Search results for: Landscape pattern

Authors: Raquel Vianna Duarte Cardoso, Eduarda Lobato Faria, José Jorge Boueri

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Rapid urbanization has transformed the global landscape, presenting significant challenges to public health. This article delves into the impact of urbanization on the spread of infectious diseases in cities and identifies crucial strategies to enhance urban community resilience. Massive urbanization over recent decades has created conducive environments for the rapid spread of diseases due to population density, mobility, and unequal living conditions. Urbanization has been observed to increase exposure to pathogens and foster conditions conducive to disease outbreaks, including seasonal flu, vector-borne diseases, and respiratory infections. In order to tackle these issues, a range of cross-disciplinary approaches are suggested. These encompass the enhancement of urban healthcare infrastructure, emphasizing the need for robust investments in hospitals, clinics, and healthcare systems to keep pace with the burgeoning healthcare requirements in urban environments. Moreover, the establishment of disease monitoring and surveillance mechanisms is indispensable, as it allows for the timely detection of outbreaks, enabling swift responses. Additionally, community engagement and education play a pivotal role in advocating for personal hygiene, vaccination, and preventive measures, thus playing a pivotal role in diminishing disease transmission. Lastly, the promotion of sustainable urban planning, which includes the creation of cities with green spaces, access to clean water, and proper sanitation, can significantly mitigate the risks associated with waterborne and vector-borne diseases. The article is based on the analysis of scientific literature, and it offers a comprehensive insight into the complexities of the relationship between urbanization and health. It places a strong emphasis on the urgent need for integrated approaches to improve urban resilience in the face of health challenges.

Keywords: Infectious diseases dissemination, public health, urbanization impacts, urban resilience.

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Authors: Hariton N. Costin, Iulian Ciocoiu, Tudor Barbu, Cristian Rotariu

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In this paper three different approaches for person verification and identification, i.e. by means of fingerprints, face and voice recognition, are studied. Face recognition uses parts-based representation methods and a manifold learning approach. The assessment criterion is recognition accuracy. The techniques under investigation are: a) Local Non-negative Matrix Factorization (LNMF); b) Independent Components Analysis (ICA); c) NMF with sparse constraints (NMFsc); d) Locality Preserving Projections (Laplacianfaces). Fingerprint detection was approached by classical minutiae (small graphical patterns) matching through image segmentation by using a structural approach and a neural network as decision block. As to voice / speaker recognition, melodic cepstral and delta delta mel cepstral analysis were used as main methods, in order to construct a supervised speaker-dependent voice recognition system. The final decision (e.g. “accept-reject" for a verification task) is taken by using a majority voting technique applied to the three biometrics. The preliminary results, obtained for medium databases of fingerprints, faces and voice recordings, indicate the feasibility of our study and an overall recognition precision (about 92%) permitting the utilization of our system for a future complex biometric card.

Keywords: Biometry, image processing, pattern recognition, speech analysis.

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Authors: Ki Ok Choi, Sung Ho Hong, Dong Suck Kim, Don Mook Choi

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Rack type warehouses are different from general buildings in the kinds, amount, and arrangement of stored goods, so the fire risk of rack type warehouses is different from those buildings. The fire pattern of rack type warehouses is different in combustion characteristic and storing condition of stored goods. The initial fire burning rate is different in the surface condition of materials, but the running time of fire is closely related with the kinds of stored materials and stored conditions. The stored goods of the warehouse are consisted of diverse combustibles, combustible liquid, and so on. Fire detection time may be delayed because the residents are less than office and commercial buildings. If fire detectors installed in rack type warehouses are inadaptable, the fire of the warehouse may be the great fire because of delaying of fire detection. In this paper, we studied what kinds of fire detectors are optimized in early detecting of rack type warehouse fire by real-scale fire tests. The fire detectors used in the tests are rate of rise type, fixed type, photo electric type, and aspirating type detectors. We considered optimum fire detecting method in rack type warehouses suggested by the response characteristic and comparative analysis of the fire detectors.

Keywords: Fire detector, rack, response characteristic, warehouse.

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Authors: C. Nutphuang, S. Chirarattananon, V.D. Hien

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In research on natural ventilation, and passive cooling with forced convection, is essential to know how heat flows in a solid object and the pattern of temperature distribution on their surfaces, and eventually how air flows through and convects heat from the surfaces of steel under roof. This paper presents some results from running the computational fluid dynamic program (CFD) by comparison between natural ventilation and forced convection within roof attic that is received directly from solar radiation. The CFD program for modeling air flow inside roof attic has been modified to allow as two cases. First case, the analysis under natural ventilation, is closed area in roof attic and second case, the analysis under forced convection, is opened area in roof attic. These extend of all cases to available predictions of variations such as temperature, pressure, and mass flow rate distributions in each case within roof attic. The comparison shows that this CFD program is an effective model for predicting air flow of temperature and heat transfer coefficient distribution within roof attic. The result shows that forced convection can help to reduce heat transfer through roof attic and an around area of steel core has temperature inner zone lower than natural ventilation type. The different temperature on the steel core of roof attic of two cases was 10-15 oK.

Keywords: CFD program, natural ventilation, forcedconvection, heat transfer, air flow.

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Authors: R. Sudhesh Solomon, P. Y. K. L. Srinivas, Abhay Narayan, Amitava Das

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Users in social networks either unicast or broadcast their messages. At mention is the popular way of unicasting for Twitter whereas general tweeting could be considered as broadcasting method. Understanding the information flow and dynamics within a Social Network and modeling the same is a promising and an open research area called Information Diffusion. This paper seeks an answer to a fundamental question - understanding if the at-mention network or the unicasting pattern in social media is purely random in nature or is there any user specific selectional preference? To answer the question we present an empirical analysis to understand the sociological aspects of Twitter mentions network within a social network community. To understand the sociological behavior we analyze the values (Schwartz model: Achievement, Benevolence, Conformity, Hedonism, Power, Security, Self-Direction, Stimulation, Traditional and Universalism) of all the users. Empirical results suggest that values traits are indeed salient cue to understand how the mention-based communication network functions. For example, we notice that individuals possessing similar values unicast among themselves more often than with other value type people. We also observe that traditional and self-directed people do not maintain very close relationship in the network with the people of different values traits.

Keywords: Social network analysis, information diffusion, personality and values, Twitter Mentions Network.

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Authors: K. Durairaj, I. N. Umar

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The asynchronous discussion forum is one of the most widely used activities in learning management system environment. Online forum allows participants to interact, construct knowledge, and can be used to complement face to face sessions in blended learning courses. However, to what extent do the students perceive the benefits or advantages of forum remain to be seen. Through content and social network analyses, instructors will be able to gauge the students’ engagement and knowledge construction level. Thus, this study aims to analyze the students’ level of knowledge construction and their participation level that occur through online discussion. It also attempts to investigate the relationship between the level of knowledge construction and their social interaction patterns. The sample involves 23 students undertaking a master course in one public university in Malaysia. The asynchronous discussion forum was conducted for three weeks as part of the course requirement. The finding indicates that the level of knowledge construction is quite low. Also, the density value of 0.11 indicating the overall communication among the participants in the forum is low. This study reveals that strong and significant correlations between SNA measures (in-degree centrality, out-degree centrality) and level of knowledge construction. Thus, allocating these active students in different group aids the interactive discussion takes place. Finally, based upon the findings, some recommendations to increase students’ level of knowledge construction and also for further research are proposed.

Keywords: Asynchronous Discussion Forums, Content Analysis, Knowledge Construction, Social Network Analysis.

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Authors: M. A Anjum, M. Y. Javed, A. Basit

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In this paper a new approach to face recognition is presented that achieves double dimension reduction making the system computationally efficient with better recognition results. In pattern recognition techniques, discriminative information of image increases with increase in resolution to a certain extent, consequently face recognition results improve with increase in face image resolution and levels off when arriving at a certain resolution level. In the proposed model of face recognition, first image decimation algorithm is applied on face image for dimension reduction to a certain resolution level which provides best recognition results. Due to better computational speed and feature extraction potential of Discrete Cosine Transform (DCT) it is applied on face image. A subset of coefficients of DCT from low to mid frequencies that represent the face adequately and provides best recognition results is retained. A trade of between decimation factor, number of DCT coefficients retained and recognition rate with minimum computation is obtained. Preprocessing of the image is carried out to increase its robustness against variations in poses and illumination level. This new model has been tested on different databases which include ORL database, Yale database and a color database. The proposed technique has performed much better compared to other techniques. The significance of the model is two fold: (1) dimension reduction up to an effective and suitable face image resolution (2) appropriate DCT coefficients are retained to achieve best recognition results with varying image poses, intensity and illumination level.

Keywords: Biometrics, DCT, Face Recognition, Feature extraction.

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Authors: Pimploi Tirastittam, Sawanath Treesathon, Amornrath Ongkawat

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Learning Management System (LMS) is the system which uses to manage the learning in order to grouping the content and learning activity between the lecturer and learner including online examination and evaluation. Nowadays, it is the borderless learning era so the learning activities can be accessed from everywhere in the world and also anytime via the information technology and media. The learner can easily access to the knowledge so the different in time and distance is not a constraint for learning anymore. The learning pattern which was used in this research is the integration of the in-class learning and online learning via internet and will be able to monitor the progress by the Learning management system which will create the fast response and accessible learning process via the social media. In order to increase the capability and freedom of the learner, the system can show the current and history of the learning document, video conference and also has the chat room for the learner and lecturer to interact to each other. So the objectives of the “The Design and Applied of Learning Management System via Social Media on Internet: Case Study of Operating System for Business Subject” are to expand the opportunity of learning and to increase the efficiency of learning as well as increase the communication channel between lecturer and student. The data of this research was collect from 30 users of the system which are students who enroll in the subject. And the result of the research is in the “Very Good” which is conformed to the hypothesis.

Keywords: Learning Management System, Social Media.

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Authors: Axay J Mehta, Hema A Mehta, T.C.Manjunath, C. Ardil

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In this paper, the modelling and design of artificial neural network architecture for load forecasting purposes is investigated. The primary pre-requisite for power system planning is to arrive at realistic estimates of future demand of power, which is known as Load Forecasting. Short Term Load Forecasting (STLF) helps in determining the economic, reliable and secure operating strategies for power system. The dependence of load on several factors makes the load forecasting a very challenging job. An over estimation of the load may cause premature investment and unnecessary blocking of the capital where as under estimation of load may result in shortage of equipment and circuits. It is always better to plan the system for the load slightly higher than expected one so that no exigency may arise. In this paper, a load-forecasting model is proposed using a multilayer neural network with an appropriately modified back propagation learning algorithm. Once the neural network model is designed and trained, it can forecast the load of the power system 24 hours ahead on daily basis and can also forecast the cumulative load on daily basis. The real load data that is used for the Artificial Neural Network training was taken from LDC, Gujarat Electricity Board, Jambuva, Gujarat, India. The results show that the load forecasting of the ANN model follows the actual load pattern more accurately throughout the forecasted period.

Keywords: Power system, Load forecasting, Neural Network, Neuron, Stabilization, Network structure, Load.

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Authors: Basavaraj V. Patil, Uday Chakkingal, T. S. Prasanna Kumar

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Equal Channel Angular Pressing (ECAP) is currently being widely investigated because of its potential to produce ultrafine grained microstructures in metals and alloys. A sound knowledge of the plastic deformation and strain distribution is necessary for understanding the relationships between strain inhomogeneity and die geometry. Considerable research has been reported on finite element analysis of this process, assuming threedimensional plane strain condition. However, the two-dimensional models are not suitable due to the geometry of the dies, especially in cylindrical ones. In the present work, three-dimensional simulation of ECAP process was carried out for six outer corner radii (sharp to 10 mm in steps of 2 mm), with channel angle 105¶Çü▒, for strain hardening aluminium alloy (AA 6101) using ABAQUS/Standard software. Strain inhomogeneity is presented and discussed for all cases. Pattern of strain variation along selected radial lines in the body of the workpiece is presented. It is found from the results that the outer corner has a significant influence on the strain distribution in the body of work-piece. Based on inhomogeneity and average strain criteria, there is an optimum outer corner radius.

Keywords: Equal Channel Angular Pressing, Finite Element Analysis, strain inhomogeneity, plastic equivalent strain, ultra fine grain size, aluminium alloy 6101.

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Authors: M. K. Bhuyan, P. K. Bora, D. Ghosh

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One very interesting field of research in Pattern Recognition that has gained much attention in recent times is Gesture Recognition. In this paper, we consider a form of dynamic hand gestures that are characterized by total movement of the hand (arm) in space. For these types of gestures, the shape of the hand (palm) during gesturing does not bear any significance. In our work, we propose a model-based method for tracking hand motion in space, thereby estimating the hand motion trajectory. We employ the dynamic time warping (DTW) algorithm for time alignment and normalization of spatio-temporal variations that exist among samples belonging to the same gesture class. During training, one template trajectory and one prototype feature vector are generated for every gesture class. Features used in our work include some static and dynamic motion trajectory features. Recognition is accomplished in two stages. In the first stage, all unlikely gesture classes are eliminated by comparing the input gesture trajectory to all the template trajectories. In the next stage, feature vector extracted from the input gesture is compared to all the class prototype feature vectors using a distance classifier. Experimental results demonstrate that our proposed trajectory estimator and classifier is suitable for Human Computer Interaction (HCI) platform.

Keywords: Hand gesture, human computer interaction, key video object plane, dynamic time warping.

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Authors: Shih-Yi Chao

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The similarity comparison of RNA secondary structures is important in studying the functions of RNAs. In recent years, most existing tools represent the secondary structures by tree-based presentation and calculate the similarity by tree alignment distance. Different to previous approaches, we propose a new method based on maximum clique detection algorithm to extract the maximum common structural elements in compared RNA secondary structures. A new graph-based similarity measurement and maximum common subgraph detection procedures for comparing purely RNA secondary structures is introduced. Given two RNA secondary structures, the proposed algorithm consists of a process to determine the score of the structural similarity, followed by comparing vertices labelling, the labelled edges and the exact degree of each vertex. The proposed algorithm also consists of a process to extract the common structural elements between compared secondary structures based on a proposed maximum clique detection of the problem. This graph-based model also can work with NC-IUB code to perform the pattern-based searching. Therefore, it can be used to identify functional RNA motifs from database or to extract common substructures between complex RNA secondary structures. We have proved the performance of this proposed algorithm by experimental results. It provides a new idea of comparing RNA secondary structures. This tool is helpful to those who are interested in structural bioinformatics.

Keywords: Clique detection, labeled vertices, RNA secondary structures, subgraph, similarity.

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Authors: R. Ruslee, H. Gollee

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Functional electrical stimulation (FES) is a commonly used technique in rehabilitation and often associated with rapid muscle fatigue which becomes the limiting factor in its applications. The objective of this study is to investigate the effects on the onset of fatigue of conventional synchronous stimulation, as well as asynchronous stimulation that mimic voluntary muscle activation targeting different motor units which are activated sequentially or randomly via multiple pairs of stimulation electrodes. We investigate three different approaches with various electrode configurations, as well as different patterns of stimulation applied to the gastrocnemius muscle: Conventional Synchronous Stimulation (CSS), Asynchronous Sequential Stimulation (ASS) and Asynchronous Random Stimulation (ARS). Stimulation was applied repeatedly for 300 ms followed by 700 ms of no-stimulation with 40 Hz effective frequency for all protocols. Ten able-bodied volunteers (28±3 years old) participated in this study. As fatigue indicators, we focused on the analysis of Normalized Fatigue Index (NFI), Fatigue Time Interval (FTI) and pre-post Twitch-Tetanus Ratio (ΔTTR). The results demonstrated that ASS and ARS give higher NFI and longer FTI confirming less fatigue for asynchronous stimulation. In addition, ASS and ARS resulted in higher ΔTTR than conventional CSS. In this study, we proposed a randomly distributed stimulation method for the application of FES and investigated its suitability for reducing muscle fatigue compared to previously applied methods. The results validated that asynchronous stimulation reduces fatigue, and indicates that random stimulation may improve fatigue resistance in some conditions.

Keywords: Asynchronous stimulation, electrode configuration, functional electrical stimulation, muscle fatigue, pattern stimulation, random stimulation, sequential stimulation, synchronous stimulation.

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Authors: Rami N. Khushaba, Adel Al-Jumaily

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The myoelectric signal (MES) is one of the Biosignals utilized in helping humans to control equipments. Recent approaches in MES classification to control prosthetic devices employing pattern recognition techniques revealed two problems, first, the classification performance of the system starts degrading when the number of motion classes to be classified increases, second, in order to solve the first problem, additional complicated methods were utilized which increase the computational cost of a multifunction myoelectric control system. In an effort to solve these problems and to achieve a feasible design for real time implementation with high overall accuracy, this paper presents a new method for feature extraction in MES recognition systems. The method works by extracting features using Wavelet Packet Transform (WPT) applied on the MES from multiple channels, and then employs Fuzzy c-means (FCM) algorithm to generate a measure that judges on features suitability for classification. Finally, Principle Component Analysis (PCA) is utilized to reduce the size of the data before computing the classification accuracy with a multilayer perceptron neural network. The proposed system produces powerful classification results (99% accuracy) by using only a small portion of the original feature set.

Keywords: Biomedical Signal Processing, Data mining andInformation Extraction, Machine Learning, Rehabilitation.

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Authors: Sanjida Ahmed Sinthia

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Bangladesh is one of the poorest countries in the world. There are several reasons for this insufficiency and uncontrolled population growth is one of the prime reasons. Others include low economic progress, imbalanced resource management, unemployment and underemployment, urban migration and natural catastrophes etc. As a result, the rate of urban poor is increasing inevitably in every sphere of urban cities in Bangladesh and Dhaka is the most affected one. Besides there is scarcity of urban land, housing, urban infrastructure and amenities which create pressure on urban cities and mostly encroach the open space, wetlands that causes environmental degradation. Government has no or limited control over these due to poor government policy and management, political pressure and lack of resource management. Unfortunately, over centralization and bureaucracy creates unnecessary delay and interruptions in any government initiations. There is also no coordination between government and private sector developer to solve the problem of urban Poor. To understand the problem of these huge populations this paper analyzes one of the single largest slum areas in Dhaka, Korail Slum. The study focuses on socio demographic analysis, morphological pattern and role of different actors responsible for the improvements of the area and recommended some possible steps for determining the potential outcomes.

Keywords: Demographic analysis, environmental degradation, physical condition, government policy, housing and land management policy.

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Authors: Samuel Olajide Babawale, O. O. Ogunkoya

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The study mapped selected wells in Inisa town, Osun state, in the guinea savanna region of southwest Nigeria, and determined the water quality considering certain elements. It also assessed the variation in the elevation of the water table surface to depth of the wells in the months of August and November. This is with a view to determine the level of contamination of the water with respect to land use and anthropogenic activities, and also to determine the variation that occurs in the quantity of well water in the rainy season and the start of the dry season. Results show a random pattern of the distribution of the mapped wells and shows that there is a shallow water table in the study area. The temporal changes in the elevation show that there are no significant variations in the depth of the water table surface over the period of study implying that there is a sufficient amount of water available to the town all year round. It also shows a high concentration of sodium in the water sample analyzed compared to other elements that were considered, which include iron, copper, calcium, and lead. This is attributed majorly to anthropogenic activities through the disposal of waste in landfill sites. There is a low concentration of lead which is a good indication of a reduced level of pollution.

Keywords: Water quality, temporal changes, elevation, water table surface, land use, anthropogenic activities.

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Authors: Mildred Moreno Villanueva

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Public space is essential to strengthen the social and urban fabric and the social cohesion; there lies the importance of its study. Hence, the aim of this paper is to analyze the quality of public space in the XXI century in both quantitative and qualitative terms. In this article, the concept of public space includes open spaces such as parks, public squares and walking areas. To make this analysis, we take Mexico City as the case study. It has a population of nearly 9 million inhabitants and is composed of sixteen boroughs. For this analysis, we consider both existing public spaces and the government intervention for building and improving new and existent public spaces. Results show that on the one hand, quantitatively there is not an equitable distribution of public spaces due to both the growth of the city itself as well as due to the absence of political will to create public spaces. Another factor is the evolution of this city, which has been growing merely in a “patched pattern”, where public space has played no role at all with a total absence of urban design. On the other hand, qualitatively, even the boroughs with the most public spaces have not shown interest in making these spaces qualitatively inclusive and open to the general population aiming for integration. Therefore, urban projects that privatize public space seem to be the rule, rather than a rehabilitation effort of the existent public spaces. Hence, state intervention should reinforce its role as an agent of social change acting in benefit of the majority of the inhabitants with the promotion of more inclusive public spaces.

Keywords: Exclusion, inclusion, Mexico City, public space.

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Authors: Rima Hleiss, Elie Bitar, Mahmoud Hassan, Mohamad Khalil

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A comprehensive study of object recognition in the human brain requires combining both spatial and temporal analysis of brain activity. Here, we are mainly interested in three issues: the time perception of visual objects, the ability of discrimination between two particular categories (objects vs. animals), and the possibility to identify a particular spatial representation of visual objects. Our experiment consisted of acquiring dense electroencephalographic (EEG) signals during a picture-naming task comprising a set of objects and animals’ images. These EEG responses were recorded from nine participants. In order to determine the time perception of the presented visual stimulus, we analyzed the Event Related Potentials (ERPs) derived from the recorded EEG signals. The analysis of these signals showed that the brain perceives animals and objects with different time instants. Concerning the discrimination of the two categories, the support vector machine (SVM) was applied on the instantaneous EEG (excellent temporal resolution: on the order of millisecond) to categorize the visual stimuli into two different classes. The spatial differences between the evoked responses of the two categories were also investigated. The results showed a variation of the neural activity with the properties of the visual input. Results showed also the existence of a spatial pattern of electrodes over particular regions of the scalp in correspondence to their responses to the visual inputs.

Keywords: Brain activity, dense EEG, evoked responses, spatiotemporal analysis, SVM, perception.

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Authors: Lee Bih Ni, Emily Doreen Lee, Wee Hui Yean

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This paper was prepared to see the perceptions of online lectures regarding collaborative learning, in terms of how lecturers view online collaborative learning in the higher learning institution. The purpose of this study was conducted to determine the perceptions of online lectures about collaborative learning, especially how lecturers see online collaborative learning in the university. Adult learning education enhance collaborative learning culture with the target of involving learners in the learning process to make teaching and learning more effective and open at the university. This will finally make students learning that will assist each other. It is also to cut down the pressure of loneliness and isolation might felt among adult learners. Their ways in collaborative online was also determined. In this paper, researchers collect data using questionnaires instruments. The collected data were analyzed and interpreted. By analyzing the data, researchers report the results according the proof taken from the respondents. Results from the study, it is not only dependent on the lecturer but also a student to shape a good collaborative learning practice. Rational concepts and pattern to achieve these targets be clear right from the beginning and may be good seen by a number of proposals submitted and include how the higher learning institution has trained with ongoing lectures online. Advantages of online collaborative learning show that lecturers should be trained effectively. Studies have seen that the lecturer aware of online collaborative learning. This positive attitude will encourage the higher learning institution to continue to give the knowledge and skills required.

Keywords: Collaborative Online Learning, Lecturers’ Training.

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Authors: Chong Zhang, Mu-Xuan Tao

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In several earthquakes, numerous reinforced concrete (RC) frames subjected to seismic excitation demonstrated a collapse pattern characterized by column hinges, though designed according to the Strong-Column-Weak-Beam (S-C-W-B) criteria. The effect of biaxial seismic excitation on the disparity between design and actual performance is carefully investigated in this article. First, a modified load contour method is proposed to derive a closed-form equation of biaxial bending moment strength, which is verified by numerical and experimental tests. Afterwards, a group of time history analyses of a simple frame modeled by fiber beam-column elements subjected to biaxial seismic excitation are conducted to verify that the current S-C-W-B criteria are not adequate to prevent the occurrence of column hinges. A biaxial over-strength factor is developed based on the proposed equation, and the reinforcement of columns is appropriately amplified with this factor to prevent the occurrence of column hinges under biaxial excitation, which is proved to be effective by another group of time history analyses.

Keywords: Biaxial bending moment strength, biaxial seismic excitation, fiber beam-column model, load contour method, strong-column-weak-beam.

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Authors: Sagar Jajoo

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Urban planning is the need of the hour in a rapidly developing county like India. In essence, urban planning enhances the quality of land at a reasonable cost. Naya (New) Raipur is the new planned capital of the Indian state of Chhattisgarh, and is one of India’s few planned cities. Over the next decade it will drastically change the landscape of the state of Chhattisgarh. This new planned development is quintessential in growing this backward region and providing for future infrastructure. Key questions that arise are: How are people living in the surrounding region of New Raipur affected by its development? Are the affected people satisfied with compensation and rehabilitation that has been provided by the New Raipur Development Authority? To answer these questions, field research study in the form of questionnaires, interviews and site visits was conducted. To summarize the findings, while a majority of the surveyed population was dissatisfied with the rehabilitation and compensation provided by the New Raipur Development Authority, they were very positive about the success of the new development. Most thought that the new city would help their careers, improve job opportunities, improve prospects for their future generations, and benefit society as a whole.

To improve rehabilitation schemes for the future, the reasons for the negative sentiment brewing amongst the villagers regarding the monetary compensation was investigated. Most villagers deemed the monetary compensation to be lacking as they had squandered their financial windfall already. With numerous interviews and site visits, it was discovered that the lump sum form of monetary compensation was to blame. With a huge sum of money received at once and a lack of financial education, many villagers squandered this newly gained money on unnecessary purchases such as alcohol and expensive vehicles without investing for the long run in farmland and education for their children. One recommendation proposed to the New Raipur Development Authority (NRDA) for future monetary compensation design in times of rehabilitating people was to provide payments in installments rather than lump sums and educate the people about investing the compensation money wisely. This would save them from wasting money they receive and the ensuing dissatisfaction of squandering that money.

Keywords: Compensation, Naya Raipur, Rehabilitation, Satisfaction Survey, Urban Planning.

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Authors: V.S.Kale, S.R.Bhide, P.P.Bedekar, G.V.K.Mohan

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The protection of parallel transmission lines has been a challenging task due to mutual coupling between the adjacent circuits of the line. This paper presents a novel scheme for detection and classification of faults on parallel transmission lines. The proposed approach uses combination of wavelet transform and neural network, to solve the problem. While wavelet transform is a powerful mathematical tool which can be employed as a fast and very effective means of analyzing power system transient signals, artificial neural network has a ability to classify non-linear relationship between measured signals by identifying different patterns of the associated signals. The proposed algorithm consists of time-frequency analysis of fault generated transients using wavelet transform, followed by pattern recognition using artificial neural network to identify the type of the fault. MATLAB/Simulink is used to generate fault signals and verify the correctness of the algorithm. The adaptive discrimination scheme is tested by simulating different types of fault and varying fault resistance, fault location and fault inception time, on a given power system model. The simulation results show that the proposed scheme for fault diagnosis is able to classify all the faults on the parallel transmission line rapidly and correctly.

Keywords: Artificial neural network, fault detection and classification, parallel transmission lines, wavelet transform.

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Authors: A. S. Telang, P. P. Bedekar

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Flexible AC transmission system controllers play an important role in controlling the line power flow and in improving voltage profiles of the power system network. They can be used to increase the reliability and efficiency of transmission and distribution system. The modeling of these FACTS controllers in power flow calculations have become a challenging research problem. This paper presents a simple and systematic approach for a steady state power flow calculations of power system with STATCOM (Static Synchronous Compensator). It shows how systematically STATCOM can be implemented in conventional power flow calculations. The main contribution of this paper is to investigate this approach for two special conditions i.e. consideration of load increase pattern incorporating load change (active, reactive and both active and reactive) at all load buses simultaneously and the line contingencies under such load change. Such investigation proves to be relevant for determination of strategy for the optimal placement of STATCOM to enhance the voltage stability. The performance has been evaluated on many standard IEEE test systems. The results for standard IEEE-30 bus test system are presented here.

Keywords: Load flow analysis, Newton-Raphson (N-R) power flow, Flexible AC transmission system, FACTS, Static synchronous compensator, STATCOM, voltage profile.

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Authors: Subramaniam Chandran

Abstract:

This paper presents an assessment study conducted among the distance learners in India. Open and distance learning systems have traveled a long way since its inception and its journey has witnessed the evolution and adoption of different generations of technology. This study focuses on the distant learners in India. Sampling for this study has been derived from the mass enrollment from Tamil Nadu area, a southern state of India. Learners were chosen from dual mode universities, private universities, Tamil Nadu Open University and IGNOU. The main focus of the study is to examine the coverage and appropriation of students support services and learning aids. It explores two aspects: the facilities available and the awareness and use of such services. It includes, self-learning materials, face-to-face counseling, multimedia learning materials, website, e-learning, radio and television services etc. While exploring the student-s perspective on these learning aspects, it is important to understand the perspectives of the teachers. Two different interests are visible among the teachers. Majority of the teachers support faceto- face counseling. However, the young teachers are in favour of online learning and multimedia supports in teaching. Through the awareness is somewhat high, the actual participation in online is very low. This is due to the inadequate infrastructure as well as the traditional attitudes of the teachers. Still the face-to-face sessions remain popular than online.

Keywords: Face-to-face session, online session, distance learning, multimedia

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Authors: Chiharu Okuma, Jun Murakami, Naoki Yamamoto

Abstract:

In digital signal processing it is important to approximate multi-dimensional data by the method called rank reduction, in which we reduce the rank of multi-dimensional data from higher to lower. For 2-dimennsional data, singular value decomposition (SVD) is one of the most known rank reduction techniques. Additional, outer product expansion expanded from SVD was proposed and implemented for multi-dimensional data, which has been widely applied to image processing and pattern recognition. However, the multi-dimensional outer product expansion has behavior of great computation complex and has not orthogonally between the expansion terms. Therefore we have proposed an alterative method, Third-order Orthogonal Tensor Product Expansion short for 3-OTPE. 3-OTPE uses the power method instead of nonlinear optimization method for decreasing at computing time. At the same time the group of B. D. Lathauwer proposed Higher-Order SVD (HOSVD) that is also developed with SVD extensions for multi-dimensional data. 3-OTPE and HOSVD are similarly on the rank reduction of multi-dimensional data. Using these two methods we can obtain computation results respectively, some ones are the same while some ones are slight different. In this paper, we compare 3-OTPE to HOSVD in accuracy of calculation and computing time of resolution, and clarify the difference between these two methods.

Keywords: Singular value decomposition (SVD), higher-order SVD (HOSVD), higher-order tensor, outer product expansion, power method.

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Authors: Yee-May Chan

Abstract:

In recent decades, it is observed that social work agencies have participated actively, and thus, have gradually been more influential in social work education in Hong Kong. The neo-liberal welfare ideologies and changing funding mode have transformed the landscape in social work practice and have also had a major influence on the fieldwork environment in Hong Kong. The aim of this research is to explore the educational role of social work agencies and examine in particular whether they are able to enhance or hinder critical reflective learning in fieldwork. In-depth interviews with 15 frontline social workers and managers in different social work agencies were conducted to collect their views and experience in helping social work students in fieldwork. The overall findings revealed that under the current social welfare context most social workers consider that the most important role of social work agencies in fieldwork is to help students prepare to fit-in the practice requirements and work within agencies’ boundary. The fit-for-purpose and down-to-earth view of fieldwork practice is seen as prevalent among most social workers. This narrow perception of agency’s role seems to be more favourable to competence-based approaches. In contrast, though critical reflection has been seen as important in addressing the changing needs of service users, the role of enhancing critical reflective learning has not been clearly expected or understood by most agency workers. The notion of critical reflection, if considered, has been narrowly perceived in fieldwork learning. The findings suggest that the importance of critical reflection is found to be subordinate to that of practice competence. The lack of critical reflection in the field is somehow embedded in the competence-based social work practice. In general, social work students’ critical reflection has not been adequately supported or enhanced in fieldwork agencies, nor critical reflective practice has been encouraged in fieldwork process. To address this situation, the role of social work agencies in fieldwork should be re-examined. To maximise critical reflective learning in the field, critical reflection as an avowed objective in fieldwork learning should be clearly stated. Concrete suggestions are made to help fieldwork agencies become more prepared to critical reflective learning. It is expected that the research can help social work communities to reflect upon the current realities of fieldwork context and to identify ways to strengthen agencies’ capacities to enhance critical reflective learning and practice of social work students.

Keywords: Competence-based social work, fieldwork, neo-liberal welfare, critical reflective learning.

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Authors: Keiji Komatsu, Tetsuo Sekiya, Ayumu Toyama, Atsushi Nakamura, Ikumi Toda, Shigeo Ohshio, Hiroyuki Muramatsu, Hidetoshi Saitoh, Atsushi Nakamura, Ariyuki Kato

Abstract:

Yttrium oxide (Y2O3) films have been successfully deposited with yttrium-ethylenediamine tetraacetic acid (EDTA·Y·H) complexes prepared by various milling techniques. The effects of the properties of the EDTA·Y·H complex on the properties of the deposited Y2O3 films have been analyzed. Seven different types of the raw EDTA·Y·H complexes were prepared by various commercial milling techniques such as ball milling, hammer milling, commercial milling, and mortar milling. The milled EDTA·Y·H complexes exhibited various particle sizes and distributions, depending on the milling method. Furthermore, we analyzed the crystal structure, morphology and elemental distribution profile of the metal oxide films deposited on stainless steel substrate with the milled EDTA·Y·H complexes. Depending on the milling technique, the flow properties of the raw powders differed. The X-ray diffraction pattern of all the samples revealed the formation of Y2O3 crystalline phase, irrespective of the milling technique. Of all the different milling techniques, the hammer milling technique is considered suitable for fabricating dense Y2O3 films.

Keywords: Powder sizes and distributions, Flame spray coating techniques, Yttrium oxide.

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Authors: Javad Rahimipour Anaraki, Saeed Samet, Mahdi Eftekhari, Chang Wook Ahn

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Feature selection and attribute reduction are crucial problems, and widely used techniques in the field of machine learning, data mining and pattern recognition to overcome the well-known phenomenon of the Curse of Dimensionality. This paper presents a feature selection method that efficiently carries out attribute reduction, thereby selecting the most informative features of a dataset. It consists of two components: 1) a measure for feature subset evaluation, and 2) a search strategy. For the evaluation measure, we have employed the fuzzy-rough dependency degree (FRFDD) of the lower approximation-based fuzzy-rough feature selection (L-FRFS) due to its effectiveness in feature selection. As for the search strategy, a modified version of a binary shuffled frog leaping algorithm is proposed (B-SFLA). The proposed feature selection method is obtained by hybridizing the B-SFLA with the FRDD. Nine classifiers have been employed to compare the proposed approach with several existing methods over twenty two datasets, including nine high dimensional and large ones, from the UCI repository. The experimental results demonstrate that the B-SFLA approach significantly outperforms other metaheuristic methods in terms of the number of selected features and the classification accuracy.

Keywords: Binary shuffled frog leaping algorithm, feature selection, fuzzy-rough set, minimal reduct.

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Authors: Md. Emaj Uddin

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This study compares family communication patterns in association with family socio-cultural status, especially marriage and family pattern, and couples- socio-economic status between Muslim and Santal communities in rural Bangladesh. A total of 288 couples, 145 couples from the Muslim and 143 couples from the Santal were randomly selected through cluster sampling procedure from Kalna village situated in Tanore Upazila of Rajshahi district of Bangladesh, where both the communities dwell as neighbors. In order to collect data from the selected samples, interview method with semistructural questionnaire schedule was applied. The responses given by the respondents were analyzed by Pearson-s chi-squire test and bivariate correlation techniques. The results of Pearson-s chi-squire test revealed that family communication patterns (X2= 25. 90, df= 2, p<0.01, p>0.05) were significantly different between the Muslim and Santal communities. In addition, Spearman-s bivariate correlation coefficients suggested that among the exogenous factors, family type (rs=.135, p<0.05) and occupation of both husband (rs= .197, p<0.01) and wife (rs= .265, p<0.01) were significantly positive associations, and marital arrangement (rs= -.177, p<0.01), education of husband (rs= -.108, p<0.05) and wife (rs= -.142, p<0.01 & p<0.05), and family income (rs= -.164, p<0.01) were significantly negative relations with the family communication patterns followed between the two communities, although age difference between husband and wife, family head and residence patterns were not significant relations with ones.

Keywords: Bangladesh, Cross-Cultural Comparison, Family Communication Patterns, Family Socio-Cultural Status, Muslim, Santal.

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Authors: J. P. Dubois, O. M. Abdul-Latif

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Support Vector Machine (SVM) is a recent class of statistical classification and regression techniques playing an increasing role in applications to detection problems in various engineering problems, notably in statistical signal processing, pattern recognition, image analysis, and communication systems. In this paper, SVM is applied to an infrared (IR) binary communication system with different types of channel models including Ricean multipath fading and partially developed scattering channel with additive white Gaussian noise (AWGN) at the receiver. The structure and performance of SVM in terms of the bit error rate (BER) metric is derived and simulated for these channel stochastic models and the computational complexity of the implementation, in terms of average computational time per bit, is also presented. The performance of SVM is then compared to classical binary signal maximum likelihood detection using a matched filter driven by On-Off keying (OOK) modulation. We found that the performance of SVM is superior to that of the traditional optimal detection schemes used in statistical communication, especially for very low signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) ranges. For large SNR, the performance of the SVM is similar to that of the classical detectors. The implication of these results is that SVM can prove very beneficial to IR communication systems that notoriously suffer from low SNR at the cost of increased computational complexity.

Keywords: Least square-support vector machine, on-off keying, matched filter, maximum likelihood detector, wireless infrared communication.

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