Search results for: Empirical distribution function

Authors: Sinee Sankrusme

Abstract:

Boon Rawd Brewery is a beer company based in Thailand that has an exemplary image, both as a good employer and a well-managed company with a strong record of social responsibility. The most famous of the company’s products is Singha beer. To study the company’s marketing strategy, a case study analysis was conducted together with qualitative research methods. The study analyzed the marketing strategy of Boon Rawd Brewery before the liberalization of the liquor market in 2000. The company’s marketing strategies consisted of the following: product line strategy, product development strategy, block channel strategy, media strategy, trade strategy, and consumer incentive strategy. Additionally, the company employed marketing mix strategy based on the 4Ps: product, price, promotion and place (of distribution).

Keywords: Beer, Boon Rawd Brewery Company, Marketing Strategy.

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Authors: Marina Velikova, Hennie Daniels, Ad Feelders

Abstract:

In many applications, it is a priori known that the target function should satisfy certain constraints imposed by, for example, economic theory or a human-decision maker. Here we consider partially monotone problems, where the target variable depends monotonically on some of the predictor variables but not all. We propose an approach to build partially monotone models based on the convolution of monotone neural networks and kernel functions. The results from simulations and a real case study on house pricing show that our approach has significantly better performance than partially monotone linear models. Furthermore, the incorporation of partial monotonicity constraints not only leads to models that are in accordance with the decision maker's expertise, but also reduces considerably the model variance in comparison to standard neural networks with weight decay.

Keywords: Mixture models, monotone neural networks, partially monotone models, partially monotone problems.

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Authors: Rhoann Kerh, Chen-Fu Chien, Kuo-Yi Lin

Abstract:

In the era of rapidly increasing notebook market, consumer electronics manufacturers are facing a highly dynamic and competitive environment. In particular, the product appearance is the first part for user to distinguish the product from the product of other brands. Notebook product should differ in its appearance to engage users and contribute to the user experience (UX). The UX evaluates various product concepts to find the design for user needs; in addition, help the designer to further understand the product appearance preference of different market segment. However, few studies have been done for exploring the relationship between consumer background and the reaction of product appearance. This study aims to propose a data mining framework to capture the user’s information and the important relation between product appearance factors. The proposed framework consists of problem definition and structuring, data preparation, rules generation, and results evaluation and interpretation. An empirical study has been done in Taiwan that recruited 168 subjects from different background to experience the appearance performance of 11 different portable computers. The results assist the designers to develop product strategies based on the characteristics of consumers and the product concept that related to the UX, which help to launch the products to the right customers and increase the market shares. The results have shown the practical feasibility of the proposed framework.

Keywords: Consumers Decision Making, Product Design, Rough Set Theory, User Experience.

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Authors: Homa Torabizadeh

Abstract:

This study proposes a basic molecular formula for all proteins. A total of 10,739 proteins belonging to 9 different protein groups classified on the basis of their functions were selected randomly. They included enzymes, storage proteins, hormones, signalling proteins, structural proteins, transport proteins, immunoglobulins or antibodies, motor proteins and receptor proteins. After obtaining the protein molecular formula using the ProtParam tool, the H/C, N/C, O/C, and S/C ratios were determined for each randomly selected sample. In this case, H, N, O, and S coefficients were specified per carbon atom. Surprisingly, the results demonstrated that H, N, O, and S coefficients for all 10,739 proteins are similar and highly correlated. This study demonstrates that despite differences in the structure and function, all known proteins have a similar basic molecular formula CnH1.58 ± 0.015nN0.28 ± 0.005nO0.30 ± 0.007nS0.01 ± 0.002n. The total correlation between all coefficients was found to be 0.9999.

Keywords: Protein molecular formula, Basic unit formula, Protparam tool.

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Authors: Gang Uk Hwang

Abstract:

In communication networks where communication nodes are connected with finite capacity transmission links, the packet inter-arrival times are strongly correlated with the packet length and the link capacity (or the packet service time). Such correlation affects the system performance significantly, but little attention has been paid to this issue. In this paper, we propose a mathematical framework to study the impact of the correlation between the packet service times and the packet inter-arrival times on system performance. With our mathematical model, we analyze the system performance, e.g., the unfinished work of the system, and show that the correlation affects the system performance significantly. Some numerical examples are also provided.

Keywords: Performance analysis, Correlated queueing system, Unfinished work, PH-type distribution, Communicationsystem.

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Authors: Samir Abdelhamid, Noureddine Bouguechal

Abstract:

We report in this paper the procedure of a system of automatic speech recognition based on techniques of the dynamic programming. The technique of temporal retiming is a technique used to synchronize between two forms to compare. We will see how this technique is adapted to the field of the automatic speech recognition. We will expose, in a first place, the theory of the function of retiming which is used to compare and to adjust an unknown form with a whole of forms of reference constituting the vocabulary of the application. Then we will give, in the second place, the various algorithms necessary to their implementation on machine. The algorithms which we will present were tested on part of the corpus of words in Arab language Arabdic-10 [4] and gave whole satisfaction. These algorithms are effective insofar as we apply them to the small ones or average vocabularies.

Keywords: Continuous speech recognition, temporal retiming, phonetic decoding, algorithms, vocal signal, dynamic programming.

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Authors: V. Ramnarain-Seetohul, J. Abdool Karim, A. Amir

Abstract:

Almost all universities include some form of assignment in their courses. The assignments are either carried out in either in groups or individually. To effectively manage these submitted assignments, a well-designed assignment submission system is needed, hence the need for an online assignment submission system to facilitate the distribution, and collection of assignments on due dates. The objective of such system is to facilitate interaction of lecturers and students for assessment and grading purposes. The aim of this study was to create a web based online assignment submission system for University of Mauritius. The system was created to eliminate the traditional process of giving an assignment and collecting the answers for the assignment. Lecturers can also create automated assessment to assess the students online. Moreover, the online submission system consists of an automatic mailing system which acts as a reminder for students about the deadlines of the posted assignments. System was tested to measure its acceptance rate among both student and lecturers.

Keywords: Assignment, assessment, online, submission

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Authors: A. Pourahmad, Sh. Gharipour

Abstract:

The present work describes the preparation and characterization of nanosized SiO₂@PbS core-shell particles by using a simple wet chemical route. This method utilizes silica spheres formation followed by successive ionic layer adsorption and reaction method assisted lead sulphide shell layer formation. The final product was characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), UV–vis spectroscopic, infrared spectroscopy (IR) and transmission electron microscopy (TEM) experiments. The morphological studies revealed the uniformity in size distribution with core size of 250 nm and shell thickness of 18 nm. The electron microscopic images also indicate the irregular morphology of lead sulphide shell layer. The structural studies indicate the face-centered cubic system of PbS shell with no other trace for impurities in the crystal structure.

Keywords: Core-shell, nanostructure, semiconductor, optical property, XRD.

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Authors: D. Laiadi, A. Hasseine, A. Merzougui

Abstract:

In this work, Experimental tie-line results and solubility (binodal) curves were obtained for the ternary systems (water + acetic acid + methyl isobutyl ketone (MIBK)), (water + lactic acid+ methyl isobutyl ketone) at T = 294.15K and atmospheric pressure. The consistency of the values of the experimental tie-lines was determined through the Othmer-Tobias and Hands correlations. For the extraction effectiveness of solvents, the distribution and selectivity curves were plotted. In addition, these experimental tieline data were also correlated with NRTL model. The interaction parameters for the NRTL model were retrieved from the obtained experimental results by means of a combination of the homotopy method and the genetic algorithms.

Keywords: Liquid-liquid equilibria, homotopy methods, carboxylic acid, NRTL.

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Authors: Vedulla Manoj Kumar, B. Nageswara Rao, Sk. Farooq

Abstract:

Heat sinks are being considered in many advanced heat transfer applications including automotive and stationary fuel cells as well as cooling of electronic devices. However, there are innumerable fundamental issues in the fields of heat transfer and fluid mechanics perspectives which remains unresolved. The present review emphasizes on the progress of research in the field of pin fin heat sinks, while understanding the fluid dynamics and heat transfer characteristics with a detailed and sophisticated prediction of the temperature distribution, high heat flux removal and by minimizing thermal resistance. Lot of research work carried out across the globe to address this challenge and trying to come up with an economically viable and user friendly solution. The high activities for future pin fin heat sinks research and development to meet the current issue is recorded in this article.

Keywords: Heat sinks, heat transfer, heat flux, thermal resistance, electronic devices.

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Authors: So-Jeong Youn, Kyung-Whan Oh

Abstract:

The human friendly interaction is the key function of a human-centered system. Over the years, it has received much attention to develop the convenient interaction through intention recognition. Intention recognition processes multimodal inputs including speech, face images, and body gestures. In this paper, we suggest a novel approach of intention recognition using a graph representation called Intention Graph. A concept of valid intention is proposed, as a target of intention recognition. Our approach has two phases: goal recognition phase and intention recognition phase. In the goal recognition phase, we generate an action graph based on the observed actions, and then the candidate goals and their plans are recognized. In the intention recognition phase, the intention is recognized with relevant goals and user profile. We show that the algorithm has polynomial time complexity. The intention graph is applied to a simple briefcase domain to test our model.

Keywords: Intention recognition, intention, graph, HCI.

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Authors: Amir Gholami Pastaki, Ali Reza Sahab, Seyed Mehdi Sadeghi

Abstract:

LSP routing is among the prominent issues in MPLS networks traffic engineering. The objective of this routing is to increase number of the accepted requests while guaranteeing the quality of service (QoS). Requested bandwidth is the most important QoS criterion that is considered in literatures, and a various number of heuristic algorithms have been presented with that regards. Many of these algorithms prevent flows through bottlenecks of the network in order to perform load balancing, which impedes optimum operation of the network. Here, a modern routing algorithm is proposed as MIRAD: having a little information of the network topology, links residual bandwidth, and any knowledge of the prospective requests it provides every request with a maximum bandwidth as well as minimum end-to-end delay via uniform load distribution across the network. Simulation results of the proposed algorithm show a better efficiency in comparison with similar algorithms.

Keywords: new generation networks, QoS, traffic engineering, MPLS, QoS based routing, LSP

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Authors: Basheer M. Al-Maqaleh, Kamal K. Bharadwaj

Abstract:

Automated discovery of hierarchical structures in large data sets has been an active research area in the recent past. This paper focuses on the issue of mining generalized rules with crisp hierarchical structure using Genetic Programming (GP) approach to knowledge discovery. The post-processing scheme presented in this work uses flat rules as initial individuals of GP and discovers hierarchical structure. Suitable genetic operators are proposed for the suggested encoding. Based on the Subsumption Matrix(SM), an appropriate fitness function is suggested. Finally, Hierarchical Production Rules (HPRs) are generated from the discovered hierarchy. Experimental results are presented to demonstrate the performance of the proposed algorithm.

Keywords: Genetic Programming, Hierarchy, Knowledge Discovery in Database, Subsumption Matrix.

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Authors: I. Boroňová, J. Bernasovská, J. Kľoc, Z. Tomková, E. Petrejčíková, S. Mačeková, J. Poráčová, M. M. Blaščáková

Abstract:

Osteoporosis is a common multifactorial disease with a strong genetic component characterized by reduced bone mass and increased risk of fractures. Genetic factors play an important role in the pathogenesis of osteoporosis. The aim of our study was to identify the genotype and allele distribution of T245G polymorphism in OPG gene in Slovak postmenopausal women. A total of 200 unrelated Slovak postmenopausal women with diagnosed osteoporosis and 200 normal controls were genotyped for T245G (rs3134069) polymorphism of OPG gene. Genotyping was performed using the Custom Taqman®SNP Genotyping assays. Genotypes and alleles frequencies showed no significant differences (p=0.5551; p=0.6022). The results of the present study confirm the importance of T245G polymorphism in OPG gene in the pathogenesis of osteoporosis.

Keywords: OPG gene, osteoporosis, Real-time PCR, T245G polymorphism.

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Authors: Keunhong Chae, Youngpo Lee, Seokho Yoon

Abstract:

In cognitive radio (CR) systems, the primary user (PU) signal would randomly depart or arrive during the sensing period of a CR user, which is referred to as the high traffic environment. In this paper, we propose a novel spectrum sensing scheme based on the cyclostationarity of PU signals in high traffic environments. Specifically, we obtain a test statistic by applying an estimate of spectral autocoherence function of the PU signal to the generalized- likelihood ratio. From numerical results, it is confirmed that the proposed scheme provides a better spectrum sensing performance compared with the conventional spectrum sensing scheme based on the energy of the PU signals in high traffic environments.

Keywords: Spectrum sensing, cyclostationarity, high traffic environments.

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Authors: N. Boutra, N. Ravot, J. Benoit, O. Picon

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Submarine power cables used for offshore wind farms electric energy distribution and transmission are subject to numerous threats. Some of the risks are associated with transport, installation and operating in harsh marine environment. This paper describes the feasibility of an electromagnetic low frequency sensing technique for submarine power cable failure prediction. The impact of a structural damage shape and material variability on the induced electric field is evaluated. The analysis is performed by modeling the cable using the finite element method, we use sensitivity analysis in order to identify the main damage characteristics affecting electric field variation. Lastly, we discuss the results obtained.

Keywords: Electromagnetism, defect, finite element method, sensitivity analysis, submarine power cables.

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Authors: M. Chomczyńska

Abstract:

The studies concerned an effect of six variants of ion exchange substrate (nutrient carriers with a different potential impact on pH of soil solution) on vegetation of orchard grass during two different periods (42 and 84 days). In the pot experiment plants were grown on sand (model of degraded soil) and six mixtures of sand and 2% (v/v) additions of particular variants of ion exchange substrate (with pH ranged from 5.5 to 8.0). The study results showed that the addition of the substrate at pH=6.5 caused the highest increase in plant yield after shorter vegetation period whereas the addition of the substrate at pH=5.5 increased dry stem and root biomass of orchard grass after longer vegetation period. Thus, the ion exchange substrate at pH=6.5 can be recommended for restoration of exhausted soils when shorter vegetation period is planned; the ion exchange substrate at pH=5.5 can be used for the same purpose when longer periods of vegetative growth are considered.

Keywords: ion exchanger, ion exchange substrate, soilrestoration

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Authors: Rudolf Egger

Abstract:

This paper explores the relationships between the basic learning processes of leading trade union workers and their methods for coping with the changes in the life-courses of societies today. It will discuss the fragile discourse on lifelong learning in trade unions and the “production of self-techniques” to get in touch with the new economic forms. On the basis of an empirical project, different processes of the socialization of leading trade union workers will be analysed to discover the consequences of the lifelong learning discourse. The results show what competences they need to develop for the “wider benefits of negotiations”. The main challenge remains to make visible how deeply intertwined trade union learning and education are with development in an ongoing dynamic economic process, rather than a quick-fix injection of skills and information. There is a complex relationship existing between the three ‘partners’, work, learning and society forming. The author suggests that contemporary trade unions could be trendsetters who make their own learning agendas by drawing less on formal education and more on informal and non-formal learning contexts. This is in parallel with growing political and scientific consciousness of the need to arrive at new educational/vocational policies and practices.

Keywords: Lifelong learning, Trade unions, Non-formal learning, Educational/vocational policies.

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Authors: M.Sujaritha, S. Annadurai

Abstract:

An adaptive spatial Gaussian mixture model is proposed for clustering based color image segmentation. A new clustering objective function which incorporates the spatial information is introduced in the Bayesian framework. The weighting parameter for controlling the importance of spatial information is made adaptive to the image content to augment the smoothness towards piecewisehomogeneous region and diminish the edge-blurring effect and hence the name adaptive spatial finite mixture model. The proposed approach is compared with the spatially variant finite mixture model for pixel labeling. The experimental results with synthetic and Berkeley dataset demonstrate that the proposed method is effective in improving the segmentation and it can be employed in different practical image content understanding applications.

Keywords: Adaptive; Spatial, Mixture model, Segmentation, Color.

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Authors: Stepan Petrosyan, Ashkhen Yesayan, Suren Nersesyan

Abstract:

We have developed an analytic model for the radial pn-junction in a nanowire (NW) core-shell structure utilizing as a new building block in different semiconductor devices. The potential distribution through the p-n-junction is calculated and the analytical expressions are derived to compute the depletion region widths. We show that the widths of space charge layers, surrounding the core, are the functions of core radius, which is the manifestation of so called classical size effect. The relationship between the depletion layer width and the built-in potential in the asymptotes of infinitely large core radius transforms to square-root dependence specific for conventional planar p-n-junctions. The explicit equation is derived to compute the capacitance of radial p-n-junction. The current-voltage behavior is also carefully determined taking into account the “short base" effects.

Keywords: Snanowire, p-n- junction, barrier capacitance, high injection.

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Authors: Farhad Asadi, Hossein Sadati

Abstract:

In fields such as neuroscience and especially in cognition modeling of mental processes, uncertainty processing in temporal zone of signal is vital. In this paper, Bayesian online inferences in estimation of change-points location in signal are constructed. This method separated the observed signal into independent series and studies the change and variation of the regime of data locally with related statistical characteristics. We give conditions on simulations of the method when the data characteristics of signals vary, and provide empirical evidence to show the performance of method. It is verified that correlation between series around the change point location and its characteristics such as Signal to Noise Ratios and mean value of signal has important factor on fluctuating in finding proper location of change point. And one of the main contributions of this study is related to representing of these influences of signal statistical characteristics for finding abrupt variation in signal. There are two different structures for simulations which in first case one abrupt change in temporal section of signal is considered with variable position and secondly multiple variations are considered. Finally, influence of statistical characteristic for changing the location of change point is explained in details in simulation results with different artificial signals.

Keywords: Time series, fluctuation in statistical characteristics, optimal learning.

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Authors: Ek Ngoy, A F Mulaba-Bafubiandi

Abstract:

Cobalt was acid nitric leached from a mixed cobaltcopper oxide with variable acid concentration. Resulting experimental data were used to analyze effects of increase in acid concentration, based on a shrinking core model of the process. The mathematical simulation demonstrated that the time rate of the dissolution mechanism is an increasing function of acid concentration. It was also shown that the magnitude of the acid concentration effect is time dependent and the increase in acid concentration is more effective at earlier stage of the dissolution than at later stage. The remaining process parameters are comprehensively affected by acid concentration and their interaction is synergetic.

Keywords: Acid effect, Cobalt, Cobalt-copper oxide, Leaching, Simulation

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Authors: Byoung-Tak Zhang, Chan-Hoon Park

Abstract:

Hypernetworks are a generalized graph structure representing higher-order interactions between variables. We present a method for self-organizing hypernetworks to learn an associative memory of sentences and to recall the sentences from this memory. This learning method is inspired by the “mental chemistry" model of cognition and the “molecular self-assembly" technology in biochemistry. Simulation experiments are performed on a corpus of natural-language dialogues of approximately 300K sentences collected from TV drama captions. We report on the sentence completion performance as a function of the order of word-interaction and the size of the learning corpus, and discuss the plausibility of this architecture as a cognitive model of language learning and memory.

Keywords: Linguistic recall memory, sentence completion task, self-organizing hypernetworks, cognitive learning and memory.

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Authors: R. O. Ocaya, J. J. Terblans

Abstract:

The laws of Newtonian mechanics allow ab-initio molecular dynamics to model and simulate particle trajectories in material science by defining a differentiable potential function. This paper discusses some considerations for the coding of ab-initio programs for simulation on a standalone computer and illustrates the approach by C language codes in the context of embedded metallic atoms in the face-centred cubic structure. The algorithms use velocity-time integration to determine particle parameter evolution for up to several thousands of particles in a thermodynamical ensemble. Such functions are reusable and can be placed in a redistributable header library file. While there are both commercial and free packages available, their heuristic nature prevents dissection. In addition, developing own codes has the obvious advantage of teaching techniques applicable to new problems.

Keywords: C-language, molecular dynamics, simulation, embedded atom method.

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Authors: Yasuyuki Konishi, Masayoshi Kobayashi

Abstract:

Six parameters, the effective diffusivity (De), activation energy of De, pre-exponential factor of De, amount (ASOW) of self-organized water species, and amplitude (α) of the forced oscillation of the molecular mobility (1/tC) derived from the forced cyclic temperature change operation, were characterized by using six typical foods, squid, sardines, scallops, salmon, beef, and pork, as a function of the correlation time (tC) of the water molecule-s proton retained in the foods. Each of the six parameters was clearly divided into the water species A1 and A2 at a specified value of tC =10-8s (=CtC), indicating an anomalous change in the physicochemical nature of the water species at the CtC. The forced oscillation of 1/tC clearly demonstrated a characteristic mode depending on the food shown as a three dimensional map associated with 1/tC, the amount of self-organized water, and tC.

Keywords: molecular mobility, self-organization, hysteresis, water species A1 and A2, forced cyclic temperature change operation (FCTCO)

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Authors: Abdel-Samad M. Ali

Abstract:

Given the motivation of maps impact in enhancing the perception of the quality of life in a region, this work examines the use of spatial analytical techniques in exploring the role of space in shaping human development patterns in Assiut governorate. Variations of human development index (HDI) of the governorate-s villages, districts and cities are mapped using geographic information systems (GIS). Global and local spatial autocorrelation measures are employed to assess the levels of spatial dependency in the data and to map clusters of human development. Results show prominent disparities in HDI between regions of Assiut. Strong patterns of spatial association were found proving the presence of clusters on the distribution of HDI. Finally, the study indicates several "hot-spots" in the governorate to be area of more investigations to explore the attributes of such levels of human development. This is very important for accomplishing the development plan of poorest regions currently adopted in Egypt.

Keywords: Human development, Egypt, GIS, Spatial analysis.

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Authors: A. Azadeh, Z. Raoofi

Abstract:

Natural gas, as one of the most important sources of energy for many of the industrial and domestic users all over the world, has a complex, huge supply chain which is in need of heavy investments in all the phases of exploration, extraction, production, transportation, storage and distribution. The main purpose of supply chain is to meet customers’ need efficiently and with minimum cost. In this study, with the aim of minimizing economic costs, different levels of natural gas supply chain in the form of a multi-echelon, multi-period fuzzy linear programming have been modeled. In this model, different constraints including constraints on demand satisfaction, capacity, input/output balance and presence/absence of a path have been defined. The obtained results suggest efficiency of the recommended model in optimal allocation and reduction of supply chain costs.

Keywords: Cost Approach, Fuzzy Theory, Linear Programming, Natural Gas Supply Chain.

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Authors: Jonas Mayer, Kai-Frederic Seitz, Thorben Kuprat

Abstract:

In today’s competitive environment production’s logistic objectives such as ‘delivery reliability’ and ‘delivery time’ and distribution’s logistic objectives such as ‘service level’ and ‘delivery delay’ are attributed great importance. Especially for small and mid-sized enterprises (SME) attaining these objectives pose a key challenge. Within this context, one of the difficulties is that interactions between departments within the enterprise and their specific objectives are insufficiently taken into account and aligned. Interdepartmental independencies along with contradicting targets set within the different departments result in enterprises having sub-optimal logistic performance capability. This paper presents a research project which will systematically describe the interactions between departments and convert them into a quantifiable form.

Keywords: Department-specific actuating and control variables, interdepartmental interactions, cybernetic model, logistic objectives.

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Authors: E. Farshidi

Abstract:

In this paper, based on a novel synthesis, a set of new simplified circuit design to implement the linguistic-hedge operations for adjusting the fuzzy membership function set is presented. The circuits work in current-mode and employ floating-gate MOS (FGMOS) transistors that operate in weak inversion region. Compared to the other proposed circuits, these circuits feature severe reduction of the elements number, low supply voltage (0.7V), low power consumption (<200nW), immunity from body effect and wide input dynamic range (>60dB). In this paper, a set of fuzzy linguistic hedge circuits, including absolutely, very, much more, more, plus minus, more or less and slightly, has been implemented in 0.18 mm CMOS process. Simulation results by Hspice confirm the validity of the proposed design technique and show high performance of the circuits.

Keywords: Current-mode, Linguistic-Hedge, Fuzzy Logic, lowpower

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Authors: Sara Soltanpour, Adolfo Foriero

Abstract:

Frost heave is arguably the most problematic adverse phenomenon in cold region areas. It is a complex process that depends on heat and water transfer. The coupled physical fields generate considerable heave stresses as well as deformations. In the present study, a coupled Thermal-Hydraulic-Mechanical (THM) model using COMSOL Multiphysics in frozen unsaturated soils, such as fine sand, is investigated. Particular attention to the frost heave and temperature distribution, as well as the water migrating during soil freezing, is assessed. The results obtained from the numerical simulations are consistent with the results measured in the full-scale tests conducted by Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory (CRREL).

Keywords: Frost heave, numerical simulations, COMSOL software, unsaturated freezing soil.

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