Search results for: environmental index.

Authors: Zenab Naseem, Sadia Imran

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One of the key solutions to the climate change crisis is to develop renewable energy resources, such as solar and wind power and biogas. This paper explores the socioeconomic and environmental viability of solar energy, based on a case study of the Soan Valley Development Program. Under this project, local farmers were provided solar water pumps at subsidized rates. These have been functional for the last seven years and have gained popularity among the local communities. The study measures the economic viability of using solar energy in agriculture, based on data from 36 households, of which 12 households each use diesel, electric and solar water pumps. Our findings are based on the net present value of each technology type. We also carry out a qualitative assessment of the social impact of solar water pumps relative to diesel and electric pumps. Finally, we conduct an environmental impact assessment, using the lifecycle assessment approach. All three analyses indicate that solar energy is a viable alternative to diesel and electricity.

Keywords: Alternative energy sources, pollution control adoption and costs, solar energy pumps, sustainable development.

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Authors: Jing Zhu, Liancun Zheng, Xinxin Zhang

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This work is focused on the steady boundary layer flow near the forward stagnation point of plane and axisymmetric bodies towards a stretching sheet. The no slip condition on the solid boundary is replaced by the partial slip condition. The analytical solutions for the velocity distributions are obtained for the various values of the ratio of free stream velocity and stretching velocity, slip parameter, the suction and injection velocity parameter, magnetic parameter and dimensionality index parameter in the series forms with the help of homotopy analysis method (HAM). Convergence of the series is explicitly discussed. Results show that the flow and the skin friction coefficient depend heavily on the velocity slip factor. In addition, the effects of all the parameters mentioned above were more pronounced for plane flows than for axisymmetric flows.

Keywords: slip flow, axisymmetric flow, homotopy analysismethod, stagnation-point.

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Authors: Sitthichon Kanitthakun, Pinit Kumhom, Kosin Chamnongthai

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In quality control of freeze-dried durian, crispiness is a key quality index of the product. Generally, crispy testing has to be done by a destructive method. A nondestructive testing of the crispiness is required because the samples can be reused for other kinds of testing. This paper proposed a crispiness classification method of freeze-dried durians using fuzzy logic for decision making. The physical changes of a freeze-dried durian include the pores appearing in the images. Three physical features including (1) the diameters of pores, (2) the ratio of the pore area and the remaining area, and (3) the distribution of the pores are considered to contribute to the crispiness. The fuzzy logic is applied for making the decision. The experimental results comparing with food expert opinion showed that the accuracy of the proposed classification method is 83.33 percent.

Keywords: Durian, crispiness, freeze drying, pore, fuzzy logic.

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Authors: S. M. Abbas, M. A. Hannan, S. A. Samad, A. Hussain

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This paper presented a modified efficient inductive powering link based on ASK modulator and proposed efficient class- E power amplifier. The design presents the external part which is located outside the body to transfer power and data to the implanted devices such as implanted Microsystems to stimulate and monitoring the nerves and muscles. The system operated with low band frequency 10MHZ according to industrial- scientific – medical (ISM) band to avoid the tissue heating. For external part, the modulation index is 11.1% and the modulation rate 7.2% with data rate 1 Mbit/s assuming Tbit = 1us. The system has been designed using 0.35-μm fabricated CMOS technology. The mathematical model is given and the design is simulated using OrCAD P Spice 16.2 software tool and for real-time simulation, the electronic workbench MULISIM 11 has been used.

Keywords: Implanted devices, ASK techniques, Class-E power amplifier, Inductive powering and low-frequency ISM band.

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Authors: T. Prommi, P. Thamsenanupap

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The influence of physicochemical water quality parameters on the abundance and diversity of caddisfly larvae was studied in seven sampling stations in Mae Tao and Mae Ku watersheds, Mae Sot District, Tak Province, northern Thailand. The streams: MK2 and MK8 as reference site, and impacted streams (MT1-MT5) were sampled bi-monthly during July 2011 to May 2012. A total of 4,584 individual of caddisfly larvae belonging to 10 family and 17 genera were found. The larvae of family Hydropsychidae were the most abundance, followed by Philopotamidae, Odontoceridae, and Leptoceridae, respectively. The genus Cheumatopsyche, Hydropsyche, and Chimarra were the most abundance genera in this study. Results of CCA ordination showed the total dissolved solids, sulfate, water temperature, dissolved oxygen and pH were the most important physicochemical factors to affect distribution of caddisflies communities. Changes in the caddisfly fauna may indicate changes in physicochemical factors owing to agricultural pollution, urbanization, or other human activities. Results revealed that the order Trichoptera, identified to species or genus, can be potentially used to assess environmental water quality status in freshwater ecosystems.

Keywords: Caddisfly larvae, environmental variables, diversity, streams.

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Authors: Touba Amirazodi

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Rapid process of urbanism development has increased the demand for some infrastructures such as supplying potable water, electricity network and transportation facilities and etc. Nonefficiency of the existing system with parallel managements of urban traffic management has increased the gap between supply and demand of traffic facilities. A sustainable transport system requires some activities more important than air pollution control, traffic or fuel consumption reduction and the studies show that there is no unique solution for solving complicated transportation problems and solving such a problem needs a comprehensive, dynamic and reliable mechanism. Sustainable transport management considers the effects of transportation development on economic efficiency, environmental issues, resources consumption, land use and social justice and helps reduction of environmental effects, increase of transportation system efficiency as well as improvement of social life and aims to enhance efficiency, goods transportation, provide services with minimum access problems that cannot be realized without reorganization of strategies, policies and plans.

Keywords: Sustainable Urban Transport, Environment, Social Justice, Air Pollution

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Authors: Abdel-Rahman A., El Okle O. S.

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Fever, bloody diarrhea and high mortality rate were the main clinical finding in a group of fattening calves. Analysis of corn silage revealed presence of aflatoxins at level of 370 ppb. This level of aflatoxins in the feed of cattle is somewhat low to be the main cause of reported signs. Leukocytopenia, anemia, decreased lymphocytic activity and lowered phagocytic index are the main hematological and immunological alterations in diseased calves. Bacteriological investigation revealed isolation of pathogenic Salmonella typhimurium from the rectal swabs of diseased calves. Our results suggested that, long duration of exposure to aflatoxins even at small concentrations may considered as predisposing factor for the incidence of natural infectious outbreaks as salmonellosis due to its immunosuppressive effect. We can conclude that the veterinarians and owners must be given an attention to the relation between aflatoxicosis and salmonellosis under field condition. We are recommended that the treatment program during similar outbreaks must be including anti-aflatoxins preparations beside the antimicrobial therapy.

Keywords: Aflatoxins, Calves, Salmonellosis.

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Authors: Claudia Camargo, Enrique J. de la Vega, Jesús E. Olguín, Juan A. López, Sandra K. Enríquez

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This study focuses on the application of sensory thermography, as a non-invasive method to evaluate the musculoskeletal injuries that industry workers performing Highly Repetitive Movements (HRM) may acquire. It was made at a wireless company having the target of analyze temperatures in worker’s wrists, elbows and shoulders in workstations during their activities, this thru sensorial thermography with the goal of detecting maximum temperatures (Tmax) that could indicate possible injuries. The tests were applied during 3 hours for only 2 workers that work in workstations where there’s been the highest index of injuries and accidents. We were made comparisons for each part of the body that were study for both because of the similitude between the activities of the workstations; they were requiring both an immediate evaluation. The Tmax was recorder during the test of the worker 2, in the left wrist, reaching a temperature of 35.088ºC and with a maximum increase of 1.856°C

Keywords: Highly Repetitive Movements (HRM), Maximum temperatures (Tmax), Worker.

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Authors: Shatha A. Yousif, Qasim M. Zamil, Hasan Y. Al Muhi, Jamal A. Al Shammari

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Potato (Solanum tuberosum L.) is one of the major vegetable crops that are grown world –wide because of its economic importance. This experiment investigated the effect of local sands (River Base, Al-Ekader and Karbala) on number and total weight of minitubers. Statistical analysis revealed that there were no significant differences among sand cultures in number of stem/plant, chlorophyll index and tubers dry weight. River Base sand had the highest plant height (74.9 cm), leaf number/plant number (39.3), leaf area (84.4 dcm2⁄plant), dry weight/plant (26.31), tubers number/plant (8.5), tubers weight/plant (635.53 gm) and potato tuber yields/trove (28.60 kg), whereas the Karbala sand had lower performance. All the characters had positive and significant correlation with yields except the traits number of stem and tuber dry weight.

Keywords: Correlation, Potato, Sand Culture, Yield.

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Authors: A. Mojtaba Aghajani, B. Leila Shavakhi

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Energy intensity(energy consumption intensity) is a global index which computes the required energy for producing a specific value of goods and services in each country. It is computed in terms of initial energy supply or final energy consumption. In this study (research) Divisia method is used to decompose energy consumption and energy intensity. This method decomposes consumption and energy intensity to production effects, structural and net intensity and could be done as time series or two-periodical. This study analytically investigates consumption changes and energy intensity on economical sectors of Iran and more specific on road transportation(rail road and road).Our results show that the contribution of structural effect (change in economical activities combination) is very low and the effect of net energy consumption has the higher contribution in consumption changes and energy intensity. In other words, the high consumption of energy is due to Intensity of energy consumption and is not to structural effect of transportation sector.

Keywords: Divisia Method, Energy Intensity, Net IntensityEffect, Road Transportation , Structural Effect.

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Authors: Shen Weishou, Ji Di, Zhang Hui, Yan Shouguang, Li Haidong, Lin Naifeng

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Based on a long-term vegetation index dataset of NDVI and meteorological data from 68 meteorological stations in the Qinghai-Tibet plateau and their relations with major climate factors were analyzed. The results show the following: 1) The linear trends of temperature in the Qinghai-Tibet plateau indicate that the temperature in the plateau generally increased, but it rose faster in the last 20 years. 2) The most significant NDVI increase occurred in the eastern and southern plateau. However, the western and northern plateau demonstrate a decreasing trend. 3) There is a significant positive linear correlation between NDVI and temperature and a negative correlation between NDVI and mean wind speed. However, no significant statistical relationship was found between NDVI and relative humidity, precipitation or sunshine duration.4) The changes in NDVI for the plateau are driven by temperature-precipitation, but for the desert and forest areas, the relation changes to precipitation-temperature-wind velocity and wind velocity-temperature-precipitation.

Keywords: Qinghai-Tibet plateau, NDVI, climate warming.

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Authors: P. Mukhopadhyay, N. C. Dey

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Occupational health hazard is a very common term in every emerging country. Along with the unorganized sector, most organized sectors including government industries are suffering from this affliction. In addition to workload, the seasonal changes also have some impacts on working environment. With this focus in mind, one hundred male industrial workers, who are directly involved to the task of Periodic Overhauling (POH) in a fabricating workshop in the public domain are selected for this research work. They have been studied during work periods throughout different seasons in a year. For each and every season, the participants working heart rate (WHR) is measured and compared with the standards given by different national and internationally recognized agencies i.e., World Health Organization (WHO) and American Conference of Governmental Industrial Hygienists (ACGIH) etc. The different environmental parameters i.e. dry bulb temperature (DBT), wet bulb temperature (WBT), globe temperature (GT), natural wet bulb temperature (NWB), relative humidity (RH), wet bulb globe temperature (WBGT), air velocity (AV), effective temperature (ET) are recorded throughout the seasons to critically observe the effect of seasonal changes on the WHR of the workers. The effect of changes in environment to the WHR of the workers is very much surprising. It is found that the percentages of workers who belong to the ‘very heavy’ workload category are 83.33%, 66.66% and 16.66% in the summer, rainy and winter seasons, respectively. Ongoing undertaking of this type of job profile forces the worker towards occupational disorders causing absenteeism. This occurrence results in lower production rates, and on the other hand, costs due to medical claims also weaken the industry’s economic condition. In this circumstance, the authors are trying to focus on some remedial measures from the ergonomic angle by proposing a new work/ rest regimen and introducing engineering controls along with management controls which may help the worker, and consequently, the management also.

Keywords: Environmental changes, industrial worker, working heart rate, workload, occupational health hazard.

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Authors: Nan Li, Ying Wang

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Using entropy weight and TOPSIS method, a comprehensive evaluation is done on the development level of Chinese regional service industry in this paper. Firstly, based on existing research results, an evaluation index system is constructed from the scale of development, the industrial structure and the economic benefits. An evaluation model is then built up based on entropy weight and TOPSIS, and an empirical analysis is conducted on the development level of service industries in 31 Chinese provinces during 2006 and 2009 from the two dimensions or time series and cross section, which provides new idea for assessing regional service industry. Furthermore, the 31 provinces are classified into four categories based on the evaluation results, and deep analysis is carried out on the evaluation results.

Keywords: Chinese regional service industry, Development level, Entropy weight, TOPSIS Evaluation Method

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Authors: Seyed Alireza Valadabadi, Hossein Aliabadi Farahani

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This experiment was carried out to study the effect of AMF, drought stress and phosphorus on physiological growth indices of basil at Iran using by a split-plot design with three replications. The main-plot factor included: two levels of irrigation regimes (control=no drought stress and irrigation after 80 evaporation= drought stress condition) while the sub-plot factors included phosphorus (0, 35 and 70 kg/ha) and application and non-application of Glomus fasciculatum. The results showed that total dry matter (TDM), life area index (LAI), relative growth rate (RGR) and crop growth rate (CGR) were all highly significantly different among the phosphorus, whereas drought stress had effect of practical significance on TDM, LAI, RGR and CGR. The results also showed that the highest TDM, LAI, RGR and CGR were obtained from application of Glomus fasciculatum under no-drought condition.

Keywords: Drought stress, Glomus fasciculatum, physiological growth indices

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Authors: M. Fathi, M. J. Alvarez, V. Rodríguez

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Assembly line balancing is a very important issue in mass production systems due to production cost. Although many studies have been done on this topic, but because assembly line balancing problems are so complex they are categorized as NP-hard problems and researchers strongly recommend using heuristic methods. This paper presents a new heuristic approach called the critical task method (CTM) for solving U-shape assembly line balancing problems. The performance of the proposed heuristic method is tested by solving a number of test problems and comparing them with 12 other heuristics available in the literature to confirm the superior performance of the proposed heuristic. Furthermore, to prove the efficiency of the proposed CTM, the objectives are increased to minimize the number of workstation (or equivalently maximize line efficiency), and minimizing the smoothness index. Finally, it is proven that the proposed heuristic is more efficient than the others to solve the U-shape assembly line balancing problem.

Keywords: Critical task method, Heuristic, Line balancingproblem, U-shape

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Authors: Nicola Gualandi, Luca Mantecchini, Davide Serrau

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Airport capacity has always been perceived in the traditional sense as the number of aircraft operations during a specified time corresponding to a tolerable level of average delay and it mostly depends on the airside characteristics, on the fleet mix variability and on the ATM. The adoption of the Directive 2002/30/EC in the EU countries drives the stakeholders to conceive airport capacity in a different way though. Airport capacity in this sense is fundamentally driven by environmental criteria, and since acoustical externalities represent the most important factors, those are the ones that could pose a serious threat to the growth of airports and to aviation market itself in the short-medium term. The importance of the regional airports in the deregulated market grew fast during the last decade since they represent spokes for network carriers and a preferential destination for low-fares carriers. Not only regional airports have witnessed a fast and unexpected growth in traffic but also a fast growth in the complaints for the nuisance by the people living near those airports. In this paper the results of a study conducted in cooperation with the airport of Bologna G. Marconi are presented in order to investigate airport acoustical capacity as a defacto constraint of airport growth.

Keywords: Airport acoustical capacity, airport noise, air traffic noise, sustainability of regional airports.

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Authors: K. Petcharaporn, S. Kumchoo

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The acidity (citric acid) is the one of chemical content that can be refer to the internal quality and it’s a maturity index of tomato, The titratable acidity (%TA) can be predicted by a non-destructive method prediction by using the transmittance short wavelength (SW-NIR) spectroscopy in the wavelength range between 665-955 nm. The set of 167 tomato samples divided into groups of 117 tomatoes sample for training set and 50 tomatoes sample for test set were used to establish the calibration model to predict and measure %TA by partial least squares regression (PLSR) technique. The spectra were pretreated with MSC pretreatment and it gave the optimal result for calibration model as (R = 0.92, RMSEC = 0.03%) and this model obtained high accuracy result to use for %TA prediction in test set as (R = 0.81, RMSEP = 0.05%). From the result of prediction in test set shown that the transmittance SW-NIR spectroscopy technique can be used for a non-destructive method for %TA prediction of tomato.

Keywords: Tomato, quality, prediction, transmittance, titratable acidity, citric acid.

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Authors: Zain M. Al-Houri, Abbas S. Al-Omari

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Roadways in Amman city face many problems consequent upon poor drainage systems. Evaluation tools are necessary to identify those roads needing improvement in their drainage system, and those needing regular maintenance. This work aims at evaluating drainage conditions in selected roadways in Amman city with the intent of identifying the problems encountered in their drainage systems. Three sites in the vicinity of Amman city have been selected and then inspected via several field visits to determine the state of their existing drainage systems and define the major problems encountered in these systems. The evaluation tool used in this study is based on visual inspection supported by photographs that depicted the defined problems. Following the field assessment, the drainage system in each road was rated as excellent, fair, good, or poor. The study reveals that more than 60% of the roadways in the selected sites were in poor drainage conditions, which lead to tremendous environmental problems. This assessment serves as a guide for local decision makers to help plan for the maintenance of Amman city roadways drainage systems, and propose ways of managing the associated problems.

Keywords: Amman Stormwater, Drainage systems, Environmental problems, Roadways drainage.

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Authors: A. Kasmi, N. E. Abriak, M. Benzerzour, I. Shahrour

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Large volumes of river sediments are dredged each year in Europe in order to maintain harbour activities and prevent floods. The management of this sediment has become increasingly complex. Several European projects were implemented to find environmentally sound solutions for these materials. The main objective of this study is to show the ability of river sediment to be used in road. Since sediments contain a high amount of water, then a dehydrating treatment by addition of the flocculation aid has been used. Firstly, a lot of physical characteristics are measured and discussed for a better identification of the raw sediment and this dehydrated sediment by addition the flocculation aid. The identified parameters are, for example, the initial water content, the density, the organic matter content, the grain size distribution, the liquid limit and plastic limit and geotechnical parameters. The environmental impacts of the used material were evaluated. The results obtained show that there is a slight change on the physical-chemical and geotechnical characteristics of sediment after dehydration by the addition of polymer. However, these sediments cannot be used in road construction.

Keywords: River sediment, dehydration, flocculation aid, characteristics, environmental impacts, road construction.

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Authors: Asep Bayu Dani Nandiyanto, Asep Suhendi, Yutaka Kisakibaru, Takashi Ogi, Kikuo Okuyama

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An ordered porous antimony-doped tin oxide (ATO) film was successfully prepared using a simple coating process with colloidal templates. The facile production was effective when a combination of 16-nm ATO (as a model of an inorganic nanoparticle) and polystyrene (PS) spheres (as a model of the template) weresimply coated to produce a composite ATO/PS film. Heat treatment was then used to remove the PS and produce the porous film. The porous film with a spherical pore shape and a highly ordered porous structure could be obtained. A potential way for the control of pore size could be also achieved by changing initial template size. The theoretical explanation and mechanism of porous formation were also added, which would be important for the scaling-up prediction and estimation.

Keywords: Porous structure film; ATO particle; Ultra-low refractive index; vertical drop method; Low-density material;

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Authors: Ivo Jánský, Milan Rippel

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The paper evaluates several hundred one-day-ahead VaR forecasting models in the time period between the years 2004 and 2009 on data from six world stock indices - DJI, GSPC, IXIC, FTSE, GDAXI and N225. The models model mean using the ARMA processes with up to two lags and variance with one of GARCH, EGARCH or TARCH processes with up to two lags. The models are estimated on the data from the in-sample period and their forecasting accuracy is evaluated on the out-of-sample data, which are more volatile. The main aim of the paper is to test whether a model estimated on data with lower volatility can be used in periods with higher volatility. The evaluation is based on the conditional coverage test and is performed on each stock index separately. The primary result of the paper is that the volatility is best modelled using a GARCH process and that an ARMA process pattern cannot be found in analyzed time series.

Keywords: VaR, risk analysis, conditional volatility, garch, egarch, tarch, moving average process, autoregressive process

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Authors: Rosita Hedayati , Sedighe Kahrizi , Mohammad Parnianpour , Fariba Bahrami , Anoshirvan Kazemnejad

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The study of the variability of the postural strategies in low back pain patients, as a criterion in evaluation of the adaptability of this system to the environmental demands is the purpose of this study. A cross-sectional case-control study was performed on 21 recurrent non-specific low back pain patients and 21 healthy volunteers. The electromyography activity of Deltoid, External Oblique (EO), Transverse Abdominis/Internal Oblique (TrA/IO) and Erector Spine (ES) muscles of each person was recorded in 75 rapid arm flexion with maximum acceleration. Standard deviation of trunk muscles onset relative to deltoid muscle onset were statistically analyzed by MANOVA . The results show that chronic low back pain patients exhibit less variability in their anticipatory postural adjustments (APAs) in comparison with the control group. There is a decrease in variability of postural control system of recurrent non-specific low back pain patients that can result in the persistence of pain and chronicity by decreasing the adaptability to environmental demands.

Keywords: EMG Onset Latency, Variability, Posture, Non - specific Low Back Pain

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Authors: P. Moeinzadeh, A. Hajfathaliha

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Many firms implemented various initiatives such as outsourced manufacturing which could make a supply chain (SC) more vulnerable to various types of disruptions. So managing risk has become a critical component of SC management. Different types of SC vulnerability management methodologies have been proposed for managing SC risk, most offer only point-based solutions that deal with a limited set of risks. This research aims to reinforce SC risk management by proposing an integrated approach. SC risks are identified and a risk index classification structure is created. Then we develop a SC risk assessment approach based on the analytic network process (ANP) and the VIKOR methods under the fuzzy environment where the vagueness and subjectivity are handled with linguistic terms parameterized by triangular fuzzy numbers. By using FANP, risks weights are calculated and then inserted to the FVIKOR to rank the SC members and find the most risky partner.

Keywords: Analytic network process (ANP), Fuzzy sets, Supply chain risk management (SCRM), VIšekriterijumsko KOmpromisno Rangiranje (VIKOR)

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Authors: K.Ramesh, A.Nirmalkumar, G.Gurusamy

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In this paper, a new model order reduction phenomenon is introduced at the design stage of linear phase digital IIR filter. The complexity of a system can be reduced by adopting the model order reduction method in their design. In this paper a mixed method of model order reduction is proposed for linear IIR filter. The proposed method employs the advantages of factor division technique to derive the reduced order denominator polynomial and the reduced order numerator is obtained based on the resultant denominator polynomial. The order reduction technique is used to reduce the delay units at the design stage of IIR filter. The validity of the proposed method is illustrated with design example in frequency domain and stability is also examined with help of nyquist plot.

Keywords: Error index (J), Factor division method, IIR filter, Nyquist plot, Order reduction.

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Authors: Nazar Younis, Raied Salman

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It has been always observed that the effectiveness of MIS as a support tool for management decisions degenerate after time of implementation, despite the substantial investments being made. This is true for organizations at the initial stages of MIS implementations, manual or computerized. A survey of a sample of middle to top managers in business and government institutions was made. A large ratio indicates that the MIS has lost its impact on the day-to-day operations, and even the response lag time expands sometimes indefinitely. The data indicates an infant mortality phenomenon of the bathtub model. Reasons may be monotonous nature of MIS delivery, irrelevance, irreverence, timeliness, and lack of adequate detail. All those reasons collaborate to create a degree of degeneracy. We investigate and model as a bathtub model the phenomenon of MIS degeneracy that inflicts the MIS systems and renders it ineffective. A degeneracy index is developed to identify the status of the MIS system and possible remedies to prevent the onset of total collapse of the system to the point of being useless.

Keywords: MIS, management theory, information technology, information systems, IS, organizational environment, organizations, degeneracy, organizational change.

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Authors: A. Akın, H. Çoban

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This study was carried out to determine the effects of Control (C), 1/3 Cluster Tip Reduction (1/3 CTR), 1/6 Cluster Tip Reduction (1/6 CTR), 1/9 Cluster Tip Reduction (1/9 CTR), 1/3 CTR + Boric Acid (BA), 1/6 CTR + BA, 1/9 CTR + BA applications on yield and yield components of four years old Alphonse Lavallee grape variety (Vitis vinifera L.) grown on grafted 110 Paulsen rootstock in Konya province in Turkey in the vegetation period in 2015. According to the results, the highest maturity index 21.46 with 1/9 CTR application; the highest grape juice yields 736.67 ml with 1/3 CTR + BA application; the highest L* color value 32.07 with 1/9 CTR application; the highest a* color value 1.74 with 1/9 CTR application; the highest b* color value 3.72 with 1/9 CTR application were obtained. The effects of applications on grape fresh yield, cluster weight and berry weight were not found statistically significant.

Keywords: Alphonse Lavallee grape cultivar, different cluster tip reduction (1/3, 1/6, 1/9), foliar boric acid application, yield, quality.

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Authors: Manjie Li, Xiangju Cheng, Yongcan Chen

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With rapid development of industrialization and urbanization, water environmental deterioration is widespread in majority of urban rivers, which seriously affects city image and life satisfaction of residents. As an emergency measure to improve water quality, clean water diversion is introduced for water environmental management. Lubao River and Southwest River, two urban rivers in typical plain tidal river network, are identified as technically and economically feasible for the application of clean water diversion. One-dimensional hydrodynamic-water quality model is developed to simulate temporal and spatial variations of water level and water quality, with satisfactory accuracy. The mathematical model after calibration is applied to investigate hydrodynamic and water quality variations in rivers as well as determine the optimum operation scheme of water diversion. Assessment system is developed for evaluation of positive and negative effects of water diversion, demonstrating the effectiveness of clean water diversion and the necessity of pollution reduction.

Keywords: Assessment system, clean water diversion, hydrodynamic-water quality model, tidal river network, urban rivers, water environment improvement.

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Authors: Bruno B. Oliveira, Arnaldo P. Mourão, Teógenes A. da Silva

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The Brazilian legislation has only established diagnostic reference levels (DRLs) in terms of Multiple Scan Average Dose (MSAD) as a quality control parameter for computed tomography (CT) scanners. Compliance with DRLs can be verified by measuring the Computed Tomography Kerma Index (Ca,100) with a pencil ionization chamber or by obtaining the kerma distribution in CT scans with radiochromic films or rod shape lithium fluoride termoluminescent dosimeters (TLD-100). TL dosimeters were used to record kerma profiles and to determine MSAD values of a Bright Speed model GE CT scanner. Measurements were done with radiochromic films and TL dosimeters distributed in cylinders positioned in the center and in four peripheral bores of a standard polymethylmethacrylate (PMMA) body CT dosimetry phantom. Irradiations were done using a protocol for adult chest. The maximum values were found at the midpoint of the longitudinal axis. The MSAD values obtained with three dosimetric techniques were compared.

Keywords: Kerma profile, CT, MSAD, patient dosimetry

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Authors: Kalyan Kumar Mandal, Damodar Maity

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The degradation of concrete due to various hygrochemo- mechanical actions is inevitable for the structures particularly built to store water. Therefore, it is essential to determine the material properties of dam-like structures due to ageing to predict the behavior of such structures after a certain age. The degraded material properties are calculated by introducing isotropic degradation index. The predicted material properties are used to study the behavior of aged dam at different ages. The dam is modeled by finite elements and displacement and is considered as an unknown variable. The parametric study reveals that the displacement is quite larger for comparatively lower design life of the structure because the degradation of elastic properties depends on the design life of the dam. The stresses in dam cam be unexpectedly large at any age with in the design life. The outcomes of the present study indicate the importance of the consideration ageing effect of concrete exposed to water for the safe design of dam throughout its life time.

Keywords: Hygro-chemo-mechanical, isotropic degradation, finite element method, Koyna earthquake.

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Authors: Guoliang Fan, Aiping Li, Xuemei Liu, Liyun Xu

Abstract:

The performance of the tightening equipment will decline with the working process in manufacturing system. The main manifestations are the randomness and discretization degree increasing of the tightening performance. To evaluate the degradation tendency of the tightening performance accurately, a complexity measurement approach based on Kolmogorov entropy is presented. At first, the states of performance index are divided for calibrating the discrete degree. Then the complexity measurement model based on Kolmogorov entropy is built. The model describes the performance degradation tendency of tightening equipment quantitatively. At last, a study case is applied for verifying the efficiency and validity of the approach. The research achievement shows that the presented complexity measurement can effectively evaluate the degradation tendency of the tightening equipment. It can provide theoretical basis for preventive maintenance and life prediction of equipment.

Keywords: Complexity measurement, Kolmogorov entropy, manufacturing system, performance evaluation, tightening equipment.

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