Abstract: Since the European renewable energy directives set the
target for 22.1% of electricity generation to be supplied by 2010
[1], there has been increased interest in using green technologies
also within the urban enviroment. The most commonly considered
installations are solar thermal and solar photovoltaics. Nevertheless,
as observed by Bahaj et al. [2], small scale turbines can reduce the
built enviroment related CO2 emissions. Thus, in the last few years,
an increasing number of manufacturers have developed small wind
turbines specifically designed for the built enviroment. The present
work focuses on the integration into architectural systems of such
installations and presents a survey of successful case studies.
Abstract: The Prediction of aerodynamic characteristics and
shape optimization of airfoil under the ground effect have been carried
out by integration of computational fluid dynamics and the multiobjective
Pareto-based genetic algorithm. The main flow
characteristics around an airfoil of WIG craft are lift force, lift-to-drag
ratio and static height stability (H.S). However, they show a strong
trade-off phenomenon so that it is not easy to satisfy the design
requirements simultaneously. This difficulty can be resolved by the
optimal design. The above mentioned three characteristics are chosen
as the objective functions and NACA0015 airfoil is considered as a
baseline model in the present study. The profile of airfoil is
constructed by Bezier curves with fourteen control points and these
control points are adopted as the design variables. For multi-objective
optimization problems, the optimal solutions are not unique but a set
of non-dominated optima and they are called Pareto frontiers or Pareto
sets. As the results of optimization, forty numbers of non- dominated
Pareto optima can be obtained at thirty evolutions.
Abstract: This paper is introduced a modification to Diffie-
Hellman protocol to be applicable on the decimal numbers, which
they are the numbers between zero and one. For this purpose we
extend the theory of the congruence. The new congruence is over
the set of the real numbers and it is called the “real congruence"
or the “real modulus". We will refer to the existing congruence by
the “integer congruence" or the “integer modulus". This extension
will define new terms and redefine the existing terms. As the
properties and the theorems of the integer modulus are extended as
well. Modified Diffie-Hellman key exchange protocol is produced a
sharing, secure and decimal secret key for the the cryptosystems that
depend on decimal numbers.
Abstract: A 3D industrial computed tomography (CT)
manufactured based on a first generation CT systems, single-source
– single-detector, was evaluated. Operation accuracy assessment of
the manufactured system was achieved using simulation in
comparison with experimental tests. 137Cs and 60Co were used as a gamma source. Simulations were achieved using MCNP4C code.
Experimental tests of 137Cs were in good agreement with the simulations
Abstract: This article explores the sociological perspectives on
social problems and the role of the media which has a delicate role to
tread in balancing its duty to the public and the victim Whilst social
problems have objective conditions, it is the subjective definition of
such problems that ensure which social problem comes to the fore
and which doesn-t. Further it explores the roles and functions of
policymakers when addressing social problems and the impact of the
inception of media profiling as well as the advantages and
disadvantages of media profiling towards social problems. It focuses
on the inception of media profiling due to its length and a follow up
article will explore how current media profiling towards social
problems have evolved since its inception.
Abstract: This paper explores university course timetabling
problem. There are several characteristics that make scheduling and
timetabling problems particularly difficult to solve: they have huge
search spaces, they are often highly constrained, they require
sophisticated solution representation schemes, and they usually
require very time-consuming fitness evaluation routines. Thus
standard evolutionary algorithms lack of efficiency to deal with
them. In this paper we have proposed a memetic algorithm that
incorporates the problem specific knowledge such that most of
chromosomes generated are decoded into feasible solutions.
Generating vast amount of feasible chromosomes makes the progress
of search process possible in a time efficient manner. Experimental
results exhibit the advantages of the developed Hybrid Genetic
Algorithm than the standard Genetic Algorithm.
Abstract: This paper presented a modified efficient inductive
powering link based on ASK modulator and proposed efficient class-
E power amplifier. The design presents the external part which is
located outside the body to transfer power and data to the implanted
devices such as implanted Microsystems to stimulate and monitoring
the nerves and muscles. The system operated with low band
frequency 10MHZ according to industrial- scientific – medical (ISM)
band to avoid the tissue heating. For external part, the modulation
index is 11.1% and the modulation rate 7.2% with data rate 1 Mbit/s
assuming Tbit = 1us. The system has been designed using 0.35-μm
fabricated CMOS technology. The mathematical model is given and
the design is simulated using OrCAD P Spice 16.2 software tool and
for real-time simulation, the electronic workbench MULISIM 11 has
been used.
Abstract: TUSAT is a prospective Turkish
Communication Satellite designed for providing mainly data
communication and broadcasting services through Ku-Band
and C-Band channels. Thermal control is a vital issue in
satellite design process. Therefore, all satellite subsystems and
equipments should be maintained in the desired temperature
range from launch to end of maneuvering life. The main
function of the thermal control is to keep the equipments and
the satellite structures in a given temperature range for various
phases and operating modes of spacecraft during its lifetime.
This paper describes the thermal control design which uses
passive and active thermal control concepts. The active
thermal control is based on heaters regulated by software via
thermistors. Alternatively passive thermal control composes of
heat pipes, multilayer insulation (MLI) blankets, radiators,
paints and surface finishes maintaining temperature level of
the overall carrier components within an acceptable value.
Thermal control design is supported by thermal analysis using
thermal mathematical models (TMM).
Abstract: This paper suggests a rethinking of the existing
research about Genetically Modified (GM) food. Since the first batch
of GM food was commercialised in the UK market, GM food rapidly
received and lost media attention in the UK. Disagreement on GM
food policy between the US and the EU has also drawn scholarly
attention to this issue. Much research has been carried out intending to
understand people-s views about GM food and the shaping of these
views. This paper was based on the data collected in twenty-nine
semi-structured interviews, which were examined through Erving
Goffman-s idea of self-presentation in interactions to suggest that the
existing studies investigating “consumer attitudes" towards GM food
have only considered the “front stage" in the dramaturgic metaphor.
This paper suggests that the ways in which people choose to present
themselves when participating these studies should be taken into
account during the data analysis.
Abstract: Decrease in hardware costs and advances in computer
networking technologies have led to increased interest in the use of
large-scale parallel and distributed computing systems. One of the
biggest issues in such systems is the development of effective
techniques/algorithms for the distribution of the processes/load of a
parallel program on multiple hosts to achieve goal(s) such as
minimizing execution time, minimizing communication delays,
maximizing resource utilization and maximizing throughput.
Substantive research using queuing analysis and assuming job
arrivals following a Poisson pattern, have shown that in a multi-host
system the probability of one of the hosts being idle while other host
has multiple jobs queued up can be very high. Such imbalances in
system load suggest that performance can be improved by either
transferring jobs from the currently heavily loaded hosts to the lightly
loaded ones or distributing load evenly/fairly among the hosts .The
algorithms known as load balancing algorithms, helps to achieve the
above said goal(s). These algorithms come into two basic categories -
static and dynamic. Whereas static load balancing algorithms (SLB)
take decisions regarding assignment of tasks to processors based on
the average estimated values of process execution times and
communication delays at compile time, Dynamic load balancing
algorithms (DLB) are adaptive to changing situations and take
decisions at run time.
The objective of this paper work is to identify qualitative
parameters for the comparison of above said algorithms. In future this
work can be extended to develop an experimental environment to
study these Load balancing algorithms based on comparative
parameters quantitatively.
Abstract: As wind, solar and other clean and green energy
sources gain popularity worldwide, engineers are seeking ways to
make renewable energy systems more affordable and to integrate
them with existing ac power grids. In the present paper an attempt
has been made for integrating the PV arrays to the smart nano grid
using an artificial intelligent (AI) based solar powered cascade multilevel
inverter. The AI based controller switching scheme has been
used for improving the power quality by reducing the Total Harmonic
Distortion (THD) of the multi-level inverter output voltage.
Abstract: The element of justice or al-‘adl in the context of
Islamic critical thinking deals with the notion of justice in a thinking
process which critically rationalizes the truth in a fair and objective
manner with no irrelevant interference that can jeopardize a sound
judgment. This Islamic axiological element is vital in technological
decision making as it addresses the issues of religious values and
ethics that are primarily set to fulfill the purpose of human life on
earth. The main objective of this study was to examine and analyze
the perception of Muslim engineering students in Malaysian higher
education institutions towards the concept of al-‘adl as an essential
element of Islamic critical thinking. The study employed mixed
methods approach that comprises data collection from the
questionnaire survey and the interview responses. A total of 557
Muslim engineering undergraduates from six Malaysian universities
participated in the study. The study generally indicated that Muslim
engineering undergraduates in the higher institutions have rather
good comprehension and consciousness for al-‘adl with a slight
awareness on the importance of objective thinking. Nonetheless there
were a few items on the concept that have implied a comparatively
low perception on the rational justice in Islam as the means to grasp
the ultimate truth.
Abstract: Soil stabilization has been widely used to improve
soil strength and durability or to prevent erosion and dust generation.
Generally to reduce problems of clayey soils in engineering work and
to stabilize these soils additional materials are used. The most
common materials are lime, fly ash and cement. Using this materials,
although improve soil property , but in some cases due to financial
problems and the need to use special equipment are limited .One of
the best methods for stabilization clayey soils is neutralization the
clay particles. For this purpose we can use ion exchange materials.
Ion exchange solution like CBR plus can be used for soil
stabilization. One of the most important things in using CBR plus is
determination the amount of this solution for various soils with
different properties. In this study a laboratory experiment is conduct
to evaluate the ion exchange capacity of three soils with various
plasticity index (PI) to determine amount or required CBR plus
solution for soil stabilization.
Abstract: Wind farms (WFs) with high level of penetration are
being established in power systems worldwide more rapidly than
other renewable resources. The Independent System Operator (ISO),
as a policy maker, should propose appropriate places for WF
installation in order to maximize the benefits for the investors. There
is also a possibility of congestion relief using the new installation of
WFs which should be taken into account by the ISO when proposing
the locations for WF installation. In this context, efficient wind farm
(WF) placement method is proposed in order to reduce burdens on
congested lines. Since the wind speed is a random variable and load
forecasts also contain uncertainties, probabilistic approaches are used
for this type of study. AC probabilistic optimal power flow (P-OPF)
is formulated and solved using Monte Carlo Simulations (MCS). In
order to reduce computation time, point estimate methods (PEM) are
introduced as efficient alternative for time-demanding MCS.
Subsequently, WF optimal placement is determined using generation
shift distribution factors (GSDF) considering a new parameter
entitled, wind availability factor (WAF). In order to obtain more
realistic results, N-1 contingency analysis is employed to find the
optimal size of WF, by means of line outage distribution factors
(LODF). The IEEE 30-bus test system is used to show and compare
the accuracy of proposed methodology.
Abstract: Diagnosis can be achieved by building a model of a
certain organ under surveillance and comparing it with the real time
physiological measurements taken from the patient. This paper deals
with the presentation of the benefits of using Data Mining techniques
in the computer-aided diagnosis (CAD), focusing on the cancer
detection, in order to help doctors to make optimal decisions quickly
and accurately. In the field of the noninvasive diagnosis techniques,
the endoscopic ultrasound elastography (EUSE) is a recent elasticity
imaging technique, allowing characterizing the difference between
malignant and benign tumors. Digitalizing and summarizing the main
EUSE sample movies features in a vector form concern with the use
of the exploratory data analysis (EDA). Neural networks are then
trained on the corresponding EUSE sample movies vector input in
such a way that these intelligent systems are able to offer a very
precise and objective diagnosis, discriminating between benign and
malignant tumors. A concrete application of these Data Mining
techniques illustrates the suitability and the reliability of this
methodology in CAD.
Abstract: The quest of providing more secure identification
system has led to a rise in developing biometric systems. Dorsal
hand vein pattern is an emerging biometric which has attracted the
attention of many researchers, of late. Different approaches have
been used to extract the vein pattern and match them. In this work,
Principle Component Analysis (PCA) which is a method that has
been successfully applied on human faces and hand geometry is
applied on the dorsal hand vein pattern. PCA has been used to obtain
eigenveins which is a low dimensional representation of vein pattern
features. Low cost CCD cameras were used to obtain the vein
images. The extraction of the vein pattern was obtained by applying
morphology. We have applied noise reduction filters to enhance the
vein patterns. The system has been successfully tested on a database
of 200 images using a threshold value of 0.9. The results obtained are
encouraging.
Abstract: This paper proposes a new optimization techniques
for the optimization a gas processing plant uncertain feed and
product flows. The problem is first formulated using a continuous
linear deterministic approach. Subsequently, the single and joint
chance constraint models for steady state process with timedependent
uncertainties have been developed. The solution approach
is based on converting the probabilistic problems into their
equivalent deterministic form and solved at different confidence
levels Case study for a real plant operation has been used to
effectively implement the proposed model. The optimization results
indicate that prior decision has to be made for in-operating plant
under uncertain feed and product flows by satisfying all the
constraints at 95% confidence level for single chance constrained and
85% confidence level for joint chance constrained optimizations
cases.
Abstract: The paper attempts a synthesis of problems relating to
municipal waste management in Nigeria and proposes a conceptual
knowledge management approach for tackling municipal waste
problems in cities across Nigeria. The application of knowledge
management approach and strategy is crucial for inculcating a change
of attitude towards improving the management of waste. The paper is
a review of existing literatures, information, policies and data on
municipal waste management in Nigeria. The inefficient management
of waste by individuals, households, consumers and waste
management companies can be attributed to inadequate information
on waste management benefits, lack of producers- involvement in
waste management as well as poor implementation of government
policies. The paper presents an alternative approach providing
solutions promoting efficient municipal waste management.
Abstract: This study uses GIS (Geographic Information
Systems) to conduct an evaluation of the degree of the sufficiency of
public green spaces such as parks and urban green areas as an
indicator of the density of metropolitan areas, in particular the Chubu
metropolitan area, in Japan. To that end, it first grasps the distribution
situation of green spaces in the three metropolitan areas in Japan,
especially in the Chubu metropolitan area, using GIS digital maps.
And based on this result, it conducts a GIS evaluation of the degree of
sufficiency of public green spaces and arranges the result for every
distance belt from the central part to compare and exam for every
distance belt away from the center in the Chubu metropolitan area.
Furthermore, after pointing out the insufficient areas of public green
spaces based on the result, it also proposes the improvement policy
which can be introduced in the Chubu metropolitan area.
Abstract: Over the past decade, mobile has experienced a
revolution that will ultimately change the way we communicate.All
these technologies have a common denominator exploitation of
computer information systems, but their operation can be tedious
because of problems with heterogeneous data sources.To overcome
the problems of heterogeneous data sources, we propose to use a
technique of adding an extra layer interfacing applications of
management or supervision at the different data sources.This layer
will be materialized by the implementation of a mediator between
different host applications and information systems frequently used
hierarchical and relational manner such that the heterogeneity is
completely transparent to the VoIP platform.