Search results for: pollution history.

Authors: J. Alamelu Mangai, Satej Wagle, V. Santhosh Kumar

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The exponential increase in the volume of medical image database has imposed new challenges to clinical routine in maintaining patient history, diagnosis, treatment and monitoring. With the advent of data mining and machine learning techniques it is possible to automate and/or assist physicians in clinical diagnosis. In this research a medical image classification framework using data mining techniques is proposed. It involves feature extraction, feature selection, feature discretization and classification. In the classification phase, the performance of the traditional kNN k nearest neighbor classifier is improved using a feature weighting scheme and a distance weighted voting instead of simple majority voting. Feature weights are calculated using the interestingness measures used in association rule mining. Experiments on the retinal fundus images show that the proposed framework improves the classification accuracy of traditional kNN from 78.57 % to 92.85 %.

Keywords: Medical Image Mining, Data Mining, Feature Weighting, Association Rule Mining, k nearest neighbor classifier.

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Authors: A. R. Binesh, S. Hossainpour

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Due to the stringent legislation for emission of diesel engines and also increasing demand on fuel consumption, the importance of detailed 3D simulation of fuel injection, mixing and combustion have been increased in the recent years. In the present work, FIRE code has been used to study the detailed modeling of spray and mixture formation in a Caterpillar heavy-duty diesel engine. The paper provides an overview of the submodels implemented, which account for liquid spray atomization, droplet secondary break-up, droplet collision, impingement, turbulent dispersion and evaporation. The simulation was performed from intake valve closing (IVC) to exhaust valve opening (EVO). The predicted in-cylinder pressure is validated by comparing with existing experimental data. A good agreement between the predicted and experimental values ensures the accuracy of the numerical predictions collected with the present work. Predictions of engine emissions were also performed and a good quantitative agreement between measured and predicted NOx and soot emission data were obtained with the use of the present Zeldowich mechanism and Hiroyasu model. In addition, the results reported in this paper illustrate that the numerical simulation can be one of the most powerful and beneficial tools for the internal combustion engine design, optimization and performance analysis.

Keywords: Diesel engine, Combustion, Pollution, CFD.

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Authors: El-Sadek H. Nour El-deen, K. Harby

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Energy saving and environment friendly applications are turning out to be one of the most important topics nowadays. In this work, a simulation analysis using TRNSYS software has been carried out to study the benefit of employing a solar adsorption cooling system under the climatic conditions of Al-Minya city, Egypt. A theoretical model was carried out on a two bed adsorption cooling system employing granular activated carbon-HFC-404A as working pair. Temporal and averaged history of solar collector, adsorbent beds, evaporator and condenser has been shown. System performance in terms of daily average cooling capacity and average coefficient of performance around the year has been investigated. The results showed that maximum yearly average coefficient of performance (COP) and cooling capacity are about 0.26 and 8 kW respectively. The maximum value of the both average cooling capacity and COP cyclic is directly proportional to the maximum solar radiation. The system performance was found to be increased with the average ambient temperature. Finally, the proposed solar powered adsorption cooling systems can be used effectively under Al-Minya climatic conditions.

Keywords: Adsorption, solar energy, environment, cooling, Egypt.

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Authors: Hilmi Yazici

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The more homogenized population taken over by the Republic immediately after the Ottoman was being canalized towards the goal of national identity and the historical and cultural structure of the nation was being readdressed and redefined. Modernization and Westernization history of the new Turkey, which started with Ottoman reforms and took its final form with the Kemalist nation-state, politically resulted in transformation from a multinational empire to a “nation-state” and adopted reaching to the level of Western civilizations as a sociology ideal. This objective of change will be achieved, on the one hand, by finding the Turkish culture which was preserved only by the society and by instilling Western civilization to national culture, on the other hand.  In line with this, it is seen that in musical considerations while Turkish folk music was accepted and adopted as an indispensible part of Turkish identity, Turkish classical music was refused on the ground that it was not a part of Turkish identity. Again in this period, it is seen that with the notion of cultural reform, which is a part of “nation building”, the desire to create a national music to be performed with Western techniques brought along deliberate interventions to folk music.

Keywords: Folk song, Nationalism, National music, nation-state, Turkish music.

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Authors: B. Bahmani Firouzi, T. Niknam, M. Nayeripour

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With Power system movement toward restructuring along with factors such as life environment pollution, problems of transmission expansion and with advancement in construction technology of small generation units, it is expected that small units like wind turbines, fuel cells, photovoltaic, ... that most of the time connect to the distribution networks play a very essential role in electric power industry. With increase in developing usage of small generation units, management of distribution networks should be reviewed. The target of this paper is to present a new method for optimal management of active and reactive power in distribution networks with regard to costs pertaining to various types of dispersed generations, capacitors and cost of electric energy achieved from network. In other words, in this method it-s endeavored to select optimal sources of active and reactive power generation and controlling equipments such as dispersed generations, capacitors, under load tapchanger transformers and substations in a way that firstly costs in relation to them are minimized and secondly technical and physical constraints are regarded. Because the optimal management of distribution networks is an optimization problem with continuous and discrete variables, the new evolutionary method based on Ant Colony Algorithm has been applied. The simulation results of the method tested on two cases containing 23 and 34 buses exist and will be shown at later sections.

Keywords: Distributed Generation, Optimal Operation Management of distribution networks, Ant Colony Optimization(ACO).

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Authors: Stephanie Fabris Russo, Daiane Costa Guimarães, Jonas Pedro Fabris, Maria Emilia Camargo, Suzana Leitão Russo, José Augusto Andrade Filho

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Among renewable energy sources, solar energy is the one that has stood out. Solar radiation can be used as a thermal energy source and can also be converted into electricity by means of effects on certain materials, such as thermoelectric and photovoltaic panels. These panels are often used to generate energy in homes, buildings, arenas, etc., and have low pollution emissions. Thus, a technological prospecting was performed to find patents related to the use of photovoltaic plates in urban residences. The patent search was based on ESPACENET, associating the keywords photovoltaic and home, where we found 136 patent documents in the period of 1994-2015 in the fields title and abstract. Note that the years 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013 and 2014 had the highest number of applicants, with respectively, 11, 13, 23, 29, 15 and 21. Regarding the country that deposited about this technology, it is clear that China leads with 67 patent deposits, followed by Japan with 38 patents applications. It is important to note that most depositors, 50% are companies, 44% are individual inventors and only 6% are universities. On the International Patent classification (IPC) codes, we noted that the most present classification in results was H02J3/38, which represents provisions in parallel to feed a single network by two or more generators, converters or transformers. Among all categories, there is the H session, which means Electricity, with 70% of the patents.

Keywords: Prospecting, technology forecasting, photovoltaic, urban residences.

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Authors: Mahesh Kumar Farejiya, Anil Kumar Dikshit

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The toxic metal contamination and their biomagnification in marine fishes is a serious public health concern specially, in the coastal areas and the small islands. In the present study, concentration of toxic heavy metals like zinc (Zn), cadmium (Cd), lead (Pb), nickel (Ni), cobalt (Co), chromium (Cr) and mercury (Hg) were determined in the tissues of tunas (T. albacores) caught from the area near to Lakshdweep Islands. The heavy metals are one of the indicators for the marine water pollution. Geochemical weathering, industrialization, agriculture run off, fishing, shipping and oil spills are the major pollutants. The presence of heavy toxic metals in the near coastal water fishes at both western coast and eastern coast of India has been well established. The present study was conducted assuming that the distant island will not have the metals presence in a way it is at the near main land coast. However, our study shows that there is a significant amount of the toxic metals present in the tissues of tuna samples. The gill, lever and flash samples were collected in waters around Lakshdweep Islands. They were analyzed using ICP–AES for the toxic metals after microwave digestion. The concentrations of the toxic metals were found in all fish samples and the general trend of presence was in decreasing order as Zn > Al > Cd > Pb > Cr > Ni > Hg. The amount of metals was found to higher in fish having more weight.

Keywords: Biomagnifications, marine environment, toxic heavy metals, Tuna fish.

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Authors: Kiurski S. Jelena, Aksentijević M. Snežana, Kecić S. Vesna, Oros B. Ivana

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Prosperity of electronic equipment in photocopying environment not only has improved work efficiency, but also has changed indoor air quality. Considering the number of photocopying employed, indoor air quality might be worse than in general office environments. Determining the contribution from any type of equipment to indoor air pollution is a complex matter. Non-methane hydrocarbons are known to have an important role on air quality due to their high reactivity. The presence of hazardous pollutants in indoor air has been detected in one photocopying shop in Novi Sad, Serbia. Air samples were collected and analyzed for five days, during 8-hr working time in three time intervals, whereas three different sampling points were determined. Using multiple linear regression model and software package STATISTICA 10 the concentrations of occupational hazards and microclimates parameters were mutually correlated. Based on the obtained multiple coefficients of determination (0.3751, 0.2389 and 0.1975), a weak positive correlation between the observed variables was determined. Small values of parameter F indicated that there was no statistically significant difference between the concentration levels of nonmethane hydrocarbons and microclimates parameters. The results showed that variable could be presented by the general regression model: y = b0 + b1xi1+ b2xi2. Obtained regression equations allow to measure the quantitative agreement between the variables and thus obtain more accurate knowledge of their mutual relations.

Keywords: Indoor air quality, multiple regression analysis, nonmethane hydrocarbons, photocopying process.

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Authors: Hilal A. Abdelwali, Elsayed E.M. Ellaimony, Ahmad E.M. Murad, Jasem M.S. Al-Rajhi

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Due to the excess of a vehicle operation through its life, some elements may face failure and deteriorate with time. This leads us to carry out maintenance, repair, tune up or full overhaul. After a certain period, the vehicle elements deteriorations increase with time which causes a very high increase of doing the maintenance operations and their costs. However, the logic decision at this point is to replace the current vehicle by a new one with minimum failure and maximum income. The importance of studying vehicle replacement problems come from the increase of stopping days due to many deteriorations in the vehicle parts. These deteriorations increase year after year causing an increase of operating costs and decrease the vehicle income. Vehicle replacement aims to determine the optimum time to keep, maintain, overhaul, renew and replace vehicles. This leads to an improvement in vehicle income, total operating costs, maintenance cost, fuel and oil costs, ton-kilometers, vehicle and engine performance, vehicle noise, vibration, and pollution. The aim of this paper is to find the optimum replacement policies of Kuwait Passenger Transport Company (KPTCP) fleet of busses. The objective of these policies is to maximize the busses pure profits. The dynamic programming (D.P.) technique is used to generate the busses optimal replacement policies

Keywords: Replacement Problem, Automotive Replacement, Dynamic Programming, Equipment Replacement, K.P.T.C.

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Authors: E. A. Azrulhisham, Y. M. Asri, A. W. Dzuraidah, A. H. Hairul Fahmi

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The aim of this paper is to introduce a parametric distribution model in fatigue life reliability analysis dealing with variation in material properties. Service loads in terms of responsetime history signal of Belgian pave were replicated on a multi-axial spindle coupled road simulator and stress-life method was used to estimate the fatigue life of automotive stub axle. A PSN curve was obtained by monotonic tension test and two-parameter Weibull distribution function was used to acquire the mean life of the component. A Pearson system was developed to evaluate the fatigue life reliability by considering stress range intercept and slope of the PSN curve as random variables. Considering normal distribution of fatigue strength, it is found that the fatigue life of the stub axle to have the highest reliability between 10000 – 15000 cycles. Taking into account the variation of material properties associated with the size effect, machining and manufacturing conditions, the method described in this study can be effectively applied in determination of probability of failure of mass-produced parts.

Keywords: Stub axle, Fatigue life reliability, Stress-life, PSN curve, Weibull distribution, Pearson system

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Authors: Yun Zhang, Zhu Wang

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Renewing ancient residential areas is an integral part of the sustainable development of modern cities. Compared with a metropolis, the old areas of small and medium-sized cities is more complicated to update, as the spatial form is more fragmented. In this context, the author takes as the research object, the ancient town of Changshu City, which is a small city representative in China with a history of more than 1,200 years. Through the analysis of urban research and update projects, the spatial evolution characteristics and renewal strategies of small ancient urban settlements are studied. On this basis, it is proposed to protect the residential area from the perspective of integrity and sustainability, strengthen the core public part, control the district building, and reshape the important interface. Renewing small and medium-sized urban areas should respect the rhythm of their own urban development and gradually complete the update, not blindly copying the experience of large cities.

Keywords: Ancient residential area, Changshu, city renewal strategy, small and medium-sized cities.

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Authors: Mosaad Khadr, Gerd Morgenschweis, Andreas Schlenkhoff

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Drought is one of the most damaging climate-related hazards, it is generally considered as a prolonged absence of precipitation. This normal and recurring climate phenomenon had plagued civilization throughout history because of the negative impacts on economical, environmental and social sectors. Drought characteristics are thus recognized as important factors in water resources planning and management. The purpose of this study is to detect the changes in drought frequency, persistence and severity in the Ruhr river basin. The frequency of drought events was calculated using the Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI). Used data are daily precipitation records from seven meteorological stations covering the period 1961-2007. The main benefit of the application of this index is its versatility, only rainfall data is required to deliver five major dimensions of a drought : duration, intensity, severity, magnitude, and frequency. Furthermore, drought can be calculated in different time steps. In this study SPI was calculated for 1, 3, 6, 9, 12, and 24 months. Several drought events were detected in the covered period, these events contain mild, moderate and severe droughts. Also positive and negative trends in the SPI values were observed.

Keywords: Drought, Germany, Precipitation, Ruhr River, Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI), Trend Test.

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Authors: V. Sivakumar, R. Neelakantan

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Mineral mapping on the Moon surface provides the clue to understand the origin, evolution, stratigraphy and geological history of the Moon. Recently, reflectance imaging spectroscopy plays a significant role in identifying minerals on the planetary surface in the Visible to NIR region of the electromagnetic spectrum. The Moon Mineralogy Mapper (M³) onboard Chandrayaan-1 provides unprecedented spectral data of lunar surface to study about the Moon surface. Here we used the M³ sensor data (hyperspectral imaging spectroscopy) for analysing mineralogy of Orientale basin region on the Moon surface. Reflectance spectrums were sampled from different locations of the basin and continuum was removed using ENvironment for Visualizing Images (ENVI) software. Reflectance spectra of unknown mineral composition were compared with known Reflectance Experiment Laboratory (RELAB) spectra for discriminating mineralogy. Minerals like olivine, Low-Ca Pyroxene (LCP), High-Ca Pyroxene (HCP) and plagioclase were identified. In addition to these minerals, an unusual type of spectral signature was identified, which indicates the probable Fe-Mg-spinel lithology in the basin region.

Keywords: Chandrayaan-1, moon mineralogy mapper, orientale basin, moon, spectroscopy, hyperspectral.

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Authors: Vigen Arakelian

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The balancing of mechanisms is a well-known problem in the field of mechanical engineering because the variable dynamic loads cause vibrations, as well as noise, wear and fatigue of the machines. A mechanical system with unbalance shaking force and shaking moment transmits substantial vibration to the frame. Therefore, the objective of the balancing is to cancel or reduce the variable dynamic reactions transmitted to the frame. The resolution of this problem consists in the balancing of the shaking force and shaking moment. It can be fully or partially, by internal mass redistribution via adding counterweights or by modification of the mechanism's architecture via adding auxiliary structures. The balancing problems are of continue interest to researchers. Several laboratories around the world are very active in this area and new results are published regularly. However, despite its ancient history, mechanism balancing theory continues to be developed and new approaches and solutions are constantly being reported. Various surveys have been published that disclose particularities of balancing methods. The author believes that this is an appropriate moment to present a state of the art of the shaking force balancing studies completed by new research results. This paper presents an overview of methods devoted to the shaking force balancing of mechanisms, as well as the historical aspects of the origins and the evolution of the balancing theory of mechanisms.

Keywords: Inertia forces, shaking forces, balancing, dynamics.

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Authors: Hicham Gourgue, Ahmed Aharoune, Ahmed Ihlal

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We present in this work our model of road traffic emissions (line sources) and dispersion of these emissions, named DISPOLSPEM (Dispersion of Poly Sources and Pollutants Emission Model). In its emission part, this model was designed to keep the consistent bottom-up and top-down approaches. It also allows to generate emission inventories from reduced input parameters being adapted to existing conditions in Morocco and in the other developing countries. While several simplifications are made, all the performance of the model results are kept. A further important advantage of the model is that it allows the uncertainty calculation and emission rate uncertainty according to each of the input parameters. In the dispersion part of the model, an improved line source model has been developed, implemented and tested against a reference solution. It provides improvement in accuracy over previous formulas of line source Gaussian plume model, without being too demanding in terms of computational resources. In the case study presented here, the biggest errors were associated with the ends of line source sections; these errors will be canceled by adjacent sections of line sources during the simulation of a road network. In cases where the wind is parallel to the source line, the use of the combination discretized source and analytical line source formulas minimizes remarkably the error. Because this combination is applied only for a small number of wind directions, it should not excessively increase the calculation time.

Keywords: Air pollution, dispersion, emissions, line sources, road traffic, urban transport.

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Authors: Seo-Hee Kim, Kee-Won Kim, Seung-Hoon Kim

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The most important elements of a novel are the characters, events and background. The background represents the time, place and situation that character appears, and conveys event and atmosphere more realistically. If readers have the proper knowledge about background of novels, it may be helpful for understanding the atmosphere of a novel and choosing a novel that readers want to read. In this paper, we are targeting Korean historical novels because spatio-temporal background especially performs an important role in historical novels among the genre of Korean novels. To the best of our knowledge, we could not find previous study that was aimed at Korean novels. In this paper, we build a Korean historical national dictionary. Our dictionary has historical places and temple names of kings over many generations as well as currently existing spatial words or temporal words in Korean history. We also present a method for recognizing spatio-temporal background based on patterns of phrasal words in Korean sentences. Our rules utilize postposition for spatial background recognition and temple names for temporal background recognition. The knowledge of the recognized background can help readers to understand the flow of events and atmosphere, and can use to visualize the elements of novels.

Keywords: Data mining, Korean historical novels, Korean linguistic feature, spatio-temporal background.

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Authors: Turki M. Habeebullah, Said Munir, Karl Ropkins, Essam A. Morsy, Atef M. F. Mohammed, Abdulaziz R. Seroji

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In this paper air quality conditions in Makkah and Leeds are compared. These two cities have totally different climatic conditions. Makkah climate is characterised as hot and dry (arid) whereas that of Leeds is characterised as cold and wet (temperate). This study uses air quality data from 2012 collected in Makkah, Saudi Arabia and Leeds, UK. The concentrations of all pollutants, except NO are higher in Makkah. Most notable, the concentrations of PM10 are much higher in Makkah than in Leeds. This is probably due to the arid nature of climatic conditions in Makkah and not solely due to anthropogenic emission sources, otherwise like PM10 some of the other pollutants, such as CO, NO, and SO2 would have shown much greater difference between Leeds and Makkah. Correlation analysis is performed between different pollutants at the same site and the same pollutants at different sites. In Leeds the correlation between PM10 and other pollutants is significantly stronger than in Makkah. Weaker correlation in Makkah is probably due to the fact that in Makkah most of the gaseous pollutants are emitted by combustion processes, whereas most of the PM10 is generated by other sources, such as windblown dust, re-suspension, and construction activities. This is in contrast to Leeds where all pollutants including PM10 are predominantly emitted by combustions, such as road traffic. Furthermore, in Leeds frequent rains wash out most of the atmospheric particulate matter and suppress re-suspension of dust. Temporal trends of various pollutants are compared and discussed. This study emphasises the role of climatic conditions in managing air quality, and hence the need for region-specific controlling strategies according to the local climatic and meteorological conditions.

Keywords: Air pollution, climatic conditions, particulate matter, Makkah, Leeds.

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Authors: M. Ricardo Lang, A. Costa, I. Iesbik, K. Haag, L. Trindade Buffara, O. Reimann Junior, C. Auswaldt Steclan

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Stroke affects not only the individual, but has significant impacts on the social and family context. Therefore, it is necessary to know the peculiarities of each region, in order to contribute to regional public health policies effectively. Thus, the present study discusses biomarkers in a post-stroke population, admitted to a stroke unit (U-stroke) of reference in the southern region of Brazil. Biomarkers were analyzed, such as age, length of stay, mortality rate, survival time, risk factors and family history of stroke in patients after ischemic stroke. In this studied population, comparing men and women, it was identified that men were more affected than women, and the average age of women affected was higher, as they also had the highest mortality rate and the shortest hospital stay. The risk factors identified here were according to the global scenario; with systemic arterial hypertension (SAH) being the most frequent and those associated with sedentary lifestyle in women the most frequent (dyslipidemia, heart disease and obesity). In view of this, the importance of studies that characterize populations regionally is evident, strengthening the strategic planning of policies in favor of health care.

Keywords: Biomarkers, population, stroke, sex, stroke unit.

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Authors: Masoud Mahdavi

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Today, developed and industrial cities have all kinds of sewage and water transfer canals, subway tunnels, infrastructure facilities, etc., which have caused underground cavities to be created under the buildings. The presence of these cavities causes behavioral changes in the structural behavior that must be fully evaluated. In the present study, using Abaqus finite element software, the effect of cavities with 0.5 and 1.5 meters in diameter at a depth of 2.5 meters from the earth's surface (with a circular cross-section) on the performance of the foundation and the ground (soil) has been evaluated. For this purpose, the Kobe earthquake was applied to the models for 10 seconds. Also, pore water pressure and weight were considered on the models to get complete results. The results showed that by creating and increasing the diameter of circular cavities in the soil, three indicators; 1) von Mises stress, 2) displacement and 3) plastic strain have had oscillating, ascending and ascending processes, respectively, which shows the relationship between increasing the diameter index of underground cavities and structural indicators of structure-foundation-soil.

Keywords: Underground excavations, foundation, structural substrates, Abaqus software, Kobe earthquake, time history analysis.

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Authors: Po-Chun Lin, Jyh-Cherng Gu

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This study adopted previous fault patterns, results of detection analysis, historical records and data, and experts- experiences to establish fuzzy principles and estimate the failure probability index of components of a power transformer. Considering that actual parameters and limiting conditions of parameters may differ, this study used the standard data of IEC, IEEE, and CIGRE as condition parameters. According to the characteristics of each condition parameter, relative degradation was introduced to reflect the degree of influence of the factors on the transformer condition. The method of fuzzy mathematics was adopted to determine the subordinate function of the transformer condition. The calculation used the Matlab Fuzzy Tool Box to select the condition parameters of coil winding, iron core, bushing, OLTC, insulating oil and other auxiliary components and factors (e.g., load records, performance history, and maintenance records) of the transformer to establish the fuzzy principles. Examples were presented to support the rationality and effectiveness of the evaluation method of power transformer performance conditions, as based on fuzzy comprehensive evaluation.

Keywords: Fuzzy, relative degradation degree, condition-basedmaintenance, power transformer

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Authors: Kiurski S. Jelena, Kecić S. Vesna, Aksentijević M. Snežana

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Samples of tap and wastewater were collected in three offset printing facilities in Novi Sad, Serbia. Ten physicochemical parameters were analyzed within all collected samples: pH, conductivity, m - alkalinity, p - alkalinity, acidity, carbonate concentration, hydrogen carbonate concentration, active oxygen content, chloride concentration and total alkali content. All measurements were conducted using the standard analytical and instrumental methods. Comparing the obtained results for tap water and wastewater, a clear quality difference was noticeable, since all physicochemical parameters were significantly higher within wastewater samples. The study also involves the application of simple linear regression analysis on the obtained dataset. By using software package ORIGIN 5 the pH value was mutually correlated with other physicochemical parameters. Based on the obtained values of Pearson coefficient of determination a strong positive correlation between chloride concentration and pH (r = -0.943), as well as between acidity and pH (r = -0.855) was determined. In addition, statistically significant difference was obtained only between acidity and chloride concentration with pH values, since the values of parameter F (247.634 and 182.536) were higher than F_critical (5.59). In this way, results of statistical analysis highlighted the most influential parameter of water contamination in offset printing, in the form of acidity and chloride concentration. The results showed that variable dependence could be represented by the general regression model: y = a₀ + a₁x+ k, which further resulted with matching graphic regressions.

Keywords: Pollution, printing industry, simple linear regression analysis, wastewater.

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Authors: Ime R. Udotong, Justina I. R. Udotong

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Mobil Producing Nigeria Unlimited (MPNU), a subsidiary of ExxonMobil and the highest crude oil & condensate producer in Nigeria has its operational base and an oil terminal, the Qua Iboe terminal (QIT) located at Ibeno, Nigeria. Other oil companies like Network Exploration and Production Nigeria Ltd, Frontier Oil Ltd; Shell Petroleum Development Company Ltd; Elf Petroleum Nigeria Ltd and Nigerian Agip Energy, a subsidiary of the Italian ENI E&P operate onshore, on the continental shelf and in deep offshore of the Atlantic Ocean, respectively with the coastal waters of Ibeno, Nigeria as the nearest shoreline. This study was designed to delineate the oil-polluted sites in Ibeno, Nigeria using microbiological and physico-chemical characterization of soils, sediments and ground and surface water samples from the study area. Results obtained revealed that there have been significant recent hydrocarbon inputs into this environment as observed from the high counts of hydrocarbonoclastic microorganisms in excess of 1% at all the stations sampled. Moreover, high concentrations of THC, BTEX and heavy metals contents in all the samples analyzed corroborate the high recent crude oil input into the study area. The results also showed that the pollution of the different environmental media sampled were of varying degrees, following the trend: ground water > surface water > sediments > soils.

Keywords: Microbiological characterization, oil-polluted sites, physico-chemical analyses, total hydrocarbon content.

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Authors: Abdollah Hosseini, Abbas Maleki, Khalil Fasihi, Rahim Naseri

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In order to investigate the effect of Plant Growth Promoting Rhizobacteria (PGPR) and rhizobium bacteria on grain yield and some agronomic traits of mungbean (Vigna radiate L.), an experiment was carried out based on randomized complete block design with three replications in Malekshahi, Ilam province, Iran during 2012-2013 cropping season. Experimental treatments consisted of control treatment, inoculation with rhizobium bacteria, rhizobium bacteria and Azotobacter, rhizobium bacteria and Azospirillum, rhizobium bacteria and Pseudomonas, rhizobium bacteria, Azotobacter and Azospirillum, rhizobium bacteria, Azotobacter and Pseudomonas, rhizobium bacteria, Azospirillum and Pseudomonas and rhizobium bacteria, Azotobacter, Azospirillum and Pseudomonas. The results showed that the effect of PGPR and rhizobium bacteria were significant affect on grain and its components in mungbean plant. Grain yield significantly increased by PGPR and rhizobium bacteria, so that the maximum grain yield was obtained from rhizobium bacteria + Azospirillum + Pseudomonas with the amount of 2287 kg.ha-1 as compared to control treatment. Excessive application of chemical fertilizers causes environmental and economic problems. That is, the overfertilization of P and N leads to pollution due to soil erosion and runoff water, so the use of PGPR and rhizobium bacteria can be justified due to reduce input costs, increase in grain yield and environmental friendly.

Keywords: Azotobacter, Mungbean, Pseudomonas, Rhizobium bacteria.

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Authors: Livinus A. Obasi, Augustine N. Ajah

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Biotechnology in recent times has tried to develop a mechanism whereby sustainable electricity can be generated by the activity of microorganisms on waste and renewable biomass (often regarded as “negative value”) in a device called microbial fuel cell, MFC. In this paper, we established how the biocatalytic activities of bacteria on organic matter (substrates) produced some electrons with the associated removal of some water pollution parameters; Biochemical oxygen demand (BOD), chemical oxygen demand (COD) to the tune of 77.2% and 88.3% respectively from a petrochemical sanitary wastewater. The electricity generation was possible by conditioning the bacteria to operate anaerobically in one chamber referred to as the anode while the electrons are transferred to the fully aerated counter chamber containing the cathode. Power densities ranging from 12.83 mW/m² to 966.66 mW/m² were achieved using a dual-chamber starch membrane MFC experimental set-up. The maximum power density obtained in this research shows an improvement in the use of low cost MFC set up to achieve power production. Also, the level of organic matter removal from the sanitary waste water by the operation of this device clearly demonstrates its potential benefit in achieving an improved benign environment. The beauty of the MFCs is their potential utility in areas lacking electrical infrastructures like in most developing countries.

Keywords: Bioelectricity, chemical oxygen demand, microbial fuel cell, sanitary wastewater, wheat starch.

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Authors: Ali Alotaibi, Francis Edum-Fotwe, Andrew Price /

Abstract:

Mega construction projects create buildings and major infrastructure to respond to work and life requirements while playing a vital role in promoting any nation’s economy. However, the industry is often criticised for not balancing economic, environmental and social dimensions of their projects, with emphasis typically on one aspect to the detriment of the others. This has resulted in many negative impacts including environmental pollution, waste throughout the project lifecycle, low productivity, and avoidable accidents. The identification of comprehensive Social Responsibility (SR) indicators, which combine social, environmental and economic aspects, is urgently needed. This is particularly the case in the context of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), which often has mega public construction projects. The aim of this paper is to develop a set of wide-ranging SR indicators which encompass social, economic and environmental aspects unique to the KSA. A qualitative approach was applied to explore relevant indicators through a review of the existing literature, international standards and reports. A list of appropriate indicators was developed, and its comprehensiveness was corroborated by interviews with experts on mega construction projects working with SR concepts in the KSA. The findings present 39 indicators and their metrics, covering 10 economic, 12 environmental and 17 social aspects of SR mapped against their references. These indicators are a valuable reference for decision-makers and academics in the KSA to understand factors related to SR in mega construction projects. The indicators are related to mega construction projects within the KSA and require validation in a real case scenario or within a different industry to demonstrate their generalisability.

Keywords: Social responsibility, construction projects, economic, social, environmental, indicators.

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Authors: Fardin Boustani

Abstract:

The Kowsar dam supply water for different usages such as drinking, industrial, agricultural and aquaculture farms usages and located next to the city of Dehdashat in Kohgiluye and Boyerahmad province in southern Iran. There are some towns and villages on the Kowsar dam watersheds, which Dehdasht and Choram are the most important and populated cities in this area. The study was undertaken to assess the status of water quality in the urban areas of the Kowsar dam. A total of 28 water samples were collected from 6 stations on surface water and 1 station from groundwater on the watershed of the Kowsar dam. All the samples were analyzed for Cd concentration using standard procedures. The results were compared with other national and international standards. Among the analyzed samples, as the maximum value of cadmium (1.131 μg/L) was observed on the station 2 at the winter 2009, all the samples analyzed were within the maximum admissible limits by the United States Environmental Protection Agency, EU, WHO, New Zealand , Australian, Iranian, and the Indian standards. In general results of the present study have shown that Cd mean values of stations No. 4, 1 and 2 with 0.5135, 0.0.4733 and 0.4573 μg/L respectively are higher than the other stations . Although Cd level of all samples and stations have had normal values but this is an indication of pollution potential and hazards because of human activity and waste water of towns in the areas, which can effect on human health implications in future. This research, therefore, recommends the government and other responsible authorities to take suitable improving measures in the Kowsar dam watershed-s.

Keywords: Kowsar dam, Drinking water quality, Cadmium, Maximum admissible limit, World health organization,

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Authors: Vinay Gautam, Vivek Gautam

Abstract:

With increase in the unauthorized users access, it is required to increase the security in the Near Field Communication (NFC). In the paper we propose a user behavior based enhanced protocol entitled ‘User Behavior based Enhanced Protocol (UBEP)’ to increase the security in NFC enabled devices. The UBEP works on the history of interaction of a user with system.The propose protocol considers four different factors (touch, time and distance & angle) of user behavior to know the authenticity or authorization of the users. These factors can be same for a user during interaction with the system. The UBEP uses two phase user verification system to authenticate a user. Firstly the acquisition phase is used to acquire and store the user interaction with NFC device and the same information is used in future to detect the authenticity of the user. The second phase (recognition) uses analysis of current and previous scenario of user interaction and digital signature verification system to finally authenticate user. The analysis of user based input makes a NFC transaction more advance and secure. This security is very tactical because it is completely depends on usage of the device.

Keywords: Security, Network Field communication, NFC Protocol.

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Authors: Nasser M. Amaitik, Nabil A. Alfagi

Abstract:

The world-s largest Pre-stressed Concrete Cylinder Pipe (PCCP) water supply project had a series of pipe failures which occurred between 1999 and 2001. This has led the Man-Made River Authority (MMRA), the authority in charge of the implementation and operation of the project, to setup a rehabilitation plan for the conveyance system while maintaining the uninterrupted flow of water to consumers. At the same time, MMRA recognized the need for a long term management tool that would facilitate repair and maintenance decisions and enable taking the appropriate preventive measures through continuous monitoring and estimation of the remaining life of each pipe. This management tool is known as the Pipe Risk Management System (PRMS) and now in operation at MMRA. Both the rehabilitation plan and the PRMS require the availability of complete and accurate pipe construction and manufacturing data This paper describes a systematic approach of data collection, analysis, evaluation and correction for the construction and manufacturing data files of phase I pipes which are the platform for the PRMS database and any other related decision support system.

Keywords: Asbuilt, History, IMD, MMRA, PDBMS & PRMS

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Authors: Maassoumeh Javadi Baygi, Abdul Rahman B Ramli, Borhanuddin Mohd Ali, Syamsiah Mashohor

Abstract:

The expectation of network performance from the early days of ARPANET until now has been changed significantly. Every day, new advancement in technological infrastructure opens the doors for better quality of service and accordingly level of perceived quality of network services have been increased over the time. Nowadays for many applications, late information has no value or even may result in financial or catastrophic loss, on the other hand, demands for some level of guarantee in providing and maintaining quality of service are ever increasing. Based on this history, having a QoS aware routing system which is able to provide today's required level of quality of service in the networks and effectively adapt to the future needs, seems as a key requirement for future Internet. In this work we have extended the traditional AntNet routing system to support QoS with multiple metrics such as bandwidth and delay which is named Q-Net. This novel scalable QoS routing system aims to provide different types of services in the network simultaneously. Each type of service can be provided for a period of time in the network and network nodes do not need to have any previous knowledge about it. When a type of quality of service is requested, Q-Net will allocate required resources for the service and will guarantee QoS requirement of the service, based on target objectives.

Keywords: Quality of Service, Routing, Ant Colony Optimization, Ant-based algorithms.

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Authors: Abimbola Motunrayo Folami, Ibironke Titilayo Enitan, Feroz Mohomed Swalaha

Abstract:

Water is a vital resource that is important in ensuring the growth and development of any country. To sustain the basic human needs and the demands for agriculture, industry, conservational and ecosystem, enough quality and quantity water is needed. Contamination of water resources is now a global and public health concern. Hence, this study assessed the water quality of Ndawuse River by measuring the physicochemical parameters and heavy metals concentrations of the river using standard methods. In total, 16 surface water samples were obtained from five locations along the river, from upstream to downstream as well as samples from the dumpsite. The results obtained were compared with the standard limits set by both the World Health Organization and the Federal Environmental Protection Agency for domestic purposes. The results of the measured parameters indicated that biological oxygen demand (85.88 mg/L), turbidity (44.51 NTU), Iron (0.014 - 3.511 mg /L) and chromium (0.078 - 0.14 mg /L) were all above the standard limits. The results further showed that the quality of surface water is being significantly affected by human activities around the Ndawuse River which could pose an adverse health risk to several communities that rely on this river as their primary source of water. Therefore, there is a need for strict enforcement of environmental laws to protect the aquatic ecosystem and to avoid long term cumulative exposure risk that heavy metals may pose on human health.

Keywords: Abuja, contaminants, heavy metals, Ndawuse River, Nigeria, surface water.

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