Search results for: school function assessment.

Authors: Orkide Donma, Mustafa M. Donma

Abstract:

Obesity is a low-grade inflammatory disease and may lead to health problems such as hypertension, dyslipidemia, diabetes. It is also associated with important risk factors for cardiovascular diseases. This requires the detailed evaluation of obesity, particularly in children. The aim of this study is to enlighten the potential associations between lipid ratios and obesity indices and to introduce those with discriminating features among children with obesity and metabolic syndrome (MetS). A total of 408 children (aged between six and eighteen years) participated in the scope of the study. Informed consent forms were taken from the participants and their parents. Ethical Committee approval was obtained. Anthropometric measurements such as weight, height as well as waist, hip, head, neck circumferences and body fat mass were taken. Systolic and diastolic blood pressure values were recorded. Body mass index (BMI), diagnostic obesity notation model assessment index-II (D2 index), waist-to-hip, head-to-neck ratios were calculated. Total cholesterol, triglycerides, high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDLChol), low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDLChol) analyses were performed in blood samples drawn from 110 children with normal body weight, 164 morbid obese (MO) children and 134 children with MetS. Age- and sex-adjusted BMI percentiles tabulated by World Health Organization were used to classify groups; normal body weight, MO and MetS. 15^th-to-85^th percentiles were used to define normal body weight children. Children, whose values were above the 99th percentile, were described as MO. MetS criteria were defined. Data were evaluated statistically by SPSS Version 20. The degree of statistical significance was accepted as p≤0.05. Mean±standard deviation values of BMI for normal body weight children, MO children and those with MetS were 15.7±1.1, 27.1±3.8 and 29.1±5.3 kg/m², respectively. Corresponding values for the D2 index were calculated as 3.4±0.9, 14.3±4.9 and 16.4±6.7. Both BMI and D2 index were capable of discriminating the groups from one another (p≤0.01). As far as other obesity indices were considered, waist-to hip and head-to-neck ratios did not exhibit any statistically significant difference between MO and MetS groups (p≥0.05). Diagnostic obesity notation model assessment index-II was correlated with the triglycerides-to-HDL-C ratio in normal body weight and MO (r=0.413, p≤0.01 and r=0.261, (p≤0.05, respectively). Total cholesterol-to-HDL-C and LDL-C-to-HDL-C showed statistically significant differences between normal body weight and MO as well as MO and MetS (p≤0.05). The only group in which these two ratios were significantly correlated with waist-to-hip ratio was MetS group (r=0.332 and r=0.334, p≤0.01, respectively). Lack of correlation between the D2 index and the triglycerides-to-HDL-C ratio was another important finding in MetS group. In this study, parameters and ratios, whose associations were defined previously with increased cardiovascular risk or cardiac death have been evaluated along with obesity indices in children with morbid obesity and MetS. Their profiles during childhood have been investigated. Aside from the nature of the correlation between the D2 index and triglycerides-to-HDL-C ratio, total cholesterol-to-HDL-C as well as LDL-C-to- HDL-C ratios along with their correlations with waist-to-hip ratio showed that the combination of obesity-related parameters predicts better than one parameter and appears to be helpful for discriminating MO children from MetS group.

Keywords: Children, lipid ratios, metabolic syndrome, obesity indices.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 837

Authors: Xiaohua Liu, Juan F. Beltran, Nishant Mohanchandra, Godfried T. Toussaint

Abstract:

Support vector machines (SVMs) are considered to be the best machine learning algorithms for minimizing the predictive probability of misclassification. However, their drawback is that for large data sets the computation of the optimal decision boundary is a time consuming function of the size of the training set. Hence several methods have been proposed to speed up the SVM algorithm. Here three methods used to speed up the computation of the SVM classifiers are compared experimentally using a musical genre classification problem. The simplest method pre-selects a random sample of the data before the application of the SVM algorithm. Two additional methods use proximity graphs to pre-select data that are near the decision boundary. One uses k-Nearest Neighbor graphs and the other Relative Neighborhood Graphs to accomplish the task.

Keywords: Machine learning, data mining, support vector machines, proximity graphs, relative-neighborhood graphs, k-nearestneighbor graphs, random sampling, training data condensation.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1919

Authors: Jamal A. Gledan, Akrm H. Algnin

Abstract:

The Global Positioning System (GPS), satellite-based technology, has been utilized extensively in the last few years in a wide range of Geometrics and Geographic Information Systems’ (GIS) applications. One of the main challenges dealing with GPS-based heights consists of converting them into Mean Sea Level (MSL) heights, which is used in surveys and mapping.

In this research’s work, differences in heights of 50 points, in northern part of Libya has been carried out by using both ordinary leveling (in which Geoid is the reference datum) and GPS techniques (in which Ellipsoid is the reference datum). In addition, this study utilized the EGM2008 model to obtain the undulation values between the ellipsoidal and orthometric heights. From these values of ellipsoidal heights can be obtained from GPS observations to compute the orthomteric heights. This research presents a suitable alternative, from an economical point of view, to substitute the expensive traditional leveling technique, particularly, for topographic mapping.

Keywords: Geoid undulation, GPS, ordinary and geodetic leveling, orthometric height.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 2020

Authors: Yuwaraj M. Ghugal, Ajay G. Dahake

Abstract:

A trigonometric shear deformation theory for flexure of thick beams, taking into account transverse shear deformation effects, is developed. The number of variables in the present theory is same as that in the first order shear deformation theory. The sinusoidal function is used in displacement field in terms of thickness coordinate to represent the shear deformation effects. The noteworthy feature of this theory is that the transverse shear stresses can be obtained directly from the use of constitutive relations with excellent accuracy, satisfying the shear stress free conditions on the top and bottom surfaces of the beam. Hence, the theory obviates the need of shear correction factor. Governing differential equations and boundary conditions are obtained by using the principle of virtual work. The thick cantilever isotropic beams are considered for the numerical studies to demonstrate the efficiency of the. Results obtained are discussed critically with those of other theories.

Keywords: Trigonometric shear deformation, thick beam, flexure, principle of virtual work, equilibrium equations, stress.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 3092

Authors: Donald C. Lantu, Henndy Ginting, M. Yorga Permana, Dany M. A. Ramdlany

Abstract:

We constructed a training program for top-talents of a Bank with Scharmer Theory-U as the model. In this training program, we implemented the action learning perspective, as it is claimed to be the most effective one currently available. In the process, participants were encouraged to be more involved, especially compared to traditional lecturing. The goal of this study is to assess the effectiveness of this particular training. The program consists of six days non-residential workshop within two months. Between each workshop, the participants were involved in the works of action learning group. They were challenged by dealing with the real problem related to their tasks at work. The participants of the program were 30 best talents who were chosen according to their yearly performance. Using paired difference statistical test in the behavioral assessment, we found that the training was not effective to increase participants’ leadership competencies. For the future development program, we suggested to modify the goals of the program toward the next stage of development.

Keywords: Action learning, behaviour, leadership development, Theory-U.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 940

Authors: Antoni Ivanov, Nikolay Dandanov, Nicole Christoff, Vladimir Poulkov

Abstract:

Spectrum underutilization has made cognitive radio a promising technology both for current and future telecommunications. This is due to the ability to exploit the unused spectrum in the bands dedicated to other wireless communication systems, and thus, increase their occupancy. The essential function, which allows the cognitive radio device to perceive the occupancy of the spectrum, is spectrum sensing. In this paper, the performance of modern adaptations of the four most widely used spectrum sensing techniques namely, energy detection (ED), cyclostationary feature detection (CSFD), matched filter (MF) and eigenvalues-based detection (EBD) is compared. The implementation has been accomplished through the PlutoSDR hardware platform and the GNU Radio software package in very low Signal-to-Noise Ratio (SNR) conditions. The optimal detection performance of the examined methods in a realistic implementation-oriented model is found for the common relevant parameters (number of observed samples, sensing time and required probability of false alarm).

Keywords: Cognitive radio, dynamic spectrum access, GNU Radio, spectrum sensing.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1172

Authors: A. S. Mousa, R. I. Rajab, A. A. Pinto

Abstract:

An envy behavioral game theoretical model with two types of homogeneous players is considered in this paper. The strategy space of each type of players is a discrete set with only two alternatives. The preferences of each type of players is given by a discrete utility function. All envy strategies that form Nash equilibria and the corresponding envy Nash domains for each type of players have been characterized. We use geometry to construct two dimensional envy tilings where the horizontal axis reflects the preference for players of type one, while the vertical axis reflects the preference for the players of type two. The influence of the envy behavior parameters on the Cartesian position of the equilibria has been studied, and in each envy tiling we determine the envy Nash equilibria. We observe that there are 1024 combinatorial classes of envy tilings generated from envy chromosomes: 256 of them are being structurally stable while 768 are with bifurcation. Finally, some conditions for the disparate envy Nash equilibria are stated.

Keywords: Game theory, Nash Equilibrium, envy Nash Equilibrium, geometric tilings, bifurcation thresholds.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 829

Authors: Abiodun M. Aibinu, Momoh J. E. Salami, Amir A. Shafie, Athaur Rahman Najeeb

Abstract:

In this paper, novel techniques in increasing the accuracy and speed of convergence of a Feed forward Back propagation Artificial Neural Network (FFBPNN) with polynomial activation function reported in literature is presented. These technique was subsequently used to determine the coefficients of Autoregressive Moving Average (ARMA) and Autoregressive (AR) system. The results obtained by introducing sequential and batch method of weight initialization, batch method of weight and coefficient update, adaptive momentum and learning rate technique gives more accurate result and significant reduction in convergence time when compared t the traditional method of back propagation algorithm, thereby making FFBPNN an appropriate technique for online ARMA coefficient determination.

Keywords: Adaptive Learning rate, Adaptive momentum, Autoregressive, Modeling, Neural Network.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1498

Authors: V. Paployan, K. Madoyan, A. Melikyan, H. Minassian

Abstract:

In this paper, we calculate the two-photon ionization (TPI) cross-section for pump-probe scheme in Ag neutral cluster. The pump photon energy is assumed to be close to the surface plasmon (SP) energy of cluster in dielectric media. Due to this choice, the pump wave excites collective oscillations of electrons-SP and the probe wave causes ionization of the cluster. Since the interband transition energy in Ag exceeds the SP resonance energy, the main contribution into the TPI comes from the latter. The advantage of Ag clusters as compared to the other noble metals is that the SP resonance in silver cluster is much sharper because of peculiarities of its dielectric function. The calculations are performed by separating the coordinates of electrons corresponding to the collective oscillations and the individual motion that allows taking into account the resonance contribution of excited SP oscillations. It is shown that the ionization cross section increases by two orders of magnitude if the energy of the pump photon matches the surface plasmon energy in the cluster.

Keywords: Resonance enhancement, silver clusters, surface plasmon, two-photon ionization.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1470

Authors: Hu Haibo, Tu Chunmei, Fu Chunlei, Fu Li, Mao Fan, Ma Yuan

Abstract:

Chinese Idioms are a type of traditional Chinese idiomatic expressions with specific meanings and stereotypes structure which are widely used in classical Chinese and are still common in vernacular written and spoken Chinese today. Currently, Chinese Idioms are retrieved in glossary with key character or key word in morphology or pronunciation index that can not meet the need of searching semantically. OCIRS is proposed to search the desired idiom in the case of users only knowing its meaning without any key character or key word. The user-s request in a sentence or phrase will be grammatically analyzed in advance by word segmentation, key word extraction and semantic similarity computation, thus can be mapped to the idiom domain ontology which is constructed to provide ample semantic relations and to facilitate description logics-based reasoning for idiom retrieval. The experimental evaluation shows that OCIRS realizes the function of searching idioms via semantics, obtaining preliminary achievement as requested by the users.

Keywords: Chinese idiom, idiom retrieval, semantic searching, ontology, semantics similarity.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1719

Authors: Tao Peng, Jing Zhao, Yanqing Xu, Jing Cai

Abstract:

Due to missing/ambiguous boundaries between the prostate and neighboring structures, the presence of shadow artifacts, as well as the large variability in prostate shapes, ultrasound prostate segmentation is challenging. To handle these issues, this paper develops a hybrid method for ultrasound prostate segmentation by combining an optimized closed principal curve-based method and the evolutionary neural network; the former can fit curves with great curvature and generate a contour composed of line segments connected by sorted vertices, and the latter is used to express an appropriate map function (represented by parameters of evolutionary neural network) for generating the smooth prostate contour to match the ground truth contour. Both qualitative and quantitative experimental results showed that our proposed method obtains accurate and robust performances.

Keywords: Ultrasound prostate segmentation, optimized closed polygonal segment method, evolutionary neural network, smooth mathematical model.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 453

Authors: Viriyavudh Sim, Woo Young Jung

Abstract:

The failure of roof cladding mostly occurs due to the failing of the connection between claddings and purlins, which is the pull-out of the screw connecting the two parts when the pull-out load, i.e. typhoon, is higher than the resistance of the connection screw. As typhoon disasters in Korea are constantly on the rise, probability risk assessment (PRA) has become a vital tool to evaluate the performance of civil structures. In this study, we attempted to determine the fragility of roof cladding with the screw connection. Experimental study was performed to evaluate the pull-out resistance of screw joints between honeycomb panels and back frames. Subsequently, by means of Monte Carlo Simulation method, probability of failure for these types of roof cladding was determined. The results that the failure of roof cladding was depends on their location on the roof, for example, the edge most panel has the highest probability of failure.

Keywords: Monte Carlo Simulation, roof cladding, screw pull-out strength, wind fragility

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 956

Authors: Jiayue Zhao, Hongjuan Wu, Guiwen Liu

Abstract:

Old neighborhoods with a large elderly population depend on community-based elderly care facilities (community-based ECFs) for aging-in-place. Yet, due to scarce and scattered land, the facilities face inequitable distribution. This research uses spatial equity theory for measuring the spatial equity of community-based ECFs in old neighborhoods. Field surveys gather granular data and methods including coverage rate, Gini coefficient, Lorenz curve and G2SFCA. The findings showed that coverage is substantial but does not indicate supply is matching to demand, nor does it imply superior accessibility. The key contributions are that structuring spatial equity framework considering elderly residents’ travel behavior. This study dedicated to the international literature on spatial equity from the perspective of travel behavior and could provide valuable suggestions for the urban planning of old neighborhoods.

Keywords: Community-based ECFs, elderly residents’ travel behavior, old neighborhoods, spatial equity.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 50

Authors: Sedighe Arabameri, Nasser Salmasi

Abstract:

In this researcha particle swarm optimization (PSO) algorithm is proposedfor no-wait flowshopsequence dependent setuptime scheduling problem with weighted earliness-tardiness penalties as the criterion (
|, |Σ   " ).The smallestposition value (SPV) rule is applied to convert the continuous value of position vector of particles in PSO to job permutations.A timing algorithm is generated to find the optimal schedule and calculate the objective function value of a given sequence in PSO algorithm. Twodifferent neighborhood structures are applied to improve the solution quality of PSO algorithm.The first one is based on variable neighborhood search (VNS) and the second one is a simple one with invariable structure. In order to compare the performance of two neighborhood structures, random test problems are generated and solved by both neighborhood approaches.Computational results show that the VNS algorithmhas better performance than the other one especially for the large sized problems.

Keywords: minimization of summation of weighed earliness and tardiness, no-wait flowshop scheduling, particle swarm optimization, sequence dependent setup times

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1626

Authors: Rahmat A, Radin Rafeeuddin R. D., Norasrudin S., Mastura M.

Abstract:

The objective of the study is to investigate the effect of a footballer-s postural on selected physical fitness components. Twenty-one (21) subjects of the university male footballers under the Sport Excellence Center programme were photographed using qualitative analysis. The postural variables were stratified manually into normal and anomalies group and their flexibility, strength and SAQ performance were compared using the Mann-Whitney Test. The AROM assessment and SAQ test reported no significance difference (Z=-.398, p=0.711, p>0.05), similar to the lower body strength was shown with no significance different (Z=-.493, p=0.640, p>0.05). In contrast, only 1 RM strength test for the upper body strength test shown with a significance different (Z=- 2.537, p=0.009, p<0.05) the. Hence, the Body posture among the football athletes with anomalies does not influence selected physical fitness components. This study has proven, that postural anomalies will not affect or influence the physical performance the respective athletes.

Keywords: Postural Analysis, Anomalies, Flexibility, Strength, SAQ.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 2145

Authors: Hakan Aydogan, Fatih Bozkurt, Huseyin Coskun

Abstract:

In this study, the signal of brain electrical activities of the sixteen students selected from the Department of Electrical and Energy at Usak University have been recorded during a lecturer performed happiness emotions for the first group and anger emotions for the second group in different time while the groups were in the classroom separately. The attention and meditation data extracted from the recorded signals have been analyzed and evaluated toward the teacher’s specific emotion states simultaneously. Attention levels of students who are under influence of happiness emotions of the lecturer have a positive trend and attention levels of students who are under influence of anger emotions of the lecturer have a negative trend. The meditation or mental relaxation levels of students who are under influence of happiness emotions of the lecturer are 34.3% higher comparing with the mental relaxation levels of students who are under influence of anger emotions of the lecturer.

Keywords: Brainwave, attention, meditation, education.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1840

Authors: Salsabeel F. M. Alfalah, Jannat F. Falah, Nadia Muhaidat, Amjad Hudaib, Diana Koshebye, Sawsan AlHourani

Abstract:

Educational technology is changing the way how students engage and interact with learning materials. This improved the learning process amongst various subjects. Virtual Reality (VR) applications are considered one of the evolving methods that have contributed to enhancing medical education. This paper utilizes VR to provide a solution to improve the delivery of the subject of Embryology to medical students, and facilitate the teaching process by providing a useful aid to lecturers, whilst proving the effectiveness of this new technology in this particular area. After evaluating the current teaching methods and identifying students ‘needs, a VR system was designed that demonstrates in an interactive fashion the development of the human embryo from fertilization to week ten of intrauterine development. This system aims to overcome some of the problems faced by the students’ in the current educational methods, and to increase the efficacy of the learning process.

Keywords: Virtual reality, student assessment, medical education, 3D, embryology.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 862

Authors: M. S. Gaafar, S. Y. Marzouk

Abstract:

Sodium borosilicate glasses doped with different content of NdF3 mol % have been prepared by rapid quenching method. Ultrasonic velocities (both longitudinal and shear) measurements have been carried out at room temperature and at ultrasonic frequency of 4 MHz. Elastic moduli, Debye temperature, softening temperature and Poisson's ratio have been obtained as a function of NdF3 modifier content. Results showed that the elastic moduli, Debye temperature, softening temperature and Poisson's ratio have very slight change with the change of NdF3 mol % content. Based on FTIR spectroscopy and theoretical (Bond compression) model, quantitative analysis has been carried out in order to obtain more information about the structure of these glasses. The study indicated that the structure of these glasses is mainly composed of SiO4 units with four bridging oxygens (Q4), and with three bridging and one nonbridging oxygens (Q3).

Keywords: Borosilicate glasses, ultrasonic velocity, elastic moduli, FTIR spectroscopy, bond compression model.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1752

Authors: Sidhartha Panda, C. Ardil

Abstract:

Power system stabilizers (PSS) are now routinely used in the industry to damp out power system oscillations. In this paper, real-coded genetic algorithm (RCGA) optimization technique is applied to design robust power system stabilizer for both singlemachine infinite-bus (SMIB) and multi-machine power system. The design problem of the proposed controller is formulated as an optimization problem and RCGA is employed to search for optimal controller parameters. By minimizing the time-domain based objective function, in which the deviation in the oscillatory rotor speed of the generator is involved; stability performance of the system is improved. The non-linear simulation results are presented under wide range of operating conditions; disturbances at different locations as well as for various fault clearing sequences to show the effectiveness and robustness of the proposed controller and their ability to provide efficient damping of low frequency oscillations.

Keywords: Particle swarm optimization, power system stabilizer, low frequency oscillations, power system stability.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 2061

Authors: M. Elsisi, M. Soliman, M. A. S. Aboelela, W. Mansour

Abstract:

This paper considers the design of Dual Proportional- Integral (DPI) Load Frequency Control (LFC), using gravitational search algorithm (GSA). The design is carried out for nonlinear hydrothermal power system where generation rate constraint (GRC) and governor dead band are considered. Furthermore, time delays imposed by governor-turbine, thermodynamic process, and communication channels are investigated. GSA is utilized to search for optimal controller parameters by minimizing a time-domain based objective function. GSA-based DPI has been compared to Ziegler- Nichols based PI, and Genetic Algorithm (GA) based PI controllers in order to demonstrate the superior efficiency of the proposed design. Simulation results are carried for a wide range of operating conditions and system parameters variations.

Keywords: Gravitational Search Algorithm (GSA), Load Frequency Control (LFC), Dual Proportional-Integral (DPI) controller.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1985

Authors: Hassan Hajabdollahi

Abstract:

Economic optimization of shell and tube heat exchanger (STHE) is presented in this paper. To increase the rate of heat transfer, copper oxide (CuO) nanoparticle is added into the tube side fluid and their optimum results are compared with the case of without additive nanoparticle. Total annual cost (TAC) is selected as fitness function and nine decision variables related to the heat exchanger parameters as well as concentration of nanoparticle are considered. Optimization results reveal the noticeable improvement in the TAC and in the case of heat exchanger working with nanofluid compared with the case of base fluid (8.9%). Comparison of the results between two studied cases also reveal that the lower tube diameter, tube number, and baffle spacing are needed in the case of heat exchanger working with nanofluid compared with the case of base fluid.

Keywords: Shell and tube heat exchanger, nanoparticles additive, total annual cost, particle volumetric concentration.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1119

Authors: Elsa Eka Putri, N.S.V Kameswara Rao, M. A. Mannan

Abstract:

The objective of this study is to evaluate the threshold stress of the clay with sand subgrade soil. Threshold stress can be defined as the stress level above which cyclic loading leads to excessive deformation and eventual failure. The thickness determination of highways formations using the threshold stress approach is a more realistic assessment of the soil behaviour because it is subjected to repeated loadings from moving vehicles. Threshold stress can be evaluated by plastic strain criterion, which is based on the accumulated plastic strain behaviour during cyclic loadings [1]. Several conditions of the all-round pressure the subgrade soil namely, zero confinement, low all-round pressure and high all-round pressure are investigated. The threshold stresses of various soil conditions are determined. Threshold stress of the soil are 60%, 31% and 38.6% for unconfined partially saturated sample, low effective stress saturated sample, high effective stress saturated sample respectively.

Keywords: threshold stress, cyclic loading, pore water pressure.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 2604

Authors: Mohammad Taha, Dia abu al Nadi

Abstract:

In this paper, the phase control antenna array synthesis is presented. The problem is formulated as a constrained optimization problem that imposes nulls with prescribed level while maintaining the sidelobe at a prescribed level. For efficient use of the algorithm memory, compared to the well known Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO), the Accelerated Particle Swarm Optimization (APSO) is used to estimate the phase parameters of the synthesized array. The objective function is formed using a main objective and set of constraints with penalty factors that measure the violation of each feasible solution in the search space to each constraint. In this case the obtained feasible solution is guaranteed to satisfy all the constraints. Simulation results have shown significant performance increases and a decreased randomness in the parameter search space compared to a single objective conventional particle swarm optimization.

Keywords: Array synthesis, Sidelobe level control, Constrainedoptimization, Accelerated Particle Swarm Optimization.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1927

Authors: Y. A. Adla, R. Soubra, M. Kasab, M. O. Diab, A. Chkeir

Abstract:

Over the past several years, researchers have shown a great interest in assessing the mobility of elderly people to measure their functional status. Usually, such an assessment is done by conducting tests that require the subject to walk a certain distance, turn around, and finally sit back down. Consequently, this study aims to provide an at home monitoring system to assess the patient’s status continuously. Thus, we proposed a technique to automatically detect when a subject sits down while walking at home. In this study, we utilized a Doppler radar system to capture the motion of the subjects. More than 20 features were extracted from the radar signals out of which 11 were chosen based on their Intraclass Correlation Coefficient (ICC > 0.75). Accordingly, the sequential floating forward selection wrapper was applied to further narrow down the final feature vector. Finally, five features were introduced to the Linear Discriminant Analysis classifier and an accuracy of 93.75% was achieved as well as a precision and recall of 95% and 90% respectively.

Keywords: Doppler radar system, stand-to-sit phase, TUG test, machine learning, classification

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 453

Authors: Nahid-Al-Masood, Jubaer Ahmed, Amina Hasan Abedin, S. R. Deeba, Faeza Hafiz, Mahmuda Begum

Abstract:

An electric utility-s main concern is to plan, design, operate and maintain its power supply to provide an acceptable level of reliability to its users. This clearly requires that standards of reliability be specified and used in all three sectors of the power system, i.e., generation, transmission and distribution. That is why reliability of a power system is always a major concern to power system planners. This paper presents the reliability analysis of Bangladesh Power System (BPS). Reliability index, loss of load probability (LOLP) of BPS is evaluated using recursive algorithm and considering no de-rated states of generators. BPS has sixty one generators and a total installed capacity of 5275 MW. The maximum demand of BPS is about 5000 MW. The relevant data of the generators and hourly load profiles are collected from the National Load Dispatch Center (NLDC) of Bangladesh and reliability index 'LOLP' is assessed for the period of last ten years.

Keywords: Recursive algorithm, LOLP, forced outage rate, cumulative probability.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 2354

Authors: Justinian Anatory, N. Theethayi, R. Thottappillil, C. Mwase, N.H. Mvungi

Abstract:

Power-line networks are widely used today for broadband data transmission. However, due to multipaths within the broadband power line communication (BPLC) systems owing to stochastic changes in the network load impedances, branches, etc., network or channel capacity performances are affected. This paper attempts to investigate the performance of typical medium voltage channels that uses Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) techniques with Quadrature Amplitude Modulation (QAM) sub carriers. It has been observed that when the load impedances are different from line characteristic impedance channel performance decreases. Also as the number of branches in the link between the transmitter and receiver increases a loss of 4dB/branch is found in the signal to noise ratio (SNR). The information presented in the paper could be useful for an appropriate design of the BPLC systems.

Keywords: Communication channel model, Power-line communication, Transfer function, Multipath, Branched network, OFDM, QAM, performance evaluation

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1848

Authors: Florian Gschösser, Walter Purrer

Abstract:

The paper shows examples for the (environmental) optimization of production processes for asphalt mixtures applied for typical road pavements in Austria and Switzerland. The conducted “from-cradle-to-gate” LCA firstly analyzes the production one cubic meter of asphalt and secondly all material production processes for exemplary highway pavements applied in Austria and Switzerland. It is shown that environmental impacts can be reduced by the application of reclaimed asphalt pavement (RAP) and by the optimization of specific production characteristics, e.g. the reduction of the initial moisture of the mineral aggregate and the reduction of the mixing temperature by the application of low-viscosity and foam bitumen. The results of the LCA study demonstrate reduction potentials per cubic meter asphalt of up to 57 % (Global Warming Potential–GWP) and 77 % (Ozone depletion–ODP). The analysis per square meter of asphalt pavement determined environmental potentials of up to 40 % (GWP) and 56 % (ODP).

Keywords: Asphalt mixtures, environmental potentials, life cycle assessment, material production.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1093

Authors: N. W. U. D. Chathurani, Shlomo Geva, Vinod Chandran, Proboda Rajapaksha

Abstract:

Selecting an appropriate image representation is the most important factor in implementing an effective Content-Based Image Retrieval (CBIR) system. This paper presents a multi-feature fusion approach for efficient CBIR, based on the distance distribution of features and relative feature weights at the time of query processing. It is a simple yet effective approach, which is free from the effect of features' dimensions, ranges, internal feature normalization and the distance measure. This approach can easily be adopted in any feature combination to improve retrieval quality. The proposed approach is empirically evaluated using two benchmark datasets for image classification (a subset of the Corel dataset and Oliva and Torralba) and compared with existing approaches. The performance of the proposed approach is confirmed with the significantly improved performance in comparison with the independently evaluated baseline of the previously proposed feature fusion approaches.

Keywords: Feature fusion, image retrieval, membership function, normalization.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1345

Authors: Aumnad Phdungsilp, Teeradej Wuttipornpun

Abstract:

Decision support based upon risk analysis into comparison of the electricity generation from different renewable energy technologies can provide information about their effects on the environment and society. The aim of this paper is to develop the assessment framework regarding risks to health and environment, and the society-s benefits of the electric power plant generation from different renewable sources. The multicriteria framework to multiattribute risk analysis technique and the decision analysis interview technique are applied in order to support the decisionmaking process for the implementing renewable energy projects to the Bangkok case study. Having analyses the local conditions and appropriate technologies, five renewable power plants are postulated as options. As this work demonstrates, the analysis can provide a tool to aid decision-makers for achieving targets related to promote sustainable energy system.

Keywords: Analytic Hierarchy Process, Bangkok, MultiattributeRisk Analysis, Renewable Energy Technology.

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1948

Authors: J. Franková, V. Pivodová, F. Růžička, J. Ulrichová

Abstract:

An implant elicits a biological response in the surrounding tissue which determines the acceptance and long-term function of the implant. Dental implants have become one of the main therapy methods in clinic after teeth lose. A successful implant is in contact with bone and soft tissue represent by fibroblasts. In our study we focused on the interaction between six different chemically and physically modified titanium implants (Tis-MALP, Tis-O, Tis- OA, Tis-OPAAE, Tis-OZ, Tis-OPAE) with alveolar fibroblasts as well as with five type of microorganisms (S. epidermis, S.mutans, S. gordonii, S. intermedius, C.albicans). The analysis of microorganism adhesion was determined by CFU (colony forming unite) and biofilm formation. The presence of α3β1 and vinculin expression on alveolar fibroblasts was demonstrated using phospho specific cell based ELISA (PACE). Alveolar fibroblasts have the highest expression of these proteins on Tis-OPAAE and Tis-OPAE. It corresponds with results from bacterial adhesion and biofilm formation and it was related to the lowest production of collagen I by alveolar fibroblasts on Tis-OPAAE titanium disc.

Keywords: titanium disc, alveolar fibroblasts, microorganisms, adhesion

Procedia APA BibTeX Chicago EndNote Harvard JSON MLA RIS XML ISO 690 PDF Downloads 1512