Search results for: Credibility scale

Authors: A. Özköse

Abstract:

This study was conducted to determination of yield and yield components of some fodder beet types (Amarilla Barres, Feldherr, Kyros, Magnum ve Rota) under the Konya region conditions. Fodder beet was obtained from the Selcuk University, Faculty of Agriculture, at 2006-2007 season and the experiment was established in a randomized complete block design with three replicates. Differences among the averages of the fodder beet cultivars are statistically important in terms of all the characteristics investigated. Leaf attitude value was 1.2 – 2.2 (1=erect; 5= prostrate), root shape scale value was (1=spheroidal – 9=cylindrical), root diameter 11.0 – 12.2cm, remaining part of root on the ground was 6.3 – 13.7cm, root length was 21.4 – 29.6cm, leaf yield 1592 – 1917 kg/da, root yield was 10083 – 12258 kg/da, root dry matter content was %8.2 – 18.6 and root dry matter yield was 889 – 1887 kg/da. As a result of the study, it was determined that fodder beet cultivars are different conditions in terms of yield and yield components. Therefore, determination of appropriate cultivars for each region affect crop yield importantly.

Keywords: Fodder beet, root yield, yield components.

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Authors: Ebere U. Okolo, Eunice C. Okpalaojiego, Chimaobi V. Okolo

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Some investors prefer to keep their money in the bank rather than invest in Small and Medium Enterprise (SME) due to the high cost of running small and medium scale enterprise in Enugu State. This cost primarily concerns multiple-taxation, enormous tax burdens, levies and charges. This study examines the effect of multiple-taxation on the investments in SMEs. The study used survey design with SME population of 80. Questionnaire was used to collect data. Simple percentages/frequencies were used to analyze the data and the research hypotheses were tested with ANOVA. It was found that multiple taxation has negative effect on SMEs investment. Furthermore, the relationship between SMEs investment and its ability to pay tax is significant. The researcher recommends that government should develop a tax policy that considers the enhancement of SMEs’ capital allowance when imposing taxes. Government should also consider a tax policy that encourages investment in SMEs by consolidating all taxes in one slot and latter disseminate to various government purses rather than having many closely related but different taxes at the same time.

Keywords: Investments, multiple taxation, small and medium enterprises.

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Authors: Carmen E. Zapata, José F. Jiménez, Mauricio Ramiréz, Natalia A. Cano

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The majority of the urban areas in Latin America face the challenges associated with city planning and development problems, attributed to human, technical, and economical factors; therefore, we cannot ignore the issues related to climate change because the city modifies the natural landscape in a significant way transforming the radiation balance and heat content in the urbanized areas. These modifications provoke changes in the temperature distribution known as “the heat island effect”. According to this phenomenon, we have the need to conceive the urban planning based on climatological patterns that will assure its sustainable functioning, including the particularities of the climate variability. In the present study, it is identified the Local Climate Zones (LCZ) in the Metropolitan Area of the Aburrá Valley (Colombia) with the objective of relocate the air quality monitoring stations as a partial solution to the problem of how to measure representative air quality levels in a city for a local scale, but with instruments that measure in the microscale.

Keywords: Air quality, monitoring, local climatic zones, valley, monitoring stations.

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Authors: S. Dan'azumi, S. Shamsudin, A. A. Rahman

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Rainfall data at fine resolution and knowledge of its characteristics plays a major role in the efficient design and operation of agricultural, telecommunication, runoff and erosion control as well as water quality control systems. The paper is aimed to study the statistical distribution of hourly rainfall depth for 12 representative stations spread across Peninsular Malaysia. Hourly rainfall data of 10 to 22 years period were collected and its statistical characteristics were estimated. Three probability distributions namely, Generalized Pareto, Exponential and Gamma distributions were proposed to model the hourly rainfall depth, and three goodness-of-fit tests, namely, Kolmogorov-Sminov, Anderson-Darling and Chi-Squared tests were used to evaluate their fitness. Result indicates that the east cost of the Peninsular receives higher depth of rainfall as compared to west coast. However, the rainfall frequency is found to be irregular. Also result from the goodness-of-fit tests show that all the three models fit the rainfall data at 1% level of significance. However, Generalized Pareto fits better than Exponential and Gamma distributions and is therefore recommended as the best fit.

Keywords: Goodness-of-fit test, Hourly rainfall, Malaysia, Probability distribution.

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Authors: C. Rajan, B. Megala, A. Nandhini, C. Rasi Priya

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Robotics brings together several very different engineering areas and skills. There are various types of robot such as humanoid robot, mobile robots, remotely operated vehicles, modern autonomous robots etc. This survey paper advocates the operation of a robotic car (remotely operated vehicle) that is controlled by a mobile phone (communicate on a large scale over a large distance even from different cities). The person makes a call to the mobile phone placed in the car. In the case of a call, if any one of the button is pressed, a tone equivalent to the button pressed is heard at the other end of the call. This tone is known as DTMF (Dual Tone Multiple Frequency). The car recognizes this DTMF tone with the help of the phone stacked in the car. The received tone is processed by the Arduino microcontroller. The microcontroller is programmed to acquire a decision for any given input and outputs its decision to motor drivers in order to drive the motors in the forward direction or backward direction or left or right direction. The mobile phone that makes a call to cell phone stacked in the car act as a remote.

Keywords: Arduino Micro-controller, Arduino UNO, DTMF, Mobile phone, Robotic car.

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Authors: Dipen A. Mistry, Bhupelly Dheeraj, Ravit Gautam, Manmohan Singh Meena, Suresh Mikkili

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In recent years the large scale use of the power electronic equipment has led to an increase of harmonics in the power system. The harmonics results into a poor power quality and have great adverse economical impact on the utilities and customers. Current harmonics are one of the most common power quality problems and are usually resolved by using shunt active filter (SHAF). The main objective of this work is to develop PI and Fuzzy logic controllers (FLC) to analyze the performance of Shunt Active Filter for mitigating current harmonics under balanced and unbalanced sinusoidal source voltage conditions for normal load and increased load. When the supply voltages are ideal (balanced), both PI and FLC are converging to the same compensation characteristics. However, the supply voltages are non-ideal (unbalanced), FLC offers outstanding results. Simulation results validate the superiority of FLC with triangular membership function over the PI controller.

Keywords: DC link voltage, Fuzzy logic controller, Harmonics, PI controller, Shunt Active Filter.

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Authors: Mahathir Sarjan, Ramos Radzly, Noor Baiti Jamaluddin, Mohd Hafiz Zakaria, Hisham Suhadi

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Creativity is marked by the ability or power, to produce through imaginative skill and create something anew. The University is one of the great places to improve the talent in imaginative skill. The purpose of this study was to identify a creativity of the student in presentation product development. Two hundred seventeen Technical and Vocational Education (TVE) students in Universiti Tun Hussein Onn had chosen as a respondent. This study is to survey the level of creativity which is focused on knowledge, skills, presentation style, and character of creative personnel. The level of creativity was measured based on the scale at low, medium and high followed by mean score level. The data collected by questionnaire, then analyzed using SPSS version 20.0.The result of the study indicated that the students showed a higher of creativity (mean score in Knowledge = 4.12 and Skills= 4.02). In conjunction with the findings, implications and recommendations were suggested forward like to ensconce the research and improve with a more creativity concept in presentation product of development for learning and teaching process.

Keywords: Creativity, technical, vocational education, presentation products and development for learning and teaching process.

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Authors: Siriluck Lorpunmanee, Mohd Noor Sap, Abdul Hanan Abdullah, Chai Chompoo-inwai

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Grid computing is growing rapidly in the distributed heterogeneous systems for utilizing and sharing large-scale resources to solve complex scientific problems. Scheduling is the most recent topic used to achieve high performance in grid environments. It aims to find a suitable allocation of resources for each job. A typical problem which arises during this task is the decision of scheduling. It is about an effective utilization of processor to minimize tardiness time of a job, when it is being scheduled. This paper, therefore, addresses the problem by developing a general framework of grid scheduling using dynamic information and an ant colony optimization algorithm to improve the decision of scheduling. The performance of various dispatching rules such as First Come First Served (FCFS), Earliest Due Date (EDD), Earliest Release Date (ERD), and an Ant Colony Optimization (ACO) are compared. Moreover, the benefit of using an Ant Colony Optimization for performance improvement of the grid Scheduling is also discussed. It is found that the scheduling system using an Ant Colony Optimization algorithm can efficiently and effectively allocate jobs to proper resources.

Keywords: Grid computing, Distributed heterogeneous system, Ant colony optimization algorithm, Grid scheduling, Dispatchingrules.

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Authors: Tatjana Eitrich, Bruno Lang

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This work deals with aspects of support vector machine learning for large-scale data mining tasks. Based on a decomposition algorithm for support vector machine training that can be run in serial as well as shared memory parallel mode we introduce a transformation of the training data that allows for the usage of an expensive generalized kernel without additional costs. We present experiments for the Gaussian kernel, but usage of other kernel functions is possible, too. In order to further speed up the decomposition algorithm we analyze the critical problem of working set selection for large training data sets. In addition, we analyze the influence of the working set sizes onto the scalability of the parallel decomposition scheme. Our tests and conclusions led to several modifications of the algorithm and the improvement of overall support vector machine learning performance. Our method allows for using extensive parameter search methods to optimize classification accuracy.

Keywords: Support Vector Machine Training, Multi-ParameterKernels, Shared Memory Parallel Computing, Large Data

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Authors: Scott N. Gerard, Aliza Heching, Susann M. Keohane, Samuel S. Adams

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The world-wide population of people over 60 years of age is growing rapidly. The explosion is placing increasingly onerous demands on individual families, multiple industries and entire countries. Current, human-intensive approaches to eldercare are not sustainable, but IoT and AI technologies can help. The Knowledge Reactor (KR) is a contextual, data fusion engine built to address this and other similar problems. It fuses and centralizes IoT and System of Record/Engagement data into a reactive knowledge graph. Cognitive applications and services are constructed with its multiagent architecture. The KR can scale-up and scaledown, because it exploits container-based, horizontally scalable services for graph store (JanusGraph) and pub-sub (Kafka) technologies. While the KR can be applied to many domains that require IoT and AI technologies, this paper describes how the KR specifically supports the challenging domain of cognitive eldercare. Rule- and machine learning-based analytics infer activities of daily living from IoT sensor readings. KR scalability, adaptability, flexibility and usability are demonstrated.

Keywords: Ambient sensing, AI, artificial intelligence, eldercare, IoT, internet of things, knowledge graph.

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Authors: S. A. Anuar, N. H. Hamid, M. H. Hashim, S. M. D. Salleh

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This paper present the experimental work of double unit tunnel form building (TFB) subjected to in-plane lateral cyclic loading. A one third scale of 3-storey double unit of TFB is tested until its strength degradation. Then, the TFB is repaired and retrofitted using additional shear wall, steel angle and CFRP sheet. The crack patterns, lateral strength, stiffness, ductility and equivalent viscous damping (EVD) were analyzed and compared before and after repair and retrofit. The result indicates that the lateral strength increases by 22% in pushing and 27% in pulling direction. Moreover, the stiffness and ductility obtained before and after retrofit increase tremendously by 87.87% and 39.66%, respectively. Meanwhile, the energy absorption measured by equivalent viscous damping obtained after retrofit increase by 12.34% in pulling direction. It can be concluded that the proposed retrofit method is capable to increase the lateral strength capacity, stiffness and energy absorption of double unit TFB.

Keywords: Crack pattern, stiffness, ductility, equivalent viscous damping.

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Authors: Suselo Thomas, Suyoto, Dwiandiyanta B. Yudi

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This paper explain about prototype of a business directory for micro-scale businesses, small and medium enterprises (SMEs), the third phase of the research. The third phase is the phase of software development based on the model of SME business directory that had been developed, to create prototype software SME business directory. In the fourth phase, namely the implementation, these units have been developed are tested to obtain input from potential users. The fifth phase is the testing phase to determine the strengths and weaknesses of software has been developed. The result of this phase is the software in the form of on-line (web based) and multimedia-based. Business Directory, if implemented will facilitate and optimize the access of SMEs to ease supplier access to marketing. Business Directory will be equipped with the power of geocoding, so each location can be easily viewed SMEs on the map. The map will be constructed by using the functionality of a web-based Google Maps API. The information presented in the form of multimedia that can be more interesting and interactive. Methodology used to achieve the goal: observation, interviews, modeling and classifying business directory for SMEs. 

Keywords: Business directories, SMEs, Google Maps API, Multimedia, Prototype.

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Authors: Mohd Anuar Awang Idris, Muhammad Nubli Abdul Wahab, Nora Yusma Mohamed Yusoff

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Wudu’ (Ablution) and Zikr are amongst some of the spiritual tools which may help an individual control his mind, emotion and attitude. These tools are deemed to be able to deliver a positive impact on an individual’s psychophysiology. The main objective of this research is to determine the effects of Wudu’ (Ablution) and Zikr therapy using the biofeedback emWave application and technology. For this research, 13 students were selected as samples from the students’ representative body at the University Tenaga National, Malaysia. The DASS (Depression Anxiety Stress Scale) questionnaire was used to help with the assessment and measurement of each student’s ability in controlling his or her emotions before and after the therapies. The biofeedback emWave technology was utilized to monitor the student’s psychophysiology level. In addition, the data obtained from the Heart rate variability (HRV) test have also been used to affirm that Wudu’ and Zikr had had significant impacts on the student’s success in controlling his or her emotional pressure.

Keywords: Biofeedback emWave, emotion, psychophysiology, wudu’, zikr.

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Authors: Maruful H. Mazumder, Raymond I. Gilbert

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The design specifications for calculating development and lapped splice lengths of reinforcement in concrete are derived from a conventional empirical modelling approach that correlates experimental test data using a single mathematical equation. This paper describes part of a recently completed experimental research program to assess the effects of different structural parameters on the development length requirements of modern high strength steel reinforcing bars, including the case of lapped splices in large-scale reinforced concrete members. The normalized average bond stresses for the different variations of anchorage lengths are assessed according to the general form of a typical empirical analytical model of bond and anchorage. Improved analytical modelling equations are developed in the paper that better correlate the normalized bond strength parameters with the structural parameters of an empirical model of bond and anchorage.

Keywords: Bond stress, Development length, Lapped splice length, Reinforced concrete.

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Authors: Farid Arya, Trevor Hyde, Paul Henshall, Phillip Eames, Roger Moss, Stan Shire

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Vacuum flat plate solar thermal collectors offer several advantages over other collectors namely the excellent optical and thermal characteristics they exhibit due to a combination of their wide surface area and high vacuum thermal insulation. These characteristics can offer a variety of applications for industrial process heat as well as for building integration as they are much thinner than conventional collectors making installation possible in limited spaces. However, many technical challenges which need to be addressed to enable wide scale adoption of the technology still remain. This paper will discuss the challenges, expectations and requirements for the flat-plate vacuum solar collector development. In addition, it will provide an overview of work undertaken in Ulster University, Loughborough University, and the University of Warwick on flat-plate vacuum solar thermal collectors. Finally, this paper will present a detailed experimental investigation on the development of a vacuum panel with a novel sealing method which will be used to accommodate a novel slim hydroformed solar absorber.

Keywords: Hot box calorimeter, infrared thermography, solar thermal collector, vacuum insulation.

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Authors: B. Manshoor, N. Ihsak, Amir Khalid

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The sensitivity of orifice plate metering to disturbed flow (either asymmetric or swirling) is a subject of great concern to flow meter users and manufacturers. The distortions caused by pipe fittings and pipe installations upstream of the orifice plate are major sources of this type of non-standard flows. These distortions can alter the accuracy of metering to an unacceptable degree. In this work, a multi-scale object known as metal foam has been used to generate a predetermined turbulent flow upstream of the orifice plate. The experimental results showed that the combination of an orifice plate and metal foam flow conditioner is broadly insensitive to upstream disturbances. This metal foam demonstrated a good performance in terms of removing swirl and producing a repeatable flow profile within a short distance downstream of the device. The results of using a combination of a metal foam flow conditioner and orifice plate for non-standard flow conditions including swirling flow and asymmetric flow show this package can preserve the accuracy of metering up to the level required in the standards.

Keywords: Metal foam flow conditioner, flow measurement, orifice plate.

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Authors: Shu-Ying Marissa Pang, Stephen Tristram, Simon Brown

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Fungal infections are becoming more common and the range of susceptible individuals has expanded. While Candida albicans remains the most common infective species, other Candida spp. are becoming increasingly significant. In a range of large-scale studies of candidaemia between 1999 and 2006, about 52% of 9717 cases involved C. albicans, about 30% involved either C. glabrata or C. parapsilosis and less than 15% involved C. tropicalis, C. krusei or C. guilliermondii. However, the probability of mortality within 30 days of infection with a particular species was at least 40% for C. tropicalis, C. albicans, C. glabrata and C. krusei and only 22% for C. parapsilopsis. Clinical isolates of Candida spp. grew at rates ranging from 1.65 h-1 to 4.9 h-1. Three species (C. krusei, C. albicans and C. glabrata) had relatively high growth rates (μm > 4 h-1), C. tropicalis and C. dubliniensis grew moderately quickly (Ôëê 3 h-1) and C. parapsilosis and C. guilliermondii grew slowly (< 2 h-1). Based on these data, the log of the odds of mortality within 30 days of diagnosis was linearly related to μm. From this the underlying probability of mortality is 0.13 (95% CI: 0.10-0.17) and it increases by about 0.09 ± 0.02 for each unit increase in μm. Given that the overall crude mortality is about 0.36, the growth of Candida spp. approximately doubles the rate, consistent with the results of larger case-matched studies of candidaemia.

Keywords: Candida spp., candidiasis, growth, pathogenicity.

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Authors: Jianzheng Wei, Duo Zhen, Zhihan Yang, Huifeng Tan

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The deployable descent technology is a lightweight entry method using an inflatable heat shield. The heatshield consists of a pressurized core which is covered by different layers of thermal insulation and flexible ablative materials in order to protect against the thermal loads. In this paper, both aluminum and silicon-aluminum aerogels were prepared by freeze-drying method. The latter material has bigger specific surface area and nano-scale pores. Mullite fibers are used as the reinforcing fibers to prepare the aerogel matrix to improve composite flexibility. The flexible composite materials were performed as an insulation layer to an underlying aramid fabric by a thermal shock test at a heat flux density of 120 kW/m² and uniaxial tensile test. These results show that the aramid fabric with untreated mullite fibers as the thermal protective layer is completely carbonized at the heat of about 60 s. The aramid fabric as a thermal resistance layer of the composite material still has good mechanical properties at the same heat condition.

Keywords: Aerogel, aramid fabric, flexibility, thermal resistance.

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Authors: Mangesh R. Phate, V. H. Tatwawadi

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This paper is intended to develop an artificial neural network (ANN) based model of material removal rate (MRR) in the turning of ferrous and nonferrous material in a Indian small-scale industry. MRR of the formulated model was proved with the testing data and artificial neural network (ANN) model was developed for the analysis and prediction of the relationship between inputs and output parameters during the turning of ferrous and nonferrous materials. The input parameters of this model are operator, work-piece, cutting process, cutting tool, machine and the environment.

The ANN model consists of a three layered feedforward back propagation neural network. The network is trained with pairs of independent/dependent datasets generated when machining ferrous and nonferrous material. A very good performance of the neural network, in terms of contract with experimental data, was achieved. The model may be used for the testing and forecast of the complex relationship between dependent and the independent parameters in turning operations.

Keywords: Field data based model, Artificial neural network, Simulation, Convectional Turning, Material removal rate.

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Authors: H. Akbari Khorami, P. Wild, N. Djilali

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This paper reports on the response of a fiber-optic sensing probe to small concentrations of hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) vapor at room temperature. H2O2 has extensive applications in industrial and medical environments. Conversely, H2O2 can be a health hazard by itself. For example, H2O2 induces cellular damage in human cells and its presence can be used to diagnose illnesses such as asthma and human breast cancer. Hence, development of reliable H2O2 sensor is of vital importance to detect and measure this species. Ferric ferrocyanide, referred to as Prussian Blue (PB), was deposited on the tip of a multimode optical fiber through the single source precursor technique and served as an indicator of H2O2 in a spectroscopic manner. Sensing tests were performed in H2O2-H2O vapor mixtures with different concentrations of H2O2. The results of sensing tests show the sensor is able to detect H2O2 concentrations in the range of 50.6 ppm to 229.5 ppm. Furthermore, the sensor response to H2O2 concentrations is linear in a log-log scale with the adjacent R-square of 0.93. This sensing behavior allows us to detect and quantify the concentration of H2O2 in the vapor phase.

Keywords: Chemical deposition, fiber-optic sensors, hydrogen peroxide vapor, prussian blue.

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Authors: T. Matsubayashi, T. Yamada

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In this paper, we propose a fast and efficient method for drawing very large-scale graph data. The conventional force-directed method proposed by Fruchterman and Rheingold (FR method) is well-known. It defines repulsive forces between every pair of nodes and attractive forces between connected nodes on a edge and calculates corresponding potential energy. An optimal layout is obtained by iteratively updating node positions to minimize the potential energy. Here, the positions of the nodes are updated every global timestep at the same time. In the proposed method, each node has its own individual time and time step, and nodes are updated at different frequencies depending on the local situation. The proposed method is inspired by the hierarchical individual time step method used for the high accuracy calculations for dense particle fields such as star clusters in astrophysical dynamics. Experiments show that the proposed method outperforms the original FR method in both speed and accuracy. We implement the proposed method on the MDGRAPE-3 PCI-X special purpose parallel computer and realize a speed enhancement of several hundred times.

Keywords: visualization, graph drawing, Internet Map

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Authors: S.H. Mirdamadian, S.M. Khayam-Nekoui, H. Ghanavati

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Composting is the process in which municipal solid waste (MSW) and other organic waste materials such as biosolids and manures are decomposed through the action of bacteria and other microorganisms into a stable granular material which, applied to land, as soil conditioner. Microorganisms, especially those that are able to degrade polymeric organic material have a key role in speed up this process. The aim of this study has been established to isolation of microorganisms with high ability to production extracellular enzymes for degradation of natural polymers that are exists in MSW for decreasing time of degradation phase. Our experimental study for isolation designed in two phases: in first phase we isolated degrading microorganism with selected media that consist a special natural polymer such as cellulose, starch, lipids and etc as sole source of carbon. In second phase we selected microorganism that had high degrading enzyme production with enzymatic assay for seed production. However, our findings in pilot scale have indicated that usage of this microbial consortium had high efficiency for decreasing degradation phase.

Keywords: Biodegradation, Compost, Municipal Solid Waste, Waste Management.

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Authors: Samar M. Alqhtani, Suhuai Luo, Brian Regan

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Data fusion technology can be the best way to extract useful information from multiple sources of data. It has been widely applied in various applications. This paper presents a data fusion approach in multimedia data for event detection in twitter by using Dempster-Shafer evidence theory. The methodology applies a mining algorithm to detect the event. There are two types of data in the fusion. The first is features extracted from text by using the bag-ofwords method which is calculated using the term frequency-inverse document frequency (TF-IDF). The second is the visual features extracted by applying scale-invariant feature transform (SIFT). The Dempster - Shafer theory of evidence is applied in order to fuse the information from these two sources. Our experiments have indicated that comparing to the approaches using individual data source, the proposed data fusion approach can increase the prediction accuracy for event detection. The experimental result showed that the proposed method achieved a high accuracy of 0.97, comparing with 0.93 with texts only, and 0.86 with images only.

Keywords: Data fusion, Dempster-Shafer theory, data mining, event detection.

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Authors: Lucy Patricia Onundo, Wilfred Njoroge Mwema

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The rapidly diminishing fossil fuel reserves, their exorbitant cost and the increasingly apparent negative effect of fossil fuels to climate changes is a wake-up call to explore renewable energy. Wind, bio-fuel and solar power have already become staples of Kenyan electricity mix. The potential of electric power generation from marine tidal currents is enormous, with oceans covering more than 70% of the earth. However, attempts to harness marine tidal energy in Kenya, has yet to be studied thoroughly due to its promising, cyclic, reliable and predictable nature and the vast energy contained within it. The high load factors resulting from the fluid properties and the predictable resource characteristics make marine currents particularly attractive for power generation and advantageous when compared to others. Global-level resource assessments and oceanographic literature and data have been compiled in an analysis of the technology-specific requirements for tidal energy technologies and the physical resources. Temporal variations in resource intensity as well as the differences between small-scale applications are considered.

Keywords: Energy data assessment, environmental legislation, renewable energy, tidal-in-stream turbines.

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Authors: Flur R. Ismagilov, Irek Kh. Khayrullin, Vyacheslav E. Vavilov, Ruslan D. Karimov, Anton S. Gorbunov, Danis R. Farrakhov

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The paper presents another structural scheme of high-temperature starter-generator with external rotor to be installed on High Pressure Shaft (HPS) of aircraft engines (AE) to implement More Electrical Engine concept. The basic materials to make this starter-generator (SG) were selected and justified. Multi-criteria optimization of the developed structural scheme was performed using a genetic algorithm and Pareto method. The optimum (in Pareto terms) active length and thickness of permanent magnets of SG were selected as a result of the optimization. Using the dimensions obtained, allowed to reduce the weight of the designed SG by 10 kg relative to a base option at constant thermal loads. Multidisciplinary computer simulation was performed on the basis of the optimum geometric dimensions, which proved performance efficiency of the design. We further plan to make a full-scale sample of SG of HPS and publish the results of its experimental research.

Keywords: High-temperature starter-generator, More electrical engine, multi-criteria optimization, permanent magnet.

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Authors: Vijay Kumar Bajpai, Sudhir Kumar Singh

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In this study, the performance analyses of the twenty five Coal-Fired Power Plants (CFPPs) used for electricity generation are carried out through various Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) models. Three efficiency indices are defined and pursued. During the calculation of the operational performance, energy and non-energy variables are used as input, and net electricity produced is used as desired output (Model-1). CO2 emitted to the environment is used as the undesired output (Model-2) in the computation of the pure environmental performance while in Model-3 CO2 emissions is considered as detrimental input in the calculation of operational and environmental performance. Empirical results show that most of the plants are operating in increasing returns to scale region and Mettur plant is efficient one with regards to energy use and environment. The result also indicates that the undesirable output effect is insignificant in the research sample. The present study will provide clues to plant operators towards raising the operational and environmental performance of CFPPs.

Keywords: Coal fired power plants, environmental performance, data envelopment analysis, operational performance.

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Authors: Saemee Han, Kittipong Buranakulpairoj

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Many new experimental films which were free from conventional movie forms have appeared since Nubellbak Movement in the late 1950s. Forty years after the movement started, on March 13th, 1995, on the 100th anniversary of the birth of film, the declaration called Dogme 95, was issued in Copenhagen, Denmark. It aimed to create a new style of avant-garde film, and showed a tendency toward being anti-Hollywood and anti-genre, which were against the highly popular Hollywood trend of movies based on large-scale investment. The main idea of Dogme 95 is the opposition to 'the writer's doctrine' that a film should be the artist's individual work and to 'the overuse of technology' in film. The key figures declared ten principles called 'Vow of Chastity', by which new movie forms were to be produced. Interview (2000), directed by Byunhyuk, was made in 2000, five years after Dogme 95 was declared. This movie was dedicated as the first Asian Dogme. This study will survey the relationship between Korean film and the Vow of Chastity through the Korean films released in theaters from a viewpoint of technology and content. It also will call attention to its effects on and significance to Korean film in modern society.

Keywords: Anti-Hollywood, Dogme 95, Korean Films, Vow of Chastity.

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Authors: Atilla Evcin, Bahri Ersoy, Süleyman Akpınar, I. Sinan Atlı

Abstract:

Ceramic, polymer and composite nanofibers are nowadays begun to be utilized in many fields of nanotechnology. By the means of dimensions, these fibers are as small as nano scale but because of having large surface area and microstructural characteristics, they provide unique mechanic, optical, magnetic, electronic and chemical properties. In terms of nanofiber production, electrospinning has been the most widely used technique in recent years. In this study, carbon nanofibers have been synthesized from solutions of Polyacrylonitrile (PAN)/ N,N-dimethylformamide (DMF) by electrospinning method. The carbon nanofibers have been stabilized by oxidation at 250 °C for 2 h in air and carbonized at 750 °C for 1 h in H2/N2. Images of carbon nanofibers have been taken with scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The images have been analyzed to study the fiber morphology and to determine the distribution of the fiber diameter using FibraQuant 1.3 software. Then polymer composites have been produced from mixture of carbon nanofibers and silicone polymer. The final polymer composites have been characterized by X-ray diffraction method and scanning electron microscopy (SEM) energy dispersive X-ray (EDX) measurements. These results have been reported and discussed. At result, homogeneous carbon nanofibers with 100-167 nm of diameter were obtained with optimized electrospinning conditions.

Keywords: Electrospinning, characterization, composites, nanofiber.

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Authors: Jatin Kumar Choudhary, Naren Rayala, Abbas Eslami Kiasari, Fahimeh Jafari

Abstract:

Great Britain has one of the safest road networks in the world. However, the consequences of any death or serious injury are devastating for loved ones, as well as for those who help the severely injured. This paper aims to analyse Great Britain's road safety situation and show the response measures for areas where the total damage caused by accidents can be significantly and quickly reduced. For the past 30 years, the UK has had a good record in reducing fatalities over the past 30 years, there is still a considerable number of road deaths. The government continues to scale back road deaths empowering responsible road users by identifying and prosecuting the parameters that make the roads less safe. This study represents an exploratory analysis with deep insights which could provide policy makers with invaluable insights into how accidents happen and how they can be mitigated. We use STATS19 data published by the UK government. Since we need more information about locations which is not provided in STATA19, we first expand the features of the dataset using OpenStreetMap and Visual Crossing. This paper also provides a discussion regarding new road safety methods.

Keywords: Road safety, data analysis, OpenStreetMap, feature expanding.

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Authors: Andreia Guimarães Farnese, Mateus Fernandes Réu Urban, Leandro Procópio, Renato Zângaro, Regiane Albertini

Abstract:

Senescence changes include postural balance, inferring the risk of falls, and can lead to fractures, bedridden, and the risk of death. Physical activity, e.g., cardiovascular exercises, is notable for improving balance due to brain cell stimulations, but fine coordination exercises also elevate cell brain metabolism. This study aimed to verify whether the elderly person who performs fine motor activity has a balance similar to that of those who practice physical activity. The subjects were divided into three groups according to the activity practice: control group (CG) with seven participants for the sedentary individuals, motor coordination group (MCG) with six participants, and physical activity group (PAG) with eight participants. Data comparisons were from the Berg balance scale, Time up and Go test, and stabilometric analysis. Descriptive statistical and ANOVA analyses were performed for data analysis. The results reveal that including fine motor activities can improve the balance of the elderly and indirectly decrease the risk of falls.

Keywords: Balance, barapodometer, coordination, elderly.

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