Abstract: Classification is an important data mining technique
and could be used as data filtering in artificial intelligence. The
broad application of classification for all kind of data leads to be
used in nearly every field of our modern life. Classification helps us
to put together different items according to the feature items decided
as interesting and useful. In this paper, we compare two
classification methods Naïve Bayes and ADTree use to detect spam
e-mail. This choice is motivated by the fact that Naive Bayes
algorithm is based on probability calculus while ADTree algorithm is
based on decision tree. The parameter settings of the above
classifiers use the maximization of true positive rate and
minimization of false positive rate. The experiment results present
classification accuracy and cost analysis in view of optimal classifier
choice for Spam Detection. It is point out the number of attributes to
obtain a tradeoff between number of them and the classification
accuracy.
Abstract: Imazu Bay plays an important role for endangered
species such as horseshoe crabs and black-faced spoonbills that stay in
the bay for spawning or the passing of winter. However, this bay is
semi-enclosed with slow water exchange, which could lead to
eutrophication under the condition of excess nutrient inflow to the bay.
Therefore, quantification of nutrient inflow is of great importance.
Generally, analysis of nutrient inflow to the bays takes into
consideration nutrient inflow from only the river, but that from
groundwater should not be ignored for more accurate results. The main
objective of this study is to estimate the amounts of nutrient inflow
from river and groundwater to Imazu Bay by analyzing water budget
in Zuibaiji River Basin and loads of T-N, T-P, NO3-N and NH4-N. The
water budget computation in the basin is performed using groundwater
recharge model and quasi three-dimensional two-phase groundwater
flow model, and the multiplication of the measured amount of nutrient
inflow with the computed discharge gives the total amount of nutrient
inflow to the bay. In addition, in order to evaluate nutrient inflow to the
bay, the result is compared with nutrient inflow from geologically
similar river basins. The result shows that the discharge is 3.50×107
m3/year from the river and 1.04×107 m3/year from groundwater. The
submarine groundwater discharge accounts for approximately 23 % of
the total discharge, which is large compared to the other river basins. It
is also revealed that the total nutrient inflow is not particularly large.
The sum of NO3-N and NH4-N loadings from groundwater is less than
10 % of that from the river because of denitrification in groundwater.
The Shin Seibu Sewage Treatment Plant located below the observation
points discharges treated water of 15,400 m3/day and plans to increase
it. However, the loads of T-N and T-P from the treatment plant are 3.9
mg/L and 0.19 mg/L, so that it does not contribute a lot to
eutrophication.
Abstract: This study was designed to evaluate whether carvacrol
(CAR) could provide protection against lung injury by acute
pancreatitis development. The rats were randomized into groups to
receive (I) no therapy; (II) 50 μg/kg cerulein at 1h intervals by four
intraperitoneal injections (i.p.); (III) 50, 100 and 200 mg/kg CAR by
one i.p.; and (IV) cerulein+CAR after 2h of cerulein injection. 12h
later, serum samples were obtained to assess pancreatic function the
lipase and amylase values. The animals were euthanized and lung
samples were excised. The specimens were stained with
hematoxylin-eosin (H&E), periodic acid–Schif (PAS), Mallory's
trichrome and amyloid. Additionally, oxidative DNA damage was
determined by measuring as increases in 8-hydroxy-deoxyguanosine
(8-OH-dG) adducts. The results showed that the serum activity of
lipase and amylase in AP rats were significantly reduced after the
therapy (p
Abstract: The housing industry is crucial for sustainable
development of every country. Housing is a basic need that can
enhance the quality of life. Owning a house is therefore the main aim
of individuals. However, affordability has become a critical issue
towards homeownership. In recent years, housing price in the main
cities has increased tremendously to unaffordable level. This paper
investigates factors influencing the housing price from developer’s
perspective and provides recommendation on strategies to tackle this
issue. Online and face-to-face survey was conducted on housing
developers operating in Penang, Malaysia. The results indicate that
(1) location; (2) macroeconomics factor; (3) demographic factors; (4)
land/zoning and; (5) industry factors are the main factors influencing
the housing price. This paper contributes towards better
understanding on developers’ view on how the housing price is
determined and form a basis for government to help tackle the
housing affordability issue.
Abstract: High reflectance of surgical instruments under bright
light hinders the visual clarity during laparoscopic surgical
procedures leading to loss of precision and device control and creates
strain and undesired difficulties to surgeons. Majority of the surgical
instruments are made of surgical grade steel. Instruments with a non
reflective surface can enhance the visual clarity during precision
surgeries. A conversion coating of black oxide has been successfully
developed 410 grade surgical stainless steel .The characteristics of
the developed coating suggests the application of this technique for
developing 410 grade surgical instruments with minimal reflectance.
Abstract: There is an increasing demand for developing urban
land to provide better living conditions for all citizens in Afghanistan.
Most of the development will involve the acquisition of land. And the
current land acquisition method practiced by central government is
expropriation, which is a cash-based transaction method that imposes
heavy fiscal burden on local municipalities and central government,
and it does not protect ownership rights and social equity of
landowners besides it relocates the urban poor to remote areas with
limited access to jobs and public services. The questionnaire analysis,
backed by observations of different case studies in countries where
land readjustment is used as a collaborative land development tool
indicates that the method plays a key role in valuing landowners’
rights, giving other community members and stakeholders the
opportunity to collaboratively implement urban development
projects. The practice of the method is reducing the heavy fiscal
burden on the local and central governments and is a better option to
deal with the current development challenges in Afghanistan.
Abstract: Waste polyethylene (PE) is classified as waste low
density polyethylene (LDPE) and waste high density polyethylene
(HDPE) according to their densities. Pyrolysis of plastic waste may
have an important role in dealing with the enormous amounts of
plastic waste produced all over the world, by decreasing their
negative impact on the environment. This waste may be converted
into economically valuable hydrocarbons, which can be used both as
fuels and as feed stock in the petrochemical industry. End product
yields and properties depend on the plastic waste composition.
Pyrolytic biochar is one of the most important products of waste
plastics pyrolysis. In this study, HDPE and LDPE plastic wastes were
co-pyrolyzed together with waste olive pomace. Pyrolysis runs were
performed at temperature 700°C with heating rates of 5°C/min.
Higher pyrolysis oil and gas yields were observed by the using waste
olive pomace. The biochar yields of HDPE- olive pomace and LDPEolive
pomace were 6.37% and 7.26% respectively for 50% olive
pomace doses. The calorific value of HDPE-olive pomace and
LDPE-olive pomace of pyrolysis oil were 8350 and 8495 kCal.
Abstract: The main purposes of this study are to develop a scale
that reflects emerging theoretical understandings of new media
credibility, based on the evolution of credibility studies in western
researches, identification of the determinants of credibility in the
media and its components by comparing traditional and new media
credibility scales and building accumulative scale to test new media
credibility. This approach was built on western researches using
conceptualizations of media credibility, which focuses on four
principal components: Source (journalist), message (article), medium
(newspaper, radio, TV, web, etc.), and organization (owner of the
medium), and adding user and cultural context as key components to
assess new media credibility in particular. This study’s value lies in
its contribution to the conceptualization and development of new
media credibility through the creation of a theoretical measurement
tool. Future studies should explore this scale to test new media
credibility, which represents a promising new approach in the efforts
to define and measure credibility of all media types.
Abstract: The development of numerical analysis and its
application to geomechanics problems have provided geotechnical
engineers with extremely powerful tools. One of the most important
problems in geotechnical engineering is the slope stability
assessment. It is a very difficult task due to several aspects such the
nature of the problem, experimental consideration, monitoring,
controlling, and assessment. The main objective of this paper is to
perform a comparative numerical study between the following
methods: The Limit Equilibrium (LEM), Finite Element (FEM),
Limit Analysis (LAM) and Distinct Element (DEM). The comparison
is conducted in terms of the safety factors and the critical slip
surfaces. Through the results, we see the feasibility to analyse slope
stability by many methods.
Abstract: The aim of this work is to present a low cost adsorbent
for removing toxic heavy metals from aqueous solutions. Therefore,
we are interested to investigate the efficiency of natural clay minerals
collected from south Tunisia and their modified form using sulfuric
acid in the removal of toxic metal ions: Zn(II) and Pb(II) from
synthetic waste water solutions. The obtained results indicate that
metal uptake is pH-dependent and maximum removal was detected to
occur at pH 6. Adsorption equilibrium is very rapid and it was
achieved after 90 min for both metal ions studied. The kinetics results
show that the pseudo-second-order model describes the adsorption
and the intraparticle diffusion models are the limiting step. The
treatment of natural clay with sulfuric acid creates more active sites
and increases the surface area, so it showed an increase of the
adsorbed quantities of lead and zinc in single and binary systems. The
competitive adsorption study showed that the uptake of lead was
inhibited in the presence of 10 mg/L of zinc. An antagonistic binary
adsorption mechanism was observed. These results revealed that clay
is an effective natural material for removing lead and zinc in single
and binary systems from aqueous solution.
Abstract: The idea of cropping-system is a method used by
farmers. It is an environmentally-friendly method, protecting the
natural resources (soil, water, air, nutritive substances) and increase
the production at the same time, taking into account some crop
particularities. The combination of this powerful method with the
concepts of genetic algorithms results into a possibility of generating
sequences of crops in order to form a rotation. The usage of this type
of algorithms has been efficient in solving problems related to
optimization and their polynomial complexity allows them to be used
at solving more difficult and various problems. In our case, the
optimization consists in finding the most profitable rotation of
cultures. One of the expected results is to optimize the usage of the
resources, in order to minimize the costs and maximize the profit. In
order to achieve these goals, a genetic algorithm was designed. This
algorithm ensures the finding of several optimized solutions of
cropping-systems possibilities which have the highest profit and,
thus, which minimize the costs. The algorithm uses genetic-based
methods (mutation, crossover) and structures (genes, chromosomes).
A cropping-system possibility will be considered a chromosome and
a crop within the rotation is a gene within a chromosome. Results
about the efficiency of this method will be presented in a special
section. The implementation of this method would bring benefits into
the activity of the farmers by giving them hints and helping them to
use the resources efficiently.
Abstract: The aim of the paper is to investigate the effect of
corporate social responsibility (CSR) CSR on the National
Commercial Bank (NCB) in Saudi Arabia. In order to achieve this, a
case study was made of the CSR activities of this bank from the
perspective of its branch managers. The NCB was chosen as it was
one of the first Saudi banks to engage in CSR and currently has a
wide range of CSR initiatives. A qualitative research method was
used. Open-ended questionnaires were administered to eighty branch
managers of the NCB, with fifty-five usable questionnaires returned
and twenty managers were interviewed as part of the primary
research. Data from both questionnaires and interviews were
analysed using qualitative content analysis. Six themes emerged from
the questionnaire findings were used to develop the interview
questions. These themes are the following: Awareness of employees
about CSR in the NCB; CSR activities as a type of investment;
Government and media support; Increased employee loyalty in the
NCB; Prestige and profit to the NCB; and View of CSR in Islam.
This paper makes a theoretical contribution in that it investigates and
increases understanding of the effect of CSR on the NCB in Saudi
Arabia. In addition, it makes a practical contribution by making
recommendations which can support the development of CSR in the
NCB. A limitation of the paper is that it is a case study of only one
bank. It is therefore recommended that future research could be
conducted with other banks in Saudi Arabia, or indeed, with a range
of other types of firm within the financial services area in Saudi
Arabia. In this way, the same issues could be explored but with a
greater potential generalisability of findings of CSR within the Saudi
Arabian financial services industry. In addition, this paper takes a
qualitative approach and it is suggested that future research be carried
out using mixed methods, which could provide a greater depth of
analysis.
Abstract: Discrimination against women and girls impairs progress in all domains of development articulated either in the framework of Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) or in the Post-2015 Development Agenda. Paper aspires to create greater awareness among researchers and policy makers of the challenges posed by gender gaps and the opportunities created by reducing them within the Arab region. The study reveals how Arab countries are closing in on gender-oriented targets of the third and fifth MDGs. While some countries can claim remarkable achievements particularly in girls’ equality in education, there is still a long way to go to keep Arab’s commitments to current and future generations in other countries and subregions especially in the economic participation or in the political empowerment of women. No country has closed or even expected to close the economic participation gap or the political empowerment gap. This should provide the incentive to keep moving forward in the Post-2015 Agenda. Findings of the study prove that while Arab states have uneven achievements in reducing maternal mortality, Arab women remain at a disadvantage in the labour market. For Arab region especially LDCs, improving maternal health is part of the unmet agenda for the post-2015 period and still calls for intensified efforts and procedures. While antenatal care coverage is improving across the Arab region, progress is marginal in LDCs. To achieve proper realization of gender equality and empowerment of women in the Arab region in the post-2015 agenda, the study presents critical key challenges to be addressed. These challenges include: Negative cultural norms and stereotypes; violence against women and girls; early marriage and child labour; women’s limited control over their own bodies; limited ability of women to generate their own income and control assets and property; gender-based discrimination in law and in practice; women’s unequal participation in private and public decision making autonomy; and limitations in data. However, in all Arab states, gender equality must be integrated as a goal across all issues, particularly those that affect the future of a country.
Abstract: This study presents an inverse analysis for predicting the thermal conductivities and the heat flux of a high-temperature metallurgical reactor simultaneously. Once these thermal parameters are predicted, the time-varying thickness of the protective phase-change bank that covers the inside surface of the brick walls of a metallurgical reactor can be calculated. The enthalpy method is used to solve the melting/solidification process of the protective bank. The inverse model rests on the Levenberg-Marquardt Method (LMM) combined with the Broyden method (BM). A statistical analysis for the thermal parameter estimation is carried out. The effect of the position of the temperature sensors, total number of measurements and measurement noise on the accuracy of inverse predictions is investigated. Recommendations are made concerning the location of temperature sensors.
Abstract: Broadband Wireless Network (BWN) is the promising technology nowadays due to the increased number of smartphones. Buffering scheme using network coding considers the reliability and proper degree distribution in Worldwide interoperability for Microwave Access (WiMAX) multi-hop network. Using network coding, a secure way of transmission is performed which helps in improving throughput and reduces the packet loss in the multicast network. At the outset, improved network coding is proposed in multicast wireless mesh network. Considering the problem of performance overhead, degree distribution makes a decision while performing buffer in the encoding / decoding process. Consequently, BuS (Buffer Scheme) based on network coding is proposed in the multi-hop network. Here the encoding process introduces buffer for temporary storage to transmit packets with proper degree distribution. The simulation results depend on the number of packets received in the encoding/decoding with proper degree distribution using buffering scheme.
Abstract: In an economic crisis such as the one that shook (and still shake) Europe, one does not question the importance of the measures that encourage the hiring and integration of young people into the labour market. In the mentioned context, enterprises tend to reduce the cost of labour and to seek flexible contracting instruments. The professional internships allow innovation and creativity at low cost, because, as they are not labour contracts, the enterprises do not have to respect the minimum standards related to wages, working time duration and so on. In Portugal, we observe a widespread existence of training contracts in which the trainee worked several hours without salary or was paid below the legally prescribed for the function and the work period. For this reason, under the tripartite agreement for a new system of regulation of labour relations, employment policies and social protection, between the Government and the social partners, in June 2008, foresaw a prohibition of professional internships unpaid and the legal regulation of the mandatory internships for access to an activity. The first Act about private internship contracts, i.e., internships without public funding was embodied in the Decree-Law N. 66/2011, of 1st June. This work is dedicated to the study of the legal regime of the internship contract in Portugal, by analysing the problems brought by the new set of rules and especially those which remains unresolved. In fact, we can conclude that the number of situations covered by the Act is much lower than what was expected, because of the exclusion of the mandatory internship for access to a profession when the activity is developed autonomously. Since the majority of the activities can be developed both autonomously or subordinated, it is quite easy to out of the Act requirements and, so, out of the protection that it confers to the intern. In order to complete this study, we considered not only the mentioned legal Act, but also the few doctrine and jurisprudence about the theme.
Abstract: This paper empirically investigates the relationship between Sabah state core tourism products and its destination image. Through a descriptive design using a quantitative method with a self-reported and self-administered questionnaire, this research surveyed the individual international tourists who had visited Sabah and experienced the state’s core tourism products. The research findings clearly indicate that Sabah, one of the states in Malaysia has a lot of valuable resources in the eyes of the international tourists. Interestingly, it was found that Sabah’s core tourism products namely unique marine resources, various nature attractions and cultural diversities have undoubtedly contributed to the state’s tourism image. Good feedbacks and the promising insights from the international tourists’ point of view offer varying consequences, repercussion, and implication to the state government and the relevant authorities. Collaboration and cooperation between all responsible authorities are therefore crucial in strengthening the “total tourism experience” among the international tourists in this state.
Abstract: With the increasing complexity of cyberspace security, the cyber-attack attribution has become an important challenge of the security protection systems. The difficult points of cyber-attack attribution were forced on the problems of huge data handling and key data missing. According to this situation, this paper presented a reasoning method of cyber-attack attribution based on threat intelligence. The method utilizes the intrusion kill chain model and Bayesian network to build attack chain and evidence chain of cyber-attack on threat intelligence platform through data calculation, analysis and reasoning. Then, we used a number of cyber-attack events which we have observed and analyzed to test the reasoning method and demo system, the result of testing indicates that the reasoning method can provide certain help in cyber-attack attribution.
Abstract: Solid particle erosion has been identified as a critical wear phenomenon which takes place during operation of aeroengines in dusty environment. The present work discusses the erosion behavior of Ti-44.5Al-6.25Nb-0.8Mo-0.1B alloy (TNB-V4) which finds its application in low pressure gas turbines and can be used for high pressure compressors too. Prior to the erosion tests, the alloy was heat treated to improve the mechanical properties. Afterwards, specimens were eroded at impact angles of 30° and 90° at room and high temperatures (100 °C-400 °C). Volume loss and erosion behavior are studied through gravimetric analysis, whereas erosion mechanisms are characterized through scanning electron microscopy. The results indicate a clear difference in the erosion mechanism for different impact angles. The influence of the test temperature on the erosion behavior of the alloy is also discussed in the present contribution.
Abstract: Edge detection is one of the most important tasks in image processing. Medical image edge detection plays an important role in segmentation and object recognition of the human organs. It refers to the process of identifying and locating sharp discontinuities in medical images. In this paper, a neuro-fuzzy based approach is introduced to detect the edges for noisy medical images. This approach uses desired number of neuro-fuzzy subdetectors with a postprocessor for detecting the edges of medical images. The internal parameters of the approach are optimized by training pattern using artificial images. The performance of the approach is evaluated on different medical images and compared with popular edge detection algorithm. From the experimental results, it is clear that this approach has better performance than those of other competing edge detection algorithms for noisy medical images.