Search results for: Smart and connected cabin management

Authors: Krešimir Fertalj, Mladen Matejaš

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In turbulent modern economy, the companies need to properly manage their business processes. Well-defined and stable business processes ensure security of crucial data and applications, and provide a quality product or service to the end customer. On the other side, constant changes on the market, new regulatory provisions, and emerging new technologies require the need of issuing prompt and effective changes of business process. In this article, we explore the use of agile principles in working with business process management (BPM) solutions. We deal with difficulties in BPM development cycle, review the benefits of using agility, and choose the basic agile principles that ensure the success of a BPM project.

Keywords: Agile development, BPM environment, Kanban, SCRUM, XP.

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Authors: R. Malisa, E. Schwella, K. I. Theletsane

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Due to climate change, population growth and rapid urbanization, the demand for water in South Africa is inevitably surpassing supply. To address similar challenges globally, there has been a paradigm shift from conventional urban waste water management “government” to a “governance” paradigm. From the governance paradigm, Integrated Urban Water Management (IUWM) principle emerged. This principle emphasizes efficient urban waste water treatment and production of high-quality recyclable effluent. In so doing mimicking natural water systems, in their processes of recycling water efficiently, and averting depletion of natural water resources.  The objective of this study was to investigate drivers of shifting the current urban waste water management approach from a “government” paradigm towards “governance”. The study was conducted through Interactive Management soft systems research methodology which follows a qualitative research design. A case study methodology was employed, guided by realism research philosophy. Qualitative data gathered were analyzed through interpretative structural modelling using Concept Star for Professionals Decision-Making tools (CSPDM) version 3.64.  The constructed model deduced that the main drivers in shifting the Stellenbosch municipal urban waste water management towards IUWM “governance” principles are mainly social elements characterized by overambitious expectations of the public on municipal water service delivery, mis-interpretation of the constitution on access to adequate clean water and sanitation as a human right and perceptions on recycling water by different communities. Inadequate public participation also emerged as a strong driver. However, disruptive events such as draught may play a positive role in raising an awareness on the value of water, resulting in a shift on the perceptions on recycled water. Once the social elements are addressed, the alignment of governance and administration elements towards IUWM are achievable. Hence, the point of departure for the desired paradigm shift is the change of water service authorities and serviced communities’ perceptions and behaviors towards shifting urban waste water management approaches from “government” to “governance” paradigm.

Keywords: Integrated urban water management, urban water system, waste water governance, waste water treatment works.

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Authors: Merita Dauti, Edita Alili-Idrizi, Sihana Ahmeti–Lika, Ledjan Malaj

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The extermination and proper disposal of pharmaceutical wastes from expired and unused medications remains a disputable issue due to their specific nature and characteristics. Even though the hazards from these wastes are already well known in terms of environment and human health, people still treat them as usual wastes. At a national level, in many countries the management of pharmaceutical and medical wastes has been one of the main objectives in order to protect people’s health and the environment. Even though many legal regulations exist in this respect, there has not been a single law that would clearly explain the procedures of returning medicines, ways of selection, treatment and extermination of pharmaceutical wastes. This paper aims at analyzing the practices of pharmaceutical waste management and treatment in some European countries as well as a review of the legislation and official guidelines in managing these kinds of wastes and protecting the environment and human health. A suitable treatment and management of expired medications and other similar wastes would be in the interest of public health in the first place, as well as in the interest of healthcare institutions and other bodies engaged in environment protection.

Keywords: Pharmaceutical waste, legal regulation, proper disposal, environment pollution.

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Authors: Shanxiong Chen, Xu Han, Xiaolong Wang, Hui Ma

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Yi is an ethnic group mainly living in mainland China, with its own spoken and written language systems, after development of thousands of years. Ancient Yi is one of the six ancient languages in the world, which keeps a record of the history of the Yi people and offers documents valuable for research into human civilization. Recognition of the characters in ancient Yi helps to transform the documents into an electronic form, making their storage and spreading convenient. Due to historical and regional limitations, research on recognition of ancient characters is still inadequate. Thus, deep learning technology was applied to the recognition of such characters. Five models were developed on the basis of the four-layer convolutional neural network (CNN). Alpha-Beta divergence was taken as a penalty term to re-encode output neurons of the five models. Two fully connected layers fulfilled the compression of the features. Finally, at the softmax layer, the orthographic features of ancient Yi characters were re-evaluated, their probability distributions were obtained, and characters with features of the highest probability were recognized. Tests conducted show that the method has achieved higher precision compared with the traditional CNN model for handwriting recognition of the ancient Yi.

Keywords: Recognition, CNN, convolutional neural network, Yi character, divergence.

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Authors: R. Walha, F. Drira, H. El-Abed, A. M. Alimi

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The Automatic Speech Recognition (ASR) applied to Arabic language is a challenging task. This is mainly related to the language specificities which make the researchers facing multiple difficulties such as the insufficient linguistic resources and the very limited number of available transcribed Arabic speech corpora. In this paper, we are interested in the development of a HMM-based ASR system for Standard Arabic (SA) language. Our fundamental research goal is to select the most appropriate acoustic parameters describing each audio frame, acoustic models and speech recognition unit. To achieve this purpose, we analyze the effect of varying frame windowing (size and period), acoustic parameter number resulting from features extraction methods traditionally used in ASR, speech recognition unit, Gaussian number per HMM state and number of embedded re-estimations of the Baum-Welch Algorithm. To evaluate the proposed ASR system, a multi-speaker SA connected-digits corpus is collected, transcribed and used throughout all experiments. A further evaluation is conducted on a speaker-independent continue SA speech corpus. The phonemes recognition rate is 94.02% which is relatively high when comparing it with another ASR system evaluated on the same corpus.

Keywords: ASR, HMM, acoustical analysis, acoustic modeling, Standard Arabic language

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Authors: Favour Makuochukwu Orji, Yingkui Zhao

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A myriad of environmental issues face the Nigerian industrial region, resulting from; oil and gas production, mining, manufacturing and domestic wastes. Amidst these, much effort has been directed by stakeholders in the Nigerian oil producing regions, because of the impacts of the region on the wider Nigerian economy. Although collaborative environmental management has been noted as an effective approach in managing environmental issues, little attention has been given to the roles and practices of stakeholders in effecting a collaborative environmental management framework for the Nigerian oil-producing region. This paper produces a framework to expand and deepen knowledge relating to stakeholders aspects of collaborative roles in managing environmental issues in the Nigeria oil-producing region. The knowledge is derived from analysis of stakeholders’ practices – studied through multiple case studies using document analysis. Selected documents of key stakeholders – Nigerian government agencies, multi-national oil companies and host communities, were analyzed. Open and selective coding was employed manually during document analysis of data collected from the offices and websites of the stakeholders. The findings showed that the stakeholders have a range of roles, practices, interests, drivers and barriers regarding their collaborative roles in managing environmental issues. While they have interests for efficient resource use, compliance to standards, sharing of responsibilities, generating of new solutions, and shared objectives; there is evidence of major barriers and these include resource allocation, disjointed policy, ineffective monitoring, diverse socio- economic interests, lack of stakeholders’ commitment and limited knowledge sharing. However, host communities hold deep concerns over the collaborative roles of stakeholders for economic interests, particularly, where government agencies and multi-national oil companies are involved. With these barriers and concerns, a genuine stakeholders’ collaboration is found to be limited, and as a result, optimal environmental management practices and policies have not been successfully implemented in the Nigeria oil-producing region. A framework is produced that describes practices that characterize collaborative environmental management might be employed to satisfy the stakeholders’ interests. The framework recommends critical factors, based on the findings, which may guide a collaborative environmental management in the oil producing regions. The recommendations are designed to re-define the practices of stakeholders in managing environmental issues in the oil producing regions, not as something wholly new, but as an approach essential for implementing a sustainable environmental policy. This research outcome may clarify areas for future research as well as to contribute to industry guidance in the area of collaborative environmental management.

Keywords: Collaborative environmental management framework, document analysis, case studies, multinational oil companies, Nigerian oil-producing region, stakeholders analysis.

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Authors: D. D. Vaziri, D. DeOliveira

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This article concerns with the accessibility of Business process modelling tools (BPMo tools) and business process modelling languages (BPMo languages). Therefore the reader will be introduced to business process management and the authors' motivation behind this inquiry. Afterwards, the paper will reflect problems when applying inaccessible BPMo tools. To illustrate these problems the authors distinguish between two different categories of issues and provide practical examples. Finally the article will present three approaches to improve the accessibility of BPMo tools and BPMo languages.

Keywords: Accessibility, Business Process Management, BPM, Event Process Chains, Modelling Languages

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Authors: Zulkefli bin Ibrahim, Ainin Sulaiman, Tengku M. Faziharudean

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Malaysia is aggressive in promoting the usage of ICT to its mass population through the support by the government policies and programs targeting the general population. However, with the uneven distribution of the basic telecommunication infrastructure between the urban and rural area, cost for being “interconnected" that is considered high among the poorer rural population and the lack of local contents that suit the rural population needs or lifestyles, it is still a challenge for Malaysia to achieve its Vision 2020 Agenda moving the nation towards an information society by the year 2020. Among the existing programs that have been carried out by the government to encourage the usage of ICT by the rural population is “Kedaikom", a community telecenter with the general aim is to engage the community to get exposed and to use the ICT, encouraging the diffusion of the ICT technology to the rural population. The research investigated by using a questionnaire survey of how Kedaikom, as a community telecenter could play a role in encouraging the rural or underserved community to use the ICT. The result from the survey has proven that the community telecenter could bridge the digital divide between the underserved rural population and the well-accessed urban population in Malaysia. More of the rural population, especially from the younger generation and those with higher educational background are using the community telecenter to be connected to the ICT.

Keywords: Digital divide, ICT, telecenters.

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Authors: F. Lhafiane, A. Elbyed, M. Bouchoum

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Reverse Logistics (RL) Network is considered as complex and dynamic network that involves many stakeholders such as: suppliers, manufactures, warehouse, retails and costumers, this complexity is inherent in such process due to lack of perfect knowledge or conflicting information. Ontologies on the other hand can be considered as an approach to overcome the problem of sharing knowledge and communication among the various reverse logistics partners. In this paper we propose a semantic representation based on hybrid architecture for building the Ontologies in ascendant way, this method facilitates the semantic reconciliation between the heterogeneous information systems that support reverse logistics processes and product data.

Keywords: Reverse Logistics, information management, heterogeneity, Ontologies, semantic web.

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Authors: G. Feletti, D. Tedesco, P. Trucco

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The present study aims to develop a dashboard of Key Performance Indicators (KPI) to enhance information and predictive capabilities in Emergency Medical Services (EMS) systems, supporting both operational and strategic decisions of different actors. The employed research methodology consists of a first phase of revision of the technical-scientific literature concerning the indicators currently in use for the performance measurement of EMS. It emerges that current studies focus on two distinct areas and independent objectives: the ambulance service, a fundamental component of pre-hospital health treatment, and the patient care in the Emergency Department (ED). Conversely, the perspective proposed by this study is to consider an integrated view of the ambulance service process and the ED process, both essential to ensure high quality of care and patient safety. Thus, the proposal covers the end-to-end healthcare service process and, as such, allows considering the interconnection between the two EMS processes, the pre-hospital and hospital ones, connected by the assignment of the patient to a specific ED. In this way, it is possible to optimize the entire patient management. Therefore, attention is paid even to EMS aspects that in current literature tend to be neglected or underestimated. In particular, the integration of the two processes enables to evaluate the advantage of an ED selection decision having visibility on EDs’ saturation status and therefore considering, besides the distance, the available resources and the expected waiting times. Starting from a critical review of the KPIs proposed in extant literature, the design of the dashboard was carried out: the high number of analyzed KPIs was reduced by eliminating firstly the ones not in line with the aim of the study and then the ones supporting a similar functionality. The KPIs finally selected were tested on a realistic dataset, which draw us to exclude additional indicators due to unavailability of data required for their computation. The final dashboard, that was discussed and validated by experts in the field, includes a variety of KPIs able to support operational and planning decisions, early warning, and citizens’ awareness on EDs accessibility in real time. The association of each KPI to the EMS phase it refers to enabled the design of a well-balanced dashboard, covering both efficiency and effectiveness performance objectives of the entire EMS process. Indeed, just the initial phases related to the interconnection between ambulance service and patient care are covered by traditional KPIs. Future developments could be directed to building a hierarchical dashboard, composed by a high-level minimal set of KPIs for measuring the basic performance of the EMS system, at an aggregate level, and lower levels of KPIs that bring additional and more detailed information on specific performance dimensions or EMS phases.

Keywords: Emergency Medical Services, Key Performance Indicators, Dashboard, Decision Support.

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Authors: Christos Spandonidis, Stefanos Tsantilas, Elias Sedikos, Nektarios Galiatsatos, Fotios Giannopoulos, Panagiotis Papadopoulos, Nikolaos Demagos, Dimitrios Reppas, Christos Giordamlis

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In the present paper, a low cost, compact and modular Internet of Things (IoT) platform for air quality monitoring in urban areas is presented. This platform comprises of dedicated low cost, low power hardware and the associated embedded software that enable measurement of particles (PM2.5 and PM10), NO, CO, CO₂ and O₃ concentration in the air, along with relative temperature and humidity. This integrated platform acts as part of a greater air pollution data collecting wireless network that is able to monitor the air quality in various regions and neighborhoods of an urban area, by providing sensor measurements at a high rate that reaches up to one sample per second. It is therefore suitable for Big Data analysis applications such as air quality forecasts, weather forecasts and traffic prediction. The first real world test for the developed platform took place in Thessaloniki, Greece, where 16 devices were installed in various buildings in the city. In the near future, many more of these devices are going to be installed in the greater Thessaloniki area, giving a detailed air quality map of the city.

Keywords: Distributed sensor system, environmental monitoring, Internet of Things, IoT, Smart Cities.

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Authors: Hariton N. Costin, Sorin Puscoci, Cristian Rotariu, Bogdan Dionisie, Marinela C. Cimpoesu

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TELMES project aims to develop a securized multimedia system devoted to medical consultation teleservices. It will be finalized with a pilot system for a regional telecenters network that connects local telecenters, having as support multimedia platforms. This network will enable the implementation of complex medical teleservices (teleconsulations, telemonitoring, homecare, urgency medicine, etc.) for a broader range of patients and medical professionals, mainly for family doctors and those people living in rural or isolated regions. Thus, a multimedia, scalable network, based on modern IT&C paradigms, will result. It will gather two inter-connected regional telecenters, in Iaşi and Piteşti, Romania, each of them also permitting local connections of hospitals, diagnostic and treatment centers, as well as local networks of family doctors, patients, even educational entities. As communications infrastructure, we aim to develop a combined fixmobile- internet (broadband) links. Other possible communication environments will be GSM/GPRS/3G and radio waves. The electrocardiogram (ECG) acquisition, internet transmission and local analysis, using embedded technologies, was already successfully done for patients- telemonitoring.

Keywords: Healthcare, telemedicine, telemonitoring, ECG analysis.

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Authors: M. A. Badr, M.N. El Kordy, A. N. Mohib, M. M. Ibrahim

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The basic objective of the research is to study the effect of hybrid wind energy on the cost of generated electricity considering the cost of reduction CO₂ emissions. The system consists of small wind turbine(s), storage battery bank and a diesel generator (W/D/B). Using an optimization software package, different system configurations are investigated to reach optimum configuration based on the net present cost (NPC) and cost of energy (COE) as economic optimization criteria. The cost of avoided CO₂ is taken into consideration. The system is intended to supply the electrical load of a small community (gathering six families) in a remote Egyptian area. The investigated system is not connected to the electricity grid and may replace an existing conventional diesel powered electric supply system to reduce fuel consumption and CO₂ emissions. The simulation results showed that W/D energy system is more economic than diesel alone. The estimated COE is 0.308$/kWh and extracting the cost of avoided CO₂, the COE reached 0.226 $/kWh which is an external benefit of wind turbine, as there are no pollutant emissions through operational phase.

Keywords: Hybrid wind turbine systems, remote areas electrification, simulation of hybrid energy systems, techno-economic study.

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Authors: Mojtaba Mahmoodian, Joshua Phelan, Mehdi Shahparvari

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With a large percentage of countries’ total infrastructure expenditure attributed to water network maintenance, it is essential to optimise maintenance strategies to rehabilitate or replace underground pipes before failure occurs. The aim of this paper is to provide water utility managers with a maintenance management approach for underground water pipes, subject to external loading and material corrosion, to give the lowest life cycle cost over a predetermined time period. This reliability-based maintenance management methodology details the optimal years for intervention, the ideal number of maintenance activities to perform before replacement and specifies feasible renewal options and intervention prioritisation to minimise the life cycle cost. The study was then extended to include feasible renewal methods by determining the structural condition index and potential for soil loss, then obtaining the failure impact rating to assist in prioritising pipe replacement. A case study on optimisation of maintenance plans for the Melbourne water pipe network is considered in this paper to evaluate the practicality of the proposed methodology. The results confirm that the suggested methodology can provide water utility managers with a reliable systematic approach to determining optimum maintenance plans for pipe networks.

Keywords: Water pipe networks, maintenance management, reliability analysis, optimum maintenance plan.

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Authors: Dong-Hyun Kim, Jin-Woong Choi, Hyeong-Yeol Kim, Sun-Kyu Park

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This study is to evaluate the behavior of integral and segmental specimens through static and cyclic tests. Integral specimens were made with the same size to be compared with segmental specimens that were made by connected precast members. To evaluate its bending performance and serviceability, 1 integral and 3 segmental specimens were tested under static load. And 1 integral and 2 segmental specimens were tested under cyclic load, respectively. Different load ranges were considered in the cyclic tests to evaluate the safety and serviceability. The test results showed that under static loading, segmental specimens had about 94% of the integral specimen's maximum moment, averagely. Under cyclic loading, the segmental specimens showed that had enough safety in the range of higher than service load and enough serviceability. In conclusion, the maximum crack width (0.16mm) satisfied the allowable crack width (0.30mm) in the range of service load.

Keywords: Modular bridge, Transverse connection, Precast concrete, Static and cyclic test.

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Authors: Josefina Bengoechea, Alex Bell

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In the metaverse, the characters were avatars working in a 3-dimensional virtual reality. This virtual reality existed beyond reality. The metaverse is a “the post-reality universe”; a perpetual and persistent multiuser environment in which physical reality and digital virtuality are merged. The virtual infrastructure needed to build a metaverse (which is in the process of being created), are: web3 technologies, non-fungible tokens (NFTs), blockchain, smart contracts, and cryptocurrencies. Web3 refers to a new iteration of the actual web2. The actual web2 is dominated by powerful providers like Google, Apple, Amazon, and other corporate tech companies. The vision for web3 is a decentralized, and thus more equitable version of the web. The aim of this paper is, first, to present the Metaverse as a form of reality in which physical reality and digital virtuality combined to provide new experiences to users; second, to discuss the implications for education, specifically for higher education, and how programs will have to be modified so that the skills obtained by graduates match those demanded by the virtual labour market. This paper builds upon a constructivist approach, combining a literature review and research on key publications.

Keywords: Ethics in technology, cross realities, cryptocurrencies, labour market, metaverse, technology in higher education.

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Authors: Pakorn Uttayopas, Chawalit Kittichaikarn

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This paper presents an experimental investigation for the characteristics of an energy harvesting device exploiting flow-induced vibration in a wind tunnel. A stationary bluff body is connected with a downstream tip body via an aluminium cantilever beam. Various lengths of aluminium cantilever beam and different shapes of downstream tip body are considered. The results show that the characteristics of the energy harvester’s vibration depend on both the length of the aluminium cantilever beam and the shape of the downstream tip body. The highest ratio between vibration amplitude and bluff body diameter was found to be 1.39 for an energy harvester with a symmetrical triangular tip body and L/D₁ = 5 at 9.8 m/s of flow speed (Re = 20077). Using this configuration, the electrical energy was extracted with a polyvinylidene fluoride (PVDF) piezoelectric beam with different load resistances, of which the optimal value could be found on each Reynolds number. The highest power output was found to be 3.19 µW, at 9.8 m/s of flow speed (Re = 20077) and 27 MΩ of load resistance.

Keywords: Downstream structures, energy harvesting, flow-induced vibration, piezoelectric material, wind tunnel.

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Authors: Anastasia Rita Widiarti, Agus Harjoko, Marsono, Sri Hartati

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This paper presents the results of a study to test whether the Javanese character manuscript image preprocessing model that have been more widely applied, can also be applied to segment of the Batak characters manuscripts. The treatment process begins by converting the input image into a binary image. After the binary image is cleaned of noise, then the segmentation lines using projection profile is conducted. If unclear histogram projection is found, then the smoothing process before production indexes line segments is conducted. For each line image which has been produced, then the segmentation scripts in the line is applied, with regard of the connectivity between pixels which making up the letters that there is no characters are truncated. From the results of manuscript preprocessing system prototype testing, it is obtained the information about the system truth percentage value on pieces of Pustaka Batak Podani Ma AjiMamisinon manuscript ranged from 65% to 87.68% with a confidence level of 95%. The value indicates the truth percentage shown the initial processing model in Javanese characters manuscript image can be applied also to the image of the Batak characters manuscript.

Keywords: Connected component, preprocessing manuscript image, projection profiles.

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Authors: Jorge Martinez-Garcia, Ingrid Stelzner, Joerg Stelzner, Damian Gwerder, Philipp Schuetz

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Tree-ring analysis is an important part of the quality assessment and the dating of (archaeological) wood samples. It provides quantitative data about the whole anatomical ring structure, which can be used, for example, to measure the impact of the fluctuating environment on the tree growth, for the dendrochronological analysis of archaeological wooden artefacts and to estimate the wood mechanical properties. Despite advances in computer vision and edge recognition algorithms, detection and counting of annual rings are still limited to 2D datasets and performed in most cases manually, which is a time consuming, tedious task and depends strongly on the operator’s experience. This work presents an image processing approach to detect the whole 3D tree-ring structure directly from X-ray computed tomography imaging data. The approach relies on a modified Canny edge detection algorithm, which captures fully connected tree-ring edges throughout the measured image stack and is validated on X-ray computed tomography data taken from six wood species.

Keywords: Ring recognition, edge detection, X-ray computed tomography, dendrochronology.

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Authors: S. Panda, S. C. Swain, A. K. Baliarsingh, C. Ardil

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Optimal supplementary damping controller design for Thyristor Controlled Series Compensator (TCSC) is presented in this paper. For the proposed controller design, a multi-objective fitness function consisting of both damping factors and real part of system electromachanical eigenvalue is used and Real- Coded Genetic Algorithm (RCGA) is employed for the optimal supplementary controller parameters. The performance of the designed supplementary TCSC-based damping controller is tested on a weakly connected power system with different disturbances and loading conditions with parameter variations. Simulation results are presented and compared with a conventional power system stabilizer and also with the TCSC-based supplementary controller when the controller parameters are not optimized to show the effectiveness and robustness of the proposed approach over a wide range of loading conditions and disturbances.

Keywords: Power System Oscillations, Real-Coded Genetic Algorithm (RCGA), Thyristor Controlled Series Compensator (TCSC), Damping Controller, Power System Stabilizer.

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Authors: Mojtaba Ghodsi, Hamidreza Ziaifar, Morteza Mohammadzaheri, Payam Soltani

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This article presents an analytical model to estimate the harvested power from a Magnetostrictive cantilevered beam with tip excitation. Furthermore, the effects of internal and external damping on harvested power are investigated. The magnetostrictive material in this harvester is Galfenol. In comparison to other popular smart materials like Terfenol-D, Galfenol has higher strength and machinability. In this article, first, a mechanical model of the Euler-Bernoulli beam is employed to calculate the deflection of the harvester. Then, the magneto-mechanical equation of Galfenol is combined with Faraday's law to calculate the generated voltage of the Magnetostrictive cantilevered beam harvester. Finally, the beam model is incorporated in the aforementioned combination. The results show that a 30×8.5×1 mm Galfenol cantilever beam harvester with 80 turn pickup coil can generate up to 3.7 mV and 9 mW. Furthermore, sensitivity analysis made by Response Surface Method (RSM) shows that the harvested power is only sensitive to the internal damping coefficient.

Keywords: Internal damping coefficient, external damping coefficient, Euler-Bernoulli, energy harvester, Galfenol, magnetostrictive, response surface method.

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Authors: S. Panda, N. P. Patidar, R. Singh

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Power system stability enhancement by simultaneous tuning of a Power System Stabilizer (PSS) and a Static Var Compensator (SVC)-based controller is thoroughly investigated in this paper. The coordination among the proposed damping stabilizers and the SVC internal voltage regulators has also been taken into consideration. The design problem is formulated as an optimization problem with a time-domain simulation-based objective function and Real-Coded Genetic Algorithm (RCGA) is employed to search for optimal controller parameters. The proposed stabilizers are tested on a weakly connected power system with different disturbances and loading conditions. The nonlinear simulation results are presented to show the effectiveness and robustness of the proposed control schemes over a wide range of loading conditions and disturbances. Further, the proposed design approach is found to be robust and improves stability effectively even under small disturbance and unbalanced fault conditions.

Keywords: Real-Coded Genetic Algorithm (RCGA), Static Var Compensator (SVC), Power System Stabilizer (PSS), Low Frequency Oscillations, Power System Stability.

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Authors: Yi-Cheng Huang, Yan-Chen Shin

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This paper proposes method of diagnosing ball screw preload loss through the Hilbert-Huang Transform （HHT） and Multiscale entropy （MSE） process. The proposed method can diagnose ball screw preload loss through vibration signals when the machine tool is in operation. Maximum dynamic preload of 2 %, 4 %, and 6 % ball screws were predesigned, manufactured, and tested experimentally. Signal patterns are discussed and revealed using Empirical Mode Decomposition（EMD）with the Hilbert Spectrum. Different preload features are extracted and discriminated using HHT. The irregularity development of a ball screw with preload loss is determined and abstracted using MSE based on complexity perception. Experiment results show that the proposed method can predict the status of ball screw preload loss. Smart sensing for the health of the ball screw is also possible based on a comparative evaluation of MSE by the signal processing and pattern matching of EMD/HHT. This diagnosis method realizes the purposes of prognostic effectiveness on knowing the preload loss and utilizing convenience.

Keywords: Empirical Mode Decomposition, Hilbert-Huang Transform, Multi-scale Entropy, Preload Loss, Single-nut Ball Screw

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Authors: Amos Barkai, Guy Meredith, Fatima Felaar, Zahrah Dantie, Dave de Buys

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Fisheries management all around the world is hampered by the lack, or poor quality, of critical data on fish resources and fishing operations. The main reasons for the chronic inability to collect good quality data during fishing operations is the culture of secrecy common among fishers and the lack of modern data gathering technology onboard most fishing vessels. In response, OLRAC-SPS, a South African company, developed fisheries datalogging software (eLog in short) and named it Olrac. The Olrac eLog solution is capable of collecting, analysing, plotting, mapping, reporting, tracing and transmitting all data related to fishing operations. Olrac can be used by skippers, fleet/company managers, offshore mariculture farmers, scientists, observers, compliance inspectors and fisheries management authorities. The authors believe that using eLog onboard fishing vessels has the potential to revolutionise the entire process of data collection and reporting during fishing operations and, if properly deployed and utilised, could transform the entire commercial fleet to a provider of good quality data and forever change the way fish resources are managed. In addition it will make it possible to trace catches back to the actual individual fishing operation, to improve fishing efficiency and to dramatically improve control of fishing operations and enforcement of fishing regulations.

Keywords: data management, electronic logbook (eLog), electronic reporting system (ERS), fisheries management

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Authors: Janusz K. Grabara, Bartłomiej Okwiet, Sebastian Kot

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The purpose of the article is presentation and analysis of the aspect of job security in small and medium-size enterprises in Poland with reference to other EU countries. We show the theoretical aspects of the risk with reference to managing small and medium enterprises, next risk management in small and medium enterprises in Poland, which were subjected to a detailed analysis. We show in detail the risk associated with the operation of the mentioned above companies, as well as analyses its levels on various stages and for different kinds of conducted activity.

Keywords: Job safety, small and medium-size companies, SME, work risk, risk management.

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Authors: Michelle Zeyuan Ma, Hermann Heilmeier

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Recently, meat production ecosystem impacts initiated many hot discussions and researchers, and it is a difficult implementation to reduce such impacts due to the demand of meat products. It calls for better management and control of ecosystem impacts from every aspects of meat production. This article analyzes the ecosystem impacts of meat production based on meat products life cycle. The analysis shows that considerable ecosystem impacts are caused by different meat production steps: initial establishment phase, animal raising, slaughterhouse processing, meat consumption, and wastes management. Based on this analysis, the impacts are summarized as: leading factor for biodiversity loss; water waste, land use waste and land degradation; greenhouse gases emissions; pollution to air, water, and soil; related major diseases. The article also provides a discussion on a solution-sustainable food system, which could help in reducing ecosystem impacts. The analysis method is based on the life cycle level, it provides a concept of the whole meat industry ecosystem impacts, and the analysis result could be useful to manage or control meat production ecosystem impacts from investor, producer and consumer sides.

Keywords: Eutrophication, life cycle based analysis, sustainable food, waste management.

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Authors: Mira Trebar

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Logistics processes of perishable food in the supply chain include the distribution activities and the real time temperature monitoring to fulfil the cold chain requirements. The paper presents the use of RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) technology as an identification tool of receiving and shipping activities in the cold store. At the same time, the use of RFID data loggers with temperature sensors is presented to observe and store the temperatures for the purpose of analyzing the processes and having the history data available for traceability purposes and efficient recall management.

Keywords: Logistics, warehouse, RFID device, cold chain.

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Authors: Sidhartha Panda, N. P. Padhy, R.N.Patel

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In this paper, genetic algorithm (GA) opmization technique is applied to design Flexible AC Transmission System (FACTS)-based damping controllers. Two types of controller structures, namely a proportional-integral (PI) and a lead-lag (LL) are considered. The design problem of the proposed controllers is formulated as an optimization problem and GA is employed to search for optimal controller parameters. By minimizing the time-domain based objective function, in which the deviation in the oscillatory rotor speed of the generator is involved; stability performance of the system is improved. The proposed controllers are tested on a weakly connected power system subjected to different disturbances. The non-linear simulation results are presented to show the effectiveness of the proposed controller and their ability to provide efficient damping of low frequency oscillations. It is also observed that the proposed SSSC-based controllers improve greatly the voltage profile of the system under severe disturbances. Further, the dynamic performances of both the PI and LL structured FACTS-controller are analyzed at different loading conditions and under various disturbance condition as well as under unbalanced fault conditions..

Keywords: Genetic algorithm, proportional-integral controller, lead-lag controller, power system stability, FACTS.

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Authors: Thandar Aung, Tun Lin Naing

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In this paper, the DC-link voltage control of DC-DC boost converter–inverter system is proposed. The mathematical model is developed from four different sub-circuits that depended on the switch positions. The developed differential equations are combined to develop the dynamic model. Transfer function is generated from the switched function model. Fluctuation of DC-link voltage causes connected loads malfunction. For this problem, a kind of traditional controller, the PI controller is applied to achieve constant DC-link voltage. The PI controller gains are obtained based on transfer function step response. The simulation work has been studied by using MATLAB/Simulink software and hardware prototype is implemented with a low-cost microcontroller Arduino Nano. Experimental results are collected by using ArduinoIO library package. Closed-loop DC-link voltage control system is tested with various line and load disturbances. It is found that the experimental results give equal responses with the simulation results.

Keywords: ArduinoIO library package, boost converter-inverter system, low cost microcontroller, PI controller, switched function model.

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Authors: T. Delval, C. Sauvage, Q. Jullien, R. Viano, T. Diallo, B. Collignan, G. Picinbono

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In the context of the international spread of COVID-19, the Centre Scientifique et Technique du Bâtiment (CSTB) has led a joint research with the French government authorities Hauts-de-Seine department, to analyse the risk in school spaces according to their configuration, ventilation system and spatial segmentation strategy. This paper describes the main results of this joint research. A multidisciplinary team involving experts in indoor air quality/ventilation, pedestrian movements and IT domains was established to develop a COVID risk analysis tool based on Building Information Model. The work started with specific analysis on two pilot schools in order to provide for the local administration specifications to minimize the spread of the virus. Different recommendations were published to optimize/validate the use of ventilation systems and the strategy of student occupancy and student flow segmentation within the building. This COVID expertise has been digitized in order to manage a quick risk analysis on the entire building that could be used by the public administration through an easy user interface implemented in a free BIM Management software. One of the most interesting results is to enable a dynamic comparison of different ventilation system scenarios and space occupation strategy inside the BIM model. This concurrent engineering approach provides users with the optimal solution according to both ventilation and pedestrian flow expertise.

Keywords: BIM, knowledge management, system expert, risk management, indoor ventilation, pedestrian movement, integrated design.

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