Abstract: With optimized bandwidth and latency discrepancy ratios, Node Gain Scores (NGSs) are determined and used as a basis for shaping the max-heap overlay. The NGSs - determined as the respective bandwidth-latency-products - govern the construction of max-heap-form overlays. Each NGS is earned as a synergy of discrepancy ratio of the bandwidth requested with respect to the estimated available bandwidth, and latency discrepancy ratio between the nodes and the source node. The tree leads to enhanceddelivery overlay multicasting – increasing packet delivery which could, otherwise, be hindered by induced packet loss occurring in other schemes not considering the synergy of these parameters on placing the nodes on the overlays. The NGS is a function of four main parameters – estimated available bandwidth, Ba; individual node's requested bandwidth, Br; proposed node latency to its prospective parent (Lp); and suggested best latency as advised by source node (Lb). Bandwidth discrepancy ratio (BDR) and latency discrepancy ratio (LDR) carry weights of α and (1,000 - α ) , respectively, with arbitrary chosen α ranging between 0 and 1,000 to ensure that the NGS values, used as node IDs, maintain a good possibility of uniqueness and balance between the most critical factor between the BDR and the LDR. A max-heap-form tree is constructed with assumption that all nodes possess NGS less than the source node. To maintain a sense of load balance, children of each level's siblings are evenly distributed such that a node can not accept a second child, and so on, until all its siblings able to do so, have already acquired the same number of children. That is so logically done from left to right in a conceptual overlay tree. The records of the pair-wise approximate available bandwidths as measured by a pathChirp scheme at individual nodes are maintained. Evaluation measures as compared to other schemes – Bandwidth Aware multicaSt architecturE (BASE), Tree Building Control Protocol (TBCP), and Host Multicast Tree Protocol (HMTP) - have been conducted. This new scheme generally performs better in terms of trade-off between packet delivery ratio; link stress; control overhead; and end-to-end delays.
Abstract: In this paper we propose a new knowledge model using
the Dempster-Shafer-s evidence theory for image segmentation and
fusion. The proposed method is composed essentially of two steps.
First, mass distributions in Dempster-Shafer theory are obtained from
the membership degrees of each pixel covering the three image
components (R, G and B). Each membership-s degree is determined by
applying Fuzzy C-Means (FCM) clustering to the gray levels of the
three images. Second, the fusion process consists in defining three
discernment frames which are associated with the three images to be
fused, and then combining them to form a new frame of discernment.
The strategy used to define mass distributions in the combined
framework is discussed in detail. The proposed fusion method is
illustrated in the context of image segmentation. Experimental
investigations and comparative studies with the other previous methods
are carried out showing thus the robustness and superiority of the
proposed method in terms of image segmentation.
Abstract: Electronics Products that achieve high levels of integrated communications, computing and entertainment, multimedia features in small, stylish and robust new form factors are winning in the market place. Due to the high costs that an industry may undergo and how a high yield is directly proportional to high profits, IC (Integrated Circuit) manufacturers struggle to maximize yield, but today-s customers demand miniaturization, low costs, high performance and excellent reliability making the yield maximization a never ending research of an enhanced assembly process. With factors such as minimum tolerances, tighter parameter variations a systematic approach is needed in order to predict the assembly process. In order to evaluate the quality of upcoming circuits, yield models are used which not only predict manufacturing costs but also provide vital information in order to ease the process of correction when the yields fall below expectations. For an IC manufacturer to obtain higher assembly yields all factors such as boards, placement, components, the material from which the components are made of and processes must be taken into consideration. Effective placement yield depends heavily on machine accuracy and the vision of the system which needs the ability to recognize the features on the board and component to place the device accurately on the pads and bumps of the PCB. There are currently two methods for accurate positioning, using the edge of the package and using solder ball locations also called footprints. The only assumption that a yield model makes is that all boards and devices are completely functional. This paper will focus on the Monte Carlo method which consists in a class of computational algorithms (information processed algorithms) which depends on repeated random samplings in order to compute the results. This method utilized in order to recreate the simulation of placement and assembly processes within a production line.
Abstract: Liposomal magnetofection is a simple, highly efficient
technology for cell transfection, demonstrating better outcome than a
number of other common gene delivery methods. However,
aggregate complexes distribution over the cell surface is non-uniform
due to the gradient of the permanent magnetic field. The aim of this
study was to estimate the efficiency of liposomal magnetofection for
prostate carcinoma PC3 cell line using newly designed device,
“DynaFECTOR", ensuring magnetofection in a dynamic gradient
magnetic field. Liposomal magnetofection in a dynamic gradient
magnetic field demonstrated the highest transfection efficiency for
PC3 cells – it increased for 21% in comparison with liposomal
magnetofection and for 42% in comparison with lipofection alone.
The optimal incubation time under dynamic magnetic field for PC3
cell line was 5 minutes and the optimal rotation frequency of
magnets – 5 rpm. The new approach also revealed lower cytotoxic
effect to cells than liposomal magnetofection.
Abstract: On the basis of Bayesian inference using the
maximizer of the posterior marginal estimate, we carry out phase
unwrapping using multiple interferograms via generalized mean-field
theory. Numerical calculations for a typical wave-front in remote
sensing using the synthetic aperture radar interferometry, phase
diagram in hyper-parameter space clarifies that the present method
succeeds in phase unwrapping perfectly under the constraint of
surface- consistency condition, if the interferograms are not corrupted
by any noises. Also, we find that prior is useful for extending a phase
in which phase unwrapping under the constraint of the
surface-consistency condition. These results are quantitatively
confirmed by the Monte Carlo simulation.
Abstract: This paper presents an effective method for detecting vehicles in front of the camera-assisted car during nighttime driving. The proposed method detects vehicles based on detecting vehicle headlights and taillights using techniques of image segmentation and clustering. First, to effectively extract spotlight of interest, a segmentation process based on automatic multi-level threshold method is applied on the road-scene images. Second, to spatial clustering vehicle of detecting lamps, a grouping process based on light tracking and locating vehicle lighting patterns. For simulation, we are implemented through Da-vinci 7437 DSP board with near infrared mono-camera and tested it in the urban and rural roads. Through the test, classification performances are above 97% of true positive rate evaluated on real-time environment. Our method also has good performance in the case of clear, fog and rain weather.
Abstract: The performances of a thermoacoustic travelling-wave
refrigerator are presented. Developed in the frame of the European
project called THATEA, it is designed for providing 600 W at a
temperature of 233 K with an efficiency of 40 % relative to the
Carnot efficiency. This paper presents the device and the results of
the first measurements. For a cooling power of 210 W, a coefficient
of performance relative to Carnot of 30 % is achieved when the
refrigerator is coupled with an existing standing-wave engine.
Abstract: Solid oxide fuel cells have been considered in the last years as one of the most promising technologies for very highefficiency electric energy generation from hydrogen or other hydrocarbons, both with simple fuel cell plants and with integrated gas turbine-fuel cell systems. In the present study, a detailed thermodynamic analysis has been carried out. Mass and exergy balances are performed not only for the whole plant but also for each component in order to evaluate the thermal efficiency of combined cycle. Moreover, different sources of irreversibilities within the SOFC stack have been discussed and a parametric study conducted to evaluate the effect of temperature as well as pressure on SOFC irreversibilities and its performance. In this investigation methane and hydrogen have been used for fueling the SOFC stack and combustion chamber.
Abstract: In this work, statistical experimental design was
applied for the optimization of medium constituents for Gentamicin
production by Micromsonospora echinospora subs pallida (MTCC
708) in a batch reactor and the results are compared with the ANN
predicted values. By central composite design, 50 experiments are
carried out for five test variables: Starch, Soya bean meal, K2HPO4,
CaCO3 and FeSO4. The optimum condition was found to be: Starch
(8.9,g/L), Soya bean meal (3.3 g/L), K2HPO4 (0.8 g/L), CaCO3 (4
g/L) and FeSO4 (0.03 g/L). At these optimized conditions, the yield
of gentamicin was found to be 1020 mg/L. The R2 values were found
to be 1 for ANN training set, 0.9953 for ANN test set, and 0.9286 for
RSM.
Abstract: The Taiwan government has invested approximately
21 billion NT dollars in the construction of bicycle paths since
bicycling has gained huge popularity as a healthy leisure and
recreational activity. This study focuses on the behavior of
recreational bicyclists in Danshuei and Bali, northern Taiwan. Data
were collected from a field investigation carried out along the
Danshuei bicycle path and Bali left-bank bicycle path. A total of 578
questionnaires were gathered for data analysis. Descriptive statistics
and Chi-Square tests were used to assess bicyclists- behaviors. The
frequency shows that, in these areas, Danshuei and Bali, most
bicyclists rented bicycles, rode the bicycle path in the afternoon for
about 2 hours. The used the bicycle path one time per week. For most,
it was the first time to ride these bicycle paths. There were significant
differences in distribution of bicycle ownership, time of day, duration
of ride, ride frequency, and whether riding occurred on weekdays or
weekends. Results indicated that most bicyclists in Danshuei and Bali
were infrequent users.
Abstract: Online Communities are an example of sociallyaware,
self-organising, complex adaptive computing systems.
The multi-agent systems (MAS) paradigm coordinated by
self-organisation mechanisms has been used as an effective
way for the simulation and modeling of such systems. In this
paper, we propose a model for simulating an online health
community using a situated multi-agent system approach,
governed by the co-evolution of the social and spatial
organisations of the agents.
Abstract: Arenga pinnata is an abundantly natural fiber that can be used for sound proof material. However, the scientific data of acoustics properties of Arenga pinnata was not available yet. In this study the sound absorption of pure arenga pinnata was measured. The thickness of Arenga pinnata was varied in 10 mm, 20 mm, 30mm, and 40mm. This work was carried out to investigate the potential of using Arenga pinnata fiber as raw material for sound absorbing material. Impedance Tube Method was used to measure sound absorption coefficient (α). The Measurements was done in accordance with ASTM E1050-98, that is the standard test method for impedance and absorption of acoustical materials using a tube, two microphones and a digital frequency analysis system . The results showed that sound absorption coefficients of Arenga pinnata were good from 2000 Hz to 5000 Hz within the range of 0.75 – 0.90. The optimum sound absorption coefficient was obtained from the thickness of 40 mm. These results indicated that Arenga pinnata fiber is promising to be used as raw material of sound absorbing material with low cost, light, and biodegradable.
Abstract: Carbon dioxide capture process has been simulated
and studied under different process conditions. It has been shown
that several process parameters such as lean amine temperature,
number of adsorber stages, number of stripper stages and stripper
pressure affect different process conditions and outputs such as
carbon dioxide removal and reboiler duty. It may be concluded that
the simulation of carbon dioxide capture process can help to estimate
the best process conditions.
Abstract: The performance of modified Fenton (MF) treatment
to promote PAH oxidation in artificially contaminated soil was
investigated in packed soil column with a hydrogen peroxide (H2O2)
delivery system simulating in situ injection. Soil samples were spiked
with phenanthrene (low molecular weight PAH) and fluoranthene
(high molecular weight PAH) to an initial concentration of 500
mg/kg dried soil each. The effectiveness of process parameters
H2O2/soil, iron/soil, chelating agent/soil weight ratios and reaction
time were studied using a 24 three level factorial design experiments.
Statistically significant quadratic models were developed using
Response Surface Methodology (RSM) for degrading PAHs from the
soil samples. Optimum operating condition was achieved at mild
range of H2O2/soil, iron/soil and chelating agent/soil weight ratios,
indicating cost efficient method for treating highly contaminated
lands.
Abstract: The aim of this paper is to study the internal
stabilization of the Bernoulli-Euler equation numerically. For this,
we consider a square plate subjected to a feedback/damping force
distributed only in a subdomain. An algorithm for obtaining an
approximate solution to this problem was proposed and implemented.
The numerical method used was the Finite Difference Method.
Numerical simulations were performed and showed the behavior of
the solution, confirming the theoretical results that have already been
proved in the literature. In addition, we studied the validation of the
numerical scheme proposed, followed by an analysis of the numerical
error; and we conducted a study on the decay of the energy associated.
Abstract: The Ni/α-Al2O3 catalysts with different amounts of La
as promoter from 0 to 4 wt % were prepared, characterized and their
catalytic activity was investigated in syngas methanation reaction.
Effects of reaction temperature and lanthanum loading on carbon
oxides conversion and methane selectivity were also studied. Adding
certain amount of lanthanum to 10Ni /α-Al2O3 catalysts can decrease
the average NiO crystallite diameter which leads to higher activity and
stability while excessive addition would cause deactivation quickly.
Stability on stream towards deactivation was observed up to 800 min
at 500 °C, 0.1MPa and 600000 mL·g-1·h-1.
Abstract: Mobile WiMAX is a broadband wireless solution that
enables convergence of mobile and fixed broadband networks
through a common wide area broadband radio access technology and
flexible network architecture. It adopts Orthogonal Frequency
Division Multiple Access (OFDMA) for improved multi-path
performance in Non-Line-Of-Sight (NLOS) environments. Scalable
OFDMA (SOFDMA) is introduced in the IEEE 802e[1]. WIMAX
system uses one of different types of channel coding but The
mandatory channel coding scheme is based on binary nonrecursive
Convolutional Coding (CC). There are other several optional channel
coding schemes such as block turbo codes, convolutional turbo
codes, and low density parity check (LDPC).
In this paper a comparison between the performance of WIMAX
using turbo code and using convolutional product code (CPC) [2] is
made. Also a combination between them had been done. The CPC
gives good results at different SNR values compared to both the
turbo system, and the combination between them. For example, at
BER equal to 10-2 for 128 subcarriers, the amount of improvement
in SNR equals approximately 3 dB higher than turbo code and equals
approximately 2dB higher than the combination respectively. Several
results are obtained at different modulating schemes (16QAM and
64QAM) and different numbers of sub-carriers (128 and 512).
Abstract: In this paper we study the resource allocation problem
for an OFDMA based cooperative two-way relaying (TWR) network.
We focus on amplify and forward (AF) analog network coding
(ANC) protocol. An optimization problem for two basic resources
namely, sub-carrier and power is formulated for multi-user TWR
networks. A joint optimal optimization problem is investigated and
two-step low complexity sub-optimal resource allocation algorithm is
proposed for multi-user TWR networks with ANC protocol. The
proposed algorithm has been evaluated in term of total achievable
system sum-rate and achievable individual sum-rate for each userpair.
The good tradeoff between system sum-rate and fairness is
observed in the two-step proportional resource allocation scheme.
Abstract: The study area receives a wide variety of wastes
generated by municipalities and the industries like paints and
pigments, metal processing industries, thermal power plants electroprocessing
industries etc. The Physico-chemical and structural
investigation of water from river Pandu indicated high level of
chlorides and calcium which made the water unsuitable for human
use. Algae like Cyclotella fumida, Asterionella Formosa,
Cladophora glomerata, Pediastrum simplex, Scenedesmus bijuga,
Cladophora glomerata were the dominant pollution tolerant species
recorded under these conditions. The sensitive and less abundant
species of algae included Spirogyra sps., Merismopedia sps. The
predominance colonies of Zygnema sps, Phormidium sps,
Mycrocystis aeruginosa, Merismopedia minima, Pandorina morum,
seems to correlate with high organic contents of Pandu river water.
This study assumes significance as some algae can be used as
bioindicators of water pollution and algal floral of a municipal drain
carrying waste effluents from industrial area Kanpur and discharge
them into the river Pandu flowing onto southern outskirts of Kanpur
city.
Abstract: This research aimed to develop plasma system used in air conditioners. This developed plasma system could be installed in the air conditioners - all split type. The quality of air could be improved to be equal to present plasma system. Development processes were as follows: 1) to study the plasma system used in the air conditioners, 2) to design a plasma generator, 3) to develop the plasma generator, and 4) to test its performance in many types of the air conditioners. This plasma system was developed by AC high voltage – 14 kv with a frequency of 50 kHz. Carbon was a conductor to generate arc in air purifier system. The research was tested by installing the plasma generator in the air conditioners - wall type. Whereas, there were 3 types of installations: air flow out, air flow in, and room center. The result of the plasma generator installed in the air conditioners, split type, revealed that the air flow out installation provided the highest average of o-zone at 223 mg/h. This type of installation provided the highest efficiency of air quality improvement. Moreover, the air flow in installation and the room center installation provided the average of the o-zone at 163 mg/h and 64 mg/h, respectively.