had different level of expectations. Employees- perceptions were correlated with their expectations toward CSR.

Keywords: Employees, Perceptions, Expectations, Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR).

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Authors: Zeyneb Kurt, Oguzhan Yavuz

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The feature of HIV genome is in a wide range because of it is highly heterogeneous. Hence, the infection ability of the virus changes related with different chemokine receptors. From this point, R5 and X4 HIV viruses use CCR5 and CXCR5 coreceptors respectively while R5X4 viruses can utilize both coreceptors. Recently, in Bioinformatics, R5X4 viruses have been studied to classify by using the coreceptors of HIV genome. The aim of this study is to develop the optimal Multilayer Perceptron (MLP) for high classification accuracy of HIV sub-type viruses. To accomplish this purpose, the unit number in hidden layer was incremented one by one, from one to a particular number. The statistical data of R5X4, R5 and X4 viruses was preprocessed by the signal processing methods. Accessible residues of these virus sequences were extracted and modeled by Auto-Regressive Model (AR) due to the dimension of residues is large and different from each other. Finally the pre-processed dataset was used to evolve MLP with various number of hidden units to determine R5X4 viruses. Furthermore, ROC analysis was used to figure out the optimal MLP structure.

Keywords: Multilayer Perceptron, Auto-Regressive Model, HIV, ROC Analysis

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Authors: Vinko Vidučić, Ljiljana Vidučić, Damir Boras

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The goals of the research include the determination of the characteristics of SMEs finance in Croatia, as well as the determination of indirect growth rates of the information model of the entrepreneurs` perception of business environment. The research results show that cost of finance and access to finance are most important constraining factor in setting up and running the business of small entrepreneurs in Croatia. Furthermore, small entrepreneurs in Croatia are significantly dissatisfied with the administrative barriers although relatively to a lesser extent than was the case in the pre crisis time. High collateral requirement represents the main characteristic of bank lending concerning SMEs followed by long credit elaboration process. Formulated information model has defined the individual impact of indirect growth rates of the remaining variables on the model’s specific variable.

Keywords: Business environment, information model, indirect growth rates, SME finance.

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Authors: T. Motsima

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The under-5 mortality rate is high in sub-Saharan Africa with Lesotho being amongst the highest under-5 mortality rates in the world. The objective of the study is to determine the factors associated with under-5 mortality in Lesotho. The data used for this analysis come from the nationally representative household survey called the 2009 Lesotho Demographic and Health Survey. Odds ratios produced by the logistic regression models were used to measure the effect of each independent variable on the dependent variable. Female children were significantly 38% less likely to die than male children. Children who were breastfed for 13 to 18 months and those who were breastfed for more than 19 months were significantly less likely to die than those who were breastfed for 12 months or less. Furthermore, children of mothers who stayed in Quthing, Qacha’s Nek and Thaba Tseka ran the greatest risk of dying. The results suggested that: sex of child, type of birth, breastfeeding duration, district, source of energy and marital status were significant predictors of under-5 mortality, after correcting for all variables.

Keywords: Under-5 mortality, risk factors, millennium development goals, breastfeeding, logistic regression.

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Authors: Sandra Valdez-Hernández

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Motivation is one of the most important factors when teaching language. Most institutions, at least in Mexico, pay low attention to the types of motivation students have when they are studying English; however, considering the motivation they have may lead to better understanding about their needs and purposes for learning English and the professors may understand and focus on their interests for making them persist in action through the course. This topic has been widely investigated in different countries, but more research needs to be done in Mexico to shed light on this area of potential impact. This quantitative study examines how students (n = 180) at a Rural University in Quintana Roo perceive their different types of motivation, intrinsic and extrinsic, instrumental, and integrative and the attitudes for the language. The findings reveal a high degree of intrinsic and instrumental motivation and provide insights into the perceived attitudes for learning English. Finding ways to persist in action may lead to better comprehending the reasons for learning English.

Keywords: Attitudes for motivation, types of motivation, Extrinsic and Intrinsic motivation, instrumental and integrative motivation.

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Authors: Ana Paula Esteves, Diego S. Caetano, Louise L. B. Lomardo

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This paper presents an approach on the advantages of using adequate coverage in the zenithal lighting typology in various areas of architectural production, while at the same time to encourage to the design concerns inherent in this choice of roofing in Brazil. Understanding that sustainability needs to cover several aspects, a roofing system such as zenithal lighting system can contribute to the provision of better quality natural light for the interior of the building, which is related to the good health and welfare; it will also be able to contribute for the sustainable aspects and environmental needs, when it allows the generation of energy in semitransparent or opacity photovoltaic solutions and economize the artificial lightning. When the energy balance in the building is positive, that is, when the building generates more energy than it consumes, it may fit into the Net Zero Energy Building concept. The zenithal lighting systems could be an important ally in Brazil, when solved the burden of heat gains, participate in the set of pro-efficiency actions in search of "zero energy buildings". The paper presents comparative three cases of buildings that have used this feature in search of better environmental performance, both in light comfort and sustainability as a whole. Two of these buildings are examples in Europe: the Notley Green School in the UK and the Isofóton factory in Spain. The third building with these principles of shed´s roof is located in Brazil: the Ipel´s factory in São Paulo.

Keywords: Natural lightning, net zero energy building, sheds, semi-transparent photovoltaics.

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Authors: Dinara F. Gaynutdinova, Vladimir Ya Modorsky, Nikolay A. Shevelev

Abstract:

The problem under research is that of unpredictable modes occurring in two-stage centrifugal hydraulic pump as a result of hydraulic processes caused by vibrations of structural components. Numerical, analytical and experimental approaches are considered. A hypothesis was developed that the problem of unpredictable pressure decrease at the second stage of centrifugal pumps is caused by cavitation effects occurring upon vibration. The problem has been studied experimentally and theoretically as of today. The theoretical study was conducted numerically and analytically. Hydroelastic processes in dynamic “liquid – deformed structure” system were numerically modelled and analysed. Using ANSYS CFX program engineering analysis complex and computing capacity of a supercomputer the cavitation parameters were established to depend on vibration parameters. An influence domain of amplitudes and vibration frequencies on concentration of cavitation bubbles was formulated. The obtained numerical solution was verified using CFM program package developed in PNRPU. The package is based on a differential equation system in hyperbolic and elliptic partial derivatives. The system is solved by using one of finite-difference method options – the particle-in-cell method. The method defines the problem solution algorithm. The obtained numerical solution was verified analytically by model problem calculations with the use of known analytical solutions of in-pipe piston movement and cantilever rod end face impact. An infrastructure consisting of an experimental fast hydro-dynamic processes research installation and a supercomputer connected by a high-speed network, was created to verify the obtained numerical solutions. Physical experiments included measurement, record, processing and analysis of data for fast processes research by using National Instrument signals measurement system and Lab View software. The model chamber end face oscillated during physical experiments and, thus, loaded the hydraulic volume. The loading frequency varied from 0 to 5 kHz. The length of the operating chamber varied from 0.4 to 1.0 m. Additional loads weighed from 2 to 10 kg. The liquid column varied from 0.4 to 1 m high. Liquid pressure history was registered. The experiment showed dependence of forced system oscillation amplitude on loading frequency at various values: operating chamber geometrical dimensions, liquid column height and structure weight. Maximum pressure oscillation (in the basic variant) amplitudes were discovered at loading frequencies of approximately 1,5 kHz. These results match the analytical and numerical solutions in ANSYS and CFM.

Keywords: Computing experiment, hydroelasticity, physical experiment, vibration.

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Authors: Y. Obikane , M.Kaneko, K.Kakioka, K.Ogura

Abstract:

The fine structure of supercavitation in the wake of a symmetrical cylinder is studied with high-speed video cameras. The flow is observed in a cavitation tunnel at the speed of 8m/sec when the sidewall and the wake are partially filled with the massive cavitation bubbles. The present experiment observed that a two-dimensional ripple wave with a wave length of 0.3mm is propagated in a downstream direction, and then abruptly increases to a thicker three-dimensional layer. IR-photography recorded that the wakes originated from the horseshoe vortexes alongside the cylinder. The wake was developed to inside the dead water zone, which absorbed the bubbly wake propelled from the separated vortices at the center of the cylinder. A remote sensing classification technique (maximum most likelihood) determined that the surface porosity was 0.2, and the mean speed in the mixed wake was 7m/sec. To confirm the existence of two-dimensional wave motions in the interface, the experiments were conducted at a very low frequency, and showed similar gravity waves in both the upper and lower interfaces.

Keywords: Supercavitation, density gradient correlation

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