Abstract: The objective of present work is to stimulate the
machining of material by electrical discharge machining (EDM) to
give effect of input parameters like discharge current (Ip), pulse on
time (Ton), pulse off time (Toff) which can bring about changes in the
output parameter, i.e. material removal rate. Experimental data was
gathered from die sinking EDM process using copper electrode and
Medium Carbon Steel (AISI 1040) as work-piece. The rules of
membership function (MF) and the degree of closeness to the
optimum value of the MMR are within the upper and lower range of
the process parameters. It was found that proposed fuzzy model is in
close agreement with the experimental results. By Intelligent, model
based design and control of EDM process parameters in this study
will help to enable dramatically decreased product and process
development cycle times.
Abstract: The research on two-wheeled inverted pendulum (TWIP) mobile robots or commonly known as balancing robots have gained momentum over the last decade in a number of robotic laboratories around the world. This paper describes the hardware design of such a robot. The objective of the design is to develop a TWIP mobile robot as well as MATLAB interfacing configuration to be used as flexible platform comprises of embedded unstable linear plant intended for research and teaching purposes. Issues such as selection of actuators and sensors, signal processing units, MATLAB Real Time Workshop coding, modeling and control scheme will be addressed and discussed. The system is then tested using a wellknown state feedback controller to verify its functionality.
Abstract: The kinetics of palm oil catalytic cracking over
aluminum containing mesoporous silica Al-MCM-41 (5% Al) was
investigated in a batch autoclave reactor at the temperatures range of
573 – 673 K. The catalyst was prepared by using sol-gel technique
and has been characterized by nitrogen adsorption and x-ray
diffraction methods. Surface area of 1276 m2/g with average pore
diameter of 2.54 nm and pore volume of 0.811 cm3/g was obtained.
The experimental catalytic cracking runs were conducted using 50 g
of oil and 1 g of catalyst. The reaction pressure was recorded at
different time intervals and the data were analyzed using Levenberg-
Marquardt (LM) algorithm using polymath software. The results
show that the reaction order was found to be -1.5 and activation
energy of 3200 J/gmol.
Abstract: The forest fires in Thailand are annual occurrence which is the cause of air pollutions. This study intended to estimate the emission from forest fire during 2005-2009 using MODerateresolution Imaging Spectro-radiometer (MODIS) sensor aboard the Terra and Aqua satellites, experimental data, and statistical data. The forest fire emission is estimated using equation established by Seiler and Crutzen in 1982. The spatial and temporal variation of forest fire emission is analyzed and displayed in the form of grid density map. From the satellite data analysis suggested between 2005 and 2009, the number of fire hotspots occurred 86,877 fire hotspots with a significant highest (more than 80% of fire hotspots) in the deciduous forest. The peak period of the forest fire is in January to May. The estimation on the emissions from forest fires during 2005 to 2009 indicated that the amount of CO, CO2, CH4, and N2O was about 3,133,845 tons, 47,610.337 tons, 204,905 tons, and 6,027 tons, respectively, or about 6,171,264 tons of CO2eq. They also emitted 256,132 tons of PM10. The year 2007 was found to be the year when the emissions were the largest. Annually, March is the period that has the maximum amount of forest fire emissions. The areas with high density of forest fire emission were the forests situated in the northern, the western, and the upper northeastern parts of the country.
Abstract: In recent years various types of electric vehicles
has gained again increasing attention as an environmentally
benign technology in transport. Especially for urban areas with
high local pollution this Zero-emission technology (at the point
of use) is considered to provide proper solutions. Yet, the bad
economics and the limited driving ranges are still major barriers
for a broader market penetration of battery electric vehicles
(BEV) and of fuel cell vehicles (FCV). The major result of our
analyses is that the most important precondition for a further
dissemination of BEV in urban areas are emission-free zones.
This is an instrument which allows the promotion of BEV
without providing excessive subsidies. In addition, it is
important to note that the full benefits of EV can only be
harvested if the electricity used is produced from renewable
energy sources. That is to say, it has to be ensured that the use of
BEV in urban areas is clearly linked to a green electricity
purchase model. And moreover, the introduction of a CO2-
emission-based tax system would support this requirement.
Abstract: The present study is aim to prepare and evaluate the selfnanoemulsifying drug delivery (SNEDDS) system of a poorly water soluble drug valsartan in order to achieve a better dissolution rate which would further help in enhancing oral bioavailability. The present research work describes a SNEDDS of valsartan using labrafil M 1944 CS, Tween 80 and Transcutol HP. The pseudoternary phase diagrams with presence and absence of drug were plotted to check for the emulsification range and also to evaluate the effect of valsartan on the emulsification behavior of the phases. The mixtures consisting of oil (labrafil M 1944 CS) with surfactant (tween 80), co-surfactant (Transcutol HP) were found to be optimum formulations. Prepared formulations were evaluated for its particle size distribution, nanoemulsifying properties, robustness to dilution, self emulsication time, turbidity measurement, drug content and invitro dissolution. The optimized formulations are further evaluated for heating cooling cycle, centrifugation studies, freeze thaw cycling, particle size distribution and zeta potential were carried out to confirm the stability of the formed SNEDDS formulations. The prepared formulation revealed t a significant improvement in terms of the drug solubility as compared with marketed tablet and pure drug.
Abstract: In this paper, the data correction algorithm is suggested
when the environmental air temperature varies. To correct the infrared
data in this paper, the initial temperature or the initial infrared image
data is used so that a target source system may not be necessary. The
temperature data obtained from infrared detector show nonlinear
property depending on the surface temperature. In order to handle this
nonlinear property, Taylor series approach is adopted. It is shown that
the proposed algorithm can reduce the influence of environmental
temperature on the components in the board. The main advantage of
this algorithm is to use only the initial temperature of the components
on the board rather than using other reference device such as black
body sources in order to get reference temperatures.
Abstract: Thermo-chemical treatment (TCT) such as pyrolysis
is getting recognized as a valid route for (i) materials and valuable
products and petrochemicals recovery; (ii) waste recycling; and (iii)
elemental characterization. Pyrolysis is also receiving renewed
attention for its operational, economical and environmental
advantages. In this study, samples of polyethylene terephthalate
(PET) and polystyrene (PS) were pyrolysed in a microthermobalance
reactor (using a thermogravimetric-TGA setup). Both
polymers were prepared and conditioned prior to experimentation.
The main objective was to determine the kinetic parameters of the
depolymerization reactions that occur within the thermal degradation
process. Overall kinetic rate constants (ko) and activation energies
(Eo) were determined using the general kinetics theory (GKT)
method previously used by a number of authors. Fitted correlations
were found and validated using the GKT, errors were within ± 5%.
This study represents a fundamental step to pave the way towards the
development of scaling relationship for the investigation of larger
scale reactors relevant to industry.
Abstract: The phase diagrams and compositions of coexisting
phases have been determined for aqueous two-phase systems
containing poly(propylene glycol) with average molecular weight of
425 and sodium citrate at various pH of 3.93, 4.44, 4.6, 4.97, 5.1,
8.22. The effect of pH on the salting-out effect of poly (propylene
glycol) by sodium citrate has been studied. It was found that, an
increasing in pH caused the expansion of two-phase region.
Increasing pH also increases the concentration of PPG in the PPGrich
phase, while the salt-rich phase will be somewhat mole diluted.
Abstract: This paper uses quasi-steady molecular statics model
and diamond tool to carry out simulation temperature rise of nanoscale
orthogonal cutting single-crystal silicon. It further qualitatively
analyzes temperature field of silicon workpiece without considering
heat transfer and considering heat transfer. This paper supposes that
the temperature rise of workpiece is mainly caused by two heat sources:
plastic deformation heat and friction heat. Then, this paper develops a
theoretical model about production of the plastic deformation heat and
friction heat during nanoscale orthogonal cutting. After the increased
temperature produced by these two heat sources are added up, the
acquired total temperature rise at each atom of the workpiece is
substituted in heat transfer finite difference equation to carry out heat
transfer and calculates the temperature field in each step and makes
related analysis.
Abstract: In this work, grinding or microcutting tools in the form of pellets were manufactured using a bounded alumina abrasive grains. The bound used is a vitreous material containing quartz feldspars, kaolinite and a quantity of hematite. The pellets were used in glass grinding process to replace the free abrasive grains lapping process. The study of the elaborated pellets were done to define their effectiveness in the grinding process and to optimize the influence of the pellets elaboration parameters. The obtained results show the existence of an optimal combination of the pellets elaboration parameters for each glass grinding phase (coarse to fine grinding). The final roughness (rms) reached by the elaborated pellets on a BK7 glass surface was about 0.392 μm.
Abstract: The project describes the modeling of various
architectures mechatronics specifically morphologies of robots in an educational environment. Each structure developed by students of
pre-school, primary and secondary was created using the concept of
reverse engineering in a constructivist environment, to later be integrated in educational software that promotes the teaching of
educational Robotics in a virtual and economic environment.
Abstract: This paper presents an algorithm to estimate the parameters of two closely spaced sinusoids, providing a frequency resolution that is more than 800 times greater than that obtained by using the Discrete Fourier Transform (DFT). The strategy uses a highly optimized grid search approach to accurately estimate frequency, amplitude and phase of both sinusoids, keeping at the same time the computational effort at reasonable levels. The proposed method has three main characteristics: 1) a high frequency resolution; 2) frequency, amplitude and phase are all estimated at once using one single package; 3) it does not rely on any statistical assumption or constraint. Potential applications to this strategy include the difficult task of resolving coincident partials of instruments in musical signals.
Abstract: The purpose of this research was to study the inspector performance by using computer based training (CBT). Visual inspection task was printed circuit board (PCB) simulated on several types of defects. Subjects were 16 undergraduate randomly selected from King Mongkut-s University of Technology Thonburi and test for 20/20. Then, they were equally divided on performance into two groups (control and treatment groups) and were provided information before running the experiment. Only treatment group was provided feedback information after first experiment. Results revealed that treatment group was showed significantly difference at the level of 0.01. The treatment group showed high percentage on defects detected. Moreover, the attitude of inspectors on using the CBT to inspection was showed on good. These results have been showed that CBT could be used for training to improve inspector performance.
Abstract: Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) is an imaging radar form by taking full advantage of the relative movement of the antenna with respect to the target. Through the simultaneous processing of the radar reflections over the movement of the antenna via the Range Doppler Algorithm (RDA), the superior resolution of a theoretical wider antenna, termed synthetic aperture, is obtained. Therefore, SAR can achieve high resolution two dimensional imagery of the ground surface. In addition, two filtering steps in range and azimuth direction provide accurate enough result. This paper develops a simulation in which realistic SAR images can be generated. Also, the effect of velocity errors in the resulting image has also been investigated. Taking some velocity errors into account, the simulation results on the image resolution would be presented. Most of the times, algorithms need to be adjusted for particular datasets, or particular applications.
Abstract: In this paper, we present a new method for
incorporating global shift invariance in support vector machines.
Unlike other approaches which incorporate a feature extraction stage,
we first scale the image and then classify it by using the modified
support vector machines classifier. Shift invariance is achieved by
replacing dot products between patterns used by the SVM classifier
with the maximum cross-correlation value between them. Unlike the
normal approach, in which the patterns are treated as vectors, in our
approach the patterns are treated as matrices (or images). Crosscorrelation
is computed by using computationally efficient
techniques such as the fast Fourier transform. The method has been
tested on the ORL face database. The tests indicate that this method
can improve the recognition rate of an SVM classifier.
Abstract: Model-checking tools such as Symbolic Model Verifier
(SMV) and NuSMV are available for checking hardware designs.
These tools can automatically check the formal legitimacy of a
design. However, NuSMV is too low level for describing a complete
hardware design. It is therefore necessary to translate the system
definition, as designed in a language such as Verilog or VHDL, into
a language such as NuSMV for validation. In this paper, we present
a meta hardware description language, Melasy, that contains a code
generator for existing hardware description languages (HDLs) and
languages for model checking that solve this problem.
Abstract: The steady incompressible flow has been solved in cylindrical coordinates in both vapour region and wick structure. The governing equations in vapour region are continuity, Navier-Stokes and energy equations. These equations have been solved using SIMPLE algorithm. For study of parameters variation on heat pipe operation, a benchmark has been chosen and the effect of changing one parameter has been analyzed when the others have been fixed.
Abstract: Network-Centric Air Defense Missile Systems
(NCADMS) represents the superior development of the air defense
missile systems and has been regarded as one of the major research
issues in military domain at present. Due to lack of knowledge and
experience on NCADMS, modeling and simulation becomes an effective
approach to perform operational analysis, compared with
those equation based ones. However, the complex dynamic interactions
among entities and flexible architectures of NCADMS put forward
new requirements and challenges to the simulation framework
and models. ABS (Agent-Based Simulations) explicitly addresses
modeling behaviors of heterogeneous individuals. Agents have capability
to sense and understand things, make decisions, and act on the
environment. They can also cooperate with others dynamically to
perform the tasks assigned to them. ABS proves an effective approach
to explore the new operational characteristics emerging in
NCADMS. In this paper, based on the analysis of network-centric
architecture and new cooperative engagement strategies for
NCADMS, an agent-based simulation framework by expanding the
simulation framework in the so-called System Effectiveness Analysis
Simulation (SEAS) was designed. The simulation framework specifies
components, relationships and interactions between them, the
structure and behavior rules of an agent in NCADMS. Based on scenario
simulations, information and decision superiority and operational
advantages in NCADMS were analyzed; meanwhile some
suggestions were provided for its future development.
Abstract: Newcastle Disease Virus (NDV), an avian
paramyxovirus, is a highly contagious, generalised virus disease of
domestic poultry and wild birds characterized by gastro-intestinal,
respiratory and nervous signs. In this study, it was shown that NDV
strain AF2240 and V4-UPM are cytolytic to Human Promyelocytic
Leukemia, HL60 and Human T-lymphoblastic Leukemia, CEM-SS
cells. Results from MTT cytolytic assay showed that CD50 for NDV
AF2240 against HL60 was 130 HAU and NDV V4-UPM against
HL60 and CEM-SS were 110.6 and 150.9 HAU respectively.
Besides, both strains were found to inhibit the proliferation of cells in
a dose dependent manner. The mode of cell death either by apoptosis
or necrosis was further analyzed using acridine orange and propidium
iodide (AO/PI) staining. Our results showed that both NDV strains
induced primarily apoptosis in treated cells at CD50 concentration. In
conclusion, both NDV strains caused cytolytic effects primarily via
apoptosis in leukemia cells.