Search results for: building energy retrofit.

Authors: Kazunori Nomura, Hiromichi Ogi, Masaumi Nakahara, Sou Watanabe, Atsuhiro Shibata

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Chemical Processing Facility of Japan Atomic Energy Agency is a basic research field for advanced back-end technology developments with using actual high-level radioactive materials such as irradiated fuels from the fast reactor, high-level liquid waste from reprocessing plant. In the nature of a research facility, various kinds of chemical reagents have been offered for fundamental tests. Most of them were treated properly and stored in the liquid waste vessel equipped in the facility, but some were not treated and remained at the experimental space as a kind of legacy waste. It is required to treat the waste in safety. On the other hand, we formulated the Medium- and Long-Term Management Plan of Japan Atomic Energy Agency Facilities. This comprehensive plan considers Chemical Processing Facility as one of the facilities to be decommissioned. Even if the plan is executed, treatment of the “legacy” waste beforehand must be a necessary step for decommissioning operation. Under this circumstance, we launched a collaborative research project called the STRAD project, which stands for Systematic Treatment of Radioactive liquid waste for Decommissioning, in order to develop the treatment processes for wastes of the nuclear research facility. In this project, decomposition methods of chemicals causing a troublesome phenomenon such as corrosion and explosion have been developed and there is a prospect of their decomposition in the facility by simple method. And solidification of aqueous or organic liquid wastes after the decomposition has been studied by adding cement or coagulants. Furthermore, we treated experimental tools of various materials with making an effort to stabilize and to compact them before the package into the waste container. It is expected to decrease the number of transportation of the solid waste and widen the operation space. Some achievements of these studies will be shown in this paper. The project is expected to contribute beneficial waste management outcome that can be shared world widely.

Keywords: Chemical Processing Facility, medium- and long-term management plan of JAEA Facilities, STRAD project, treatment of radioactive waste.

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Authors: Fiona Wahr, Sitalakshmi Venkatraman

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Industry employers require new graduates to bring with them a range of knowledge, skills and abilities which mean these new employees can immediately make valuable work contributions. These will be a combination of discipline and professional knowledge, skills and abilities which give graduates the technical capabilities to solve practical problems whilst interacting with a range of stakeholders. Underpinning the development of these disciplines and professional knowledge, skills and abilities, are “enabling” knowledge, skills and abilities which assist students to engage in learning. These are academic and learning skills which are essential to common starting points for both the learning process of students entering the course as well as forming the foundation for the fully developed graduate knowledge, skills and abilities. This paper reports on a project created to introduce and strengthen these enabling skills into the first semester of a Bachelor of Information Technology degree in an Australian polytechnic. The project uses an action research approach in the context of ongoing continuous improvement for the course to enhance the overall learning experience, learning sequencing, graduate outcomes, and most importantly, in the first semester, student engagement and retention. The focus of this is implementing the new curriculum in first semester subjects of the course with the aim of developing the “enabling” learning skills, such as literacy, research and numeracy based knowledge, skills and abilities (KSAs). The approach used for the introduction and embedding of these KSAs, (as both enablers of learning and to underpin graduate attribute development), is presented. Building on previous publications which reported different aspects of this longitudinal study, this paper recaps on the rationale for the curriculum redevelopment and then presents the quantitative findings of entering students’ reading literacy and numeracy knowledge and skills degree as well as their perceived research ability. The paper presents the methodology and findings for this stage of the research. Overall, the cohort exhibits mixed KSA levels in these areas, with a relatively low aggregated score. In addition, the paper describes the considerations for adjusting the design and delivery of the new subjects with a targeted learning experience, in response to the feedback gained through continuous monitoring. Such a strategy is aimed at accommodating the changing learning needs of the students and serves to support them towards achieving the enabling learning goals starting from day one of their higher education studies.

Keywords: Enabling skills, student retention, embedded learning support, continuous improvement.

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Authors: Heejung Lee, Hyo-Won Suh

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Hybrid knowledge model is suggested as an underlying framework for product development management. It can support such hybrid features as ontologies and rules. Effective collaboration in product development environment depends on sharing and reasoning product information as well as engineering knowledge. Many studies have considered product information and engineering knowledge. However, most previous research has focused either on building the ontology of product information or rule-based systems of engineering knowledge. This paper shows that F-logic based knowledge model can support such desirable features in a hybrid way.

Keywords: Ontology, rule, F-logic, product development.

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Authors: Venus Marza, Amin Seyyedi, Luiz Fernando Capretz

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Software estimation accuracy is among the greatest challenges for software developers. This study aimed at building and evaluating a neuro-fuzzy model to estimate software projects development time. The forty-one modules developed from ten programs were used as dataset. Our proposed approach is compared with fuzzy logic and neural network model and Results show that the value of MMRE (Mean of Magnitude of Relative Error) applying neuro-fuzzy was substantially lower than MMRE applying fuzzy logic and neural network.

Keywords: Artificial Neural Network, Fuzzy Logic, Neuro-Fuzzy, Software Estimation

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Authors: Oyugi Ngure Robert, Tabitha A. Amollo, Kallen Mulilo Nalyanya

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Nanomaterials have attracted significant attention in research because of their exemplary properties, making them suitable for diverse applications. This paper reports the successful synthesis as well as the structural and optical properties of silver sulfide-reduced graphene oxide (Ag2S-rGO) nanocomposite. The nanocomposite was synthesized by the chemical reduction method. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) showed that the reduced graphene oxide (rGO) sheets were intercalated within the Ag2S nanoparticles during the chemical reduction process. The SEM images also showed that Ag2S had the shape of nanowires. Further, SEM energy dispersive X-ray (SEM EDX) showed that Ag2S-rGO is mainly composed of C, Ag, O, and S. X-ray diffraction analysis manifested a high crystallinity for the nanowire-shaped Ag2S nanoparticles with a d-spacing ranging between 1.0 Å and 5.2 Å. Thermal gravimetric analysis (TGA) showed that rGO enhances the thermal stability of the nanocomposite. Ag2S-rGO nanocomposite exhibited strong optical absorption in the UV region. The formed nanocomposite is dispersible in polar and non-polar solvents, qualifying it for solution-based device processing. Thus, the surface plasmon resonance effect associated with metallic nanoparticles, strong optical absorption, thermal stability crystallinity and hydrophilicity of the nanocomposite suits it for solar energy conversion applications.

Keywords: Silver sulfide, reduced graphene oxide, nanocomposite, structural properties, optical properties.

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Authors: S.I Sulaiman, T.K Abdul Rahman, I. Musirin, S. Shaari

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This paper presents performance analysis of the Evolutionary Programming-Artificial Neural Network (EPANN) based technique to optimize the architecture and training parameters of a one-hidden layer feedforward ANN model for the prediction of energy output from a grid connected photovoltaic system. The ANN utilizes solar radiation and ambient temperature as its inputs while the output is the total watt-hour energy produced from the grid-connected PV system. EP is used to optimize the regression performance of the ANN model by determining the optimum values for the number of nodes in the hidden layer as well as the optimal momentum rate and learning rate for the training. The EPANN model is tested using two types of transfer function for the hidden layer, namely the tangent sigmoid and logarithmic sigmoid. The best transfer function, neural topology and learning parameters were selected based on the highest regression performance obtained during the ANN training and testing process. It is observed that the best transfer function configuration for the prediction model is [logarithmic sigmoid, purely linear].

Keywords: Artificial neural network (ANN), Correlation coefficient (R), Evolutionary programming-ANN (EPANN), Photovoltaic (PV), logarithmic sigmoid and tangent sigmoid.

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Authors: Maurício Covolan Rosito, Daniel Antonio Callegari, Ricardo Melo Bastos

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Software organizations are constantly looking for better solutions when designing and using well-defined software processes for the development of their products and services. However, while the technical aspects are virtually easier to arrange, many software development processes lack more support on project management issues. When adopting such processes, an organization needs to apply good project management skills along with technical views provided by those models. This research proposes the definition of a new model that integrates the concepts of PMBOK and those available on the OPEN metamodel, helping not only process integration but also building the steps towards a more comprehensive and automatable model.

Keywords: OPEN metamodel, PMBOK metamodel, Project Management, Software Process

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Authors: Jincan Li, Mingyu Gao, Zhiwei He, Yuxiang Yang, Zhongfei Yu, Yuanyuan Liu

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Building an appropriate motion model is crucial for trajectory planning of robots and determines the operational quality directly. An adaptive acceleration and deceleration motion planning based on trigonometric functions for the end-effector of 6-DOF robots in Cartesian coordinate system is proposed in this paper. This method not only achieves the smooth translation motion and rotation motion by constructing a continuous jerk model, but also automatically adjusts the parameters of trigonometric functions according to the variable inputs and the kinematic constraints. The results of computer simulation show that this method is correct and effective to achieve the adaptive motion planning for linear trajectories.

Keywords: 6-DOF robots, motion planning, trigonometric function, kinematic constraints

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Authors: A.Abbasi, F.Mirekhtiary

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The gamma radiation in samples of a variety of natural tiling rocks (granites) produced and imported in Iran use in the building industry was measured, employing high-resolution Gamma-ray spectroscopy. The rock samples were pulverized, sealed in 0.5 liter plastic Marinelli beakers, and measured in the laboratory with an accumulating time between 50000 and 80000 second each. From the measured Gamma-ray spectra, activity concentrations were determined for 232Th (range from 6.5 to 172.2 Bq kg-1), 238U (from 7.5 to 178.1 Bq kg-1 ),226Ra( from 3.8 to 94.2 Bq kg-1 ) 40K (from 556.9 to 1539.2 Bq kg-1). From the 29 samples measured in this study, “Nehbndan ( Berjand )" appears to present the highest concentrations for 232Th,“Big Red Flower (China) "for 238U , “ Khoram dareh" for 226 Ra and “ Peranshahr" for 40K , respectively.

Keywords: activity concentration, natural radioactivity, tilingrocks (granites)

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Authors: Raju Kumar

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Information and communication technology (ICT) has become, within a very short time, one of the basic building blocks of modern society. Many countries now understanding the importance of ICT and mastering the basic skills and concepts of it as part of the core of education. Organizations, experts and practitioners in the education sector increasingly recognizing the importance of ICT in supporting educational improvement and reform. This paper addresses the convergence of ICT and education. When two technologies are converging to each other, together they will generate some great opportunities and challenges. This paper focuses on these issues. In introduction section, it explains the ICT, education, and ICT-enhanced education. In next section it describes need of ICT in education, relationship between ICT skills and education, and stages of teaching learning process. The next two sections describe opportunities and challenges in integrating ICT in education. Finally the concluding section summaries the idea and its usefulness.

Keywords: Education, Information and CommunicationTechnology, Learning, Teaching.

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Authors: S. Houssaini, L. Bahi

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The motorway segment between Tangier and Oued R’mel has experienced, since the beginning of building works, significant instability and landslides linked to a number of geological, hydrogeological and geothermic factors affecting the different formations. The landslides observed are not fully understood, despite many studies conducted on this segment. This study aims at producing new methods to better explain the phenomena behind the landslides, taking into account the geotechnical and geothermic contexts. This analysis builds up on previous studies and geotechnical data collected in the field. The final body of data collected shall be processed through the Plaxis software for a better and customizable view of the landslide problems in the area, which will help tofind solutions and stabilize land in the area.

Keywords: Landslides, modeling, risk, stabilization.

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Authors: Venerando E. Amaro, Francisco Gabriel F. de Lima, Marcelo S.T. Santos

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The morphological short-term evolution of Ponta do Tubarão Island (PTI) was investigated through high accurate surveys based on post-processed kinematic (PPK) relative positioning on Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS). PTI is part of a barrier island system on a high energy northeast Brazilian coastal environment and also an area of high environmental sensitivity. Surveys were carried out quarterly over a two years period from May 2010 to May 2012. This paper assesses statically the performance of digital elevation models (DEM) derived from different interpolation methods to represent morphologic features and to quantify volumetric changes and TIN models shown the best results to that purposes. The MDE allowed quantifying surfaces and volumes in detail as well as identifying the most vulnerable segments of the PTI to erosion and/or accumulation of sediments and relate the alterations to climate conditions. The coastal setting and geometry of PTI protects a significant mangrove ecosystem and some oil and gas facilities installed in the vicinities from damaging effects of strong oceanwaves and currents. Thus, the maintenance of PTI is extremely required but the prediction of its longevity is uncertain because results indicate an irregularity of sedimentary balance and a substantial decline in sediment supply to this coastal area.

Keywords: DEM, GNSS, short-term monitoring, Brazil.

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Authors: A. Muthuramalingam, S. Himavathi

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Harmonic pollution and low power factor in power systems caused by power converters have been of great concern. To overcome these problems several converter topologies using advanced semiconductor devices and control schemes have been proposed. This investigation is to identify a low cost, small size, efficient and reliable ac to dc converter to meet the input performance index of UPS. The performance of single phase and three phase ac to dc converter along with various control techniques are studied and compared. The half bridge converter topology with linear current control is identified as most suitable. It is simple, energy efficient because of single switch power loss and transformer-less operation of UPS. The results are validated practically using a prototype built using IGBT and analog controller. The performance for both single and three-phase system is verified. Digital implementation of closed loop control achieves higher reliability. Its cost largely depends on chosen bit precision. The minimal bit precision for optimum converter performance is identified as 16-bit with fixed-point operation. From the investigation and practical implementation it is concluded that half bridge ac – dc converter along with digital linear controller meets the performance index of UPS for single and three phase systems.

Keywords: PFC, energy efficient, half bridge, ac-dc converter, boost topology, linear current control, digital bit precision.

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Authors: Rana Th. A. Al-Rubaye, Arthur A. Garforth

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This work details the generation of thin films of structured zeolite catalysts (ZSM–5 and Y) onto the surface of a metal substrate (FeCrAlloy) using in-situ hydrothermal synthesis. In addition, the zeolite Y is post-synthetically modified by acidified ammonium ion exchange to generate US-Y. Finally the catalytic activity of the structured ZSM-5 catalyst films (Si/Al = 11, thickness 146 0m) and structured US–Y catalyst film (Si/Al = 8, thickness 230m) were compared with the pelleted powder form of ZSM–5 and USY catalysts of similar Si/Al ratios. The structured catalyst films have been characterised using a range of techniques, including X-ray diffraction (XRD), Electron microscopy (SEM), Energy Dispersive X–ray analysis (EDX) and Thermogravimetric Analysis (TGA). The transition from oxide-onalloy wires to hydrothermally synthesised uniformly zeolite coated surfaces was followed using SEM and XRD. In addition, the robustness of the prepared coating was confirmed by subjecting these to thermal cycling (ambient to 550oC). The cracking of n–heptane over the pellets and structured catalysts for both ZSM–5 and Y zeolite showed very similar product selectivities for similar amounts of catalyst with an apparent activation energy of around 60 kJ mol-1. This paper demonstrates that structured catalysts can be manufactured with excellent zeolite adherence and when suitably activated/modified give comparable cracking results to the pelleted powder forms. These structured catalysts will improve temperature distribution in highly exothermic and endothermic catalysed processes.

Keywords: FeCrAlloy, Structured catalyst, and Zeolite Y, Zeolite ZSM-5.

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Authors: Sharifullah Ahmed, Sarwar Jahan Md. Yasin

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Shallow foundations on unimproved soft natural soils can undergo a high consolidation and secondary settlement. For low and medium rise building projects on such soil condition, pile foundation may not be cost effective. In such cases an alternative to pile foundations may be shallow strip footings placed on a double layered improved soil system soil. The upper layer of this system is untreated or cement treated compacted sand and underlying layer is natural soft clay. This system will reduce the settlement to an allowable limit. The current research has been conducted with the settlement of a rigid plane-strain strip footing of 2.5 m width placed on the surface of a soil consisting of an untreated or cement treated sand layer overlying a bed of homogeneous soft clay. The settlement of the mentioned shallow foundation has been studied considering both cases with the thicknesses of the sand layer are 0.3 to 0.9 times the width of footing. The response of the clay layer is assumed as undrained for plastic loading stages and drained during consolidation stages. The response of the sand layer is drained during all loading stages. FEM analysis was done using PLAXIS 2D Version 8.0. A natural clay deposit of 15 m thickness and 18 m width has been modeled using Hardening Soil Model, Soft Soil Model, Soft Soil Creep Model, and upper improvement layer has been modeled using only Hardening Soil Model. The groundwater level is at the top level of the clay deposit that made the system fully saturated. Parametric study has been conducted to determine the effect of thickness, density, cementation of the sand mat and density, shear strength of the soft clay layer on the settlement of strip foundation under the uniformly distributed vertical load of varying value. A set of the chart has been established for designing shallow strip footing on the sand mat over thick, soft clay deposit through obtaining the particular thickness of sand mat for particular subsoil parameter to ensure no punching shear failure and no settlement beyond allowable level. Design guideline in the form of non-dimensional charts has been developed for footing pressure equivalent to medium-rise residential or commercial building foundation with strip footing on soft inorganic Normally Consolidated (NC) soil of Bangladesh having void ratio from 1.0 to 1.45.

Keywords: Design charts, ground improvement, PLAXIS 2D, primary and secondary settlement, sand Mat, soft clay.

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Authors: Joseph E. Estevez, Mahdi Ghazizadeh, James G. Ryan, Ajit D. Kelkar

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Radiation shielding is an obstacle in long duration space exploration. Boron Nitride Nanotubes (BNNTs) have attracted attention as an additive to radiation shielding material due to B¹⁰’s large neutron capture cross section. The B¹⁰ has an effective neutron capture cross section suitable for low energy neutrons ranging from 10^-5 to 10⁴ eV and hydrogen is effective at slowing down high energy neutrons. Hydrogenated BNNTs are potentially an ideal nanofiller for radiation shielding composites. We use Molecular Dynamics (MD) Simulation via Material Studios Accelrys 6.0 to model the Young’s Modulus of Hydrogenated BNNTs. An extrapolation technique was employed to determine the Young’s Modulus due to the deformation of the nanostructure at its theoretical density. A linear regression was used to extrapolate the data to the theoretical density of 2.62g/cm³. Simulation data shows that the hydrogenated BNNTs will experience a 11% decrease in the Young’s Modulus for (6,6) BNNTs and 8.5% decrease for (8,8) BNNTs compared to non-hydrogenated BNNT’s. Hydrogenated BNNTs are a viable option as a nanofiller for radiation shielding nanocomposite materials for long range and long duration space exploration.

Keywords: Boron Nitride Nanotube, Radiation Shielding, Young Modulus, Atomistic Modeling.

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Authors: Preeti Yadav, Dandeswar Bisoyi, Debkumar Chakrabarti

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Mascots provide memories to viewers, and numerous promotional campaigns with different appearances, continue to trigger viewers and capture their interest. This study investigates the effect of Indian food mascot designs and influence on enhancing communication; thereby, building long-term brand recognition by the consumers. This paper presents a descriptive approach to Indian food mascot design as an advertising tool, and its research adopts a quantitative methodology. The study confirms that mascots have an ability to communicate a message in an effective manner; all though they are simple in terms of design and fashion trend, they have the capability to build positive reactions.

Keywords: Food mascot, brand recognitions, advertising, humour.

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Authors: Isabel Duarte de Almeida, João Vilas-Boas, Luís Miguel Ferreira

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Environmental concerns about the scarcity of marine resources are critical driving forces for firms aiming to prepare their supply chains for sustainability. Building on previous work, this paper highlights the implementation of good practices geared towards sustainable operations in the seafood department, which were pursued in an exploratory retailer case. Outcomes of the adopted environmentally and socially acceptable fish retailing strategies, ranged from traceability, to self-certification and eco-labelling. The consequences for business were, as follows: stronger collaboration and trust across the chain of custody, improvement of sponsors’ image and of consumers’ loyalty and, progress in the Greenpeace retailers’ evaluation ranking.

Keywords: Sustainability in sea food, Supply Chain Traceability, Social Responsibility.

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Authors: M. Ahmadi, M. Kafil, H. Ebrahimi

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Nowadays, induction motors have a significant role in industries. Condition monitoring (CM) of this equipment has gained a remarkable importance during recent years due to huge production losses, substantial imposed costs and increases in vulnerability, risk, and uncertainty levels. Motor current signature analysis (MCSA) is one of the most important techniques in CM. This method can be used for rotor broken bars detection. Signal processing methods such as Fast Fourier transformation (FFT), Wavelet transformation and Empirical Mode Decomposition (EMD) are used for analyzing MCSA output data. In this study, these signal processing methods are used for broken bar problem detection of Mobarakeh steel company induction motors. Based on wavelet transformation method, an index for fault detection, CF, is introduced which is the variation of maximum to the mean of wavelet transformation coefficients. We find that, in the broken bar condition, the amount of CF factor is greater than the healthy condition. Based on EMD method, the energy of intrinsic mode functions (IMF) is calculated and finds that when motor bars become broken the energy of IMFs increases.

Keywords: Broken bar, condition monitoring, diagnostics, empirical mode decomposition, Fourier transform, wavelet transform.

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Authors: Chandra Gupt Porwal

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Excessive vibration means increased wear, increased repair efforts, bad product selection & quality and high energy consumption. This may be sometimes experienced by cavitation or suction/discharge recirculation which could occur only when net positive suction head available NPSHA drops below the net positive suction head required NPSHR. Cavitation can cause axial surging, if it is excessive, will damage mechanical seals, bearings, possibly other pump components frequently, and shorten the life of the impeller. Efforts have been made to explain Suction Energy (SE), Specific Speed (Ns), Suction Specific Speed (Nss), NPSHA, NPSHR & their significance, possible reasons of cavitation /internal recirculation, its diagnostics and remedial measures to arrest and prevent cavitation in this paper. A case study is presented by the author highlighting that the root cause of unwanted noise and vibration is due to cavitation, caused by high specific speeds or inadequate net- positive suction head available which results in damages to material surfaces of impeller & suction bells and degradation of machine performance, its capacity and efficiency too. Author strongly recommends revisiting the technical specifications of CW pumps to provide sufficient NPSH margin ratios >1.5, for future projects and Nss be limited to 8500 - 9000 for cavitation free operation.

Keywords: Best efficiency point (BEP), Net positive suction head NPSHA, NPSHR, Specific Speed NS, Suction Specific Speed Nss.

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Authors: Mohammad A. N. M. Shafiqul Karim

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As a developing country, Bangladesh has to face numerous challenges. Self Independence in electricity, contributing to climate change by reducing carbon emission and bringing the backward population of society to the mainstream is more challenging for them. Therefore, it is essential to ensure recycled use of local products to the maximum level in every sector. Some private organizations have already worked alongside government to bring the backward population to the mainstream by developing their financial capacities. As rice husk is the largest single category of the total energy supply in Bangladesh. As part of this strategy, rice husk can play a great as a promising renewable energy source, which is readily available, has considerable environmental benefits and can produce electricity and ensure multiple uses of byproducts in construction technology. For the first time in Bangladesh, an experimental multidimensional project depending on Rice Husk Electricity and Rice Husk Ash (RHA) concrete brick/block under Green Eco-Tech Limited has already been started. Project analysis, opportunity, sustainability, the high monitoring component, limitations and finally evaluated data reflecting the viability of establishing more projects using rice husk are discussed in this paper. The by-product of rice husk from the production of green electricity, RHA, can be used for making, in particular, RHA concrete brick/block in Bangladeshi aspects is also discussed here.

Keywords: Project analysis, rice husk, rice husk ash concrete brick/block, compressive strength of rice husk ash concrete brick/block.

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Authors: Maíra O. Palm, Cintia Marangoni, Ozair Souza, Noeli Sellin

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Wastes from a vegetal extracts industry (cocoa, oak, Guarana and mate) were characterized by particle size, proximate and ultimate analysis, lignocellulosic fractions, high heating value, thermal analysis (Thermogravimetric analysis – TGA, and Differential thermal analysis - DTA) and energy density to evaluate their potential as biomass in the form of briquettes for power generation. All wastes presented adequate particle sizes to briquettes production. The wastes showed high moisture content, requiring previous drying for use as briquettes. Cocoa and oak wastes had the highest volatile matter contents with maximum mass loss at 310 ºC and 450 ºC, respectively. The solvents used in the aroma extraction process influenced in the moisture content of the wastes, which was higher for mate due to water has been used as solvent. All wastes showed an insignificant loss mass after 565 °C, hence resulting in low ash content. High carbon and hydrogen contents and low sulfur and nitrogen contents were observed ensuring a low generation of sulfur and nitrous oxides. Mate and cocoa exhibited the highest carbon and lignin content, and high heating value. The dried wastes had high heating value, from 17.1 MJ/kg to 20.8 MJ/kg. The results indicate the energy potential of wastes for use as fuel in power generation.

Keywords: Agro-industrial waste, biomass, briquettes, combustion.

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Authors: Juha Kettunen

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This study presents a project that tests and adjusts active European learning and teaching methods in Indonesian universities to increase their external impact on enterprises and other organizations; it also assesses the implementation of the Erasmus+ projects funded by the European Union. The project is based on the approach of innovation pedagogy that responds to regional development needs and integrates applied research and development projects into education to create capabilities for students to participate in development work after graduation. The assessment of the Erasmus+ project resulted in many improvements that can be made to achieve higher quality and innovativeness. The results of this study are useful for those who want to improve the applied research and development projects of higher education institutions.

Keywords: Higher education, innovations, project management, networks.

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Authors: Abdoullah Fath-Allah, Laila Cheikhi, Rafa E. Al-Qutaish, Ali Idri

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The e-government emerging concept transforms the way in which the citizens are dealing with their governments. Thus, the citizens can execute the intended services online anytime and anywhere. This results in great benefits for both the governments (reduces the number of officers) and the citizens (more flexibility and time saving). Therefore, building a maturity model to assess the egovernment portals becomes desired to help in the improvement process of such portals. This paper aims at proposing an egovernment maturity model based on the measurement of the best practices’ presence. The main benefit of such maturity model is to provide a way to rank an e-government portal based on the used best practices, and also giving a set of recommendations to go to the higher stage in the maturity model.

Keywords: Best practices, e-government portal, maturity model, quality model.

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Authors: Swapna Bhargavi Gantasala

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If teamwork is the key to organizational learning, productivity and growth, then, why do some teams succeed in achieving these, while others falter at different stages? Building teams in higher education institutions has been a challenge and an open-ended constructivist approach was considered on an experimental basis for this study to address this challenge. For this research, teams of students from the MBA program were chosen to study the effect of teamwork in learning, the motivation levels among student team members, and the effect of collaboration in achieving team goals. The teams were built on shared vision and goals, cohesion was ensured, positive induction in the form of faculty mentoring was provided for each participating team and the results have been presented with conclusions and suggestions.

Keywords: Collaboration, Leadership, Motivation, Reinforcement Teamwork.

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Authors: F. Al-Mufadi, F. Djavanroodi

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During the last decade ultrafine grained (UFG) and nano-structured (NS) materials have experienced a rapid development. In this research work finite element analysis has been carried out to investigate the plastic strain distribution in equal channel angular process (ECAP). The magnitudes of Standard deviation (S. D.) and inhomogeneity index (C_i) were compared for different ECAP passes. Verification of a three-dimensional finite element model was performed with experimental tests. Finally the mechanical property including impact energy of ultrafine grained pure commercially pure Aluminum produced by severe plastic deformation method has been examined. For this aim, equal channel angular pressing die with the channel angle, outer corner angle and channel diameter of 90^°, 20^° and 20mm had been designed and manufactured. Commercial pure Aluminum billets were ECAPed up to four passes by route B_C at the ambient temperature. The results indicated that there is a great improvement at the hardness measurement, yield strength and ultimate tensile strength after ECAP process. It is found that the magnitudes of HV reach 67HV from 21HV after the final stage of process. Also, about 330% and 285% enhancement at the YS and UTS values have been obtained after the fourth pass as compared to the as-received conditions, respectively. On the other hand, the elongation to failure and impact energy have been reduced by 23% and 50% after imposing four passes of ECAP process, respectively.

Keywords: SPD, ECAP, FEM, Pure Al, Mechanical properties.

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Authors: Isabella Bianco, Gian Andrea Blengini

Abstract:

The environmental impact related to ornamental stones (such as marbles and granites) is largely debated. Starting from the industrial revolution, continuous improvements of machineries led to a higher exploitation of this natural resource and to a more international interaction between markets. As a consequence, the environmental impact of the extraction and processing of stones has increased. Nevertheless, if compared with other building materials, ornamental stones are generally more durable, natural, and recyclable. From the scientific point of view, studies on stone life cycle sustainability have been carried out, but these are often partial or not very significant because of the high percentage of approximations and assumptions in calculations. This is due to the lack, in life cycle databases (e.g. Ecoinvent, Thinkstep, and ELCD), of datasets about the specific technologies employed in the stone production chain. For example, databases do not contain information about diamond wires, chains or explosives, materials commonly used in quarries and transformation plants. The project presented in this paper aims to populate the life cycle databases with specific data of specific stone processes. To this goal, the methodology follows the standardized approach of Life Cycle Assessment (LCA), according to the requirements of UNI 14040-14044 and to the International Reference Life Cycle Data System (ILCD) Handbook guidelines of the European Commission. The study analyses the processes of the entire production chain (from-cradle-to-gate system boundaries), including the extraction of benches, the cutting of blocks into slabs/tiles and the surface finishing. Primary data have been collected in Italian quarries and transformation plants which use technologies representative of the current state-of-the-art. Since the technologies vary according to the hardness of the stone, the case studies comprehend both soft stones (marbles) and hard stones (gneiss). In particular, data about energy, materials and emissions were collected in marble basins of Carrara and in Beola and Serizzo basins located in the province of Verbano Cusio Ossola. Data were then elaborated through an appropriate software to build a life cycle model. The model was realized setting free parameters that allow an easy adaptation to specific productions. Through this model, the study aims to boost the direct participation of stone companies and encourage the use of LCA tool to assess and improve the stone sector environmental sustainability. At the same time, the realization of accurate Life Cycle Inventory data aims at making available, to researchers and stone experts, ILCD compliant datasets of the most significant processes and technologies related to the ornamental stone sector.

Keywords: LCA datasets, life cycle assessment, ornamental stone, stone environmental impact.

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Authors: Felix Wong, YT Tang

Abstract:

This paper reviews the greenhouse gas emissions of prefabrication elements for residential development in Hong Kong. Prefabrication becomes a common practice in residential development in Hong Kong and is considered as a green approach. In Hong Kong, prefabrication took place at factories in Pearl River Delta. Although prefabrication reduces construction wastage, it might generate more greenhouse gas emission from transportation and manufacturing processes. This study attempts to measure the “cradle to site" greenhouse gas emission from prefabrication elements for a public housing development in Kai Tak area. The findings could help further reduction of greenhouse gas emissions through process improvement.

Keywords: Prefabrication, greenhouse gas emission, cradle-tosite, residential development.

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Authors: Takumi Ito, Kurumi Kurokawa, Dong Hang Wu, Takashi Nagumo, Haruhiko Hirata

Abstract:

The structural system of wooden house by two-by-four method is widely adopted in any countries, and a various type of vibration control system for building structures has been developed on country with frequent earthquake. In this study, a vibration control device called “Scaling Frame” (SF) is suggested, and which is applied to wooden two-by-four method structures. This paper performs the experimental study to investigate the restoring force characteristics of two-by-four with SF device installed. The seismic resistant performance is estimated experimentally, and also the applicability and effectiveness are discussing.

Keywords: Two-by-four method, seismic vibration control, horizontally loading test, restoring force characteristics.

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Authors: Shahryar Shaghaghi G., Mojtaba H. Ghoshouni, Bahareh S. Ghabel

Abstract:

The issue of scientific – technological parks has been proposed in several countries of the world especially in western countries since a few decades ago and its efficiency is under examination. In our county Iran, some scientific – technological parks have been established or are being established. This design would evaluate the urban role and method of architecture of these parks in order to criticize its efficiency and offer some suggestions, as much as possible to improve its building methods in Iran. The main problem of this design is that how much these parks in Iran do meet the international measurements. So for this reason, one scientific park in Iran and one from western countries would be studied and compared with each other.

Keywords: Applicability, Architectural pattern, Scientific _technological park , Urban role

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