Search results for: school function assessment.

Authors: A. Sunkar, Y. Santosa, S. B. Rushayati

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Indonesia has experienced annual forest fires that have rapidly destroyed and degraded its forests. Fires in the peat swamp forests of Riau Province, have set the stage for problems to worsen, this being the ecosystem most prone to fires (which are also the most difficult, to extinguish). Despite various efforts to curb deforestation, and forest degradation processes, severe forest fires are still occurring. To find an effective solution, the basic causes of the problems must be identified. It is therefore critical to have an indepth understanding of the underlying causal factors that have contributed to deforestation and forest degradation as a whole, in order to attain reductions in their rates. An assessment of the drivers of deforestation and forest degradation was carried out, in order to design and implement measures that could slow these destructive processes. Research was conducted in Giam Siak Kecil–Bukit Batu Biosphere Reserve (GSKBB BR), in the Riau Province of Sumatera, Indonesia. A biosphere reserve was selected as the study site because such reserves aim to reconcile conservation with sustainable development. A biosphere reserve should promote a range of local human activities, together with development values that are in line spatially and economically with the area conservation values, through use of a zoning system. Moreover, GSKBB BR is an area with vast peatlands, and is experiencing forest fires annually. Various factors were analysed to assess the drivers of deforestation and forest degradation in GSKBB BR; data were collected from focus group discussions with stakeholders, key informant interviews with key stakeholders, field observation and a literature review. Landsat satellite imagery was used to map forest-cover changes for various periods. Analysis of landsat images, taken during the period 2010-2014, revealed that within the non-protected area of core zone, there was a trend towards decreasing peat swamp forest areas, increasing land clearance, and increasing areas of community oilpalm and rubber plantations. Fire was used for land clearing and most of the forest fires occurred in the most populous area (the transition area). The study found a relationship between the deforested/ degraded areas, and certain distance variables, i.e. distance from roads, villages and the borders between the core area and the buffer zone. The further the distance from the core area of the reserve, the higher was the degree of deforestation and forest degradation. Research findings suggested that agricultural expansion may be the direct cause of deforestation and forest degradation in the reserve, whereas socio-economic factors were the underlying driver of forest cover changes; such factors consisting of a combination of sociocultural, infrastructural, technological, institutional (policy and governance), demographic (population pressure) and economic (market demand) considerations. These findings indicated that local factors/problems were the critical causes of deforestation and degradation in GSKBB BR. This research therefore concluded that reductions in deforestation and forest degradation in GSKBB BR could be achieved through ‘local actor’-tailored approaches such as community empowerment.

Keywords: Actor-led solution, community empowerment, drivers of deforestation and forest degradation, Giam Siak Kecil– Bukit Batu Biosphere Reserve.

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Authors: Moumita Palchaudhuri, Sujata Biswas

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Drought is universally acknowledged as a phenomenon associated with scarcity of water. The Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI) expresses the actual rainfall as standardized departure from rainfall probability distribution function. In this study severity and spatial pattern of meteorological drought was analyzed in the Puruliya District, West Bengal, India using multi-temporal SPI. Daily gridded data for the period 1971-2005 from 4 rainfall stations surrounding the study area were collected from IMD, Pune, and used in the analysis. Geographic Information System (GIS) was used to generate drought severity maps for the different time scales and months of the year. Temporal SPI graphs show that the maximum SPI value (extreme drought) occurs in station 3 in the year 1993. Mild and moderate droughts occur in the central portion of the study area. Severe and extreme droughts were mostly found in the northeast, northwest and the southwest part of the region.

Keywords: Standardized Precipitation Index, Meteorological Drought, Geographical Information System, Drought severity.

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Authors: Ammal M. Metwally, Lobna A. El Etreby, Rehan M. Saleh, Ghada Abdrabou, Somia I. Salama, Amira Orabi, Mohamed Abdelrahman

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Hepatitis C virus infection is a public health threat in Egypt. To control infection, efforts should be spent to encourage healthy behavior. This study aimed to assess the level of behavioral development in order to create a positive environment for the adoption of the recommended behaviors. The study was conducted over one year from Jan. 2011 till Jan. 2012.Knowledge, attitude and behavior of 540 HCV patients and 102 of their contacts were assessed and the level of behavioral development was determined. The study revealed that the majority of patients and contacts knew that HCV infection is dangerous with perceived concern for early diagnosis and treatment. More than 75% knew the correct modes of transmission. The assessment showed positive attitudes towards the recommended practices with intention to adopt those practices. Strategies of creating opportunities to continue the recommended behaviors should be adopted together with the reinforcement of social support.

Keywords: Hepatitis C virus, Level of behavioral development, recommended behaviors.

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Authors: Cathy Smilan

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In our current political climate of assessment and accountability initiatives we are failing to prepare our children for a participatory role in the creative economy. The field of education is increasingly falling prey to didactic methodologies which train a nation of competent test takers, foregoing the opportunity to educate students to find problems and develop multiple solutions. No where is this more evident than in the area of art education. Due to a myriad of issues including budgetary shortfalls, time constraints and a general misconception that anyone who enjoys the arts is capable of teaching the arts, our students are not developing the skills they require to become fully literate in critical thinking and creative processing. Although art integrated curriculum is increasingly being viewed as a reform strategy for motivating students by offering alternative presentation of concepts and representation of knowledge acquisition, misinformed administrators are often excluding the art teacher from the integration equation. The paper to follow addresses the problem of the need for divergent thinking and conceptualization in our schools. Furthermore, this paper explores the role of education, and specifically, art education in the development of a creatively literate citizenry.

Keywords: Art Integration, Creativity, Artist/Teacher/Leaders, Educating for a Creative Economy.

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Authors: Raquel P. F. Guiné, Susana R. Matos, Daniela V. T. A. Costa, Fernando J. Gonçalves

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Because blueberries are worldwide recognized as a good source of beneficial components, their consumption has increased in the past decades, and so have the scientific works about their properties. Hence, this work was undertaken to evaluate the effect of some production and conservation factors on the properties of blueberries from cultivar Bluecrop. The physical and chemical analyses were done according to established methodologies and then all data was treated using software SPSS for assessment of the possible differences among the factors investigated and/or the correlations between the variables at study. The results showed that location of production influenced some of the berries properties (caliber, sugars, antioxidant activity, color and texture) and that the age of the bushes was correlated with moisture, sugars and acidity, as well as lightness. On the other hand, altitude of the farm only was correlated to sugar content. With regards to conservation, it influenced only anthocyanins content and DPPH antioxidant activity. Finally, the type of extract and the order of extraction had a pronounced influence on all the phenolic properties evaluated.

Keywords: Antioxidant activity, blueberry, conservation, geographical origin, phenolic compounds, statistical analysis.

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Authors: Dean J. Callaghan, Mark M. McGrath

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Sensorized instruments that accurately measure the interaction forces (between biological tissue and instrument endeffector) during surgical procedures offer surgeons a greater sense of immersion during minimally invasive robotic surgery. Although there is ongoing research into force measurement involving surgical graspers little corresponding effort has been carried out on the measurement of forces between scissor blades and tissue. This paper presents the design and development of a force measurement test apparatus, which will serve as a sensor characterization and evaluation platform. The primary aim of the experiments is to ascertain whether the system can differentiate between tissue samples with differing mechanical properties in a reliable, repeatable manner. Force-angular displacement curves highlight trends in the cutting process as well the forces generated along the blade during a cutting procedure. Future applications of the test equipment will involve the assessment of new direct force sensing technologies for telerobotic surgery.

Keywords: Force measurement, minimally invasive surgery, scissor blades, tissue cutting.

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Authors: Ana Mercedes Vernia Carrasco

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The objective of this work is to reflect through the theoretical framework on the access to the university for the formation of a degree in a teacher of primary education. The University Access Tests in Spain evaluate a series of skills and competencies in writing, which leave aside the sample of another set of skills and tools that this type of test cannot evaluate. In the last years, a very much diversified student body has arrived in the classrooms of the universities. Nowadays, talking about special education means attending to the changes that are being experienced in this area. At present, the educational model focuses on the reinforcement by the educational institutions so that they form the students according to their personal characteristics and that it is not the students that must adapt to the system. A bibliographic review plus some years of experience in training for the future teacher allows us to make an initial assessment about the lack of rigor in the tests of access to the university. In conclusion, we can say that, although we are not a specialist in the type of Special Educational Needs that can manifest the students, therefore, we understand that teacher today needs training and support to develop their teaching with the best quality possible. These teacher and student needs also imply more institutional support.

Keywords: Teacher training, special educational needs, music education.

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Authors: Anjaneyulu M.V.L.R., Harikrishna M., Chenchuobulu S.

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Rapid urbanization, industrialization and population growth have led to an increase in number of automobiles that cause air pollution. It is estimated that road traffic contributes 60% of air pollution in urban areas. A case by case assessment is required to predict the air quality in urban situations, so as to evolve certain traffic management measures to maintain the air quality levels with in the tolerable limits. Calicut city in the state of Kerala, India has been chosen as the study area. Carbon Monoxide (CO) concentration was monitored at 15 links in Calicut city and air quality performance was evaluated over each link. The CO pollutant concentration values were compared with the National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS), and the CO values were predicted by using CALINE4 and IITLS and Linear regression models. The study has revealed that linear regression model performs better than the CALINE4 and IITLS models. The possible association between CO pollutant concentration and traffic parameters like traffic flow, type of vehicle, and traffic stream speed was also evaluated.

Keywords: CO pollution, Modelling, Traffic stream parameters.

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Authors: Un-Hwan Park, Jun-Hyeok Heo, In-Sung Lee, Tae-Hyeon Oh, Dae-Gyu Park

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Automotive interior material consisting of several material layers has the sound-absorbing function. It is difficult to predict sound absorbing coefficient because of several material layers. So, many experimental tunings are required to achieve the target of sound absorption. Therefore, while the car interior materials are developed, so much time and money is spent. In this study, we present a method to predict the sound absorbing performance of the material with multi-layer using physical properties of each material. The properties are predicted by Foam-X software using the sound absorption coefficient data measured by impedance tube. Then, we will compare and analyze the predicted sound absorption coefficient with the data measured by scaled reverberation chamber and impedance tubes for a prototype. If the method is used instead of experimental tuning in the development of car interior material, the time and money can be saved, and then, the development effort can be reduced because it can be optimized by simulation.

Keywords: Multi-layer nonwoven, sound absorption coefficient, scaled reverberation chamber, impedance tubes.

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Authors: Ting (Grace) Lin, Jianhong (Cecilia) Xia, Todd Robinson

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Accessibility analysis, examining people’s ability to access facilities and destinations, is a fundamental assessment for transport planning, policy making, and social exclusion research. Dynamic accessibility which measures accessibility in real-time traffic environment has been an advanced accessibility indicator in transport research. It is also a useful indicator to help travelers to understand travel time daily variability, assists traffic engineers to monitor traffic congestions, and finally develop effective strategies in order to mitigate traffic congestions. This research involved real-time traffic information by collecting travel time data with 15-minute interval via the TomTom^® API. A framework for measuring dynamic accessibility was then developed based on the gravity theory and accessibility dichotomy theory through space and time interpolation. Finally, the dynamic accessibility can be derived at any given time and location under dynamic accessibility spatial analysis framework.

Keywords: Dynamic accessibility, space-time continuum, transport research, TomTom® API.

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Authors: Sh. Ranjbar-Bahadori, N. Farhadifar, L. Mohammadyar

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Plant preparations from thyme and garlic have been shown to be effective acaricides against the poultry red mite, Dermanyssus gallinae. In a layer house with a history of D. gallinae problem, mites were detected in the monitoring traps for the first time and number of them was counted. Then, some rows of layer house was sprayed twice using a concentration of 0.21 mg/cm² thyme essential oil and 0.07 mg/cm² garlic juice and a similar row was used as an untreated control group. Red mite traps made of cardboard were used to assess the mite density during days 1 and 7 after treatment and always removed after 24 h. the collected mites were counted and the efficacy against all mite stages (larvae, nymphs and adults) was calculated. Results showed that on day 1 and 7 after the administration of garlic extract efficacy rate was 92.05% and 74.62%, respectively. Moreover, efficacy rate on day 1 and 7 was 89.4% and 95.37% when treatment was done with thyme essential oil. It is concluded that using garlic juice to control of D. gallinae is more effective on short time. But thyme essential oil has a long time effect in compare to garlic preparation.

Keywords: Dermanyssus gallinae, Essential oil, Garlic, Thyme, Efficacy.

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Authors: T. Delval, C. Sauvage, Q. Jullien, R. Viano, T. Diallo, B. Collignan, G. Picinbono

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In the context of the international spread of COVID-19, the Centre Scientifique et Technique du Bâtiment (CSTB) has led a joint research with the French government authorities Hauts-de-Seine department, to analyse the risk in school spaces according to their configuration, ventilation system and spatial segmentation strategy. This paper describes the main results of this joint research. A multidisciplinary team involving experts in indoor air quality/ventilation, pedestrian movements and IT domains was established to develop a COVID risk analysis tool based on Building Information Model. The work started with specific analysis on two pilot schools in order to provide for the local administration specifications to minimize the spread of the virus. Different recommendations were published to optimize/validate the use of ventilation systems and the strategy of student occupancy and student flow segmentation within the building. This COVID expertise has been digitized in order to manage a quick risk analysis on the entire building that could be used by the public administration through an easy user interface implemented in a free BIM Management software. One of the most interesting results is to enable a dynamic comparison of different ventilation system scenarios and space occupation strategy inside the BIM model. This concurrent engineering approach provides users with the optimal solution according to both ventilation and pedestrian flow expertise.

Keywords: BIM, knowledge management, system expert, risk management, indoor ventilation, pedestrian movement, integrated design.

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Authors: H. Elomari, M. Fallah, A. Elmousadik

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This work was conducted in the Souss region, known by severe water scarcity and a high agricultural activity dominated by the citrus (representing 40% of the area of Morocco's citrus). The objective of this work is to diagnose the current situation of the water efficiency in citrus irrigation and analyze the impact of various production factors on water productivity and its sustainability in the context of climate change. A field survey was conducted on 65 farms with areas varying from 0.5 to 350 ha. The stratification method was adopted as a sampling frame. Initial result indicates that the use of water shows a huge shortfall, since 31% of farms in the region are still using the surface irrigation system and 67% of farms are still using only the experience of the manager to control and adjust irrigation. The assessment of water productivity showed a value of 1.2 kg/m³ for surface irrigation and 3.8 kg/m³ for drip irrigation. The use of tools for control and adjustment of irrigation increases the water productivity of drip irrigation by 25%. The availability of the technical staff (internal or external) allows an increase in productivity of 172.4% compared to farms without technical advice.

Keywords: Citrus, irrigation efficiency, water productivity, drip irrigation.

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Authors: F. Atheer, Al-Saoudi, Robin Kalfat, Riadh Al-Mahaidi

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Over the last two decades, externally bonded fiber reinforced polymer (FRP) composites bonded to concrete substrates has become a popular method for strengthening reinforced concrete (RC) highway and railway bridges. Such structures are exposed to severe cyclic loading throughout their lifetime often resulting in fatigue damage to structural components and a reduction in the service life of the structure. Since experimental and numerical results on the fatigue performance of FRP-to-concrete joints are still limited, the current research focuses on assessing the fatigue performance of externally bonded FRP-to-concrete joints using a direct shear test. Some early results indicate that the stress ratio and the applied cyclic stress level have a direct influence on the fatigue life of the externally bonded FRP. In addition, a calibrated finite element model is developed to provide further insight into the influence of certain parameters such as: concrete strength, FRP thickness, number of cycles, frequency, and stiffness on the fatigue life of the FRP-toconcrete joints.

Keywords: FRP, concrete bond, control, fatigue, finite element model.

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Authors: Minsoo Lee, Julee Choi, Sookyung Song

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The increasing interest on processing data created by sensor networks has evolved into approaches to implement sensor networks as databases. The aggregation operator, which calculates a value from a large group of data such as computing averages or sums, etc. is an essential function that needs to be provided when implementing such sensor network databases. This work proposes to add the DURING clause into TinySQL to calculate values during a specific long period and suggests a way to implement the aggregation service in sensor networks by applying materialized view and incremental view maintenance techniques that is used in data warehouses. In sensor networks, data values are passed from child nodes to parent nodes and an aggregation value is computed at the root node. As such root nodes need to be memory efficient and low powered, it becomes a problem to recompute aggregate values from all past and current data. Therefore, applying incremental view maintenance techniques can reduce the memory consumption and support fast computation of aggregate values.

Keywords: Aggregation, Incremental View Maintenance, Materialized view, Sensor Network.

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Authors: Zach-Amaury Boufoy-Bastick, Lenandlar Singh

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Computer-mediated communication technologies which provide for virtual communities have typically evolved in a cross-dichotomous manner, such that technical constructs of the technology have evolved independently from the social environment of the community. The present paper analyses some limitations of current implementations of computer-mediated communication technology that are implied by such a dichotomy, and discusses their inhibiting effects on possible developments of virtual communities. A Socio-Technical Indicator Model is introduced that utilizes integrated feedback to describe, simulate and operationalise increasing representativeness within a variety of structurally and parametrically diverse systems. In illustration, applications of the model are briefly described for financial markets and for eco-systems. A detailed application is then provided to resolve the aforementioned technical limitations of moderation on the evolution of virtual communities. The application parameterises virtual communities to function as self-transforming social-technical systems which are sensitive to emergent and shifting community values as products of on-going communications within the collective.

Keywords: Virtual community, e-democracy, feedback systems, moderation.

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Authors: Wimalin S. Laosiritaworn, Pongsak Holimchayachotikul

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this article proposed a methodology for computer numerical control (CNC) machine scoring. The case study company is a manufacturer of hard disk drive parts in Thailand. In this company, sample of parts manufactured from CNC machine are usually taken randomly for quality inspection. These inspection data were used to make a decision to shut down the machine if it has tendency to produce parts that are out of specification. Large amount of data are produced in this process and data mining could be very useful technique in analyzing them. In this research, data mining techniques were used to construct a machine scoring model called 'machine priority assessment model (MPAM)'. This model helps to ensure that the machine with higher risk of producing defective parts be inspected before those with lower risk. If the defective prone machine is identified sooner, defective part and rework could be reduced hence improving the overall productivity. The results showed that the proposed method can be successfully implemented and approximately 351,000 baht of opportunity cost could have saved in the case study company.

Keywords: Computer Numerical Control, Data Mining, HardDisk Drive.

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Authors: Eldah Ephraim Buba

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This paper evaluated the quality of tourism education in Nigeria higher education. The problem of poor quality of tourism education in Nigeria’s higher institutions prompted the study. Archival research was used with evaluation reports as secondary data, twenty evaluation reports for different polytechnics from the National board for technical education (NBTE) from 1995-2012 were assessed. The evidence from the documents shows that the quality of teaching and evaluation is fair. The programmes resources are fairly good, and most of the teachers do not have a postgraduate qualification in tourism related courses. It is therefore recommended that the institutions running tourism programmes in Nigeria need to introduce self -assessment of programmes and not rely on the NBTE accreditation which comes up in three years. Also there is need for a staff development policy that will encourage Tourism educators to further their education; The Tertiary Educational Trust Fund (TETFUND) should focus on developing staff of tourism education because it is an area of study in Nigeria that lacks qualified personnel. With the way higher institution in Nigeria are finding interest in tourism programmes, having good quality programmes will not only produce better professionals but it will help in offering better services in the industry and maximizing the impacts of the business.

Keywords: Education, evaluation tourism, quality.

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Authors: Roza Afarin, Saeed Mozaffari

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The aim of this paper is image encryption using Genetic Algorithm (GA). The proposed encryption method consists of two phases. In modification phase, pixels locations are altered to reduce correlation among adjacent pixels. Then, pixels values are changed in the diffusion phase to encrypt the input image. Both phases are performed by GA with binary chromosomes. For modification phase, these binary patterns are generated by Local Binary Pattern (LBP) operator while for diffusion phase binary chromosomes are obtained by Bit Plane Slicing (BPS). Initial population in GA includes rows and columns of the input image. Instead of subjective selection of parents from this initial population, a random generator with predefined key is utilized. It is necessary to decrypt the coded image and reconstruct the initial input image. Fitness function is defined as average of transition from 0 to 1 in LBP image and histogram uniformity in modification and diffusion phases, respectively. Randomness of the encrypted image is measured by entropy, correlation coefficients and histogram analysis. Experimental results show that the proposed method is fast enough and can be used effectively for image encryption.

Keywords: Correlation coefficients, Genetic algorithm, Image encryption, Image entropy.

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Authors: Adil Loya, Ali Haider, Arslan A. Ghaffor, Abubaker Siddique

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Simulation and modelling of Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV) has gained wide popularity in front of aerospace community. The demand of designing and modelling optimized control system for UAV has increased ten folds since last decade, as next generation warfare is dependent on unmanned technologies. Therefore, this research focuses on the simulation of nonlinear UAV dynamics on Simulink and its integration with Flightgear. There has been lots of research on implementation of optimizing control using Simulink, however, there are fewer known techniques to simulate these dynamics over Flightgear and a tedious technique of acquiring data has been tackled in this research horizon. Sending data to Flightgear is easy but receiving it from Simulink is not that straight forward, i.e. we can only receive control data on the output. However, in this research we have managed to get the data out from the Flightgear by implementation of level 2 s-function block within Simulink. Moreover, the results captured from Flightgear over a Universal Datagram Protocol (UDP) communication are then compared with the attitude signal that were sent previously. This provide useful information regarding the difference in outputs attained from Simulink to Flightgear. It was found that values received on Simulink were in high agreement with that of the Flightgear output. And complete study has been conducted in a discrete way.

Keywords: aerospace, flight control, FlightGear, communication, Simulink

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Authors: Paschalis Koutalakis, George N. Zaimes, Valasia Iakovoglou, Konstantinos Ioannou

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Mitigating soil erosion, especially in Mediterranean countries such as Greece, is essential in order to maintain environmental and agricultural sustainability. In this paper, scientific publications related to soil erosion studies in Greece were reviewed and categorized. To accomplish this, the online search engine of Scopus was used. The key words were “soil”, “erosion” and “Greece.” An analysis of the published articles was conducted at three levels: i) type of publication, ii) chronologic and iii) thematic. A hundred and ten publications published in scientific journals were reviewed. The results showed that the awareness regarding the soil erosion in Greece has increased only in the last decades. The publications covered a wide range of thematic categories such as the type of studied areas, the physical phenomena that trigger and influence the soil erosion, the negative anthropogenic impacts on them, the assessment tools that were used in order to examine the threat and the proper management. The analysis of these articles was significant and necessary in order to find the scientific gaps of soil erosion studies in Greece and help enhance the sustainability of soil management in the future.

Keywords: Climate change, agricultural sustainability, environmental sustainability, soil management.

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Authors: Nor Hayati Ibrahim, Yaakob B. Che Man, Chin Ping Tan, Nor Aini Idris

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Interaction effects of xanthan gum (XG), carboxymethyl cellulose (CMC), and locust bean gum (LBG) on the flow properties of oil-in-water emulsions were investigated by a mixture design experiment. Blends of XG, CMC and LBG were prepared according to an augmented simplex-centroid mixture design (10 points) and used at 0.5% (wt/wt) in the emulsion formulations. An appropriate mathematical model was fitted to express each response as a function of the proportions of the blend components that are able to empirically predict the response to any blend of combination of the components. The synergistic interaction effect of the ternary XG:CMC:LBG blends at approximately 33-67% XG levels was shown to be much stronger than that of the binary XG:LBG blend at 50% XG level (p < 0.05). Nevertheless, an antagonistic interaction effect became significant as CMC level in blends was more than 33% (p < 0.05). Yield stress and apparent viscosity (at 10 s-1) responses were successfully fitted with a special quartic model while flow behaviour index and consistency coefficient were fitted with a full quartic model (R2 adjusted ≥ 0.90). This study found that a mixture design approach could serve as a valuable tool in better elucidating and predicting the interaction effects beyond the conventional twocomponent blends.

Keywords: O/W emulsions, flow behavior, polysaccharideinteraction, mixture design.

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Authors: Sameena Tarannum, S. Pranesh

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A nonlinear study of triple diffusive convection in a rotating couple stress liquid has been analysed. It is performed to study the effect of heat and mass transfer by deriving Ginzburg-Landau equation. Heat and mass transfer are quantified in terms of Nusselt number and Sherwood numbers, which are obtained as a function of thermal and solute Rayleigh numbers. The obtained Ginzburg-Landau equation is Bernoulli equation, and it has been elucidated numerically by using Mathematica. The effects of couple stress parameter, solute Rayleigh numbers, and Taylor number on the onset of convection and heat and mass transfer have been examined. It is found that the effects of couple stress parameter and Taylor number are to stabilize the system and to increase the heat and mass transfer.

Keywords: Couple stress liquid, Ginzburg-Landau model, rotation, triple diffusive convection.

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Authors: Agus Sahri, Cahya Putra Dinata, Faishal Andhi Rokhman

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Intersection is a critical area on a highway which is a place of conflict points and congestion due to the meeting of two or more roads. Conflicts that occur at the intersection include diverging, merging, weaving, and crossing. To deal with these conflicts, a crossing control system is needed, at a plot of intersection there are two control systems namely signal intersections and non-signalized intersections. The control system at a plot of intersection can affect the intersection performance. In Indonesia there are still many intersections with poor intersection performance. In analyzing the parameters to measure the performance of a plot of intersection in Indonesia, it is guided by the 1997 Indonesian Road Capacity Manual. For this reason, this study aims to develop laboratory diagnostics at plot intersections to analyze parameters that can affect the performance of an intersection. The research method used is research and development. The laboratory diagnosis includes anamnesis, differential diagnosis, inspection, diagnosis, prognosis, specimens, analysis and sample data analysts. It is expected that this research can encourage the development and application of laboratory diagnostics at a plot of intersection in Indonesia so that intersections can function optimally.

Keywords: Intersection, laboratory diagnostic, control systems, Indonesia.

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Authors: Kati Kõrbe Kaare, Kristjan Kuhi, Ott Koppel

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Transportation authorities need to provide the services and facilities that are critical to every country-s well-being and development. Management of the road network is becoming increasingly challenging as demands increase and resources are limited. Public sector institutions are integrating performance information into budgeting, managing and reporting via implementing performance measurement systems. In the face of growing challenges, performance measurement of road networks is attracting growing interest in many countries. The large scale of public investments makes the maintenance and development of road networks an area where such systems are an important assessment tool. Transportation agencies have been using performance measurement and modeling as part of pavement and bridge management systems. Recently the focus has been on extending the process to applications in road construction and maintenance systems, operations and safety programs, and administrative structures and procedures. To eliminate failure and dysfunctional consequences the importance of obtaining objective data and implementing evaluation instrument where necessary is presented in this paper

Keywords: Key performance indicators, performance measurement system, evaluation, system architecture.

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Authors: Z. Pavlík, J. Žumár, M. Pavlíková, J. Kočí, R. Černý

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Water vapour transport properties of gypsum block are studied in dependence on relative humidity using inverse analysis based on genetic algorithm. The computational inverse analysis is performed for the relative humidity profiles measured along the longitudinal axis of a rod sample. Within the performed transient experiment, the studied sample is exposed to two environments with different relative humidity, whereas the temperature is kept constant. For the basic gypsum characterisation and for the assessment of input material parameters necessary for computational application of genetic algorithm, the basic material properties of gypsum are measured as well as its thermal and water vapour storage parameters. On the basis of application of genetic algorithm, the relative humidity dependent water vapour diffusion coefficient and water vapour diffusion resistance factor are calculated.

Keywords: Water vapour transport, gypsum block, transient experiment, genetic algorithm.

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Authors: M. Cangi, T. Dolar, C. Ersoy, Y. E. Aydogdu, A. I. Aydeniz, A. Mugan

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The drum is one of the critical parts in a washing machine in which the clothes are washed and spin by the rotational movement. It is activated by the drum shaft which is attached to an electric motor and subjected to dynamic loading. Being one of the critical components, failures of the drum require costly repairs of dynamic components. In this study, tolerance bands between the drum shaft and its two bearings were examined to develop a relationship between the fatigue life of the shaft and the interaction tolerances. Optimization of tolerance bands was completed in consideration of the fatigue life of the shaft as the cost function. The following methodology is followed: multibody dynamic model of a washing machine was constructed and used to calculate dynamic loading on the components. Then, these forces were used in finite element analyses to calculate the stress field in critical components which was used for fatigue life predictions. The factors affecting the fatigue life were examined to find optimum tolerance grade for a given test condition. Numerical results were verified by experimental observations.

Keywords: Fatigue life, finite element analysis, tolerance analysis, optimization.

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Authors: Ghazaleh Monazami Tehrani, Reza Khani Jazani, Rosli Hashim , Ahmad Savari, Belin Tavakoly Sany, Parastoo Parivar, Zhamak Monazami Tehrani

Abstract:

This study investigated the presence of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) in the sediments of the Musa Bay (around the PETZONE coastal area) from Feb 2010 to Jun 2010. Concentrations of PAHs recorded in the Musa Bay sediments ranged from 537.89 to 26,659.06 ng/g dry weight with a mean value of 3990.74 ng/g. the highest concentration of PAHs was observed at station 4, which is located near the aromatic outlet of Imam Khomeini petrochemical company (station 4: BI-PC Aromatic effluent outlet) in which its concentration level was more than the NOAA sediment quality guideline value (ERL= 4022 ng/g dry weight). Owing to the concentration of PAHs in the study area, its concentration level was still meet the NOAA sediment quality guideline value (ERL: 4022 ng/g dry weight); however, according to the PELq factor, slightly adverse biological effects are associated with the exposure to PAHs levels in the study area (0.1< PELq= 0.24 > 0.5).

Keywords: Musa Bay, PAHs, PETZONE, NOAA, PELq.

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Authors: R.A.Mahdavinejad

Abstract:

In this paper, multi-processors job shop scheduling problems are solved by a heuristic algorithm based on the hybrid of priority dispatching rules according to an ant colony optimization algorithm. The objective function is to minimize the makespan, i.e. total completion time, in which a simultanous presence of various kinds of ferons is allowed. By using the suitable hybrid of priority dispatching rules, the process of finding the best solution will be improved. Ant colony optimization algorithm, not only promote the ability of this proposed algorithm, but also decreases the total working time because of decreasing in setup times and modifying the working production line. Thus, the similar work has the same production lines. Other advantage of this algorithm is that the similar machines (not the same) can be considered. So, these machines are able to process a job with different processing and setup times. According to this capability and from this algorithm evaluation point of view, a number of test problems are solved and the associated results are analyzed. The results show a significant decrease in throughput time. It also shows that, this algorithm is able to recognize the bottleneck machine and to schedule jobs in an efficient way.

Keywords: Job shops scheduling, Priority dispatching rules, Makespan, Hybrid heuristic algorithm.

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Authors: Cheng Seong Khor, Xiao Qi Yeoh

Abstract:

This work concerns the topological optimization problem for determining the optimal petroleum refinery configuration. We are interested in further investigating and hopefully advancing the existing optimization approaches and strategies employing logic propositions to conceptual process synthesis problems. In particular, we seek to contribute to this increasingly exciting area of chemical process modeling by addressing the following potentially important issues: (a) how the formulation of design specifications in a mixed-logical-and-integer optimization model can be employed in a synthesis problem to enrich the problem representation by incorporating past design experience, engineering knowledge, and heuristics; and (b) how structural specifications on the interconnectivity relationships by space (states) and by function (tasks) in a superstructure should be properly formulated within a mixed-integer linear programming (MILP) model. The proposed modeling technique is illustrated on a case study involving the alternative processing routes of naphtha, in which significant improvement in the solution quality is obtained.

Keywords: Mixed-integer linear programming (MILP), petroleum refinery, process synthesis, superstructure.

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