Search results for: Research and development strategy

Authors: Suleiman E. Al-lubani, Mohammad E. Matarneh, Hussien M. Al-Wedyan, Ala M. Rayes

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Aluminum alloy has an extensive range of industrial application due to its consistent mechanical properties and structural integrity. The heat treatment by precipitation technique affected the Magnesium, Silicon Manganese and copper crystals dissolved in the Aluminum alloy. The crystals dislocated to precipitate on the crystal’s boundaries of the Aluminum alloy when given a thermal energy increased its hardness. In this project various times and temperature were varied to find out the best combination of these variables to increase the precipitation of the metals on the Aluminum crystal’s boundaries which will lead to get the highest hardness. These specimens are then tested for their hardness and tensile strength. It is noticed that when the temperature increases, the precipitation increases and consequently the hardness increases. A threshold temperature value (264C0) of Aluminum alloy should not be reached due to the occurrence of recrystalization which causes the crystal to grow. This recrystalization process affected the ductility of the alloy and decrease hardness. In addition, and while increasing the temperature the alloy’s mechanical properties will decrease. The mechanical properties, namely tensile and hardness properties are investigated according to standard procedures. In this research, different temperature and time have been applied to increase hardening.The highest hardness at 100°c in 6 hours equals to 207.31 HBR, while at the same temperature and time the lowest elongation equals to 146.5.

Keywords: Aluminum alloy, recrystalization process, heat treatment, hardness properties, precipitation, intergranular breakage.

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Authors: V. Hadavi, J. Zamani, R. Hosseini

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The special and unique advantages of explosive forming, has developed its use in different industries. Considering the important influence of improving the current explosive forming techniques on increasing the efficiency and control over the explosive forming procedure, the effects of air and water as the energy-conveying medium, and also their differences will be illustrated in this paper. Hence, a large number of explosive forming tests have been conducted on two sizes of thin walled cylindrical shells by using air and water as the working medium. Comparative diagrams of the maximum radial deflection of work-pieces of the same size, as a function of the scaled distance, show that for the points with the same values of scaled distance, the maximum radial deformation caused by the under water explosive loading is 4 to 5 times more than the deflection of the shells under explosive forming, while using air. Results of this experimental research have also been compared with other studies which show that using water as the energy conveying media increases the efficiency up to 4.8 times. The effect of the media on failure modes of the shells, and the necking mechanism of the walls of the specimens, while being explosively loaded, are also discussed in this issue. Measuring the tested specimens shows that, the increase in the internal volume has been accompanied by necking of the walls, which finally results in the radial rupture of the structure.

Keywords: Explosive Forming, Energy Conveying Medium, Tubular Shell

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Authors: Guenther Schuh, Christina Koenig, Nico Schoen, Markus Wellensiek

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Identification and selection of appropriate product and manufacturing technologies are key factors for competitiveness and market success of technology-based companies. Therefore, many companies perform technology intelligence (TI) activities to ensure the identification of evolving technologies at the right time. Technology monitoring is one of the three base activities of TI, besides scanning and scouting. As the technological progress is accelerating, more and more technologies are being developed. Against the background of limited resources it is therefore necessary to focus TI activities. In this paper we propose a concept for defining appropriate search fields for technology monitoring. This limitation of search space leads to more concentrated monitoring activities. The concept will be introduced and demonstrated through an anonymized case study conducted within an industry project at the Fraunhofer Institute for Production Technology IPT. The described concept provides a customized monitoring approach, which is suitable for use in technology-oriented companies. It is shown in this paper that the definition of search fields and search tasks are suitable methods to define topics of interest and thus to align monitoring activities. Current as well as planned product, production and material technologies and existing skills, capabilities and resources form the basis for derivation of relevant search areas. To further improve the concept of technology monitoring the proposed concept should be extended during future research e.g. by the definition of relevant monitoring parameters.

Keywords: Monitoring radar, search field, technology intelligence, technology monitoring.

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Authors: Ali Komakpanah, Maryam Yazdi

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Few studies have been conducted on polymeric strip and the behavior of soil retaining walls. This paper will present the effect of frequency on the dynamic behavior of reinforced soil retaining walls with polymeric strips. The frequency content describes how the amplitude of a ground motion is distributed among different frequencies. Since the frequency content of an earthquake motion will strongly influence the effects of that motion, the characterization of the motion cannot be completed without the consideration of its frequency content. The maximum axial force of reinforcements and horizontal displacement of the reinforced walls are focused in this research. To clarify the dynamic behavior of reinforced soil retaining walls with polymeric strips, a numerical modeling using Finite Difference Method is benefited. As the results indicate, the frequency of input base acceleration has an important effect on the behavior of these structures. Because of resonant in the system, where the frequency of the input dynamic load is equal to the natural frequency of the system, the maximum horizontal displacement and the maximum axial forces in polymeric strips is occurred. Moreover, they were to increase the structure flexibility because of the main advantages of polymeric strips; i.e. being simple method of construction, having a homogeneous behavior with soils, and possessing long durability, which are of great importance in dynamic analysis.

Keywords: dynamic analysis, frequency, polymeric strip, reinforced soil.

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Authors: Methawee Yuttapongtada

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Intensifier is the linguistic term and device that is generally found in different languages in order to enhance and give additional quantity, quality or emotion to the words of each language. In fact, each language in the world has both of the similar and dissimilar intensifying device. More specially, the wide variety of intensifying device is used for Thai language and one of those is usage of the impolite word or the word that used to mean something negative as intensifier. The data collection in this study was done throughout the spoken language style by collecting from intensifiers regarded as impolite words because these words as employed in the other contexts will be held as the rude, swear words or the words with negative meaning. Then, backward study to the past was done in order to consider the historical change. Explanation of the original meaning and the contexts of words use from the past till the present time were done by use of both textual documents and dictionaries available in different periods. It was found that regarding the semantics and pragmatic aspects, subjectification also is the significant motivation that changed the impolite words to intensifiers. At last, it can explain pathway of the semantic change of these very words undoubtedly. Moreover, it is found that use tendency in the impolite word or the word that used to mean something negative will more be increased and this phenomenon is commonly found in many languages in the world and results of this research may support to the belief that human language in the world is universal and the same still reflected that human has the fundamental thought as the same to each other basically.

Keywords: Impolite word, intensifier, Thai, semantic change.

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Authors: Emmanouel Koumoulas, Aikaterini Rokkou, Marios Moschakis

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Theagenio" in Thessaloniki exists and works for three centuries now as a hospital. Since 1975, it has been operating as an Integrated Special Cancer Hospital and since 1985 it has been integrated into the National Health System. "Theagenio" Cancer Hospital is located at the central web of Thessaloniki residential complex and consists of two buildings, the "Symeonidio Research Center", which was completed in 1962 and the Nursing Ward, a project that was later completed in 1975. This paper examines the design of the Hospital Unit according to the requirements of the energy design of buildings. Initially, the energy characteristics of the Hospital are recorded, followed by a detailed presentation of the electromechanical installations. After the existing situation has been captured and with the help of the software TEE-KENAK, different scenarios for the energy upgrading of the buildings have been studied. Proposals for upgrading concern both the shell, e.g. installation of external thermal insulation, replacement of frames, addition of shading systems, etc. as well as electromechanical installations, e.g. use of ceiling fans, improvements in heating and cooling systems, interventions in lighting, etc. The simulation calculates the future energy status of the buildings and presents the economic benefits of the proposed interventions with reference to the environmental profits that arise.

Keywords: Energy consumption in hospitals, energy saving interventions, energy upgrading, hospital facilities.

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Authors: Qing Dai, Zhengkui Lin, Jiajia Zhang, Yi Qu

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Based on activity method, this paper focuses on morning commuting behavior when commuters travel with autonomous vehicles (AVs). Firstly, a net utility function of commuters is constructed by the activity utility of commuters at home, in car and at workplace, and the disutility of travel time cost and that of schedule delay cost. Then, this net utility function is applied to build an equilibrium model. Finally, under the assumption of constant marginal activity utility, the properties of equilibrium are analyzed. The results show that, in autonomous driving, the starting and ending time of morning peak and the number of commuters who arrive early and late at workplace are the same as those in manual driving. In automatic driving, however, the departure rate of arriving early at workplace is higher than that of manual driving, while the departure rate of arriving late is just the opposite. In addition, compared with manual driving, the departure time of arriving at workplace on time is earlier and the number of people queuing at the bottleneck is larger in automatic driving. However, the net utility of commuters and the total net utility of system in automatic driving are greater than those in manual driving.

Keywords: Autonomous cars, bottleneck model, activity utility, user equilibrium.

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Authors: Shams Ul Khaliq, Khan Shahzada, Bashir Alam, Fawad Bilal, Mushtaq Zeb, Faizan Akbar

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Marble industry contributes its fair share in environmental deterioration, producing voluminous amounts of mud and other excess residues obtained from marble and granite processing, polluting soil, water and air. Reusing these products in other products will not just prevent our environment from polluting but also help with economy. In this research, an attempt has been made to study the expediency of waste Marble Powder (MP) in concrete production. Various laboratory tests were performed to investigate permeability, physical and mechanical properties, such as slump, compressive strength, split tensile test, etc. Concrete test samples were fabricated with varying MP content (replacing 5-30% cement), furnished from two different sources. 5% replacement of marble dust caused 6% and 12% decrease in compressive and tensile strength respectively. These parameters gradually decreased with increasing MP content up to 30%. Most optimum results were obtained with 10% replacement. Improvement in consistency and permeability were noticed. The permeability was improved with increasing MP proportion up to 10% without substantial decrease in compressive strength. Obtained results revealed that MP as an alternative to cement in concrete production is a viable option considering its economic and environment friendly implications.

Keywords: Waste marble dust, concrete strength, environment, concrete, permeability.

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Authors: T. Kuchukhidze, N. Jalagonia, Z. Phachulia, R. Chedia

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Ceramic obtained on the base of aluminum oxide has wide application range, because it has unique properties, for example, wear-resistance, dielectric characteristics, and exploitation ability at high temperatures and in corrosive atmosphere. Low temperature synthesis of α-Al2O3 is energo-economical process and it is topical for developing technologies of corundum ceramics fabrication. In the present work possibilities of low temperature transformation of oxyhydroxides in α-Al2O3, during the presence of small amount of rare–earth elements compounds (also Th, Re), have been discussed. Aluminum unstable oxyhydroxides have been obtained by hydrolysis of aluminium isopropoxide, nitrates, sulphate, and chloride in alkaline environment at 80-90ºC temperatures. β-Al(OH)3 has been received from aluminum powder by ultrasonic development. Drying of oxyhydroxide sol has been conducted with presence of various types seeds, which amount reaches 0,1-0,2% (mas). Neodymium, holmium, thorium, lanthanum, cerium, gadolinium, disprosium nitrates and rhenium carbonyls have been used as seeds and they have been added to the sol specimens in amount of 0.1-0.2% (mas) calculated on metals. Annealing of obtained gels is carried out at 70– 1100ºC for 2 hrs. The same specimen transforms in α-Al2O3 at 1100ºC. At this temperature in case of presence of lanthanum and gadolinium transformation takes place by 70-85%. In case of presence of thorium stabilization of γ-and θ-phases takes place. It is established, that thorium causes inhibition of α-phase generation at 1100ºC, and at the time when in all other doped specimens α-phase is generated at lower temperatures (1000-1050ºC). Synthesis of various type compounds and simultaneous consolidation has developed in the furnace of OXY-GON. Composite materials containing oxide and non-oxide components close to theoretical data have been obtained in this furnace respectively. During the work the following devices have been used: X-ray diffractometer DRON-3M (Cu-Kα, Ni filter, 2º/min), High temperature vacuum furnace OXY-GON, electronic scanning microscopes Nikon ECLIPSE LV 150, NMM-800TRF, planetary mill Pulverisette 7 premium line, SHIMADZU Dynamic Ultra Micro Hardness Tester, DUH-211S, Analysette 12 Dyna sizer.

Keywords: α-Alumina, combustion, consolidation, phase transformation, seeding.

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Authors: Youngsub Oh, Youngsoon Kim

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As the second largest group among international marriages in Korea, Vietnamese married immigrant women have been exposed to psychological crisis like divorce and family violence. The purpose of this study is to understand how to counsel those women from the perspective of indigenous healing as their own psychological problem-solving way. To this end, this study reviewed Vietnamese cultural literatures on their mentality as well as Vietnamese medical literatures on indigenous healing. The research results are as follows: First, cultural foundations that have formed Vietnamese mentality are Confucian value system, reserved communication, and religious pluralism. These cultural backgrounds play an important role in understanding their own therapeutic tradition. Second, Vietnamese indigenous healing considers cause of mental disease as a collapse of balance between mind and body and environment. Thus, indigenous treatment deals with psychological problems through a recovery of the balance from the holistic perspective. In fact, indigenous healing has been actively practiced in everyday place as well as hospital until today. The implications of Vietnamese indigenous healing for multicultural counseling in Korea are as follows: First, Korean counselors need to interactively understand their own assumptions on indigenous healing as well as counselees’ own assumptions. Second, a variety of psychological intervention strategies can be drawn from Vietnamese indigenous healing. Third, indigenous healing needs to be integrated with modern techniques of counseling and psychotherapy, as both treatments are not mutually exclusive but complementary.

Keywords: Indigenous healing, Vietnamese married immigrant women in Korea, multicultural counseling.

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Authors: Mohd Fairuz Iskandar Othman, Nazrulazhar Bahaman, Zulkiflee Muslim, Faizal Abdollah

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This paper discusses a curriculum approach that will give emphasis on practical portions of teaching network security subjects in information and communication technology courses. As we are well aware, the need to use a practice and application oriented approach in education is paramount. Research on active learning and cooperative groups have shown that students grasps more and have more tendency towards obtaining and realizing soft skills like leadership, communication and team work as opposed to the more traditional theory and exam based teaching and learning. While this teaching and learning paradigm is relatively new in Malaysia, it has been practiced widely in the West. This paper examines a certain approach whereby students learning wireless security are divided into and work in small and manageable groups where there will be 2 teams which consist of black hat and white hat teams. The former will try to find and expose vulnerabilities in a wireless network while the latter will try their best to prevent such attacks on their wireless networks using hardware, software, design and enforcement of security policy and etc. This paper will try to show that the approach taken plus the use of relevant and up to date software and hardware and with suitable environment setting will hopefully expose students to a more fruitful outcome in terms of understanding of concepts, theories and their motivation to learn.

Keywords: Curriculum approach, wireless networks, wirelesssecurity.

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Authors: Chana Raksiri, Pornchai Chatchaikulsiri

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The objective of this research is parameters optimized of the stair shape workpiece which is cut by CNC Wire-Cut EDM (WEDW). The experiment material is SKD-11 steel of stair-shaped with variable height workpiece 10, 20, 30 and 40 mm. with the same 10 mm. thickness are cut by Sodick's CNC Wire-Cut EDM model AD325L. The experiments are designed by 3k full factorial experimental design at 3 level 2 factors and 9 experiments with 2 replicate. The selected two factor are servo voltage (SV) and servo feed rate (SF) and the response is cutting thickness error. The experiment is divided in two experiments. The first experiment determines the significant effective factor at confidential interval 95%. The SV factor is the significant effective factor from first result. In order to result smallest cutting thickness error of workpieces is 17 micron with the SV value is 46 volt. Also show that the lower SV value, the smaller different thickness error of workpiece. Then the second experiment is done to reduce different cutting thickness error of workpiece as small as possible by lower SV. The second experiment result show the significant effective factor at confidential interval 95% is the SV factor and the smallest cutting thickness error of workpieces reduce to 11 micron with the experiment SV value is 36 volt.

Keywords: CNC Wire-Cut, Variable Thickness Workpiece, Design of Experiments, Full Factorial Design

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Authors: Gang Li, Ghulam Mubashar Hassan, Arcady Dyskin, Cara MacNish

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Digital image correlation (DIC) is a contactless fullfield displacement and strain reconstruction technique commonly used in the field of experimental mechanics. Comparing with physical measuring devices, such as strain gauges, which only provide very restricted coverage and are expensive to deploy widely, the DIC technique provides the result with full-field coverage and relative high accuracy using an inexpensive and simple experimental setup. It is very important to study the natural patterns effect on the DIC technique because the preparation of the artificial patterns is time consuming and hectic process. The objective of this research is to study the effect of using images having natural pattern on the performance of DIC. A systematical simulation method is used to build simulated deformed images used in DIC. A parameter (subset size) used in DIC can have an effect on the processing and accuracy of DIC and even cause DIC to failure. Regarding to the picture parameters (correlation coefficient), the higher similarity of two subset can lead the DIC process to fail and make the result more inaccurate. The pictures with good and bad quality for DIC methods have been presented and more importantly, it is a systematic way to evaluate the quality of the picture with natural patterns before they install the measurement devices.

Keywords: Digital image correlation (DIC), Deformation simulation, Natural pattern, Subset size.

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Authors: Ana-Marija Stjepić, Luka Sušac, Dalia Suša Vugec

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In the last few years, examples from scientific literature and business practices show that the adoption of technological innovations increases enterprises' performance. Recently, when it comes to the field of information technology innovation, business intelligence systems (BISs) have drawn a significant amount of attention of the scientific circles. BISs can be understood as a form of technological innovation which can bring certain benefits to the organizations that are adopting it. Therefore, the aim of this paper is twofold: (1) to define determinants of successful BISs adoption in small and medium enterprises and thus contribute to this neglected research area and (2) to present the current state of BISs adoption in small and medium-sized companies. In order to do so, determinants are defined and classified into three dimensions, according to the Technology – Organization – Environment (TOE) theoretical framework that describes the impact of each dimension on technological innovations adoption. Moreover, paper brings a case study presenting the adoption of BISs in practice within an organization from tertiary (service) industry sector. Based on the results of the study, guidelines for more efficient, faster and easier BISs adoption are presented.

Keywords: Adoption, business intelligence, business intelligence systems, case study, TOE framework.

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Authors: Mahmoud Elmezain, Ayoub Al-Hamadi, Bernd Michaelis

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Hand gesture is an active area of research in the vision community, mainly for the purpose of sign language recognition and Human Computer Interaction. In this paper, we propose a system to recognize alphabet characters (A-Z) and numbers (0-9) in real-time from stereo color image sequences using Hidden Markov Models (HMMs). Our system is based on three main stages; automatic segmentation and preprocessing of the hand regions, feature extraction and classification. In automatic segmentation and preprocessing stage, color and 3D depth map are used to detect hands where the hand trajectory will take place in further step using Mean-shift algorithm and Kalman filter. In the feature extraction stage, 3D combined features of location, orientation and velocity with respected to Cartesian systems are used. And then, k-means clustering is employed for HMMs codeword. The final stage so-called classification, Baum- Welch algorithm is used to do a full train for HMMs parameters. The gesture of alphabets and numbers is recognized using Left-Right Banded model in conjunction with Viterbi algorithm. Experimental results demonstrate that, our system can successfully recognize hand gestures with 98.33% recognition rate.

Keywords: Gesture Recognition, Computer Vision & Image Processing, Pattern Recognition.

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Authors: Osuagwu Justine Ugochukwu, Sazali Abd Wahab, Sunday Sunday Akpan

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Investigating the effects of transformational and transactional leadership styles on the performance of healthcare employees at the University Teaching Hospital (UNTH) in Enugu, Nigeria, was the goal of the research. The respondents were asked to fill out a structured questionnaire. The respondents were chosen using a straightforward random sampling technique and consisted of 370 health workers at the hospital. The result of the analysis revealed that transactional and transformational leadership style has a positive while ambidextrous leadership has a negative effect on healthcare workers' performance in UNTH, Enugu. Therefore, the management of public hospitals that have the capacity to change their top management approach to leadership styles will gain substantial support from their employees’ thereby increasing organizational commitment and performance among health workers. This will have remarkable social implications, one of which is a change in the work culture and attitude of medical personnel from the seemingly anti-community of patients to friendly engagement and treatment of patients leading to a harmonious coexistence among these individuals in society. Investigating ambidextrous leadership and the use of nonparametric analysis is unique and has brought knowledge to leadership literature.

Keywords: Workers’ performance, transformational leadership, transactional leadership, governance quality, ambidextrous leadership.

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Authors: D. A. K. S. Gunaratna, N. D. Kodikara, H. L. Premaratne

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Automatic currency note recognition invariably depends on the currency note characteristics of a particular country and the extraction of features directly affects the recognition ability. Sri Lanka has not been involved in any kind of research or implementation of this kind. The proposed system “SLCRec" comes up with a solution focusing on minimizing false rejection of notes. Sri Lankan currency notes undergo severe changes in image quality in usage. Hence a special linear transformation function is adapted to wipe out noise patterns from backgrounds without affecting the notes- characteristic images and re-appear images of interest. The transformation maps the original gray scale range into a smaller range of 0 to 125. Applying Edge detection after the transformation provided better robustness for noise and fair representation of edges for new and old damaged notes. A three layer back propagation neural network is presented with the number of edges detected in row order of the notes and classification is accepted in four classes of interest which are 100, 500, 1000 and 2000 rupee notes. The experiments showed good classification results and proved that the proposed methodology has the capability of separating classes properly in varying image conditions.

Keywords: Artificial intelligence, linear transformation and pattern recognition.

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Authors: Asser S. Abdelwahab, Nabil H. Abbasy, Ragi A. Hamdy

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Marine shipping has now become one of the major worldwide contributors to pollution and greenhouse gas emissions. Hybrid ships technology based on multiple energy sources has taken a great scope of research to get rid of ship emissions and cut down fuel expenses. Insufficiency between power generated and the demand load to withstand the transient behavior on ships during severe climate conditions will lead to a blackout. Thus, an efficient energy management system (EMS) is a mandatory scope for achieving higher system efficiency while enhancing the lifetime of the onboard storage systems is another salient EMS scope. Considering energy storage system conditions, both the battery state of charge (SOC) and temperature represent important parameters to prevent any malfunction of the storage system that eventually degrades the whole system. In this paper, a two battery packs ratio fuzzy logic control model is proposed. The overall aim is to control the charging/discharging current while including both the battery SOC and temperature in the energy management system. The full designs of the proposed controllers are described and simulated using Matlab. The results prove the successfulness of the proposed controller in stabilizing the system voltage during both loading and unloading while keeping the energy storage system in a healthy condition.

Keywords: energy storage system, fuzzy logic control, hybrid ship, thermal runaway

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Authors: Safwa Yargui

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This research is about the quest for a post-war American epic poem in the age of late capitalism. This paper explores the possibility of an epic poem in the context of post-war late capitalist America, despite the prevailing scholarly scepticism regarding the existence of epic poetry after Milton’s Paradise Lost. The aim of this paper is to demonstrate the possibility of a post-war American epic through the argument of epic consciousness by distinguishing the scholarly views on the impossibility of an epic poem and the counterargument of epic consciousness which contends that American epic poetry is possible. Epic consciousness provides a significant nuance to the reading of the post-war American epic by focusing on the epic’s responsiveness to late capitalism, via various language forms; cultural manifestations; and conscious distortions of late capitalist media-related language; in addition to the epic’ conscious inclusion of the process of writing a post-war epic that requires a direct engagement with American-based materials. By focusing on interdisciplinary theoretical approaches, this paper includes both socio-cultural literary theories as well as literary and epic approaches developed by scholars that respectively contextualise the late capitalist situation and the question of post-war American epic poetry. In examining the role of consciousness, this paper aims to suggest a re-thinking of the post-war American epic that is capable of self-commitment, for the purpose of achieving a new sense of epic poetry in post-war late capitalist America.

Keywords: American epic, epic consciousness, late capitalism, post-war poetry.

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Authors: Saleh Alshehri

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Thermoelectric technology is currently being used in many industrial applications for cooling, heating and generating electricity. This research mainly focuses on using thermoelectric to cool down high-speed computer chips at different operating conditions. A previously developed and validated three-dimensional model for optimizing and assessing the performance of cascaded thermoelectric and non-cascaded thermoelectric is used in this study to investigate the possibility of decreasing the hotspot temperature of computer chip. Additionally, a test assembly is built and tested at steady-state and transient conditions. The obtained optimum thermoelectric current at steady-state condition is used to conduct a number of pulsed tests (i.e. transient tests) with different shapes to cool the computer chips hotspots. The results of the steady-state tests showed that at hotspot heat rate of 15.58 W (5.97 W/cm²), using thermoelectric current of 4.5 A has resulted in decreasing the hotspot temperature at open circuit condition (89.3 °C) by 50.1 °C. Maximum and minimum hotspot temperatures have been affected by ON and OFF duration of the electrical current pulse. Maximum hotspot temperature was resulted by longer OFF pulse period. In addition, longer ON pulse period has generated the minimum hotspot temperature.

Keywords: Thermoelectric generator, thermoelectric cooler, chip hotspots, electronic cooling.

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Authors: Juliana Panova

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Severe symptoms, such as dissociation, depersonalization, self-mutilation, suicidal ideations and gestures, are the main reasons for a person to be diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) and admitted to an inpatient Psychiatric Hospital. However, these symptoms are also indicators of a severe traumatic history as indicated by the extensive research on the topic. Unfortunately patients with such clinical presentation often are treated repeatedly only for their symptomatic behavior, while the main cause for their suffering, the trauma itself, is usually left unaddressed therapeutically. All of the highly structured, replicable, and manualized treatments lack the recognition of the uniqueness of the person and fail to respect his/her rights to experience and react in an idiosyncratic manner. Thus the communicative and adaptive meaning of such symptomatic behavior is missed. Only its pathological side is recognized and subjected to correction and stigmatization, and the message that the person is damaged goods that needs fixing is conveyed once again. However, this time the message would be even more convincing for the victim, because it is sent by mental health providers, who have the credibility to make such a judgment. The result is a revolving door of very expensive hospitalizations for only a temporary and patchy fix. In this way the patients, once victims of abuse and hardship are left invalidated and thus their re-victimization is perpetuated in their search for understanding and help. Keywordsborderline personality disorder (BPD), complex PTSD, integrative treatment of trauma, re-victimization of trauma victims.

Keywords: borderline personality disorder (BPD), complex PTSD, integrative treatment of trauma, re-victimization of trauma victims.

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Authors: Khalid Safaa Hashim Al Khalidy, Ali Jalil Abdul Kareem Chabuk, Majid Mohammed Ali Kadhim

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This research aims to study the lead pollution in the air of Babylon governorate that resulted generally from vehicles exhausts in addition to industrial and human activities.Vehicles number in Babylon governorate increased significantly after year 2003 that resulted with increase in lead emissions into the air.Measurement of lead emissions was done in seven stations distributed randomly in Babylon governorate. These stations where located in Industrial (Al-Sena'ay) Quarter, 60 street (near to Babylon sewer directorate), 40 Street (near to the first intersection), Al-Hashmia city, Al-Mahaweel city, , Al- Musayab city in addition to another station in Sayd Idris village belong to Abugharaq district (Agricultural station for comparison). The measured concentrations in these stations were compared with the standard limits of Environmental Protection Agency EPA (2 μg /m3). The results of this study showed that the average of lead concentrations ,in Babylon governorate during year 2010, was (3.13 μg/m3) which was greater than standard limits (2 μg/m3). The maximum concentration of lead was (6.41 μg / m3) recorded in the Industrial (Al-Sena'ay) Quarter during April month, while the minimum concentrations was (0.36 μg / m3) recorded in the agricultural station (Abugharaq) during December month.

Keywords: Lead, pollution, lead concentration

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Authors: Ida Rosada, Nurliani

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Today, the number of women who seek additional income to help her husband is increasing. They do that in order to be able to express themselves in the midst of the family and society. Nonetheless, housewives are in charge of managing family’s income and prepare food for the family. The objective of this research is 1) to analyze the effect of the dual role of women to household income and 2) to analyze the effect of the dual role to consumption patterns. The study used a qualitative approach, data collection techniques are through observation, interviews, and documentation on farming households. The data was analysed qualitative descriptively. The results found that: 1) The revenue contribution of women who play double role in the informal sector amounted to 34.07% (less than 50%). 2) The main reason that the respondents worked in the informal sector is to be able to send their children to school (34%) and to improve household economy condition (28%). 3) After earning additional income, respondents said that they can contribute to increase the family’s income and to cover the family shortage (82%); 4) Respondents’ opinion to changes in food consumption after performing the dual role is the ability to purchase and provide the desired food (44%) and changing patterns of consumption per day (30%).

Keywords: Dual role, the informal sector, consumption patterns, household income.

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Authors: A. L. Ho, N. Ab. Aziz, F. S. Taip, M. N. Ibrahim

Abstract:

The study of the fouling deposition of pink guava juice (PGJ) is relatively new research compared to milk fouling deposit. In this work, a new experimental set-up was developed to imitate the fouling formation in heat exchanger, namely a continuous flow experimental set-up heat exchanger. The new experimental setup was operated under industrial pasteurization temperature of PGJ, which was at 93°C. While the flow rate and pasteurization period were based on the experimental capacity, which were 0.5 and 1 liter/min for the flow rate and the pasteurization period was set for 1 hour. Characterization of the fouling deposit was determined by using various methods. Microstructure of the deposits was carried out using ESEM. Proximate analyses were performed to determine the composition of moisture, fat, protein, fiber, ash and carbohydrate content. A study on the hardness and stickiness of the fouling deposit was done using a texture analyzer. The presence of seedstone in pink guava juice was also analyzed using a particle analyzer. The findings shown that seedstone from pink guava juice ranging from 168 to 200μm and carbohydrate was found to be a major composition (47.7% of fouling deposit consists of carbohydrate). Comparison between the hardness and stickiness of the deposits at two different flow rates showed that fouling deposits were harder and denser at higher flow rate. Findings from this work provide basis knowledge for further study on fouling and cleaning of PGJ.

Keywords: Pink guava juice, fouling deposit, heat exchanger.

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Authors: Sirirat Taneerananon

Abstract:

This paper presents the results of a study of the ultra-poor in the south of Thailand, revisited after 10 years since the original study in 2000. The original study was conducted in four provinces. The first two namely Phatthalung and Nakorn were chosen to represent the Thai Buddhists and the others, Satun and Pattani were chosen to represent the Thai Muslims. For this study, only the results from the three provinces except Pattani are reported as it was difficult and dangerous to conduct fieldwork in Pattani due to the continued unrest in the area since 2005.

The objectives of the study are to find out the changes of the poverty situation after 10 years and to see the impacts of the poverty reduction projects implemented by the government on the poor. The research methodology used both quantitative and qualitative methods. The same villages in the four provinces studied in 1999 were again chosen. In each village, five ultra-poor people and heads of the villages were interviewed. The results show that the poverty situation of the ultra-poor groups has not changed much since they lacked the basic key factor to get themselves out of poverty: The ownership of land. Their chronic poverty situation has been passed on from the last generation. In the province of Phatthalung, the ultra-poor have improved in terms of economic situation because of the big increase in the price of rubber. However, the same could not be said for other provinces. Even though the government’s projects have not reduced the poverty directly, the projects have significantly contributed to the improvement of the quality of life of the poor and the people in the areas. 

Keywords: Poverty, Southern Thailand, Ultra-poor.

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Authors: Ivanova B. Natalia, Djambova Т. Svetlana, Hristev S. Ivailo

Abstract:

The acoustic properties of recycled felt panels have been investigated using various methods. Experimentally, the sound insulation of the panels has been evaluated for frequencies in the range of 600 Hz to 4000 Hz, utilizing a small-sized acoustic chamber. Additionally, the sound absorption coefficient for the frequency range of 63 Hz to 4000 Hz was measured according to the EN ISO 354 standard in a laboratory reverberation room. This research was deemed necessary after conducting reverberation time measurements of a university classroom following the EN ISO 3382-2 standard. The measurements indicated values of 2.86 s at 500 Hz, 3.23 s at 1000 Hz, and 2.53 s at 2000 Hz, which significantly exceeded the requirements set by the national regulatory framework (0.6 s) for such premises. For this reason, recycled felt panels have been investigated in the laboratory, showing very good acoustic properties at high frequencies. To enhance performance in the low frequencies, the influence of the distance of the panel spacing was examined. Furthermore, the sound insulation of the panels was studied to expand the possibilities of their application, both for the acoustic treatment of educational and multifunctional halls and for sound insulation purposes (e.g., a suspended ceiling with an air gap passing from room to room). As a conclusion, a theoretical acoustic design of the classroom has been carried out with suggestions for improvements to achieve the necessary acoustic and aesthetic parameters for such rooms.

Keywords: Acoustic panels, recycled felt, sound absorption, sound insulation, classroom acoustics.

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Authors: Mu-Yen Chen, Min-Hsuan Fan, Chia-Chen Chen, Siang-Yu Jhong

Abstract:

In recent years, real estate prediction or valuation has been a topic of discussion in many developed countries. Improper hype created by investors leads to fluctuating prices of real estate, affecting many consumers to purchase their own homes. Therefore, scholars from various countries have conducted research in real estate valuation and prediction. With the back-propagation neural network that has been popular in recent years and the orthogonal array in the Taguchi method, this study aimed to find the optimal parameter combination at different levels of orthogonal array after the system presented different parameter combinations, so that the artificial neural network obtained the most accurate results. The experimental results also demonstrated that the method presented in the study had a better result than traditional machine learning. Finally, it also showed that the model proposed in this study had the optimal predictive effect, and could significantly reduce the cost of time in simulation operation. The best predictive results could be found with a fewer number of experiments more efficiently. Thus users could predict a real estate transaction price that is not far from the current actual prices.

Keywords: Artificial Neural Network, Taguchi Method, Real Estate Valuation Model.

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Authors: Amin Zabihinejad, Philippe Viarouge

Abstract:

In this paper, a direct power control (DPC) strategies have been investigated in order to control a high power AC/DC converter with time variable load. This converter is composed of a three level three phase neutral point clamped (NPC) converter as rectifier and an H-bridge four quadrant current control converter. In the high power application, controller not only must adjust the desire outputs but also decrease the level of distortions which are injected to the network from the converter. Regarding to this reason and nonlinearity of the power electronic converter, the conventional controllers cannot achieve appropriate responses. In this research, the precise mathematical analysis has been employed to design the appropriate controller in order to control the time variable load. A DPC controller has been proposed and simulated using Matlab/ Simulink. In order to verify the simulation result, a real time simulator- OPAL-RT- has been employed. In this paper, the dynamic response and stability of the high power NPC with variable load has been investigated and compared with conventional types using a real time simulator. The results proved that the DPC controller is more stable and has more precise outputs in comparison with conventional controller.

Keywords: Direct Power Control, Three Level Rectifier, Real Time Simulator, High Power Application.

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Authors: Heeyeul Kwon, Yongtae Park

Abstract:

Despite the highly touted benefits, emerging technologies have unleashed pervasive concerns regarding unintended and unforeseen social impacts. Thus, those wishing to create safe and socially acceptable products need to identify such side effects and mitigate them prior to the market proliferation. Various methodologies in the field of technology assessment (TA), namely Delphi, impact assessment, and scenario planning, have been widely incorporated in such a circumstance. However, literatures face a major limitation in terms of sole reliance on participatory workshop activities. They unfortunately missed out the availability of a massive untapped data source of futuristic information flooding through the Internet. This research thus seeks to gain insights into utilization of futuristic data, future-oriented documents from the Internet, as a supplementary method to generate social impact scenarios whilst capturing perspectives of experts from a wide variety of disciplines. To this end, network analysis is conducted based on the social keywords extracted from the futuristic documents by text mining, which is then used as a guide to produce a comprehensive set of detailed scenarios. Our proposed approach facilitates harmonized depictions of possible hazardous consequences of emerging technologies and thereby makes decision makers more aware of, and responsive to, broad qualitative uncertainties.

Keywords: Emerging technologies, futuristic data, scenario, text mining.

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Authors: Gizelle K. Vianna, Gabriel V. Cunha, Gustavo S. Oliveira

Abstract:

Foliage diseases in plants can cause a reduction in both quality and quantity of agricultural production. Intelligent detection of plant diseases is an essential research topic as it may help monitoring large fields of crops by automatically detecting the symptoms of foliage diseases. This work investigates ways to recognize the late blight disease from the analysis of tomato digital images, collected directly from the field. A pair of multilayer perceptron neural network analyzes the digital images, using data from both RGB and HSL color models, and classifies each image pixel. One neural network is responsible for the identification of healthy regions of the tomato leaf, while the other identifies the injured regions. The outputs of both networks are combined to generate the final classification of each pixel from the image and the pixel classes are used to repaint the original tomato images by using a color representation that highlights the injuries on the plant. The new images will have only green, red or black pixels, if they came from healthy or injured portions of the leaf, or from the background of the image, respectively. The system presented an accuracy of 97% in detection and estimation of the level of damage on the tomato leaves caused by late blight.

Keywords: Artificial neural networks, digital image processing, pattern recognition.

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