Search results for: product quality improvement

Authors: R. Schweighoffer, N. Nagy, E. Reeves, B. Liebig

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Due to aging populations, the need for seamless palliative care provision is of central interest for western societies. An essential aspect of palliative care delivery is the quality of collaboration amongst palliative care providers. Therefore, the current research is based on Bainbridge’s conceptual framework, which provides an outline for the evaluation of palliative care provision. This study is the first one to investigate the predictive validity of spatial distribution on the quantity of interaction amongst various palliative care providers. Furthermore, based on the familiarity principle, we examine whether the extent of collaboration influences the perceived quality of collaboration among palliative care providers in urban versus rural areas of Switzerland. Based on a population-representative survey of Swiss palliative care providers, the results of the current study show that professionals in densely populated areas report higher absolute numbers of interactions and are more satisfied with their collaborative practice. This indicates that palliative care providers who work in urban areas are better embedded into networks than their counterparts in more rural areas. The findings are especially important, considering that efficient collaboration is a prerequisite to achieve satisfactory patient outcomes. Conclusively, measures should be taken to foster collaboration in weakly interconnected palliative care networks.

Keywords: Collaboration, healthcare networks, palliative care, Switzerland.

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Authors: Glenn M. Calaguas

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To investigate the possible correlation between peer aggression and peer victimization, 148 sixth-graders were asked to respond to the Reduced Aggression and Victimization Scales (RAVS). RAVS measures the frequency of reporting aggressive behaviors or of being victimized during the previous week prior to the survey. The scales are composed of six items each. Each point represents one instance of aggression or victimization. Specifically, the Pearson Product-Moment Correlation Coefficient (PMCC) was used to determine the correlations between the scores of the sixthgraders in the two scales, both in individual items and total scores. Positive correlations were established and correlations were significant at the 0.01 levels.

Keywords: correlation, peer aggression, peer victimization, sixth-graders.

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Authors: Wang Xingbo

Abstract:

Computation of determinant in the form |I-X| is primary and fundamental because it can help to compute many other determinants. This article puts forward a time-reducible approach to compute determinant |I-X|. The approach is derived from the Newton’s identity and its time complexity is no more than that to compute the eigenvalues of the square matrix X. Mathematical deductions and numerical example are presented in detail for the approach. By comparison with classical approaches the new approach is proved to be superior to the classical ones and it can naturally reduce the computational time with the improvement of efficiency to compute eigenvalues of the square matrix.

Keywords: Algorithm, determinant, computation, eigenvalue, time complexity.

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Authors: Jishu Das Gupta, Srecko Howard, Angela Howard

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Insufficient Quality of Service (QoS) of Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) is a growing concern that has lead the need for research and study. In this paper we investigate the performance of VoIP and the impact of resource limitations on the performance of Access Networks. The impact of VoIP performance in Access Networks is particularly important in regions where Internet resources are limited and the cost of improving these resources is prohibitive. It is clear that perceived VoIP performance, as measured by mean opinion score [2] in experiments, where subjects are asked to rate communication quality, is determined by end-to-end delay on the communication path, delay variation, packet loss, echo, the coding algorithm in use and noise. These performance indicators can be measured and the affect in the Access Network can be estimated. This paper investigates the congestion in the Access Network to the overall performance of VoIP services with the presence of other substantial uses of internet and ways in which Access Networks can be designed to improve VoIP performance. Methods for analyzing the impact of the Access Network on VoIP performance will be surveyed and reviewed. This paper also considers some approaches for improving performance of VoIP by carrying out experiments using Network Simulator version 2 (NS2) software with a view to gaining a better understanding of the design of Access Networks.

Keywords: Codec, DiffServ, Droptail, RED, VOIP

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Authors: Raquel M. de Sousa, Sofiane Labidi, Allan Kardec D. Barros, Alex O. Barradas Filho, Aldalea L. B. Marques

Abstract:

Several parameters are established in order to measure biodiesel quality. One of them is the iodine value, which is an important parameter that measures the total unsaturation within a mixture of fatty acids. Limitation of unsaturated fatty acids is necessary since warming of higher quantity of these ones ends in either formation of deposits inside the motor or damage of lubricant. Determination of iodine value by official procedure tends to be very laborious, with high costs and toxicity of the reagents, this study uses artificial neural network (ANN) in order to predict the iodine value property as an alternative to these problems. The methodology of development of networks used 13 esters of fatty acids in the input with convergence algorithms of back propagation of back propagation type were optimized in order to get an architecture of prediction of iodine value. This study allowed us to demonstrate the neural networks’ ability to learn the correlation between biodiesel quality properties, in this caseiodine value, and the molecular structures that make it up. The model developed in the study reached a correlation coefficient (R) of 0.99 for both network validation and network simulation, with Levenberg-Maquardt algorithm.

Keywords: Artificial Neural Networks, Biodiesel, Iodine Value, Prediction.

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Authors: Edward Guillén, Stephanne Rodríguez, Jhordany Rodríguez

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Throughput enhancement can be achieved with two main approaches. The first one is by the increase of transmission rate and the second one is reducing the control traffic. This paper focuses on how the throughput can be enhanced by increasing Maximum Transmission Unit -MTU. Transmission of larger packets can cause a throughput improvement by reducing IP overhead. Analysis results are obtained by a mathematical model and simulation tools with a main focus on wireless channels.

Keywords: 802.11, Maximum Transfer Unit, throughput enhancement, wireless networks.

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Authors: Ruming Yin, Jian Yuan, Qiuhua Yang, Xiuming Shan, Xiqin Wang

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Linear cryptanalysis methods are rarely used to improve the security of chaotic stream ciphers. In this paper, we apply linear cryptanalysis to a chaotic stream cipher which was designed by strictly using the basic design criterion of cryptosystem – confusion and diffusion. We show that this well-designed chaos-based stream cipher is still insecure against distinguishing attack. This distinguishing attack promotes the further improvement of the cipher.

Keywords: Stream cipher, chaos, linear cryptanalysis, distinguishing attack.

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Authors: Ki-Sung Park, Dae-Hee Lee, Dae-Ho Won, Yeon-Mo Yang

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Solar power plants(SPPs) have shown a lot of good outcomes in providing a various functions depending on industrial expectations by deploying ad-hoc networking with helps of light loaded and battery powered sensor nodes. In particular, it is strongly requested to develop an algorithm to deriver the sensing data from the end node of solar power plants to the sink node on time. In this paper, based on the above observation we have proposed an IEEE802.15.4 based self routing scheme for solar power plants. The proposed beacon based priority routing Algorithm (BPRA) scheme utilizes beacon periods in sending message with embedding the high priority data and thus provides high quality of service(QoS) in the given criteria. The performance measures are the packet Throughput, delivery, latency, total energy consumption. Simulation results under TinyOS Simulator(TOSSIM) have shown the proposed scheme outcome the conventional Ad hoc On-Demand Distance Vector(AODV) Routing in solar power plants.

Keywords: Solar Power Plants(SPPs), Self routing, Quality of Service(QoS), WPANs, WSNs, TinyOS, TOSSIM, IEEE802.15.4

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Authors: G. Petruzzelli, F. Pedron, M. Grifoni, F. Gorini, I. Rosellini, B. Pezzarossa

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Composting is a controlled technology to enhance the natural aerobic process of organic wastes degradation. The resulting product is a humified material that is principally recyclable for agricultural purpose. The composting process is one of the most important tools for waste management, by the European Community legislation. In recent years composting has been increasingly used as a remediation technology to remove biodegradable contaminants from soil, and to modulate heavy metals bioavailability in phytoremediation strategies. An optimization in the recovery of resources from wastes through composting could enhance soil fertility and promote its use in the remediation biotechnologies of contaminated soils.

Keywords: Agriculture, biopile, compost, soil clean-up, waste recycling.

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Authors: Ján Haščík, Štefan Čerba, Jakub Lüley, Branislav Vrban

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The presented paper is related to the design methods and neutronic characterization of the reactivity control system in the large power unit of Generation IV Gas cooled Fast Reactor – GFR2400. The reactor core is based on carbide pin fuel type with the application of refractory metallic liners used to enhance the fission product retention of the SiCcladding. The heterogeneous design optimization of control rod is presented and the results of rods worth and their interferences in a core are evaluated. In addition, the idea of reflector removal as an additive reactivity management option is investigated and briefly described.

Keywords: Control rods design, GFR2400, hot spot, movable reflector, reactivity.

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Authors: Mahnaz Movahedi

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Slang argot plays a fundamental role in Burgess’ teenage special sociolect in his novel A Clockwork Orange, offered a wide variety of instances to be analyzed. Consequently, translation of the notions and keeping the effect would be of great importance. Burgess named his interesting RussiAnglicized^©-slang word as Nadsat, stands for –teen, mostly derived from Russian and Cockney rhyming. The paper discusses the lexical origin and Persian translation of his weird slang words illustrating a teenage-gang argot. The product depicts creativity but mistranslation that leads to the loss of slang meaning load and atmosphere in the target text.

Keywords: Argot, mistranslation, slang, sociolect.

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Authors: Costin Badica, Maria Ganzha, Maciej Gawinecki, Pawel Kobzdej, Marcin Paprzycki

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Recently, we have presented an initial implementation of a model agent-based e-commerce system, which utilized a simple price negotiation mechanism–English Auction. In this note we discuss how a Dutch Auction involving multiple units of a product can be included in our system. We present UML diagrams of agents involved in price negotiations and briefly discuss rule-based mechanism exemplifying Dutch Auction.

Keywords: e-commerce, rule-based price negotiation mechanism, Dutch Auction, agent system.

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Authors: Hafiz Muhammad Obaid, Umais Tayyab, Shabbir Majeed Ch.

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In this paper, a CMOS differential operational transresistance amplifier (OTRA) is presented. The amplifier is designed and implemented in a standard umc90-nm CMOS technology. The differential OTRA provides wider bandwidth at high gain. It also shows much better rise and fall time and exhibits a very good input current dynamic range of 50 to 50 μA. The OTRA can be used in many analog VLSI applications. The presented amplifier has high gain bandwidth product of 617.6 THz Ω. The total power dissipation of the presented amplifier is also very low and it is 0.21 mW.

Keywords: CMOS, differential, operational transresistance amplifier, OTRA, 90 nm, VLSI.

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Authors: Anyapak Prapannetivuth

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The purpose of this research is to investigate the marketing mix that is perceived to be important for the small sized hotels in Pattaya. This research provides insights through a review of the marketing activities performed by the small sized hotels. Nine owners & marketing manager of small sized hotels and resorts, all local Chonburi people, were selected for an in-depth interview. The research suggests that seven marketing mixes (e.g. Product, Price, Place, Promotion, People, Physical Evidence and Process) were commonly used by these hotels, however, three types – People, Price and Physical Evidence were considered most important by the owners.

Keywords: Marketing Mix, Marketing Tools, and Small Sized Hotels.

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Authors: Vahid Sabermand, Yousef Hojjat, Majid Hasanzadeh

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This paper contains 2 main parts. In the first part of paper we simulated and studied three types of electrode patterns used in various industries for suspension and handling of the semiconductor and glass and we selected the best pattern by evaluating the electrostatic force, which was comb pattern electrode. In the second part we investigated the parameters affecting the amount of electrostatic force such as the gap between surface and electrode (g), the electrode width (w), the gap between electrodes (t), the surface permittivity and electrode length and methods of improvement of adhesion force by changing these values.

Keywords: Electrostatic force, electrostatic adhesion, electrostatic chuck, electrostatic application in industry, Electroadhesive grippers.

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Authors: Yao-Tien Wang, Hsiang-Fu Yu, Dung Chen Chiou

Abstract:

In wireless and mobile communications, this progress provides opportunities for introducing new standards and improving existing services. Supporting multimedia traffic with wireless networks quality of service (QoS). In this paper, a grey-fuzzy controller for radio resource management (GF-RRM) is presented to maximize the number of the served calls and QoS provision in wireless networks. In a wireless network, the call arrival rate, the call duration and the communication overhead between the base stations and the control center are vague and uncertain. In this paper, we develop a method to predict the cell load and to solve the RRM problem based on the GF-RRM, and support the present facility has been built on the application-level of the wireless networks. The GF-RRM exhibits the better adaptability, fault-tolerant capability and performance than other algorithms. Through simulations, we evaluate the blocking rate, update overhead, and channel acquisition delay time of the proposed method. The results demonstrate our algorithm has the lower blocking rate, less updated overhead, and shorter channel acquisition delay.

Keywords: radio resource management, grey prediction, fuzzylogic control, wireless networks, quality of service.

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Authors: Noppadon Sangwalpetch

Abstract:

The objective of this research is to use Rhizophora wood to design a walking stick for elderly. The research was conducted by studying the behavior and the type of walking sticks used by 70 elderly aged between 60-80 years in Pragnamdaeng Sub-District, Samudsongkram Province. Questionnaires were used to collect data which were calculated to find percentage, mean, and standard deviation. The results are as follows: 1) most elderly use walking sticks due to the Osteoarthritis of the knees. 2) Most elderly need to use walking sticks because the walking sticks help to balance their positioning and prevent from stumble. 3) Most elderly agree that Rhizophora wood is suitable to make a walking stick because of its strength and toughness. 4) The design of the walking stick should be fine and practical with comfortable handle and the tip of the stick must not be slippery.

Keywords: Elderly, Product design, Rhizophora wood, Walking Stick.

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Authors: N. S. Imamverdiyev

Abstract:

The transition to renewable energy sources has become a critical component of global efforts to mitigate climate change and promote sustainable development. However, the deployment of renewable energy technologies can also have significant impacts on ecosystems and the services they provide, such as carbon sequestration, soil fertility, water quality, and biodiversity. These technologies also highlight the potential co-benefits of renewable energy deployment for ecosystem services, such as reducing greenhouse gas emissions and improving air and water quality. Renewable energy sources, such as wind, solar, hydro, and biomass, are increasingly being used to meet the world's energy needs due to their environmentally friendly nature and the desire to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. However, the expansion of renewable energy infrastructure can also impact ecosystem services, which are the benefits that humans derive from nature, such as clean water, air, and food. This geographic assessment aims to evaluate the relationship between renewable energy infrastructure and ecosystem services. Potential solutions such as the use of ecological benefit measures, biodiversity-friendly design of renewable energy infrastructure, and stakeholder participation in decision-making processes are being investigated to determine the positive effects of renewable energy infrastructure on ecosystem services.

Keywords: Renewable energy, solar energy, climate change, energy production.

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Authors: Mohammad I. Hossain, Omar F. Hamim

Abstract:

This paper presents a case study on a pile integrity test for assessing the integrity of piles as well as a physical dimension (e.g., cross-sectional area, length), continuity, and consistency of the pile materials. The recent boom in the socio-economic condition of Bangladesh has given rise to the building of high-rise commercial and residential infrastructures. The advantage of the pile integrity test lies in the fact that it is possible to get an approximate indication regarding the quality of the sub-structure before commencing the construction of the super-structure. This paper aims at providing a classification of cast-in-situ piles based on characteristic reflectograms obtained using the Sonic Integrity Testing program for the sub-soil condition of Narayanganj, Bangladesh. The piles have been classified as 'Pile Type-1', 'Pile Type-2', 'Pile Type-3', 'Pile type-4', 'Pile Type-5' or 'Pile Type-6' from the visual observations of reflections from the generated stress waves by striking the pile head with a handheld hammer. With respect to construction quality and integrity, piles have been further classified into three distinct categories, i.e., satisfactory, may be satisfactory, and unsatisfactory.

Keywords: Cast-in-situ piles, characteristic reflectograms, pile integrity test, sonic integrity testing program.

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Authors: Pascal Constantin, Gîlcă Ioan, Radu Rusu Răzvan, Nacu Gherasim

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In the Northern hemisphere, sheep reproduction is seasonal (September-November). Among several natural factors influencing the reproduction status of rams, we studied the daylight length and temperature. Rams from different breeds were studied: Merinos de Palas (half-precocious), Karakul de Botosani (halfbelated) and Turcana (belated breed, low reproductive plasticity). In Merinos de Palas, ejaculate volume during sexual repose is 51.3% from normal quantity. When autumn climate was experimentally induced, ejaculate volume reached 98.45% (Merinos), 94.97% (Karakul) and 97.59% (Turcana). Semen density increased from 1.031-1.033 till 1.035 after exposition to artificial light and temperature conditions. Spermatozoids mobility and sperm pH improved, passing over 82% and 6.75, values identical to those in the natural reproduction season. Behaviour analysis after photoperiodicity indicated that over 83.3% Merinos and Karakul males and all Turcana rams exteriorised normal and intense sexual reflexes. Certain effort and reduced expenses brought rams in good condition, producing higher quantity and quality sperm.

Keywords: natural factors, photoperiodicity, sexual behaviour, Romanian sheep.

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Authors: D. Prangchumpol

Abstract:

This paper is a description approach to predict incoming and outgoing data rate in network system by using association rule discover, which is one of the data mining techniques. Information of incoming and outgoing data in each times and network bandwidth are network performance parameters, which needed to solve in the traffic problem. Since congestion and data loss are important network problems. The result of this technique can predicted future network traffic. In addition, this research is useful for network routing selection and network performance improvement.

Keywords: Traffic prediction, association rule, data mining.

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Authors: Osamah M. Al-Qershi, Khoo Bee Ee

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In recent years image watermarking has become an important research area in data security, confidentiality and image integrity. Many watermarking techniques were proposed for medical images. However, medical images, unlike most of images, require extreme care when embedding additional data within them because the additional information must not affect the image quality and readability. Also the medical records, electronic or not, are linked to the medical secrecy, for that reason, the records must be confidential. To fulfill those requirements, this paper presents a lossless watermarking scheme for DICOM images. The proposed a fragile scheme combines two reversible techniques based on difference expansion for patient's data hiding and protecting the region of interest (ROI) with tamper detection and recovery capability. Patient's data are embedded into ROI, while recovery data are embedded into region of non-interest (RONI). The experimental results show that the original image can be exactly extracted from the watermarked one in case of no tampering. In case of tampered ROI, tampered area can be localized and recovered with a high quality version of the original area.

Keywords: DICOM, reversible, ROI-based, watermarking.

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Authors: Youngji Yoo, Cheong-Sool Park, Jun Seok Kim, Young-Hak Lee, Sung-Shick Kim, Jun-Geol Baek

Abstract:

In the semiconductor manufacturing process, large amounts of data are collected from various sensors of multiple facilities. The collected data from sensors have several different characteristics due to variables such as types of products, former processes and recipes. In general, Statistical Quality Control (SQC) methods assume the normality of the data to detect out-of-control states of processes. Although the collected data have different characteristics, using the data as inputs of SQC will increase variations of data, require wide control limits, and decrease performance to detect outof- control. Therefore, it is necessary to separate similar data groups from mixed data for more accurate process control. In the paper, we propose a regression tree using split algorithm based on Pearson distribution to handle non-normal distribution in parametric method. The regression tree finds similar properties of data from different variables. The experiments using real semiconductor manufacturing process data show improved performance in fault detecting ability.

Keywords: Semiconductor, non-normal mixed process data, clustering, Statistical Quality Control (SQC), regression tree, Pearson distribution system.

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Authors: Hadi Ghorbani, Samira Mohammadi Sadabad

Abstract:

Shirvan is located in plain in Northern Khorasan province north east of Iran and has semiarid to temperate climate. To investigate the annual changes in some qualitative parameters such as electrical conductivity, total dissolved solids and chloride concentrations which have increased during ten continuous years. Fourteen groundwater sources including deep as well as semi-deep wells were sampled and were analyzed using standard methods. The trends of obtained data were analyzed during these years and the effects of different factors on the changes in electrical conductivity, concentration of chloride and total dissolved solids were clarified. The results showed that the amounts of some qualitative parameters have been increased during 10 years time which has led to decrease in water quality. The results also showed that increased in urban populations as well as extensive industrialization in the studied area are the most important reasons to influence underground water quality. Furthermore decrease in water quantity is also evident due to more water utilization and occurrence of recent droughts in the region during recent years.

Keywords: Chloride, Electrical Conductivity, Shirvan, Total Dissolved Solids.

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Authors: Sandya Mummullage, Prasanna Egodawatta, Ashantha Goonetilleke, Godwin A. Ayoko

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Urban road dust comprises of a range of potentially  toxic metal elements and plays a critical role in degrading urban  receiving water quality. Hence, assessing the metal composition and  concentration in urban road dust is a high priority. This study  investigated the variability of metal composition and concentrations  in road dust in 4 different urban land uses in Gold Coast, Australia.  Samples from 16 road sites were collected and tested for selected 12  metal species. The data set was analyzed using both univariate and  multivariate techniques. Outcomes of the data analysis revealed that  the metal concentrations inroad dust differs considerably within and  between different land uses. Iron, aluminum, magnesium and zinc are  the most abundant in urban land uses. It was also noted that metal  species such as titanium, nickel, copper and zinc have the highest  concentrations in industrial land use. The study outcomes revealed  that soil and traffic related sources as key sources of metals deposited  on road surfaces.

 

Keywords: Metals build-up, Pollutant accumulation, Stormwater quality, Urban road dust.

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Authors: D. Danesh, M. J. Ryan, A. Abbasi

Abstract:

Project Portfolio Management (PPM) is an essential component of an organisation’s strategic procedures, which requires attention of several factors to envisage a range of long-term outcomes to support strategic project portfolio decisions. To evaluate overall efficiency at the portfolio level, it is essential to identify the functionality of specific projects as well as to aggregate those findings in a mathematically meaningful manner that indicates the strategic significance of the associated projects at a number of levels of abstraction. PPM success is directly associated with the quality of decisions made and poor judgment increases portfolio costs. Hence, various Multi-Criteria Decision Making (MCDM) techniques have been designed and employed to support the decision-making functions. This paper reviews possible options to enhance the decision-making outcomes in organisational portfolio management processes using the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) both from academic and practical perspectives and will examine the usability, certainty and quality of the technique. The results of the study will also provide insight into the technical risk associated with current decision-making model to underpin initiative tracking and strategic portfolio management.

Keywords: Analytic hierarchy process, decision support systems, multi-criteria decision-making, project portfolio management.

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Authors: Rawya Rizk, Rehab Abdel-Kader, Rabab Ramadan

Abstract:

Unlike the best effort service provided by the internet today, next-generation wireless networks will support real-time applications. This paper proposes an adaptive early packet discard (AEPD) policy to improve the performance of the real time TCP traffic over ATM networks and avoid the fragmentation problem. Three main aspects are incorporated in the proposed policy. First, providing quality-of-service (QoS) guaranteed for real-time applications by implementing a priority scheduling. Second, resolving the partially corrupted packets problem by differentiating the buffered cells of one packet from another. Third, adapting a threshold dynamically using Fuzzy logic based on the traffic behavior to maintain a high throughput under a variety of load conditions. The simulation is run for two priority classes of the input traffic: real time and non-real time classes. Simulation results show that the proposed AEPD policy improves throughput and fairness over that using static threshold under the same traffic conditions.

Keywords: Early packet discard, Fuzzy logic, packet dropping policies, quality-of-service (QoS), TCP over ATM

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Authors: Alexander Y. Vaninsky

Abstract:

This paper presents a method of economic factorial analysis of the CO₂ emissions based on the extension of the Divisia index to interconnected factors. This approach, contrary to the Kaya identity, considers three main factors of the CO₂ emissions: gross domestic product, energy consumption, and population - as equally important, and allows for accounting of all of them simultaneously. The three factors are included into analysis together with their carbon intensities that allows for obtaining a comprehensive picture of the change in the CO₂ emissions. A computer program in R-language that is available for free download serves automation of the calculations. A case study of the U.S. carbon dioxide emissions is used as an example. 

Keywords: CO2 emissions, Economic analysis, Factorial analysis, Divisia index, Interconnected factors.

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Authors: J. P. Dubois, O. M. Abdul-Latif

Abstract:

Support Vector Machine (SVM) is a statistical learning tool that was initially developed by Vapnik in 1979 and later developed to a more complex concept of structural risk minimization (SRM). SVM is playing an increasing role in applications to detection problems in various engineering problems, notably in statistical signal processing, pattern recognition, image analysis, and communication systems. In this paper, SVM was applied to the detection of medical ultrasound images in the presence of partially developed speckle noise. The simulation was done for single look and multi-look speckle models to give a complete overlook and insight to the new proposed model of the SVM-based detector. The structure of the SVM was derived and applied to clinical ultrasound images and its performance in terms of the mean square error (MSE) metric was calculated. We showed that the SVM-detected ultrasound images have a very low MSE and are of good quality. The quality of the processed speckled images improved for the multi-look model. Furthermore, the contrast of the SVM detected images was higher than that of the original non-noisy images, indicating that the SVM approach increased the distance between the pixel reflectivity levels (detection hypotheses) in the original images.

Keywords: LS-SVM, medical ultrasound imaging, partially developed speckle, multi-look model.

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Authors: J. P. Dubois, O. M. Abdul-Latif

Abstract:

Support Vector Machine (SVM) is a statistical learning tool that was initially developed by Vapnik in 1979 and later developed to a more complex concept of structural risk minimization (SRM). SVM is playing an increasing role in applications to detection problems in various engineering problems, notably in statistical signal processing, pattern recognition, image analysis, and communication systems. In this paper, SVM was applied to the detection of SAR (synthetic aperture radar) images in the presence of partially developed speckle noise. The simulation was done for single look and multi-look speckle models to give a complete overlook and insight to the new proposed model of the SVM-based detector. The structure of the SVM was derived and applied to real SAR images and its performance in terms of the mean square error (MSE) metric was calculated. We showed that the SVM-detected SAR images have a very low MSE and are of good quality. The quality of the processed speckled images improved for the multi-look model. Furthermore, the contrast of the SVM detected images was higher than that of the original non-noisy images, indicating that the SVM approach increased the distance between the pixel reflectivity levels (the detection hypotheses) in the original images.

Keywords: Least Square-Support Vector Machine, SyntheticAperture Radar. Partially Developed Speckle, Multi-Look Model.

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