Abstract: In this paper, the optimum weight and cost of a laminated composite plate is seeked, while it undergoes the heaviest load prior to a complete failure. Various failure criteria are defined for such structures in the literature. In this work, the Tsai-Hill theory is used as the failure criterion. The theory of analysis was based on the Classical Lamination Theory (CLT). A newly type of Genetic Algorithm (GA) as an optimization technique with a direct use of real variables was employed. Yet, since the optimization via GAs is a long process, and the major time is consumed through the analysis, Radial Basis Function Neural Networks (RBFNN) was employed in predicting the output from the analysis. Thus, the process of optimization will be carried out through a hybrid neuro-GA environment, and the procedure will be carried out until a predicted optimum solution is achieved.
Abstract: In a competitive production environment, critical
decision making are based on data resulted by random sampling of
product units. Efficiency of these decisions depends on data quality
and also their reliability scale. This point leads to the necessity of a
reliable measurement system. Therefore, the conjecture process and
analysing the errors contributes to a measurement system known as
Measurement System Analysis (MSA). The aim of this research is on
determining the necessity and assurance of extensive development in
analysing measurement systems, particularly with the use of
Repeatability and Reproducibility Gages (GR&R) to improve
physical measurements. Nowadays in productive industries,
repeatability and reproducibility gages released so well but they are
not applicable as well as other measurement system analysis
methods. To get familiar with this method and gain a feedback in
improving measurement systems, this survey would be on
“ANOVA" method as the most widespread way of calculating
Repeatability and Reproducibility (R&R).
Abstract: In this paper is reported an analysis about the outdoor air pollution of the urban centre of the city of Messina. The variations of the most critical pollutants concentrations (PM10, O3, CO, C6H6) and their trends respect of climatic parameters and vehicular traffic have been studied. Linear regressions have been effectuated for representing the relations among the pollutants; the differences between pollutants concentrations on weekend/weekday were also analyzed. In order to evaluate air pollution and its effects on human health, a method for calculating a pollution index was implemented and applied in the urban centre of the city. This index is based on the weighted mean of the most detrimental air pollutants concentrations respect of their limit values for protection of human health. The analyzed data of the polluting substances were collected by the Assessorship of the Environment of the Regional Province of Messina in the year 2004. A statistical analysis of the air quality index trends is also reported.
Abstract: Based on 276 responses from academic staff in an
evaluation of an online learning environment (OLE), this paper
identifies those elements of the OLE that were most used and valued
by staff, those elements of the OLE that staff most wanted to see
improved, and those factors that most contributed to staff perceptions
that the use of the OLE enhanced their teaching. The most used and
valued elements were core functions, including accessing unit
information, accessing lecture/tutorial/lab notes, and reading online
discussions. The elements identified as most needing attention related
to online assessment: submitting assignments, managing assessment
items, and receiving feedback on assignments. Staff felt that using the
OLE enhanced their teaching when they were satisfied that their
students were able to access and use their learning materials, and
when they were satisfied with the professional development they
received and were confident with their ability to teach with the OLE.
Abstract: In the modern construction practices, industrial wastes
or by-products are largely used as raw materials in cement and
concrete. These impart many benefits to the environment and bringabout
an economic impact because the cost of waste disposal is
constantly increasing due to strict environmental regulations. It was
reported in literature that the leakage of oil onto concrete element in
older cement grinding unit resulted in concrete with greater resistance
to freezing and thawing. This effect was thought to be similar to
adding an air-entraining chemical admixture to concrete. This paper
presents an investigation on the load deflection behaviour and crack
patterns of reinforced concrete (RC) beams subjected to four point
loading. Ten 120x260x1900 mm beams were cast with 100%
ordinary Portland cement (OPC) concrete, 20% fly ash (FA) and 20%
rice husk ash (RHA) blended cement concrete. 0.15% dosage of
admixtures (used engine oil, new engine oil, and superplasticizer)
was used throughout the experiment. Results show that OPC and
OPC/RHA RC beams containing used engine oil and superplasticizer
exhibit higher capacity, 18-26% than their corresponding control
mix.
Abstract: The relevance of the study of everyday life in Almaty
and Kyzylorda are associated with the emergence of the modern
trends in historiography and socializing areas of government reform.
The relevance is due to the fact that in the early twentieth century
Kyzylorda and Almaty began to develop as a city and this period has
a special place in the life of the state. An interesting aspect of the
everyday life of the inhabitants of the new city, which was built in the
era of Stalin's Five-Year Plans, can be examined through the eyes of
the Soviet people living in a specific environment, reflecting the life
of the citizens. The study of industrialization of the Soviet Union and
the attention paid to new developments in the first five years of
everyday aspects as the impact of the modernization of the 1930s was
one of the decisive factors in the lives of residents. Among these
factors, we would like to highlight the medical field, which is the
basis of all human life, specifically focusing on the state of medicine
in Alma-Ata in the first 20-30-years of the twentieth century, and
analyze the different aspects of human life, determining the quality of
medical care to the population during this period.
Abstract: COSMED K4b2 is a portable electrical device designed to test pulmonary functions. It is ideal for many applications that need the measurement of the cardio-respiratory response either in the field or in the lab is capable with the capability to delivery real time data to a sink node or a PC base station with storing data in the memory at the same time. But the actual sensor outputs and data received may contain some errors, such as impulsive noise which can be related to sensors, low batteries, environment or disturbance in data acquisition process. These abnormal outputs might cause misinterpretations of exercise or living activities to persons being monitored. In our paper we propose an effective and feasible method to detect and identify errors in applications by principal component analysis (PCA) and a back propagation (BP) neural network.
Abstract: This paper mainly investigates the environmental and
economic impacts of worldwide use of electric vehicles. It can be
concluded that governments have good reason to promote the use of
electric vehicles. First, the global vehicles population is evaluated with
the help of grey forecasting model and the amount of oil saving is
estimated through approximate calculation. After that, based on the
game theory, the amount and types of electricity generation needed by
electronic vehicles are established. Finally, some conclusions on the
government-s attitudes are drawn.
Abstract: Simulation is a very powerful method used for highperformance
and high-quality design in distributed system, and now
maybe the only one, considering the heterogeneity, complexity and
cost of distributed systems. In Grid environments, foe example, it is
hard and even impossible to perform scheduler performance
evaluation in a repeatable and controllable manner as resources and
users are distributed across multiple organizations with their own
policies. In addition, Grid test-beds are limited and creating an
adequately-sized test-bed is expensive and time consuming.
Scalability, reliability and fault-tolerance become important
requirements for distributed systems in order to support distributed
computation. A distributed system with such characteristics is called
dependable. Large environments, like Cloud, offer unique
advantages, such as low cost, dependability and satisfy QoS for all
users. Resource management in large environments address
performant scheduling algorithm guided by QoS constrains. This
paper presents the performance evaluation of scheduling heuristics
guided by different optimization criteria. The algorithms for
distributed scheduling are analyzed in order to satisfy users
constrains considering in the same time independent capabilities of
resources. This analysis acts like a profiling step for algorithm
calibration. The performance evaluation is based on simulation. The
simulator is MONARC, a powerful tool for large scale distributed
systems simulation. The novelty of this paper consists in synthetic
analysis results that offer guidelines for scheduler service
configuration and sustain the empirical-based decision. The results
could be used in decisions regarding optimizations to existing Grid
DAG Scheduling and for selecting the proper algorithm for DAG
scheduling in various actual situations.
Abstract: Social cognitive theory explains the power to inaugurate change is determined by the mutual influence of personal proclivity and social factors which will shape ones- motivations and expectations. In construction industry, green concept offers an opportunity to leave a lighter footprint on the environment. This opportunity, however, has not been fully grasped by many countries. As such, venturing into green construction for many practitioners would be their maiden experience. Decision to venture into new practice such as green construction will be influenced by certain drivers. This paper explores these drivers which is further expanded into motivational factors and later becomes the platform upon which expectation for green construction stands. This theoretical concept of motivation and expectations, which is adapted from social cognitive theory, focus on developers- view because of their crucial role in green application. This conceptual framework, which serves as the basis for further research, will benefit the industry as it elucidate cognitive angles to attract more new entrants to green business.
Abstract: Today, advantage of biotechnology especially in environmental issues compared to other technologies is irrefragable. Kimia Gharb Gostar Industries Company, as a largest producer of citric acid in Middle East, applies biotechnology for this goal. Citrogypsum is a by–product of citric acid production and it considered as a valid residuum of this company. At this paper summary of acid citric production and condition of Citrogypsum production in company were introduced in addition to defmition of Citrogypsum production and its applications in world. According to these information and evaluation of present conditions about Iran needing to Citrogypsum, the best priority was introduced and emphasized on strategy selection and proper programming for self-sufficiency. The Delphi technique was used to elicit expert opinions about criteria for evaluating the usages. The criteria identified by the experts were profitability, capacity of production, the degree of investment, marketable, production ease and time production. The Analytical Hierarchy Process (ARP) and Expert Choice software were used to compare the alternatives on the criteria derived from the Delphi process.
Abstract: Environmental micro-organisms include a large number of taxa and some species that are generally considered nonpathogenic, but can represent a risk in certain conditions, especially for elderly people and immunocompromised individuals. Chemotaxonomic identification techniques are powerful tools for environmental micro-organisms, and cellular fatty acid methyl esters (FAME) content is a powerful fingerprinting identification technique. A system based on an unsupervised artificial neural network (ANN) was set up using the fatty acid profiles of standard bacterial strains, obtained by gas-chromatography, used as learning data. We analysed 45 certified strains belonging to Acinetobacter, Aeromonas, Alcaligenes, Aquaspirillum, Arthrobacter, Bacillus, Brevundimonas, Enterobacter, Flavobacterium, Micrococcus, Pseudomonas, Serratia, Shewanella and Vibrio genera. A set of 79 bacteria isolated from a drinking water line (AMGA, the major water supply system in Genoa) were used as an example for identification compared to standard MIDI method. The resulting ANN output map was found to be a very powerful tool to identify these fresh isolates.
Abstract: Pipeline infrastructures normally represent high cost of investment and the pipeline must be free from risks that could cause environmental hazard and potential threats to personnel safety. Pipeline integrity such monitoring and management become very crucial to provide unimpeded transportation and avoiding unnecessary production deferment. Thus proper cleaning and inspection is the key to safe and reliable pipeline operation and plays an important role in pipeline integrity management program and has become a standard industry procedure. In view of this, understanding the motion (dynamic behavior), prediction and control of the PIG speed is important in executing pigging operation as it offers significant benefits, such as estimating PIG arrival time at receiving station, planning for suitable pigging operation, and improves efficiency of pigging tasks. The objective of this paper is to review recent developments in speed control system of pipeline PIGs. The review carried out would serve as an industrial application in a form of quick reference of recent developments in pipeline PIG speed control system, and further initiate others to add-in/update the list in the future leading to knowledge based data, and would attract active interest of others to share their view points.
Abstract: The health record in the Electronic Health Record
(EHR) system is more sensitive than demographic. It raises the
important issue for the EHR requirement in privacy, security, audit
trail, patient access, and archiving and data retention. The studies
about the EHR system security are deficient. The aim of this study is to
build a security environment for the EHR system by Integrating the
Healthcare Enterprise (IHE) Audit Trail and Node Authentication
Security (ATNA) profile. The CDAs can be access in a secure EHR
environment.
Abstract: Safety Health and Environment Code of Practice (SHE
COP) was developed to help road transportation operators to manage
its operation in a systematic and safe manner. A study was conducted
to determine the effectiveness of SHE COP implementation during
non-OPS period. The objective of the study is to evaluate the
implementations of SHE COP among bus operators during wee hour
operations. The data was collected by completing a set of checklist
after observing the activities during pre departure, during the trip, and
upon arrival. The results show that there are seven widely practiced
SHE COP elements. 22% of the buses have average speed exceeding
the maximum permissible speed on the highways (90 km/h), with
13% of the buses were travelling at the speed of more than 100 km/h.
The statistical analysis shows that there is only one significant
association which relates speeding with prior presence of
enforcement officers.
Abstract: Technology transfer of renewable energy technologies is very often unsuccessful in the developing world. Aside from challenges that have social, economic, financial, institutional and environmental dimensions, technology transfer has generally been misunderstood, and largely seen as mere delivery of high tech equipment from developed to developing countries or within the developing world from R&D institutions to society. Technology transfer entails much more, including, but not limited to: entire systems and their component parts, know-how, goods and services, equipment, and organisational and managerial procedures. Means to facilitate the successful transfer of energy technologies, including the sharing of lessons are subsequently extremely important for developing countries as they grapple with increasing energy needs to sustain adequate economic growth and development. Improving the success of technology transfer is an ongoing process as more projects are implemented, new problems are encountered and new lessons are learnt. Renewable energy is also critical to improve the quality of lives of the majority of people in developing countries. In rural areas energy is primarily traditional biomass. The consumption activities typically occur in an inefficient manner, thus working against the notion of sustainable development. This paper explores the implementation of technology transfer in the developing world (sub-Saharan Africa). The focus is necessarily on RETs since most rural energy initiatives are RETs-based. Additionally, it aims to highlight some lessons drawn from the cited RE projects and identifies notable differences where energy technology transfer was judged to be successful. This is done through a literature review based on a selection of documented case studies which are judged against the definition provided for technology transfer. This paper also puts forth research recommendations that might contribute to improved technology transfer in the developing world. Key findings of this paper include: Technology transfer cannot be complete without satisfying pre-conditions such as: affordability, maintenance (and associated plans), knowledge and skills transfer, appropriate know how, ownership and commitment, ability to adapt technology, sound business principles such as financial viability and sustainability, project management, relevance and many others. It is also shown that lessons are learnt in both successful and unsuccessful projects.
Abstract: Global environmental changes lead to increased frequency and scale of natural disaster, Taiwan is under the influence of global warming and extreme weather. Therefore, the vulnerability was increased and variability and complexity of disasters is relatively enhanced. The purpose of this study is to consider the source and magnitude of hazard characteristics on the tourism industry. Using modern risk management concepts, integration of related domestic and international basic research, this goes beyond the Taiwan typhoon disaster risk assessment model and evaluation of loss. This loss evaluation index system considers the impact of extreme weather, in particular heavy rain on the tourism industry in Taiwan. Consider the extreme climate of the compound impact of disaster for the tourism industry; we try to make multi-hazard risk assessment model, strategies and suggestions. Related risk analysis results are expected to provide government department, the tourism industry asset owners, insurance companies and banking include tourist disaster risk necessary information to help its tourism industry for effective natural disaster risk management.
Abstract: Human always tried to create a suitable situation for their life according to environmental conditions. In fact, geography has an important role in the shape of our living area. Iran also as a four-season country has different climate type: hot and humid, hot and dry, mid and humid, and cold; therefore, we can find different architecture styles in Iran. Gilan-s traditional architecture is a suitable sample of sustainable construction in Iran. Because the main factors of every dwelling are the climatic, social, economic and cultural effects which demonstrate the interaction between environment and people settlement. This paper was determined the interaction between environmental factors and the rural dwellings in the Gilan province. Also, traditional village (city) of Masouleh as a rare sample of rural and sustainable architecture was introduced.
Abstract: In this paper, we study FPGA implementation of a
novel supra-optimal receiver diversity combining technique,
generalized maximal ratio combining (GMRC), for wireless
transmission over fading channels in SIMO systems. Prior
published results using ML-detected GMRC diversity signal
driven by BPSK showed superior bit error rate performance to
the widely used MRC combining scheme in an imperfect
channel estimation (ICE) environment. Under perfect channel
estimation conditions, the performance of GMRC and MRC
were identical. The main drawback of the GMRC study was
that it was theoretical, thus successful FPGA implementation
of it using pipeline techniques is needed as a wireless
communication test-bed for practical real-life situations.
Simulation results showed that the hardware implementation
was efficient both in terms of speed and area. Since diversity
combining is especially effective in small femto- and picocells,
internet-associated wireless peripheral systems are to
benefit most from GMRC. As a result, many spinoff
applications can be made to the hardware of IP-based 4th
generation networks.
Abstract: Real-time measurement of applied forces, like tension, compression, torsion, and bending moment, identifies the transferred energies being applied to the bottomhole assembly (BHA). These forces are highly detrimental to measurement/logging-while-drilling tools and downhole equipment. Real-time measurement of the dynamic downhole behavior, including weight, torque, bending on bit, and vibration, establishes a real-time feedback loop between the downhole drilling system and drilling team at the surface. This paper describes the numerical analysis of the strain data acquired by the measurement tool at different locations on the strain pockets. The strain values obtained by FEA for various loading conditions (tension, compression, torque, and bending moment) are compared against experimental results obtained from an identical experimental setup. Numerical analyses results agree with experimental data within 8% and, therefore, substantiate and validate the FEA model. This FEA model can be used to analyze the combined loading conditions that reflect the actual drilling environment.