Search results for: form of social quality moving process

Authors: Nguyen Thi Thu Trang

Abstract:

Climate change and sea level rise is one of the greatest challenges facing human beings in the 21^st century. Because of sea level rise, several low-lying coastal areas around the globe are at risk of being completely submerged, disappearing under water. Particularly in Viet Nam, the rise in sea level is predicted to result in more frequent and even permanently inundated coastal plains. As a result, land reserving fund of coastal cities is going to be narrowed in near future, while construction ground is becoming increasingly limited due to a rapid growth in population. Faced with this reality, the solutions are being discussed not only in tradition view such as accommodation is raised or moved to higher areas, or “living with the water”, but also forwards to “living on the water”. Therefore, the concept of a sustainable floating community with floating houses based on the precious value of long term historical tradition of water dwellings in Viet Nam would be a sustainable solution for adaptation of climate change and sea level rise in the coastal areas. The sustainable floating community is comprised of sustainability in four components: architecture, environment, socio-economic and living quality. This research paper is focused on sustainability in architectural component of floating community. Through detailed architectural analysis of current floating houses and floating communities in Viet Nam, this research not only accumulates precious values of traditional architecture that need to be preserved and developed in the proposed concept, but also illustrates its weaknesses that need to address for optimal design of the future sustainable floating communities. Based on these studies the research would provide guidelines with appropriate architectural solutions for the concept of sustainable floating community with floating housing units that are adapted to climate change and sea level rise in Viet Nam.

Keywords: Climate change, floating houses, floating community, Viet Nam.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 3281

Authors: Veruska C. Dutra, Afonso R. Aquino

Abstract:

Since the 1980s, global tourism activity has consolidated worldwide to become an important economic contributor, and consequently, the sociocultural and environmental impacts are starting to become evidenced. This raises the need of discussing about actions for sustainable tourism that should be linked not only to the economy, but also to the environment and social aspects. The work that is going to be presented is part of a doctoral research project in Sciences undertaken at the Sao Paulo University, Brazil. It aims to analyze whether the monitoring of the tourism sector with a focus on sustainability is applicable or not, through those indicators, put in a case study in the Jalapão State Park (JSP) conservation unit, in the state of Tocantins, Brazil. This is a study of an interdisciplinary nature that had the deductive method as its guide. We concluded that the key points of the sustainable tourism, when analyzed with the focal point in environmental indicators, are an important evaluation and quantification tool of that activity in the study locus. It displayed itself as an adequate tool for monitoring, thus decoding, the main environmental impacts that occur in tourism regions and their intensity, which is made possible through analysis, and has the objective to trace ways to prevent and correct the presented impacts.

Keywords: Economic indicators, tourism, sustainability, Jalapão.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 2244

Authors: Kamalendu Pal

Abstract:

This paper describes the main features of a knowledge-based system evaluation method. System evaluation is placed in the context of a hybrid legal decision-support system, Advisory Support for Home Settlement in Divorce (ASHSD). Legal knowledge for ASHSD is represented in two forms, as rules and previously decided cases. Besides distinguishing the two different forms of knowledge representation, the paper outlines the actual use of these forms in a computational framework that is designed to generate a plausible solution for a given case, by using rule-based reasoning (RBR) and case-based reasoning (CBR) in an integrated environment. The nature of suitability assessment of a solution has been considered as a multiple criteria decision-making process in ASHAD evaluation. The evaluation was performed by a combination of discussions and questionnaires with different user groups. The answers to questionnaires used in this evaluations method have been measured as a fuzzy linguistic term. The finding suggests that fuzzy linguistic evaluation is practical and meaningful in knowledge-based system development purpose. 

Keywords: Case-based reasoning, decision-support system, fuzzy linguistic term, rule-based reasoning, system evaluation.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1632

Authors: Khalid A. Darabkh, Ala F. Khalifeh, Baraa A. Bathech, Saed W. Sabah

Abstract:

Despite the fact that Arabic language is currently one of the most common languages worldwide, there has been only a little research on Arabic speech recognition relative to other languages such as English and Japanese. Generally, digital speech processing and voice recognition algorithms are of special importance for designing efficient, accurate, as well as fast automatic speech recognition systems. However, the speech recognition process carried out in this paper is divided into three stages as follows: firstly, the signal is preprocessed to reduce noise effects. After that, the signal is digitized and hearingized. Consequently, the voice activity regions are segmented using voice activity detection (VAD) algorithm. Secondly, features are extracted from the speech signal using Mel-frequency cepstral coefficients (MFCC) algorithm. Moreover, delta and acceleration (delta-delta) coefficients have been added for the reason of improving the recognition accuracy. Finally, each test word-s features are compared to the training database using dynamic time warping (DTW) algorithm. Utilizing the best set up made for all affected parameters to the aforementioned techniques, the proposed system achieved a recognition rate of about 98.5% which outperformed other HMM and ANN-based approaches available in the literature.

Keywords: Arabic speech recognition, MFCC, DTW, VAD.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 4075

Authors: Norbik Bashah, Idris Bharanidharan Shanmugam, Abdul Manan Ahmed

Abstract:

Intrusion Detection Systems are increasingly a key part of systems defense. Various approaches to Intrusion Detection are currently being used, but they are relatively ineffective. Artificial Intelligence plays a driving role in security services. This paper proposes a dynamic model Intelligent Intrusion Detection System, based on specific AI approach for intrusion detection. The techniques that are being investigated includes neural networks and fuzzy logic with network profiling, that uses simple data mining techniques to process the network data. The proposed system is a hybrid system that combines anomaly, misuse and host based detection. Simple Fuzzy rules allow us to construct if-then rules that reflect common ways of describing security attacks. For host based intrusion detection we use neural-networks along with self organizing maps. Suspicious intrusions can be traced back to its original source path and any traffic from that particular source will be redirected back to them in future. Both network traffic and system audit data are used as inputs for both.

Keywords: Intrusion Detection, Network Security, Data mining, Fuzzy Logic.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 2132

Authors: Sharifullah Ahmed, Sarwar Jahan Md. Yasin

Abstract:

Shallow foundations on unimproved soft natural soils can undergo a high consolidation and secondary settlement. For low and medium rise building projects on such soil condition, pile foundation may not be cost effective. In such cases an alternative to pile foundations may be shallow strip footings placed on a double layered improved soil system soil. The upper layer of this system is untreated or cement treated compacted sand and underlying layer is natural soft clay. This system will reduce the settlement to an allowable limit. The current research has been conducted with the settlement of a rigid plane-strain strip footing of 2.5 m width placed on the surface of a soil consisting of an untreated or cement treated sand layer overlying a bed of homogeneous soft clay. The settlement of the mentioned shallow foundation has been studied considering both cases with the thicknesses of the sand layer are 0.3 to 0.9 times the width of footing. The response of the clay layer is assumed as undrained for plastic loading stages and drained during consolidation stages. The response of the sand layer is drained during all loading stages. FEM analysis was done using PLAXIS 2D Version 8.0. A natural clay deposit of 15 m thickness and 18 m width has been modeled using Hardening Soil Model, Soft Soil Model, Soft Soil Creep Model, and upper improvement layer has been modeled using only Hardening Soil Model. The groundwater level is at the top level of the clay deposit that made the system fully saturated. Parametric study has been conducted to determine the effect of thickness, density, cementation of the sand mat and density, shear strength of the soft clay layer on the settlement of strip foundation under the uniformly distributed vertical load of varying value. A set of the chart has been established for designing shallow strip footing on the sand mat over thick, soft clay deposit through obtaining the particular thickness of sand mat for particular subsoil parameter to ensure no punching shear failure and no settlement beyond allowable level. Design guideline in the form of non-dimensional charts has been developed for footing pressure equivalent to medium-rise residential or commercial building foundation with strip footing on soft inorganic Normally Consolidated (NC) soil of Bangladesh having void ratio from 1.0 to 1.45.

Keywords: Design charts, ground improvement, PLAXIS 2D, primary and secondary settlement, sand Mat, soft clay.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 671

Authors: Sinarwati Mohamad Suhaili, Naomie Salim, Mohamad Nazim Jambli

Abstract:

Sequence-to-sequence (seq2seq) models augmented with attention mechanisms are increasingly important in automated customer service. These models, adept at recognizing complex relationships between input and output sequences, are essential for optimizing chatbot responses. Central to these mechanisms are neural attention weights that determine the model’s focus during sequence generation. Despite their widespread use, there remains a gap in the comparative analysis of different attention weighting functions within seq2seq models, particularly in the context of chatbots utilizing the Customer Support Twitter (CST) dataset. This study addresses this gap by evaluating four distinct attention-scoring functions—dot, multiplicative/general, additive, and an extended multiplicative function with a tanh activation parameter — in neural generative seq2seq models. Using the CST dataset, these models were trained and evaluated over 10 epochs with the AdamW optimizer. Evaluation criteria included validation loss and BLEU scores implemented under both greedy and beam search strategies with a beam size of k = 3. Results indicate that the model with the tanh-augmented multiplicative function significantly outperforms its counterparts, achieving the lowest validation loss (1.136484) and the highest BLEU scores (0.438926 under greedy search, 0.443000 under beam search, k = 3). These findings emphasize the crucial influence of selecting an appropriate attention-scoring function to enhance the performance of seq2seq models for chatbots, particularly highlighting the model integrating tanh activation as a promising approach to improving chatbot quality in customer support contexts.

Keywords: Attention weight, chatbot, encoder-decoder, neural generative attention, score function, sequence-to-sequence.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 92

Authors: Haitam Emhemad, Brian Agnew, David Greenwood

Abstract:

Amongst the many priorities facing Libya following the 2011 uprising is the provision of a transport infrastructure that will meet the nation’s needs and not undermine its prospects for economic prosperity as with many developing economies non-technical issues such as management, planning and financing are the major barriers to the efficient and effective provision of transport infrastructure. This is particularly true in the case of the effective incorporation of sustainability criteria, and the research upon which this paper is based involves the examination of alternative ways of approaching this problem. It is probably fair to say that criteria that relate to sustainability have not, historically, featured strongly in Libya’s approach to the development of its transport infrastructure. However, the current reappraisal of how best to redevelop the country’s transport infrastructure that has been afforded by recent events may offer the opportunity to alter this. The research examines recent case studies from a number of countries to explore ways in which sustainability has been included as a criterion for planning and procurement decisions. There will also be an in-depth investigation into the Libyan planning and legislative context to examine the feasibility of the introduction of such sustainability criteria into the process of planning and procurement of Libya’s transport infrastructure.

Keywords: Libya Reconstruction, Sustainability criteria, Transport Infrastructure.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 2269

Authors: Prashant P. Bedekar, Sudhir R. Bhide, Vijay S. Kale

Abstract:

Overcurrent (OC) relays are the major protection devices in a distribution system. The operating time of the OC relays are to be coordinated properly to avoid the mal-operation of the backup relays. The OC relay time coordination in ring fed distribution networks is a highly constrained optimization problem which can be stated as a linear programming problem (LPP). The purpose is to find an optimum relay setting to minimize the time of operation of relays and at the same time, to keep the relays properly coordinated to avoid the mal-operation of relays. This paper presents two phase simplex method for optimum time coordination of OC relays. The method is based on the simplex algorithm which is used to find optimum solution of LPP. The method introduces artificial variables to get an initial basic feasible solution (IBFS). Artificial variables are removed using iterative process of first phase which minimizes the auxiliary objective function. The second phase minimizes the original objective function and gives the optimum time coordination of OC relays.

Keywords: Constrained optimization, LPP, Overcurrent relaycoordination, Two-phase simplex method.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 3007

Authors: M. A. At-Tasneem, N. T. Rao, T. M. Y. S. Tuan Ya, M. S. Idris, M. Ammar

Abstract:

River flow over micro hydro power (MHP) turbines of multiple arrays arrangement is simulated with computational fluid dynamics (CFD) software to obtain the flow characteristics. In this paper, CFD software is used to simulate the water flow over MHP turbines as they are placed in a river. Multiple arrays arrangement of MHP turbines lead to generate large amount of power. In this study, a river model is created and simulated in CFD software to obtain the water flow characteristic. The process then continued by simulating different types of arrays arrangement in the river model. A MHP turbine model consists of a turbine outer body and static propeller blade in it. Five types of arrangements are used which are parallel, series, triangular, square and rhombus with different spacing sizes. The velocity profiles on each MHP turbines are identified at the mouth of each turbine bodies. This study is required to obtain the arrangement with increasing spacing sizes that can produce highest power density through the water flow variation.

Keywords: Micro hydro power, CFD, arrays arrangement, spacing sizes, velocity profile, power.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 2110

Authors: H. B. Tibar, Z. Y. Jiang

Abstract:

In this study, the influence of rolling process parameters such as the work roll cross angle and work roll shifting value on the strip shape and profile of aluminum have been investigated under dry conditions at a speed ratio of 1.3 using Hille 100 experimental mill. The strip profile was found to improve significantly with increase in work roll cross angle from 0^o to 1^o, with an associated decrease in rolling force. The effect of roll shifting (from 0 to 8mm) was not as significant as the roll cross angle. However, an increase in work roll shifting value achieved a similar decrease in rolling force as that of work roll cross angle. The effect of work roll shifting was also found to be maximum at an optimum roll speed of 0.0986 m/s for the desired thickness. Of all these parameters, the most significant effect of the strip shape profile was observed with variation of work roll cross angle. However, the rolling force can be a significantly reduced by either increasing the the work roll cross angle or work roll shifting.

Keywords: Rolling speed ratio, strip shape, work roll cross angle, work roll shifting.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1430

Authors: A.A.Rohani, B.Hatami, L.Jokar, F.khorasheh, A.A.Safekordi

Abstract:

In industrial scale of Gas to Liquid (GTL) process in Fischer-Tropsch (FT) synthesis, a part of reactor outlet gases such as CO2 and CH4 as side reaction products, is usually recycled. In this study, the influence of CO2 and CH4 on the performance and selectivity of Co-Ru/Al2O3 catalyst is investigated by injection of these gases (0-20 vol. % of feed) to the feed stream. The effect of temperature and feed flow rate, are also inspected. The results show that low amounts of CO2 in the feed stream, doesn`t change the catalyst activity significantly but increasing the amount of CO2 (more than 10 vol. %) cause the CO conversion to decrease and the selectivity of heavy components to increase. Methane acts as an inert gas and doesn`t affect the catalyst performance. Increasing feed flow rate has negative effect on both CO conversion and heavy component selectivity. By raising the temperature, CO conversion will increase but there are more volatile components in the product. The effect of CO2 on the catalyst deactivation is also investigated carefully and a mechanism is suggested to explain the negative influence of CO2 on catalyst deactivation.

Keywords: Alumina, Carbon dioxide, Cobalt catalyst, Conversion, Fischer Tropsch, Selectivity

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1976

Authors: Iman Hadipour, Javad Marzbanrad

Abstract:

In this paper, the strength of a stabilizer is determined when the static and fatigue multiaxial loading are applied. Stabilizer is a part of suspension system in the heavy truck for stabilizing the cabin against the vibration of the road which composes of a thin-walled tube joined to a forge component by fillet weld. The component is loaded by non proportional random sequence of torsion and bending. Residual stress of welding process is considered here for static loading. This static loading with road irregularities are applied in this study as fatigue case that can affected in the fillet welded area of this part. The stresses in the welded structure are calculated using FEA. In addition, the fatigue with multi axial loading in the fillet weld is also investigated and the critical zone of the stabilizer is specified and presented by graphs. Residual stresses that have been resulted by the thermal forces are considered in FEA. Force increasing is the element of finding the critical point of the component.

Keywords: Fillet weld, fatigue, weld toe crack, weld root crack, S-N curve, multiaxial load, residual stress, combined force.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 2065

Authors: Nagore Guerra Bilbao, Clemente Lobato Fraile

Abstract:

Mentoring is provided by professionals with a higher level of experience and competence as part of the professional development of a university faculty. This paper explores the characteristics of the mentoring provided by those teachers participating in the development of an active methodology program run at the University of the Basque Country: to examine and to analyze mentors’ performance with the aim of providing empirical evidence regarding its value as a lifelong learning strategy for teaching staff. A total of 183 teachers were trained during the first three programs. The analysis method uses a coding technique and is based on flexible, systematic guidelines for gathering and analyzing qualitative data. The results have confirmed the conception of mentoring as a methodological innovation in higher education. In short, university teachers in general assessed the mentoring they received positively, considering it to be a valid, useful strategy in their professional development. They highlighted the methodological expertise of their mentor and underscored how they monitored the learning process of the active method and provided guidance and advice when necessary. Finally, they also drew attention to traits such as availability, personal commitment and flexibility in. However, a minority critique is pointed to some aspects of the performance of some mentors.

Keywords: Higher education, Mentoring, Professional development, University teachers.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 951

Authors: Robin C. Ladwig

Abstract:

Work experiences and satisfaction as well as the feeling of belonging has been narrowly explored from the perspective of trans and gender diverse individuals. Hence, the study investigates the relationship of values, attitudes, and norms of occupational environments and the working identity of trans and gender diverse people of the Australian workforce. Based on 22 semi-structured interviews with trans and gender diverse individuals regarding their work and career experiences, a first insight about their feeling of belonging through commonality in the workplace could be established. Communality between the values, attitudes and norms of a trans and gender diverse individuals working identities and profession, organization and working environment could increase the feeling of belonging. Further reflection and evaluation of trans and gender diverse identities in the workplace need to be considered to create an equitable and inclusive workplace of the future. Consequently, an essential development step for the future of work and its fundamental values of diversity, inclusion, and belonging will consist of the acknowledgement and inclusion of trans and gender diverse people as part of a broader social identity of the workplace.

Keywords: Belonging, future of work, working identity, trans and gender diverse identity.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 561

Authors: Okolie Uchenna, Ehiemere Ijeoma, Ezenduka Pauline, Ogbu Sylvester

Abstract:

A cross sectional survey design was used to collect data from 370 diabetic patients. Two instruments were used in obtaining data; in-depth interview guide and researchers- developed questionnaire. Fisher's exact test was used to investigate association between the identified factors and nonadherence. Factors identified were: socio-demographic factors such as: gender, age, marital status, educational level and occupation; psychosocial obstacles such as: non-affordability of prescribed diet, frustration due to the restriction, limited spousal support, feelings of deprivation, feeling that temptation is inevitable, difficulty in adhering in social gatherings and difficulty in revealing to host that one is diabetic; health care providers obstacles were: poor attitude of health workers, irregular diabetes education in clinics , limited number of nutrition education sessions/ inability of the patients to estimate the desired quantity of food, no reminder post cards or phone calls about upcoming patient appointments and delayed start of appointment / time wasting in clinics.

Keywords: Behavior change, diabetes mellitus, dietarymanagement, diet adherence.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 3432

Authors: M. Maleki, M. Latifi, M. Amani-Tehran

Abstract:

Nano fibers produced by electrospinning are of industrial and scientific attention due to their special characteristics such as long length, small diameter and high surface area. Applications of electrospun structures in nanotechnology are included tissue scaffolds, fibers for drug delivery, composite reinforcement, chemical sensing, enzyme immobilization, membrane-based filtration, protective clothing, catalysis, solar cells, electronic devices and others. Many polymer and ceramic precursor nano fibers have been successfully electrospun with diameters in the range from 1 nm to several microns. The process is complex so that fiber diameter is influenced by various material, design and operating parameters. The objective of this work is to apply genetic algorithm on the parameters of electrospinning which have the most significant effect on the nano fiber diameter to determine the optimum parameter values before doing experimental set up. Effective factors including initial polymer concentration, initial jet radius, electrical potential, relaxation time, initial elongation, viscosity and distance between nozzle and collector are considered to determine finest diameter which is selected by user.

Keywords: Electrospinning, genetic algorithm, nano fiber diameter, optimization.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 2033

Authors: J. C. M. Santos, J. C. A. Sousa, A. J. Rubio, L. S. Soletti, F. Gasparotto, N. U. Yamaguchi

Abstract:

Magnetic graphene has received widespread attention for their capability of water and wastewater treatment, which has been attracted many researchers in this field. A bibliometric analysis based on the Web of Science database was employed to analyze the global scientific outputs of magnetic graphene for water treatment until the present time (2012 to 2017), to improve the understanding of the research trends. The publication year, place of publication, institutes, funding agencies, journals, most cited articles, distribution outputs in thematic categories and applications were analyzed. Three major aspects analyzed including type of pollutant, treatment process and composite composition have further contributed to revealing the research trends. The most relevant research aspects of the main technologies using magnetic graphene for water treatment were summarized in this paper. The results showed that research on magnetic graphene for water treatment goes through a period of decline that might be related to a saturated field and a lack of bibliometric studies. Thus, the result of the present work will lead researchers to establish future directions in further studies using magnetic graphene for water treatment.

Keywords: Composite, graphene oxide, nanomaterials, scientometrics.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1192

Authors: M. Ricardo Lang, A. Costa, I. Iesbik, K. Haag, L. Trindade Buffara, O. Reimann Junior, C. Auswaldt Steclan

Abstract:

Stroke affects not only the individual, but has significant impacts on the social and family context. Therefore, it is necessary to know the peculiarities of each region, in order to contribute to regional public health policies effectively. Thus, the present study discusses biomarkers in a post-stroke population, admitted to a stroke unit (U-stroke) of reference in the southern region of Brazil. Biomarkers were analyzed, such as age, length of stay, mortality rate, survival time, risk factors and family history of stroke in patients after ischemic stroke. In this studied population, comparing men and women, it was identified that men were more affected than women, and the average age of women affected was higher, as they also had the highest mortality rate and the shortest hospital stay. The risk factors identified here were according to the global scenario; with systemic arterial hypertension (SAH) being the most frequent and those associated with sedentary lifestyle in women the most frequent (dyslipidemia, heart disease and obesity). In view of this, the importance of studies that characterize populations regionally is evident, strengthening the strategic planning of policies in favor of health care.

Keywords: Biomarkers, population, stroke, sex, stroke unit.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 602

Authors: Ivana Bulog

Abstract:

Decision making is a vital part of the business world and any other field of human endeavor. Which way a business organization will take, and where that way will lead it, depends on broad range of decisions made by managers in the managerial structure. Strategic decisions are of the greatest importance for organizational success. Although much empirical research has been done trying to describe and explain its nature and effectiveness, knowledge about strategic decision making is still incomplete. This paper explores the nature of strategic decision making in particular setting - in Croatian companies. The main focus of this research is on the style that decision makers on strategic management level are following when making decisions of life importance for their companies. Two main decision making style that explain the way decision maker collects and processes available information and performs all the activities in strategic decision making process were empirical tested: rational and intuitive one. Besides analyzing their existence on strategic management level in Croatian companies, their effectiveness is analyzed as well. Results showed that decision makers at strategic management level are following both styles somewhat equally in order to function effectively, and that intuitive style is more effective when considering decisions outcomes.

Keywords: Decision making style, decision making effectiveness, strategic decisions.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1695

Authors: Anna Romanova, Mojtaba Mahmoodian, Upul Chandrasekara, Morteza A. Alani

Abstract:

Corrosion of concrete sewer pipes induced by sulphuric acid attack is a recognised problem worldwide, which is not only an attribute of countries with hot climate conditions as thought before. The significance of this problem is by far only realised when the pipe collapses causing surface flooding and other severe consequences. To change the existing post-reactive attitude of managing companies, easy to use and robust models are required to be developed which currently lack reliable data to be correctly calibrated. This paper focuses on laboratory experiments of establishing concrete pipe corrosion rate by submerging samples in to 0.5pH sulphuric acid solution for 56 days under 10ºC, 20ºC and 30ºC temperature regimes. The result showed that at very early stage of the corrosion process the samples gained overall mass, at 30ºC the corrosion progressed quicker than for other temperature regimes, however with time the corrosion level for 10ºC and 20ºC regimes tended towards those at 30ºC. Overall, at these conditions the corrosion rates of 10 mm/year, 13,5 mm/year and 17 mm/year were observed.

Keywords: Sewer pipes, concrete corrosion, sulphuric acid, concrete coupons, corrosion rate.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 2575

Authors: Cheng Li, Jie Shen, Yutian Tang

Abstract:

Embracing the upcoming era of urbanization with the challenges of limitation of resources, disappearing cultural identities and conflicts among different groups of stakeholders, new integrated approaches are offered in our urban practice to help decision-makers and stakeholders frame and develop well-conceived, practical strategies for urban developing trajectories to approach urban-level sustainability in multiple social, cultural, ecological dimensions. Through bottom-up participation, we take advantage of tourism and leisure industries as driving forces for urbanization in China to promote integrated sustainable systems, with the hope of approaching both historical and ecological aspects of urban sustainability; and also thanks to top-down participation, we have codes, standards and rules established by the governments to strengthen the implementation of ecological urban sustainability. The results are monitored and evaluated experimentally and multidimensionally and the sustainable systems we constructed with local stakeholder groups turned out to be effective. The presentation of our selected projects would indicate our different focuses on urban sustainability.

Keywords: Urban sustainability, integrated urban strategy, tourism and leisure industries, history, modern technology.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1587

Authors: Reza Gheisari, Paulo J. Bartolo, Nicholas Goddard

Abstract:

Polymeric micro-cantilevers (Cs) are rapidly becoming popular for MEMS applications such as chemo- and biosensing as well as purely electromechanical applications such as microrelays. Polymer materials present suitable physical and chemical properties combined with low-cost mass production. Hence, micro-cantilevers made of polymers indicate much more biocompatibility and adaptability of rapid prototyping along with mechanical properties. This research studies the effects of three process and one size factors on the filling behaviour in micro cavity, and the role of each in the replication of micro parts using different polymer materials i.e. polypropylene (PP) SABIC 56M10 and acrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS) Magnum 8434 . In particular, the following factors are considered: barrel temperature, mould temperature, injection speed and the thickness of micro features. The study revealed that the barrel temperature and the injection speed are the key factors affecting the flow length of micro features replicated in PP and ABS. For both materials, an increase of feature sizes improves the melt flow. However, the melt fill of micro features does not increase linearly with the increase of their thickness.

Keywords: Flow length, micro-cantilevers, micro injection moulding, microfabrication.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1970

Authors: Mathias Rossi, Silna Borter, Marie Sansonnens

Abstract:

Entrepreneurs are important for national labour markets and economies in that they contribute significantly to economic growth as well as provide the majority of jobs and create new ones. According to the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor’s “Report on Women and Entrepreneurship”, investment in women’s entrepreneurship is an important way to exponentially increase the impact of new venture creation finding ways to empower women’s participation and success in entrepreneurship are critical for more sustainable and successful economic development. Our results confirm that they are still differences between men and women entrepreneurs The reasons seems to be the lack of specific business skills, the less extensive social network, and the lack of identification patterns among women. Those differences can be explained by the fact that women still have fewer opportunities to make a career. If this is correct, we can predict an increasing proportion of women among entrepreneurs in the next years. Concerning the development of a favorable environment for developing and enhancing women entrepreneurship activities, our results show the insertion in a network and the role of a model doubtless represent elements determining in the choice to launch an entrepreneurship activity, as well as a precious resource for the success of her company.

Keywords: Women entrepreneurship, entrepreneurship motivation, entrepreneurial behavior.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 3353

Authors: Xhevrie Mamaqi, Jesus Miguel, Pilar Olave

Abstract:

The lifelong learning is a crucial element in the modernization of European education and training systems. The most important actors in the development process of the lifelong learning are the trainers, whose professional characteristics need new competences and skills in the current labour market. The main objective of this paper is to establish an importance ranking of the new competences, capabilities and skills that the lifelong learning Spanish trainers must possess nowadays. A wide study of secondary sources has allowed the design of a questionnaire that organizes the trainer-s skills and competences. The e-Delphi method is used for realizing a creative, individual and anonymous evaluation by experts on the importance ranking that presents the criteria, sub-criteria and indicators of the e-Delphi questionnaire. Twenty Spanish experts in the lifelong learning have participated in two rounds of the e- DELPHI method. In the first round, the analysis of the experts- evaluation has allowed to establish the ranking of the most importance criteria, sub-criteria and indicators and to eliminate the least valued. The minimum level necessary to reach the consensus among experts has been achieved in the second round.

Keywords: competences and skills, lifelong learningtrainers, Spain, e-DELHI method.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1680

Authors: D. S. Fardhyanti, A. Damayanti

Abstract:

The utilization of biomass as a source of new and renewable energy is being carried out. One of the technologies to convert biomass as an energy source is pyrolysis which is converting biomass into more valuable products, such as bio-oil. Bio-oil is a liquid which is produced by steam condensation process from the pyrolysis of coconut shells. The composition of a coconut shell e.g. hemicellulose, cellulose and lignin will be oxidized to phenolic compounds as the main component of the bio-oil. The phenolic compounds in bio-oil are corrosive; they cause various difficulties in the combustion system because of a high viscosity, low calorific value, corrosiveness, and instability. Phenolic compounds are very valuable components which phenol has used as the main component for the manufacture of antiseptic, disinfectant (known as Lysol) and deodorizer. The experiments typically occurred at the atmospheric pressure in a pyrolysis reactor at temperatures ranging from 300 ^oC to 350 ^oC with a heating rate of 10 ^oC/min and a holding time of 1 hour at the pyrolysis temperature. The Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectroscopy (GC-MS) was used to analyze the bio-oil components. The obtained bio-oil has the viscosity of 1.46 cP, the density of 1.50 g/cm³, the calorific value of 16.9 MJ/kg, and the molecular weight of 1996.64. By GC-MS, the analysis of bio-oil showed that it contained phenol (40.01%), ethyl ester (37.60%), 2-methoxy-phenol (7.02%), furfural (5.45%), formic acid (4.02%), 1-hydroxy-2-butanone (3.89%), and 3-methyl-1,2-cyclopentanedione (2.01%).

Keywords: Bio-oil, pyrolysis, coconut shell, phenol, gas chromatography-mass spectroscopy.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1772

Authors: Gholamreza Momenzadeh, Forough Nematolahi

Abstract:

The Extended Enterprise Resource Planning (ERPII) system usually requires massive amounts of storage space, powerful servers, and large upfront and ongoing investments to purchase and manage the software and the related hardware which are not affordable for organizations. In recent decades, organizations prefer to adapt their business structures with new technologies for remaining competitive in the world economy. Therefore, cloud computing (which is one of the tools of information technology (IT)) is a modern system that reveals the next-generation application architecture. Also, cloud computing has had some advantages that reduce costs in many ways such as: lower upfront costs for all computing infrastructure and lower cost of maintaining and supporting. On the other hand, traditional ERPII is not responding for huge amounts of data and relations between the organizations. In this study, based on a literature study, ERPII is investigated in the context of cloud computing where the organizations operate more efficiently. Also, ERPII conditions have a response to needs of organizations in large amounts of data and relations between the organizations.

Keywords: Extended enterprise resource planning, cloud computing, business process, enterprise information integration.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 979

Authors: Yan Ren, Fei Guo, Jun Qiao, Shengwei Hu, Hui Zhang, Yuanzhi Wang, Pengyan Wang, Jinliang Sheng, Xinli Gu, Xiaojun Liu, Chuangfu Chen

Abstract:

Bovine viral diarrhea virus (BVDV) can cause lifelong persistent infection. One reason for the phenomena is attributed to BVDV infection to placenta tissue. However the mechanisms that BVDV invades into placenta tissue remain unclear. To clarify the molecular mechanisms, we investigated the possible means that BVDV entered into bovine trophoblast cells (TPC). Yeast two-hybrid system was used to identify proteins extracted from TPC, which interact with BVDV envelope glycoprotein E2. A PGbkt7-E2 yeast expression vector and TPC cDNA library were constructed. Through two rounds of screening, three positive clones were identified. Sequencing analysis indicated that all the three positive clones encoded the same protein clathrin. Physical interaction between clathrin and BVDV E2 protein was further confirmed by coimmunoprecipitation experiments. This result suggested that the clathrin might play a critical role in the process of BVDV entry into placenta tissue and might be a novel antiviral target for preventing BVDV infection.

Keywords: Bovine viral diarrhea virus, clathrin, glycoprotein E2, yeast two-hybrid system.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 2000

Authors: Xu Rumin, Chen Jianyi, Yue Ti, Wang Yaan

Abstract:

With the rapid development of subsea oil and gas exploitation, the demand for the related underwater process equipment is increasing fast. In order to reduce the energy consuming, people tend to separate the gas and oil phase directly on the seabed. Accordingly, an advanced separator is needed. In this paper, the pressure drop of a new type of separator named Gas Liquid Cylindrical Cyclone (GLCC) which is used in the subsea system is investigated by both experiments and numerical simulation. In the experiments, the single phase flow and gas-liquid two phase flow in GLCC were tested. For the simulation, the performance of GLCC under both laboratory and industrial conditions was calculated. The Eulerian model was implemented to describe the mixture flow field in the GLCC under experimental conditions and industrial oil-natural gas conditions. Furthermore, a relationship among Euler number (Eu), Reynolds number (Re), and Froude number (Fr) is generated according to similarity analysis and simulation data, which can present the GLCC separation performance of pressure drop. These results can give reference to the design and application of GLCC in deep sea.

Keywords: Dimensionless analysis, gas-liquid cylindrical cyclone, numerical simulation; pressure drop.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1012

Authors: Jordan Georgiev Deliversky

Abstract:

Fight against migrant smuggling has been put as a priority issues at the European Union policy agenda for more than a decade. The trafficked person, who has been targeted as the object of criminal exploitation, is specifically unique for human trafficking. Generally, the beginning of human trafficking activities is related to profit from the victim’s exploitation. The objective of this paper is to present measures that could result in the limitation of corruption mainly through analyzing the existing legislation framework against corruption in Europe. The analysis is focused on exploring the multiple origins of factors influencing migration processes in Europe, as corruption could be characterized as one of the most significant reasons for refugees to flee their countries. The main results show that law enforcement must turn the focus on the financing of the organized crime groups that are involved in migrant smuggling activities. Corruption has a significant role in managing smuggling operations and in particular when criminal organizations and networks are involved. Illegal migrants and refugees usually represent significant sources of additional income for officials involved in the process of boarding protection and immigration control within the European Union borders.

Keywords: Corruption, influence, human smuggling, legislation, migration.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1092