Search results for: Mobile payment services and application

Authors: Anita Kéri

Abstract:

Recent developments in the field of education have led to a renewed interest in teaching methodologies and practices. Gamification is fast becoming a key instrument in the education of new generations and besides other methods, serious games have become the center of attention. Ready-built serious games are available for most higher education institutions to buy and implement. However, monetary restraints and the unalterable nature of the games might deter most higher education institutions from the application of these serious games. Therefore, there is a continuously growing need for a customizable serious game that has been developed based on a concrete need analysis and experts’ opinion. There has been little evidence so far of serious games that have been created based on relevant and current need analysis from higher education institution teachers, professional practitioners and students themselves. Therefore, the aim of this current paper is to analyze the needs of higher education institution educators with special emphasis on their needs, the applicability of serious games in their classrooms, and exploring options for the development of a customizable serious game framework. The paper undertakes to analyze workshop discussions on implementing serious games in education and propose a customizable serious game framework applicable in the education of the new generation. Research results show that the most important feature of a serious game is its customizability. The fact that practitioners are able to manage different scenarios and upload their own content to a game seems to be a key to the increasingly widespread application of serious games in the classroom.

Keywords: Education, gamification, game-based learning, serious games.

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Authors: J. D. Mallapur, Supriya H., Santosh B. K., Tej H.

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The cellular network is one of the emerging areas of communication, in which the mobile nodes act as member for one base station. The cluster based communication is now an emerging area of wireless cellular multimedia networks. The cluster renders fast communication and also a convenient way to work with connectivity. In our scheme we have proposed an optimization technique for the fuzzy cluster nodes, by categorizing the group members into three categories like long refreshable member, medium refreshable member and short refreshable member. By considering long refreshable nodes as static nodes, we compute the new membership values for the other nodes in the cluster. We compare their previous and present membership value with the threshold value to categorize them into three different members. By which, we optimize the nodes in the fuzzy clusters. The simulation results show that there is reduction in the cluster computational time and iterational time after optimization.

Keywords: Clusters, fuzzy and optimization.

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Authors: Meftah O. Bashir, Fatma A. Karkory

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Rapid prototyping is a new group of manufacturing processes, which allows fabrication of physical of any complexity using a layer by layer deposition technique directly from a computer system. The rapid prototyping process greatly reduces the time and cost necessary to bring a new product to market. The prototypes made by these systems are used in a range of industrial application including design evaluation, verification, testing, and as patterns for casting processes. These processes employ a variety of materials and mechanisms to build up the layers to build the part. The present work was to build a FDM prototyping machine that could control the X-Y motion and material deposition, to generate two-dimensional and three-dimensional complex shapes. This study focused on the deposition of wax material. This work was to find out the properties of the wax materials used in this work in order to enable better control of the FDM process. This study will look at the integration of a computer controlled electro-mechanical system with the traditional FDM additive prototyping process. The characteristics of the wax were also analysed in order to optimise the model production process. These included wax phase change temperature, wax viscosity and wax droplet shape during processing.

Keywords: Rapid prototyping, wax, manufacturing processes, additive prototyping.

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Authors: Elif Gencturk, Ekin Yurdakul, Ahmet Y. Celik, Senol Mutlu, Kutlu O. Ulgen

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Yeast cells are generally used as a model system of eukaryotes due to their complex genetic structure, rapid growth ability in optimum conditions, easy replication and well-defined genetic system properties. Thus, yeast cells increased the knowledge of the principal pathways in humans. During fermentation, carbohydrates (hexoses and pentoses) degrade into some toxic by-products such as 5-hydroxymethylfurfural (5-HMF or HMF) and furfural. HMF influences the ethanol yield, and ethanol productivity; it interferes with microbial growth and is considered as a potent inhibitor of bioethanol production. In this study, yeast single cell behavior under HMF application was monitored by using a continuous flow single phase microfluidic platform. Microfluidic device in operation is fabricated by hot embossing and thermo-compression techniques from cyclo-olefin polymer (COP). COP is biocompatible, transparent and rigid material and it is suitable for observing fluorescence of cells considering its low auto-fluorescence characteristic. The response of yeast cells was recorded through Red Fluorescent Protein (RFP) tagged Nop56 gene product, which is an essential evolutionary-conserved nucleolar protein, and also a member of the box C/D snoRNP complexes. With the application of HMF, yeast cell proliferation continued but HMF slowed down the cell growth, and after HMF treatment the cell proliferation stopped. By the addition of fresh nutrient medium, the yeast cells recovered after 6 hours of HMF exposure. Thus, HMF application suppresses normal functioning of cell cycle but it does not cause cells to die. The monitoring of Nop56 expression phases of the individual cells shed light on the protein and ribosome synthesis cycles along with their link to growth. Further computational study revealed that the mechanisms underlying the inhibitory or inductive effects of HMF on growth are enriched in functional categories of protein degradation, protein processing, DNA repair and multidrug resistance. The present microfluidic device can successfully be used for studying the effects of inhibitory agents on growth by single cell tracking, thus capturing cell to cell variations. By metabolic engineering techniques, engineered strains can be developed, and the metabolic network of the microorganism can thus be manipulated such that chemical overproduction of target metabolite is achieved along with the maximum growth/biomass yield.  

Keywords: COP, HMF, ribosome biogenesis, thermoplastic microbioreactor, yeast.

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Authors: K. Alese Boniface, K. Adu Michael

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Cybercrime is now becoming a big challenge in Nigeria apart from the traditional crime. Inability to identify perpetrators is one of the reasons for the growing menace. This paper proposes a design for monitoring internet users’ activities in order to curbing cybercrime. It requires redefining the operations of Internet Service Providers (ISPs) which will now mandate users to be authenticated before accessing the internet. In implementing this work which can be adapted to a larger scale, a virtual router application is developed and configured to mimic a real router device. A sign-up portal is developed to allow users to register with the ISP. The portal asks for identification information which will include bio-data and government issued identification data like National Identity Card number, et cetera. A unique username and password are chosen by the user to enable access to the internet which will be used to reference him to an Internet Protocol Address (IP Address) of any system he uses on the internet and thereby associating him to any criminal act related to that IP address at that particular time. Questions such as “What happen when another user knows the password and uses it to commit crime?” and other pertinent issues are addressed.

Keywords: Cybercrime, Sign-up Portal, Internet Service Provider (ISP), Internet Protocol Address (IP address).

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Authors: Sevil Yıldız

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In this study, we will touch upon the legal arrangements issued in Turkey for prevention of condensation and for ensuring pluralism in the media. We will mention the legal arrangements concerning the regulatory and supervisory authority, namely the Radio and Television Supreme Council, for the visual and auditory media. In this context; the legal arrangements, which have been introduced by the Law No 6112 on the Establishment of Radio and Television Enterprises and Their Media Services in relation to the media ownership, will be reviewed through comparison with the Article 29 of the repealed Law No 3984.

Keywords: Media ownership, legal arrangements, the case for Turkey.

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Authors: P. Saravanan, T. Arunkumar

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Vehicular Adhoc Network (VANET) is a new technology which aims to ensure intelligent inter-vehicle communications, seamless internet connectivity leading to improved road safety, essential alerts, and access to comfort and entertainment. VANET operations are hindered by mobile node’s (vehicles) uncertain mobility. Routing algorithms use metrics to evaluate which path is best for packets to travel. Metrics like path length (hop count), delay, reliability, bandwidth, and load determine optimal route. The proposed scheme exploits link quality, traffic density, and intersections as routing metrics to determine next hop. This study enhances Geographical Routing Protocol (GRP) using fuzzy controllers while rules are optimized with Bee Swarm Optimization (BSO). Simulations results are compared to conventional GRP.

Keywords: Bee Swarm Optimization (BSO), Geographical Routing Protocol (GRP), Vehicular Adhoc Network (VANET).

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Authors: Xiaoqing Wang, Fang Youyuan, Zheng Yanxing, Gu Tianyang, Zong Jianjian, Tong Jinrong

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Compared with traditional distributed environment, the net-centric environment brings on more demanding challenges for information sharing with the characteristics of ultra-large scale and strong distribution, dynamic, autonomy, heterogeneity, redundancy. This paper realizes an information sharing model and a series of core services, through which provides an open, flexible and scalable information sharing platform.

Keywords: Net-centric environment, Information sharing, Metadata registry and catalog, Cross-domain data access control.

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Authors: Nigina Toktasynova, Sholpan Sagyndykova, Zhanat Kenzhebayeva, Maksat Kalimoldayev, Mariya Ishimova, Irbulat Utepbergenov

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To solve these problems, we investigated the management system of heating enterprise, including strategic planning based on the balanced scorecard (BSC), quality management in accordance with the standards of the Quality Management System (QMS) ISO 9001 and analysis of the system based on expert judgment using fuzzy inference. To carry out our work we used the theory of fuzzy sets, the QMS in accordance with ISO 9001, BSC, method of construction of business processes according to the notation IDEF0, theory of modeling using Matlab software simulation tools and graphical programming LabVIEW. The results of the work are as follows: We determined possibilities of improving the management of heat-supply plant-based on QMS; after the justification and adaptation of software tool it has been used to automate a series of functions for the management and reduction of resources and for the maintenance of the system up to date; an application for the analysis of the QMS based on fuzzy inference has been created with novel organization of communication software with the application enabling the analysis of relevant data of enterprise management system. 

Keywords: Balanced scorecard, heat supply, quality management system, the theory of fuzzy sets.

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Authors: Zeynep Şahin, Züleyha Yılmaz, Fikret Çankaya

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In today's business world, in which it is difficult to survive, the economic life of products, services or knowledge is considerably reduced. Competitors produce similar products or extra-featured ones instantly. In this environment, the contribution of companies to the social and economic environment is a preferred criterion by consumers alongside products or services. Therefore, consumers need to obtain more detailed information about companies. Besides, this drastic change in the market encourages companies to become sustainable. Sustainable business means the company puts consumed products back. Corporate sustainability, corresponds to sustainability at the level of the company, and gives equal importance to company growth and profitability together with environmental and social issues. The BIST Sustainability Index started to be calculated by the Istanbul Stock Exchange (BIST) in 2014 to evaluate the sustainability performance of companies in Turkey. The main objective of this study is to present the importance of sustainability reports in Turkey. To this aim, the performances of 15 companies in the BIST Sustainability Index were compared the periods before and after entering the index. On the other hand, sustainability reporting practices should be encouraged to increase studies on this issue. In this context, to remain on the agenda of the issue is a further objective of this study. To achieve these objectives, the financial data of the companies in the period before and after entering to the BIST Sustainability Index were analyzed using t-test in Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) package. The results of the study showed that no significant difference between the performances of the companies in terms of the net profit margin, the return on assets and equity capital in these periods could be found. Therefore, it can be said that insufficient importance is given to sustainability issues in Turkey. The reasons for this situation might be considered as a lack of awareness due to the recent introduction and calculation of the index. It is expected that the awareness of firms and investors about sustainability will increase, and that they will demonstrate the necessary importance to this issue over time.

Keywords: BIST sustainability index, firm performance, sustainability, sustainability reporting.

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Authors: Marjan Omranpour, Saeed Abbasi, Sohbat Bahraminejad

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White rust, caused by Albugo candida, is the most destructive foliar diseases of persian cress, Lepidium sativum in Iran. Application of fungicide is the most common method for the disease control. However, regarding the problems created by synthetic pesticides application, environmentally safe methods are needed to replace chemical pesticides. In this study, the antifungal activity of plant natural extracts was investigated for their ability to inhibit zoospore release from sporangia of A. candida. The crude extract of 46 plants was obtained using methanol. The inhibitory effect of the extracts was examined by mixing the plant extracts with a zoosporangial suspension of A. candida (1×106 spore/ml) at three concentrations, 250, 100 and 50 ppm. The experiments were conducted in a completely randomized design, with three replicates. The results of the experiment showed that three out of 46 plants species, including, Rhus coriaria, Anagallis arvensis and Mespilus germanica were completely inhibit zoospore release from zoosporangia of Albugo candida at concentration of 50 ppm.

Keywords: white rust, plant extract, Rhus coriaria, Anagallis arvensis and Mespilus germanica

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Authors: Mohd Faridz Ahmad, Amirul Hakim Hasbullah

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Electrical Muscle Stimulation (EMS) has been introduced and globally gained increasing attention on its usefulness. Continuous application of EMS may lead to the increment of muscle mass and indirectly will increase the strength. This study can be used as an alternative to help people especially those living a sedentary lifestyle to improve their muscle activity without having to go through a heavy workout session. Therefore, this study intended to investigate the effectiveness of EMS training program in 5 weeks interventions towards male body composition. It was a quasiexperimental design, held at the Impulse Studio Bangsar, which examined the effects of EMS training towards skeletal muscle mass among the subjects. Fifteen subjects (n = 15) were selected to assist in this study. The demographic data showed that, the average age of the subjects was 43.07 years old ± 9.90, height (173.4 cm ± 9.09) and weight was (85.79 kg ± 18.07). Results showed that there was a significant difference on the skeletal muscle mass (p = 0.01 < 0.05), upper body (p = 0.01 < 0.05) and lower body (p = 0.00 < 0.05). Therefore, the null hypothesis has been rejected in this study. As a conclusion, the application of EMS towards body composition can increase the muscle size and strength. This method has been proven to be able to improve athlete strength and thus, may be implemented in the sports science area of knowledge.

Keywords: Body composition, EMS, skeletal muscle mass, strength.

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Authors: Teklu Urgessa, Wookjae Maeng, Joong Seek Lee

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Application of five implementations of three data mining classification techniques was experimented for extracting important insights from tourism data. The aim was to find out the best performing algorithm among the compared ones for tourism knowledge discovery. Knowledge discovery process from data was used as a process model. 10-fold cross validation method is used for testing purpose. Various data preprocessing activities were performed to get the final dataset for model building. Classification models of the selected algorithms were built with different scenarios on the preprocessed dataset. The outperformed algorithm tourism dataset was Random Forest (76%) before applying information gain based attribute selection and J48 (C4.5) (75%) after selection of top relevant attributes to the class (target) attribute. In terms of time for model building, attribute selection improves the efficiency of all algorithms. Artificial Neural Network (multilayer perceptron) showed the highest improvement (90%). The rules extracted from the decision tree model are presented, which showed intricate, non-trivial knowledge/insight that would otherwise not be discovered by simple statistical analysis with mediocre accuracy of the machine using classification algorithms.

Keywords: Classification algorithms; data mining; tourism; knowledge discovery.

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Authors: Giovanni Luca Masala

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Pattern recognition is the research area of Artificial Intelligence that studies the operation and design of systems that recognize patterns in the data. Important application areas are image analysis, character recognition, fingerprint classification, speech analysis, DNA sequence identification, man and machine diagnostics, person identification and industrial inspection. The interest in improving the classification systems of data analysis is independent from the context of applications. In fact, in many studies it is often the case to have to recognize and to distinguish groups of various objects, which requires the need for valid instruments capable to perform this task. The objective of this article is to show several methodologies of Artificial Intelligence for data classification applied to biomedical patterns. In particular, this work deals with the realization of a Computer-Aided Detection system (CADe) that is able to assist the radiologist in identifying types of mammary tumor lesions. As an additional biomedical application of the classification systems, we present a study conducted on blood samples which shows how these methods may help to distinguish between carriers of Thalassemia (or Mediterranean Anaemia) and healthy subjects.

Keywords: Computer Aided Detection, mammary tumor, pattern recognition, dissimilarity

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Authors: Revathi Venkataraman, M. Pushpalatha, T. Rama Rao

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The lack of any centralized infrastructure in mobile ad hoc networks (MANET) is one of the greatest security concerns in the deployment of wireless networks. Thus communication in MANET functions properly only if the participating nodes cooperate in routing without any malicious intention. However, some of the nodes may be malicious in their behavior, by indulging in flooding attacks on their neighbors. Some others may act malicious by launching active security attacks like denial of service. This paper addresses few related works done on trust evaluation and establishment in ad hoc networks. Related works on flooding attack prevention are reviewed. A new trust approach based on the extent of friendship between the nodes is proposed which makes the nodes to co-operate and prevent flooding attacks in an ad hoc environment. The performance of the trust algorithm is tested in an ad hoc network implementing the Ad hoc On-demand Distance Vector (AODV) protocol.

Keywords: AODV, Flooding, MANETs, trust estimation

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Authors: Wei-Soon Ng, Min-Lee Lee, Siew-Ling Hii

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Microbial-induced calcite precipitation (MICP) is a relatively green and sustainable soil improvement technique. It utilizes biochemical process that exists naturally in soil to improve engineering properties of soils. The calcite precipitation process is uplifted by the mean of injecting higher concentration of urease positive bacteria and reagents into the soil. The main objective of this paper is to provide an overview of the factors affecting the MICP in soil. Several factors were identified including nutrients, bacteria type, geometric compatibility of bacteria, bacteria cell concentration, fixation and distribution of bacteria in soil, temperature, reagents concentration, pH, and injection method. These factors were found to be essential for promoting successful MICP soil treatment. Furthermore, a preliminary laboratory test was carried out to investigate the potential application of the technique in improving the shear strength and impermeability of a residual soil specimen. The results showed that both shear strength and impermeability of residual soil improved significantly upon MICP treatment. The improvement increased with increasing soil density.

Keywords: Bacteria, biocementation, bioclogging, calcite precipitation, soil improvement.

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Authors: Nisarg A. Patel, Hiren B. Patel

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Quantum cryptography is described as a point-to-point secure key generation technology that has emerged in recent times in providing absolute security. Researchers have started studying new innovative approaches to exploit the security of Quantum Key Distribution (QKD) for a large-scale communication system. A number of approaches and models for utilization of QKD for secure communication have been developed. The uncertainty principle in quantum mechanics created a new paradigm for QKD. One of the approaches for use of QKD involved network fashioned security. The main goal was point-to-point Quantum network that exploited QKD technology for end-to-end network security via high speed QKD. Other approaches and models equipped with QKD in network fashion are introduced in the literature as. A different approach that this paper deals with is using QKD in existing protocols, which are widely used on the Internet to enhance security with main objective of unconditional security. Our work is towards the analysis of the QKD in Mobile ad-hoc network (MANET).

Keywords: QKD, cryptography, quantum cryptography, network performance.

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Authors: Hyemi Gam, Dae-Sub Oh, Bon-Jun Ku

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This paper addresses the analysis of the interference between complementary ground component (CGC) base station and mobile earth station (MES). In the frequency sharing scenario between CGC base station and MES, the interference from the adjacent beams must be considered. In this paper, we estimated the interference to MES of an integrated satellite system and the result is presented as the carrier to interference ratio(C/I) with respect to the number of CGC base station in the adjacent beam and the ratio of satellite beam center radius to the total beam radius (R1/R). By using these results, we can determine the minimum separation distance between the CGC base stations of adjacent beam and MES for compatibility. This result can be applied to the CGC base station of an integrated satellite system for the effective frequency sharing.

Keywords: Integrated satellite system, interference, frequency reuse pattern, CGC base station, MES, frequency sharing.

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Authors: Fathi Taibi

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The abnormal increase in the number of applications available for download in Android markets is a good indication that they are being reused. However, little is known about their real reusability potential. A considerable amount of these applications is reported as having a poor quality or being malicious. Hence, in this paper, an approach to measure the reusability potential of classes in Android applications is proposed. The approach is not meant specifically for this particular type of applications. Rather, it is intended for Object-Oriented (OO) software systems in general and aims also to provide means to discard the classes of low quality and defect prone applications from being reused directly through inheritance and instantiation. An empirical investigation is conducted to measure and rank the reusability potential of the classes of randomly selected Android applications. The results obtained are thoroughly analyzed in order to understand the extent of this potential and the factors influencing it.

Keywords: Reusability, Software Quality Factors, Software Metrics, Empirical Investigation, Object-Oriented Software, Android Applications.

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Authors: Elham Ahmadi, Roshaali Khaturia, Pardis Sahraei, Mohammad Niyayesh, Omid Fatahi Valilai

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Nowadays, Information Technology (IT) is changing the way traditional enterprise management concepts work. One of the most dominant IT achievements is the Blockchain Technology. This technology enables the distributed collaboration of stakeholders for their interactions while fulfilling the security and consensus rules among them. This paper has focused on the application of Blockchain technology to enhance one of traditional inventory management models. The Vendor Managed Inventory (VMI) has been considered one of the most efficient mechanisms for vendor inventory planning by the suppliers. While VMI has brought competitive advantages for many industries, however its centralized mechanism limits the collaboration of a pool of suppliers and vendors simultaneously. This paper has studied the recent research for VMI application in industries and also has investigated the applications of Blockchain technology for decentralized collaboration of stakeholders. Focusing on sustainability issue for total supply chain consisting suppliers and vendors, it has proposed a Blockchain based VMI conceptual model. The different capabilities of this model for enabling the collaboration of stakeholders while maintaining the competitive advantages and sustainability issues have been discussed.

Keywords: Vendor Managed Inventory, Blockchain Technology, supply chain planning, sustainability.

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Authors: Gigih Supriyatno

Abstract:

SQL injection is one of the most common types of attacks and has a very critical impact on web servers. In the worst case, an attacker can perform post-exploitation after a successful SQL injection attack. In the case of forensics web servers, web server analysis is closely related to log file analysis. But sometimes large file sizes and different log types make it difficult for investigators to look for traces of attackers on the server. The purpose of this paper is to help investigator take appropriate steps to investigate when the web server gets attacked. We use attack scenarios using SQL injection attacks including PHP backdoor injection as post-exploitation. We perform post-mortem analysis of web server logs based on Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) POST and HTTP GET method approaches that are characteristic of SQL injection attacks. In addition, we also propose structured analysis method between the web server application log file, database application, and other additional logs that exist on the webserver. This method makes the investigator more structured to analyze the log file so as to produce evidence of attack with acceptable time. There is also the possibility that other attack techniques can be detected with this method. On the other side, it can help web administrators to prepare their systems for the forensic readiness.

Keywords: Web forensic, SQL injection, web shell, investigation.

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Authors: G.T. Cirella, L. Tao

Abstract:

The index of sustainable functionality (ISF) is an adaptive, multi-criteria technique that is used to measure sustainability; it is a concept that can be transposed to many regions throughout the world. An ISF application of the Southern Regional Organisation of Councils (SouthROC) in South East Queensland (SEQ) – the fastest growing region in Australia – indicated over a 25 year period an increase of over 10% level of functionality from 58.0% to 68.3%. The ISF of SouthROC utilised methodologies that derived from an expert panel based approach. The overall results attained an intermediate level of functionality which amounted to related concerns of economic progress and lack of social awareness. Within the region, a solid basis for future testing by way of measured changes and developed trends can be established. In this regard as management tool, the ISF record offers support for regional sustainability practice and decision making alike. This research adaptively analyses sustainability – a concept that is lacking throughout much of the academic literature and any reciprocal experimentation. This lack of knowledge base has been the emphasis of where future sustainability research can grow from and prove useful in rapidly growing regions. It is the intentions of this research to help further develop the notions of index-based quantitative sustainability.

Keywords: Environmental engineering, index of sustainable functionality, sustainability indicators, sustainable development.

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Authors: Khosro Mohammadi, Amir Ghalavand, Majid Aghaalikhani

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In order to Study the efficacy application of green manure as chickpea pre plant, field experiments were carried out in 2007 and 2008 growing seasons. In this research the effects of different strategies for soil fertilization were investigated on grain yield and yield component, minerals, organic compounds and cooking time of chickpea. Experimental units were arranged in splitsplit plots based on randomized complete blocks with three replications. Main plots consisted of (G1): establishing a mixed vegetation of Vicia panunica and Hordeum vulgare and (G2): control, as green manure levels. Also, five strategies for obtaining the base fertilizer requirement including (N1): 20 t.ha-1 farmyard manure; (N2): 10 t.ha-1 compost; (N3): 75 kg.ha-1 triple super phosphate; (N4): 10 t.ha-1 farmyard manure + 5 t.ha-1 compost and (N5): 10 t.ha-1 farmyard manure + 5 t.ha-1 compost + 50 kg.ha-1 triple super phosphate were considered in sub plots. Furthermoree four levels of biofertilizers consisted of (B1): Bacillus lentus + Pseudomonas putida; (B2): Trichoderma harzianum; (B3): Bacillus lentus + Pseudomonas putida + Trichoderma harzianum; and (B4): control (without biofertilizers) were arranged in sub-sub plots. Results showed that integrating biofertilizers (B3) and green manure (G1) produced the highest grain yield. The highest amounts of yield were obtained in G1×N5 interaction. Comparison of all 2-way and 3-way interactions showed that G1N5B3 was determined as the superior treatment. Significant increasing of N, P2O5, K2O, Fe and Mg content in leaves and grains emphasized on superiority of mentioned treatment because each one of these nutrients has an approved role in chlorophyll synthesis and photosynthesis abilities of the crops. The combined application of compost, farmyard manure and chemical phosphorus (N5) in addition to having the highest yield, had the best grain quality due to high protein, starch and total sugar contents, low crude fiber and reduced cooking time.

Keywords: chickpea, biofertilizer, nitrogen fixation.

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Authors: Marcel Schneider, Nils Nießen

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Microscopic simulation tool kits allow for consideration of the two processes of railway operations and the previous timetable production. Block occupation conflicts on both process levels are often solved by using defined train priorities. These conflict resolutions (dispatching decisions) generate reactionary delays to the involved trains. The sum of reactionary delays is commonly used to evaluate the quality of railway operations, which describes the timetable robustness. It is either compared to an acceptable train performance or the delays are appraised economically by linear monetary functions. It is impossible to adequately evaluate dispatching decisions without a well-founded objective function. This paper presents a new approach for the evaluation of dispatching decisions. The approach uses mode choice models and considers the behaviour of the end-customers. These models evaluate the reactionary delays in more detail and consider other competing modes of transport. The new approach pursues the coupling of a microscopic model of railway operations with the macroscopic choice mode model. At first, it will be implemented for railway operations process but it can also be used for timetable production. The evaluation considers the possibility for the customer to interchange to other transport modes. The new approach starts to look at rail and road, but it can also be extended to air travel. The result of mode choice models is the modal split. The reactions by the end-customers have an impact on the revenue of the train operating companies. Different purposes of travel have different payment reserves and tolerances towards late running. Aside from changes to revenues, longer journey times can also generate additional costs. The costs are either time- or track-specific and arise from required changes to rolling stock or train crew cycles. Only the variable values are summarised in the contribution margin, which is the base for the monetary evaluation of delays. The contribution margin is calculated for different possible solutions to the same conflict. The conflict resolution is optimised until the monetary loss becomes minimal. The iterative process therefore determines an optimum conflict resolution by monitoring the change to the contribution margin. Furthermore, a monetary value of each dispatching decision can also be derived.

Keywords: Choice of mode, monetary evaluation, railway operations, reactionary delays.

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Authors: H. El-Madbouly

Abstract:

In this paper, genetic algorithm (GA) is proposed for the design of an optimization algorithm to achieve the bandwidth allocation of ATM network. In Broadband ISDN, the ATM is a highbandwidth; fast packet switching and multiplexing technique. Using ATM it can be flexibly reconfigure the network and reassign the bandwidth to meet the requirements of all types of services. By dynamically routing the traffic and adjusting the bandwidth assignment, the average packet delay of the whole network can be reduced to a minimum. M/M/1 model can be used to analyze the performance.

Keywords: Bandwidth allocation, Genetic algorithm, ATMNetwork, packet delay.

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Authors: João Nóbrega Brites Moita

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Can biometrics do what everyone is expecting it will? And more importantly, should it be doing it? Biometrics is the buzzword “on the mouth" of everyone, who are trying to use this technology in a variety of applications. But all this “hype" about biometrics can be dangerous without a careful evaluation of the real needs of each application. In this paper I-ll try to focus on the dangers of using the right technology at the right time in the wrong place.

Keywords: Authentication, Authorization, Biometrics.

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Authors: Khin Sandar Win

Abstract:

In multi hop wireless systems, such as ad hoc and sensor networks, mobile ad hoc network applications are deployed, security emerges as a central requirement. A particularly devastating attack is known as the wormhole attack, where two or more malicious colluding nodes create a higher level virtual tunnel in the network, which is employed to transport packets between the tunnel end points. These tunnels emulate shorter links in the network. In which adversary records transmitted packets at one location in the network, tunnels them to another location, and retransmits them into the network. The wormhole attack is possible even if the attacker has not compromised any hosts and even if all communication provides authenticity and confidentiality. In this paper, we analyze wormhole attack nature in ad hoc and sensor networks and existing methods of the defending mechanism to detect wormhole attacks without require any specialized hardware. This analysis able to provide in establishing a method to reduce the rate of refresh time and the response time to become more faster.

Keywords: Ad hoc network, Sensor network, Wormhole attack, defending mechanism.

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Authors: A. Haddad, H. Kbab

Abstract:

A supersonic expansion cannot be achieved within a convergent-divergent nozzle if the flow velocity does not reach that of the sound at the throat. The computation of the flow field characteristics at the throat is thus essential to the nozzle developed thrust value and therefore to the aircraft or rocket it propels. Several approaches were developed in order to describe the transonic expansion, which takes place through the throat of a De-Laval convergent-divergent nozzle. They all allow reaching good results but showing a major shortcoming represented by their inability to describe the transonic flow field for nozzles having a small throat radius. The approach initially developed by Kliegel & Levine uses the velocity series development in terms of the normalized throat radius added to unity instead of solely the normalized throat radius or the traditional small disturbances theory approach. The present investigation carries out the application of these three approaches for different throat radiuses of curvature. The method using the normalized throat radius added to unity shows better results when applied to geometries integrating small throat radiuses.

Keywords: De-Laval nozzles, transonic calculations, transonic flow, supersonic nozzle.

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Authors: Giovanni Luca Masala

Abstract:

Pattern recognition is the research area of Artificial Intelligence that studies the operation and design of systems that recognize patterns in the data. Important application areas are image analysis, character recognition, fingerprint classification, speech analysis, DNA sequence identification, man and machine diagnostics, person identification and industrial inspection. The interest in improving the classification systems of data analysis is independent from the context of applications. In fact, in many studies it is often the case to have to recognize and to distinguish groups of various objects, which requires the need for valid instruments capable to perform this task. The objective of this article is to show several methodologies of Artificial Intelligence for data classification applied to biomedical patterns. In particular, this work deals with the realization of a Computer-Aided Detection system (CADe) that is able to assist the radiologist in identifying types of mammary tumor lesions. As an additional biomedical application of the classification systems, we present a study conducted on blood samples which shows how these methods may help to distinguish between carriers of Thalassemia (or Mediterranean Anaemia) and healthy subjects.

Keywords: Computer Aided Detection, mammary tumor, pattern recognition, thalassemia.

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Authors: Shilpesh R. Rajpurohit, Harshit K. Dave

Abstract:

Additive manufacturing gains the popularity in recent times, due to its capability to create prototype as well functional as end use product directly from CAD data without any specific requirement of tooling. Fused deposition modeling (FDM) is one of the widely used additive manufacturing techniques that are used to create functional end use part of polymer that is comparable with the injection-molded parts. FDM printed part has an application in various fields such as automobile, aerospace, medical, electronic, etc. However, application of FDM part is greatly affected by poor mechanical properties. Proper selection of the process parameter could enhance the mechanical performance of the printed part. In the present study, experimental investigation has been carried out to study the behavior of the mechanical performance of the printed part with respect to process variables. Three process variables viz. raster angle, raster width and layer height have been varied to understand its effect on tensile strength. Further, effect of process variables on fractured surface has been also investigated.

Keywords: 3D printing, fused deposition modeling, layer height, raster angle, raster width, tensile strength.

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