Search results for: Strategic management system

Authors: Guozhen Li, Philip Hall, Nick Miles, Tao Wu

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This paper presents a numerical investigation of two horizontally mounted four-lobed swirl pipes in terms of swirl induction effectiveness into flows passing through them. The swirl flows induced by the two swirl pipes have the potential to improve the efficiency of Clean-In-Place procedures in a closed processing system by local intensification of hydrodynamic impact on the internal pipe surface. Pressure losses, swirl development within the two swirl pipe, swirl induction effectiveness, swirl decay and wall shear stress variation downstream of two swirl pipes are analyzed and compared. It was found that a shorter length of swirl inducing pipe used in joint with transition pipes is more effective in swirl induction than when a longer one is used, in that it has a less constraint to the induced swirl and results in slightly higher swirl intensity just downstream of it with the expense of a smaller pressure loss. The wall shear stress downstream of the shorter swirl pipe is also slightly larger than that downstream of the longer swirl pipe due to the slightly higher swirl intensity induced by the shorter swirl pipe. The advantage of the shorter swirl pipe in terms of swirl induction is more significant in flows with a larger Reynolds Number.

Keywords: Swirl pipe, swirl effectiveness, CFD, wall shear stress, swirl intensity.

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Authors: Jonmichael A. Weaver, David A. Miller

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Ultra High Molecular Weight Polyethylene (UHMWPE) presents several distinct advantages as a material with a high strength to weight ratio, durability, and neutron stability. Understanding the change in the mechanical performance of UHMWPE due to environmental exposure is key to safety for future applications. Dyneema® HB-210, a 15 µm diameter UHMWPE multi-filament fiber laid up in a polyurethane matrix in [0/ 90]2, with a thickness of 0.17 mm is compared to the same fiber and orientation system, HB-212, with a rubber-based matrix under UV aging conditions. UV aging tests according to ASTM-G154 were performed on both HB-210 and HB-212 to interrogate the change in mechanical properties, as measured through dynamic mechanical analysis and imaged using a scanning electron microscope. These results showed a decrease in both the storage modulus and loss modulus of the aged material compared to the unaged, even though the tan δ slightly increased. Material degradation occurred at a higher rate in Dyneema® HB-212 compared to HB-210. The HB-210 was characterized for the effects of 100 hours of UV aging via dynamic mechanical analysis. Scanning electron microscope images were taken of the HB-210 and HB-212 to identify the primary damage mechanisms in the matrix. Embrittlement and matrix spall were the products of prolonged UV exposure and erosion, resulting in decreased mechanical properties.

Keywords: Composite materials, material characterization, UV aging, UHMWPE.

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Authors: Mayowa Philips Ibitola, Abe Oluwaseun Banji, Olorunfemi Akinade-Solomon

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A total of 20 bottom sediment samples were collected from the Lekki Lagoon during the wet and dry season. The study was carried out to determine the textural characteristics, sediment distribution pattern and energy of transportation within the lagoon system. The sediment grain sizes and depth profiling was analyzed using dry sieving method and MATLAB algorithm for processing. The granulometric reveals fine grained sand both for the wet and dry season with an average mean value of 2.03 ϕ and -2.88 ϕ, respectively. Sediments were moderately sorted with an average inclusive standard deviation of 0.77 ϕ and -0.82 ϕ. Skewness varied from strongly coarse and near symmetrical 0.34- ϕ and 0.09 ϕ. The kurtosis average value was 0.87 ϕ and -1.4 ϕ (platykurtic and leptokurtic). Entirely, the bathymetry shows an average depth of 4.0 m. The deepest and shallowest area has a depth of 11.2 m and 0.5 m, respectively. High concentration of fine sand was observed at deep areas compared to the shallow areas during wet and dry season. Statistical parameter results show that the overall sediments are sorted, and deposited under low energy condition over a long distance. However, sediment distribution and sediment transport pattern of Lekki Lagoon is controlled by a low energy current and the down slope configuration of the bathymetry enhances the sorting and the deposition rate in the Lekki Lagoon.

Keywords: Lekki Lagoon, marine sediment, bathymetry, grain size distribution.

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Authors: E. B. Quarcoo, I. Yakubu, K. J. Appau

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Current land use and land cover (LULC) dynamics in Ghana have revealed considerable changes in settlement spaces. As a result, this study is intended to merge the cellular automata and Markov chain models using remotely sensed data and Geographical Information System (GIS) approaches to monitor, map, and detect the spatio-temporal LULC change in state lands within Cape Coast Metropolis. Multi-temporal satellite images from 1986-2020 were pre-processed, geo-referenced, and then mapped using supervised maximum likelihood classification to investigate the state’s land cover history (1986-2020) with an overall mapping accuracy of approximately 85%. The study further observed the rate of change for the area to have favored the built-up area 9.8 (12.58 km2) to the detriment of vegetation 5.14 (12.68 km2), but on average, 0.37 km2 (91.43 acres, or 37.00 ha.) of the landscape was transformed yearly. Subsequently, the CA-Markov model was used to anticipate the potential LULC for the study area for 2030. According to the anticipated 2030 LULC map, the patterns of vegetation transitioning into built-up regions will continue over the following ten years as a result of urban growth.

Keywords: LULC, cellular automata, Markov Chain, state lands, urbanisation, public lands, cape coast metropolis.

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Authors: Chiung-Hui Chen

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The Internet of Things (IoT) was designed for widespread convenience. With the smart tag and the sensing network, a large quantity of dynamic information is immediately presented in the IoT. Through the internal communication and interaction, meaningful objects provide real-time services for users. Therefore, the service with appropriate decision-making has become an essential issue. Based on the science of human behavior, this study employed the environment model to record the time sequences and locations of different behaviors and adopted the probability module of the hierarchical Hidden Markov Model for the inference. The statistical analysis was conducted to achieve the following objectives: First, define user behaviors and predict the user behavior routes with the environment model to analyze user purposes. Second, construct the hierarchical Hidden Markov Model according to the logic framework, and establish the sequential intensity among behaviors to get acquainted with the use and activity fabric of the intelligent environment. Third, establish the intensity of the relation between the probability of objects’ being used and the objects. The indicator can describe the possible limitations of the mechanism. As the process is recorded in the information of the system created in this study, these data can be reused to adjust the procedure of intelligent design services.

Keywords: Behavior, big data, hierarchical Hidden Markov Model, intelligent object.

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Authors: Hironori Karachi, Haruka Yamashita

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Recently, the system of quick response (QR) code is getting popular. Many companies introduce new QR code payment services and the services are competing with each other to increase the number of users. For increasing the number of users, we should grasp the difference of feature of the demographic information, usage information, and value of users between services. In this study, we conduct an analysis of real-world data provided by Nomura Research Institute including the demographic data of users and information of users’ usages of two services; LINE Pay, and PayPay. For analyzing such data and interpret the feature of them, Nonnegative Matrix Factorization (NMF) is widely used; however, in case of the target data, there is a problem of the missing data. EM-algorithm NMF (EMNMF) to complete unknown values for understanding the feature of the given data presented by matrix shape. Moreover, for comparing the result of the NMF analysis of two matrices, there is Discriminant NMF (DNMF) shows the difference of users features between two matrices. In this study, we combine EMNMF and DNMF and also analyze the target data. As the interpretation, we show the difference of the features of users between LINE Pay and Paypay.

Keywords: Data science, non-negative matrix factorization, missing data, quality of services.

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Authors: Mourad Moussa, Ali Douik, Hassani Messaoud

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Events discrimination and decision maker in sport field are the subject of many interesting studies in computer vision and artificial intelligence. A large volume of research has been conducted for automatic semantic event detection and summarization of sports videos. Indeed the results of these researches have a very significant contribution, as well to television broadcasts as to the football teams, since the result of sporting event can be reflected on the economic field. In this paper, we propose a novel fuzzy sequential technique which lead to discriminate events and specify the technico-tactics on going the game, nor the fuzzy system or the sequential one, may be able to respond to the asked question, in fact fuzzy process is not sufficient, it does not respect the chronological order according the time of various events, similarly the sequential process needs flexibility about the parameters used in this study, it may affect a membership degree of each parameter on the one hand and respect the sequencing of events for each frame on the other hand. Indeed this technique describes special events such as dribbling, headings, short sprints, rapid acceleration or deceleration, turning, jumping, kicking, ball occupation, and tackling according velocity vectors of the two players and the ball direction.

Keywords: Sequential process, Event detection, Soccer videos analysis, Fuzzy process, Spatio-temporal parameters.

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Authors: Wanida Suwunniponth

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The objectives of this research paper were to study the expectation and satisfaction of tourists in five tourism service quality dimensions, namely, website quality, service ability, trust ability, customer empathy, and responsiveness to customer and also to study the influences of satisfaction affecting loyalty toward quality service of the online tourism enterprises located in Bangkok Thailand. This research utilized both quantitative and qualitative research methods. In terms of quantitative method, a questionnaire was used as a tool to collect data from 400 tourists who were using in online travel services. Statistics analysis included descriptive statistics, t-test and Multiple Regression Analysis. In terms of qualitative analysis, an in-depth interview and content analysis were used along with 10 individual management levels of e-commerce enterprises.

The results revealed that the respondents had higher expectations than their level of satisfaction in all five categories. However, the respondents were more satisfied with online travel services than without online service. The demographic factors such as gender and age had no influence on the level of satisfaction whereas the demographic factors of education, occupation, and income had influenced the level of satisfaction. The test results also indicated that the level of satisfaction from responsiveness to customer had the highest influence on the loyalty of tourists who used online travel. The level of satisfaction from customer empathy had the highest influence on the tourists to recommend others to use online travel services. Also, the level of satisfaction from service ability had the highest influence on tourists to take an actual trip.

Keywords: Satisfaction, Loyalty, Service Quality, Online Tourism Enterprises.

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Authors: P. Keerthika, P. Suresh

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Grid is an environment with millions of resources which are dynamic and heterogeneous in nature. A computational grid is one in which the resources are computing nodes and is meant for applications that involves larger computations. A scheduling algorithm is said to be efficient if and only if it performs better resource allocation even in case of resource failure. Resource allocation is a tedious issue since it has to consider several requirements such as system load, processing cost and time, user’s deadline and resource failure. This work attempts in designing a resource allocation algorithm which is cost-effective and also targets at load balancing, fault tolerance and user satisfaction by considering the above requirements. The proposed Budget Constrained Load Balancing Fault Tolerant algorithm with user satisfaction (BLBFT) reduces the schedule makespan, schedule cost and task failure rate and improves resource utilization. Evaluation of the proposed BLBFT algorithm is done using Gridsim toolkit and the results are compared with the algorithms which separately concentrates on all these factors. The comparison results ensure that the proposed algorithm works better than its counterparts.

Keywords: Grid Scheduling, Load Balancing, fault tolerance, makespan, cost, resource utilization.

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Authors: Omid A. Zargar

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Vibration monitoring methods of most critical equipment like main turbine and compressors always plays important role in preventive maintenance and management consideration in big industrial plants. There are a number of traditional methods like monitoring the overall vibration data from Bently Nevada panel and the time wave form (TWF) or fast Fourier transform (FFT) monitoring. Besides, Shaft centerline monitoring method developed too much in recent years. There are a number of arguments both in favor of and against this method between people who work in preventive maintenance and condition monitoring systems (vibration analysts). In this paper basic principal of Turbine compressor vibration analysis and rotor movement evaluation by shaft centerline method discussed in details through a case history. This case history is related to main turbine compressor of an olefin plant in Iran oil industry. In addition, some common mistakes that may occur by vibration analyst during the process discussed in details. It is worthy to know that, these mistakes may one of the reasons that sometimes this method seems to be not effective. Furthermore, recent patent and innovation in shaft position and movement evaluation are discussed in this paper.

Keywords: Shaft centerline position, attitude angle, journal bearing, sleeve bearing, tilting pad, steam turbine, main compressor, multistage compressor, condition monitoring, non-contact probe

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Authors: Wondwosen Teshome

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It is impossible to think about democracy without elections. The litmus test of any electoral process in any country is the possibility of a one time minority to become a majority at another time and a peaceful transition of power. In many countries in Sub-Saharan Africa though the multi-party elections appeared to be competitive they failed the acid test of democracy: peaceful regime change in a free and fair election. Failure to solve electoral disputes might lead to bloody electoral conflicts as witnessed in many emerging democracies in Africa. The aim of this paper is to investigate electoral conflicts in Africa since the end of the Cold War by using the 2005 post-election violence in Ethiopia as a case study. In Ethiopia, the coming to power of the EPRDF in 1991 marked the fall of the Derg dictatorial military government and the beginning of a multi-party democracy. The country held multi-party parliamentary elections in 1995, 2000, and 2005 where the ruling EPRDF party “won" the elections through violence, involving intimidation, manipulation, detentions of political opponents, torture, and political assassinations. The 2005 electoral violence was the worst electoral violence in the country-s political history that led to the death of 193 protestors and the imprisonment of more than 40, 000 people. It is found out that the major causes of the 2005 Ethiopian election were the defeat of the ruling party in the election and its attempt to reverse the poll results by force; the Opposition-s lack of decisive leadership; the absence of independent courts and independent electoral management body; and the ruling party-s direct control over the army and police.

Keywords: Africa, Ethiopia, Election, Electoral violence, NEBE.

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Authors: Hyun Ah Yoon, Ji Yeon Kang, Hee Sun Kim, Yeong Soo Shin

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Reinforced concrete (RC) shear wall system of residential buildings is popular in South Korea. RC walls are subjected to axial forces in common and the effect of axial forces on the strength loss of the fire damaged walls has not been investigated. This paper aims at investigating temperature distribution on fire damaged concrete walls having different axial loads. In the experiments, a variable of specimens is axial force ratio. RC walls are fabricated with 150mm of wall thicknesses, 750mm of lengths and 1,300mm of heights having concrete strength of 24MPa. After curing, specimens are heated on one surface with ISO-834 standard time-temperature curve for 2 hours and temperature distributions during the test are measured using thermocouples inside the walls. The experimental results show that the temperature of the RC walls exposed to fire increases as axial force ratio increases. To verify the experiments, finite element (FE) models are generated for coupled temperature-structure analyses. The analytical results of thermal behaviors are in good agreement with the experimental results. The predicted displacement of the walls decreases when the axial force increases. 

Keywords: Axial force ratio, coupled analysis, fire, reinforced concrete wall, temperature distribution.

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Authors: Aries Susanty

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The inability to implement the principles of good corporate governance (GCG) as demonstrated in the surveys is due to a number of constraints which can be classified into three; namely internal constraints, external constraints, and constraints coming from the structure of ownership. The issues in the internal constraints mentioned are related to the function of several elements of the company. As a business organization, corporation is unable to achieve its goal to successfully implement GCG principles since it is not support by its internal elements- functions. Two of several numbers of internal elements of a company are ethical work climate and leadership style of the top management. To prove the correlation between internal function of organization (in this case ethical work climate and transformational leadership) and the successful implementation of GCG principles, this study proposes two hypotheses to be empirically tested on thirty surveyed organizations; eleven of which are state-owned companies and nineteen are private companies. These thirty corporations are listed in the Jakarta Stock Exchange. All state-owned companies in the samples are those which have been privatized. The research showed that internal function of organization give support to the successful implementation of GCG principle. In this research we can prove that : (i) ethical work climate has positive significance of correlation with the successful implementation of social awareness principle (one of principles on GCG) and, (ii) only at the state-owned companies, transformational leadership have positive significance effect to forming the ethical work climate.

Keywords: Good Corporate Governance Principles, Ethical Work Climate, Transformational Leadership

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Authors: Jan Cernohorsky

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This article aims to assess the evolution of imperfect competition in selected banking markets, in particular in the banking markets of Slovakia, Poland, Hungary, Slovenia and Croatia. Another objective is to assess the evolution of the relationship of imperfect competition and profit development in the banking markets. The article first provides an overview of literature on the topic. It then measures the degree of imperfect competition in individual markets using the Herfindahl-Hirschman Index. The commonly used indicator of total assets was chosen as an indicator. Based on this measurement, the individual banking sectors are categorized into theoretical definitions of the various types of imperfect competition - namely all surveyed banking sectors falling within the theoretical definition of monopolistic competition. Subsequently, using correlation analysis, i.e., the Pearson correlation coefficient, or the Spearman correlation coefficient, the connection between the evolution of imperfect competition and the development of the gross profit on selected banking markets was surveyed. It was found that with the exception of the banking market in Slovenia, where there is a positive correlation; there is no correlation between the evolution of imperfect competition and profit development in the selected markets. This means a recommendation for the regulators that it is not appropriate to rationalize a higher degree of regulation in granting banking licenses on the size of the profits attained in the banking market, as the relationship between the degree of concentration in the banking market and the amount of profit according to our measurements does not exist.

Keywords: Banking system, imperfect competition, profitability.

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Authors: Tania Elena González Alvarado, Ma. Antonieta Martín Granados

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The aim of this paper is to explain what a multienterprise tie is, what evidence its analysis provides and how does the cooperation mechanism influence the establishment of a multienterprise tie. The study focuses on businesses of smaller dimension, geographically dispersed and whose businessmen are learning to cooperate in an international environment. The empirical evidence obtained at this moment permits to conclude the following: The tie is not long-lasting, it has an end; opportunism is an opportunity to learn; the multi-enterprise tie is a space to learn about the cooperation mechanism; the local tie permits a businessman to alternate between competition and cooperation strategies; the disappearance of a tie is an experience of learning for a businessman, diminishing the possibility of failure in the next tie; the cooperation mechanism tends to eliminate hierarchical relations; the multienterprise tie diminishes the asymmetries and permits SME-s to have a better position when they negotiate with large companies; the multi-enterprise tie impacts positively on the local system. The collection of empirical evidence was done trough the following instruments: direct observation in a business encounter to which the businesses attended in 2003 (202 Mexican agro industry SME-s), a survey applied in 2004 (129), a questionnaire applied in 2005 (86 businesses), field visits to the businesses during the period 2006-2008 and; a survey applied by telephone in 2008 (55 Mexican agro industry SME-s).

Keywords: Cooperation, multi-enterprise tie, links, networks.

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Authors: Chongyang Ye, Rong Liu

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Compression textiles such as compression stockings (CSs) have been extensively applied for the prevention and treatment of chronic venous insufficiency of lower extremities. The involvement of multiple mechanical factors such as interface pressure, frictional force, and elastic materials make the interactions between lower limb and CSs to be complex. Determination of Poisson’s ratio and elastic moduli of CS materials are critical for constructing finite element (FE) modeling to numerically simulate a complex interactive system of CS and lower limb. In this study, a mixed approach, including an analytic model based on the orthotropic Hooke’s Law and experimental study (uniaxial tension testing and pure shear testing), has been proposed to determine Young’s modulus, Poisson’s ratio, and shear modulus of CS fabrics. The results indicated a linear relationship existing between the stress and strain properties of the studied CS samples under controlled stretch ratios (< 100%). The proposed method and the determined key mechanical properties of elastic orthotropic CS fabrics facilitate FE modeling for analyzing in-depth the effects of compression material design on their resultant biomechanical function in compression therapy.

Keywords: Elastic compression stockings, Young’s modulus, Poisson’s ratio, shear modulus, mechanical analysis.

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Authors: Hassan Haleh, Amin Ghaffari, Parisa Farahpour

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Need for an appropriate system of evaluating students- educational developments is a key problem to achieve the predefined educational goals. Intensity of the related papers in the last years; that tries to proof or disproof the necessity and adequacy of the students assessment; is the corroborator of this matter. Some of these studies tried to increase the precision of determining question weights in scientific examinations. But in all of them there has been an attempt to adjust the initial question weights while the accuracy and precision of those initial question weights are still under question. Thus In order to increase the precision of the assessment process of students- educational development, the present study tries to propose a new method for determining the initial question weights by considering the factors of questions like: difficulty, importance and complexity; and implementing a combined method of PROMETHEE and fuzzy analytic network process using a data mining approach to improve the model-s inputs. The result of the implemented case study proves the development of performance and precision of the proposed model.

Keywords: Assessing students, Analytic network process, Clustering, Data mining, Fuzzy sets, Multi-criteria decision making, and Preference function.

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Authors: S. Benchelha, H. C. Aoudjehane, M. Hakdaoui, R. El Hamdouni, H. Mansouri, T. Benchelha, M. Layelmam, M. Alaoui

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The logistic regression (LR) and multivariate adaptive regression spline (MarSpline) are applied and verified for analysis of landslide susceptibility map in Oudka, Morocco, using geographical information system. From spatial database containing data such as landslide mapping, topography, soil, hydrology and lithology, the eight factors related to landslides such as elevation, slope, aspect, distance to streams, distance to road, distance to faults, lithology map and Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) were calculated or extracted. Using these factors, landslide susceptibility indexes were calculated by the two mentioned methods. Before the calculation, this database was divided into two parts, the first for the formation of the model and the second for the validation. The results of the landslide susceptibility analysis were verified using success and prediction rates to evaluate the quality of these probabilistic models. The result of this verification was that the MarSpline model is the best model with a success rate (AUC = 0.963) and a prediction rate (AUC = 0.951) higher than the LR model (success rate AUC = 0.918, rate prediction AUC = 0.901).

Keywords: Landslide susceptibility mapping, regression logistic, multivariate adaptive regression spline, Oudka, Taounate, Morocco.

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Authors: Matthias Kirmse, Uwe Petersohn, Elief Paffrath

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As in today's semiconductor industries test costs can make up to 50 percent of the total production costs, an efficient test error detection becomes more and more important. In this paper, we present a new machine learning approach to test error detection that should provide a faster recognition of test system faults as well as an improved test error recall. The key idea is to learn a classifier ensemble, detecting typical test error patterns in wafer test results immediately after finishing these tests. Since test error detection has not yet been discussed in the machine learning community, we define central problem-relevant terms and provide an analysis of important domain properties. Finally, we present comparative studies reflecting the failure detection performance of three individual classifiers and three ensemble methods based upon them. As base classifiers we chose a decision tree learner, a support vector machine and a Bayesian network, while the compared ensemble methods were simple and weighted majority vote as well as stacking. For the evaluation, we used cross validation and a specially designed practical simulation. By implementing our approach in a semiconductor test department for the observation of two products, we proofed its practical applicability.

Keywords: Ensemble methods, fault detection, machine learning, semiconductor test.

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Authors: Nurdan Yildirim, Arif Hepbasli

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Heating, cooling and lighting appliances in buildings account for more than one third of the world’s primary energy demand. Therefore, main components of the building heating systems play an essential role in terms of energy consumption. In this context, efficient energy and exergy utilization in HVAC-R systems has been very essential, especially in developing energy policies towards increasing efficiencies. The main objective of the present study is to assess the performance of a family house with a volume of 326.7 m3 and a net floor area of 121 m2, located in the city of Izmir, Turkey in terms of energetic, exergetic and sustainability aspects. The indoor and exterior air temperatures are taken as 20°C and 1°C, respectively. In the analysis and assessment, various metrics (indices or indicators) such as exergetic efficiency, exergy flexibility ratio and sustainability index are utilized. Two heating options (Case 1: condensing boiler and Case 2: air heat pump) are considered for comparison purposes. The total heat loss rate of the family house is determined to be 3770.72 W. The overall energy efficiencies of the studied cases are calculated to be 49.4% for Case 1 and 54.7% for Case 2. The overall exergy efficiencies, the flexibility factor and the sustainability index of Cases 1 and 2 are computed to be around 3.3%, 0.17 and 1.034, respectively.

Keywords: Buildings, exergy, low exergy, sustainability, efficiency, heating, renewable energy.

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Authors: Ajibola O. Akinrinde, Andrew Swanson, Remy Tiako

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There exist significant losses on transmission lines due to distance, as power generating stations could be located far from some isolated settlements. Standalone wind farms could be a good choice of alternative power generation for such settlements that are far from the grid due to factors of long distance or socio-economic problems. However, uncompensated wind farms consume reactive power since wind turbines are induction generators. Therefore, capacitor banks are used to compensate reactive power, which in turn improves the voltage profile of the network. Although capacitor banks help improving voltage profile, they also undergo switching actions due to its compensating response to the variation of various types of load at the consumer’s end. These switching activities could cause transient overvoltage on the network, jeopardizing the end-life of other equipment on the system. In this paper, the overvoltage caused by these switching activities is investigated using the IEEE bus 14-network to represent a standalone wind farm, and the simulation is done using ATP/EMTP software. Scenarios involving the use of pre-insertion resistor and pre-insertion inductor, as well as controlled switching was also carried out in order to decide the best mitigation option to reduce the overvoltage.

Keywords: Capacitor banks, IEEE bus 14-network, Pre-insertion resistor, Standalone wind farm.

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Authors: Timothy E. Frank, Josh R. Aldred, Sophie B. Boulware, Michelle K. Cabonce, Justin H. White

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Materials degrade at different rates in different environments depending on factors such as temperature, aridity, salinity, and solar radiation. Therefore, predicting asset longevity depends, in part, on the environmental conditions to which the asset is exposed. Heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) systems are critical to building operations yet are responsible for a significant proportion of their energy consumption. HVAC energy use increases substantially with slight operational inefficiencies. Understanding the environmental influences on HVAC degradation in detail will inform maintenance schedules and capital investment, reduce energy use, and increase lifecycle management efficiency. HVAC inspection records spanning 14 years from 21 locations across the United States were compiled and associated with the climate conditions to which they were exposed. Three environmental features were explored in this study: average high temperature, average low temperature, and annual precipitation, as well as four non-environmental features. Initial insights showed no correlations between individual features and the rate of HVAC component degradation. Using neighborhood component analysis, however, the most critical features related to degradation were identified. Two models were considered, and results varied between them. However, longitude and latitude emerged as potentially the best predictors of average HVAC component degradation. Further research is needed to evaluate additional environmental features, increase the resolution of the environmental data, and develop more robust models to achieve more conclusive results.

Keywords: Climate, infrastructure degradation, HVAC, neighborhood component analysis.

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Authors: Do Thi Ha, Khanitta Nuntaboot

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Background: Competency of nurses is vital to safe nursing practice as well as essential component to drive quality of nursing services. There exists little up to date information concerning actual competency among Vietnamese nurses. Purposes: The purpose of this study is to identify the actual nursing competency among nurses in clinical settings in Vietnam. Methods: A qualitative study, ethnographic method, comprised of the participant-observation, in-depth interview, and focus group discussion with multidisciplinary groups of nurses employing in Cho Ray hospital, Vietnam, managers/administrators, nurse teachers, medical doctors, other health care providers, patients and family members which derived from purposeful sampling technique. Content analysis was used for data analysis. Results: Five essential themes of nursing competencies among nurses were identified include (1) knowledge, (2) skills, (3) attitude and value-based nursing practice, (4) legal and ethical competencies, and (5) transcultural competencies. Basic and advanced knowledge were identified as further two dimensions of knowledge. There were five sub themes identified as further dimensions of skills include technical skills, communication skills, organizing and management skills, teamwork and interrelationship, and critical thinking skills. Conclusions: The findings from this study provide valuable information and understanding of the actual competency among nurses in clinical settings in Vietnam. It is expected that this understanding would assist in developing a guide to nursing education and training, nursing practice and relevant policy regulation used for promoting nursing competency among nurses.

Keywords: Nursing competency, qualitative design, ethnographic method, Vietnam.

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Authors: R. Resmi, M. R. Baiju

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The thermal damping of a dynamic vibrating micromirror is an important factor affecting the design of MEMS based actuator systems. In the development process of new micromirror systems, assessing the extent of energy loss due to thermal damping accurately and predicting the performance of the system is very essential. In this paper, the depth of the thermal penetration layer at different eigenfrequencies and the temperature variation distributions surrounding a vibrating micromirror is analyzed. The thermal penetration depth corresponds to the thermal boundary layer in which energy is lost which is a measure of the thermal damping is found out. The energy is mainly dissipated in the thermal boundary layer and thickness of the layer is an important parameter. The detailed thermoacoustics is used to model the air domain surrounding the micromirror. The thickness of the boundary layer, temperature variations and thermal power dissipation are analyzed for a Si based torsional mode micromirror. It is found that thermal penetration depth decreases with eigenfrequency and hence operating the micromirror at higher frequencies is essential for reducing thermal damping. The temperature variations and thermal power dissipations at different eigenfrequencies are also analyzed. Both frequency-response and eigenfrequency analyses are done using COMSOL Multiphysics software.

Keywords: Eigen frequency analysis, micromirrors, thermal damping, thermoacoustic interactions.

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Authors: Chen Zhang, Bernhard Schwarz-Röhr, Alexander Härting

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To acquire accurate ship motions at the center of gravity, a single low-cost inertial sensor is utilized and applied on board to measure ship oscillating motions. As observations, the three axes accelerations and three axes rotational rates provided by the sensor are used. The mathematical model of processing the observation data includes determination of the distance vector between the sensor and the center of gravity in x, y, and z directions. After setting up the transfer matrix from sensor’s own coordinate system to the ship’s body frame, an extended Kalman filter is applied to deal with nonlinearities between the ship motion in the body frame and the observation information in the sensor’s frame. As a side effect, the method eliminates sensor noise and other unwanted errors. Results are not only roll and pitch, but also linear motions, in particular heave and surge at the center of gravity. For testing, we resort to measurements recorded on a small vessel in a well-defined sea state. With response amplitude operators computed numerically by a commercial software (Seaway), motion characteristics are estimated. These agree well with the measurements after processing with the suggested method.

Keywords: Extended Kalman filter, nonlinear estimation, sea trial, ship motion estimation.

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Authors: Permphan Dharmasaroja

Abstract:

Acute disseminated encephalomyelitis (ADEM) has been reported to develop after a hymenoptera sting, but its pathogenesis is not known in detail. Myelin basic protein (MBP)- specific T cells have been detected in the blood of patients with ADEM, and a proportion of these patients develop multiple sclerosis (MS). In an attempt to understand the mechanisms underlying ADEM, molecular mimicry between hymenoptera venom peptides and the human immunodominant MBP peptide was scrutinized, based on the sequence and structural similarities, whether it was the root of the disease. The results suggest that the three wasp venom peptides have low sequence homology with the human immunodominant MBP residues 85-99. Structural similarity analysis among the three venom peptides and the MS-related HLA-DR2b (DRA, DRB1*1501)-associated immunodominant MHC binding/TCR contact residues 88-93, VVHFFK showed that hyaluronidase residues 7-12, phospholipase A1 residues 98-103, and antigen 5 residues 109-114 showed a high degree of similarity 83.3%, 100%, and 83.3% respectively. In conclusion, some wasp venom peptides, particularly phospholipase A1, may potentially act as the molecular motifs of the human 3HLA-DR2b-associated immunodominant MBP88-93, and possibly present a mechanism for induction of wasp sting-associated ADEM.

Keywords: central nervous system, Hymenoptera, myelin basicprotein, molecular mimicry.

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Authors: Seyed Mohammad Hosseini, Amirhossein Moghanian

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The main purpose of this research was to design a biomimetic system by freeze-drying method for evaluating the effect of adding 5 and 10 mol. % of zinc (Zn) in 58S bioactive glass and gelatin (5ZnBG/G and 10ZnBG/G) in terms of structural and biological changes. The structural analyses of samples were performed by X-Ray Diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and Fourier-transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy. Also, 3-(4,5dimethylthiazol-2-yl)-2,5-diphenyltetrazolium bromide (MTT) and alkaline phosphatase (ALP) activity tests were carried out for investigation of MC3T3-E1 cell behaviors. The SEM results demonstrated the spherical shape of the formed hydroxyapatite (HA) phases and also HA characteristic peaks were detected by XRD spectroscopy after 3 days of immersion in the simulated body fluid (SBF) solution. Meanwhile, FTIR spectra proved that the intensity of P–O peaks for 5ZnBG/G was more than 10ZnBG/G and control samples. Moreover, the results of ALP activity test illustrated that the optimal amount of Zn (5ZnBG/G) caused a considerable enhancement in bone cell growth. Taken together, the scaffold with 5 mol.% Zn was introduced as an optimal sample because of its higher biocompatibility, in vitro bioactivity and growth of MC3T3-E1 cells in comparison with other samples in bone tissue engineering.

Keywords: Scaffold, gelatin, modified bioactive glass, ALP, bone tissue engineering.

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Authors: Ml. López-Moreno, Le. Lugo Avilés, Fr. Román, J. Lugo Rosas, Ja. Hernández-Viezcas, Jr. Peralta-Videa, Jl. Gardea-Torresdey

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Degradation of agricultural soils has increased rapidly during the last 20 years due to the indiscriminate use of pesticides and other anthropogenic activities. Currently, there is an urgent need of soil restoration to increase agricultural production. Utilization of sewage sludge or municipal solid waste is an important way to recycle nutrient elements and improve soil quality. With these amendments, nutrient availability in the aqueous phase might be increased and production of healthier crops can be accomplished. This research project aimed to achieve sustainable management of tropical agricultural soils, specifically in Puerto Rico, through the amendment of water treatment plant sludge’s. This practice avoids landfill disposal of sewage sludge and at the same time results costeffective practice for recycling solid waste residues. Coriander sativum was cultivated in a compost-soil-sludge mixture at different proportions. Results showed that Coriander grown in a mixture of 25% compost+50% Voladora soi+25% sludge had the best growth and development. High chlorophyll content (33.01 ± 0.8) was observed in Coriander plants cultivated in 25% compost+62.5% Coloso soil+ 12.5% sludge compared to plants grown with no sludge (32.59 ± 0.7). ICP-OES analysis showed variations in mineral element contents (macro and micronutrients) in coriander plant grown I soil amended with sludge and compost.

Keywords: Compost, Coriandrum sativum, nutrients, waste sludge.

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Authors: Tao Zhang, Nan Yan

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In recent years, the Chaoshan area, a special place located in the southeast of Guangdong province in China, actively protects religious heritage and is developing religious tourism, which is attracting many expatriate Chinese who are coming back for travel and to worship. This paper discussed three questions. Firstly, what is the current situation about the different social background of tourists’ motivation, satisfaction and behavioral intention? Secondly, is there a relationship between the motivation, satisfaction and behavioral intention and the different social backgrounds of tourists? Thirdly, what is the relationship between religious tourists’ motivation, satisfaction and behavioral intention? The research methods use a combination of qualitative analysis and quantitative analysis. Qualitative analysis uses the method of observation and interviews. Convenient sampling technique was used for quantitative analysis. The study showed that the different social backgrounds of tourists’ forms diverse cognition and experiences about religious tourism, and their motivations, satisfaction and behavioral intention as tourists vary. Tourists’ motivation and satisfaction has a positive phase relation. Tourists’ motivation with satisfaction as the intervening variable also has a positive phase effect on tourists’ behavior intention. The result shows that religious tourists’ motivations include experiencing a religious atmosphere, and having a rest and recreation. The result also shows that religious tourists want to travel with their family members and friends. While traveling, religious tourists like to talk with Buddhist monks or nuns. Compared to other tourism types, religious tourists have higher expectations about temple environment, traveling experience, peripheral service and temple management.

Keywords: Behavioral intension, motivation, religious tourism, satisfaction.

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Authors: Tony Schönherr, Kimiya Komurasaki, Georg Herdrich

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The performance and the plasma created by a pulsed magnetoplasmadynamic thruster for small satellite application is studied to understand better the ablation and plasma propagation processes occurring during the short-time discharge. The results can be applied to improve the quality of the thruster in terms of efficiency, and to tune the propulsion system to the needs required by the satellite mission. Therefore, plasma measurements with a high-speed camera and induction probes, and performance measurements of mass bit and impulse bit were conducted. Values for current sheet propagation speed, mean exhaust velocity and thrust efficiency were derived from these experimental data. A maximum in current sheet propagation was found by the high-speed camera measurements for a medium energy input and confirmed by the induction probes. A quasilinear tendency between the mass bit and the energy input, the current action integral respectively, was found, as well as a linear tendency between the created impulse and the discharge energy. The highest mean exhaust velocity and thrust efficiency was found for the highest energy input.

Keywords: electric propulsion, low-density plasma, pulsed magnetoplasmadynamicthruster, space engineering.

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