Abstract: The aim of this article is to assess the existing
business models used by the banks operating in the CEE countries in
the time period from 2006 till 2011.
In order to obtain research results, the authors performed
qualitative analysis of the scientific literature on bank business
models, which have been grouped into clusters that consist of such
components as: 1) capital and reserves; 2) assets; 3) deposits, and 4)
loans.
In their turn, bank business models have been developed based on
the types of core activities of the banks, and have been divided into
four groups: Wholesale, Investment, Retail and Universal Banks.
Descriptive statistics have been used to analyse the models,
determining mean, minimal and maximal values of constituent
cluster components, as well as standard deviation. The analysis of
the data is based on such bank variable indices as Return on Assets
(ROA) and Return on Equity (ROE).
Abstract: Since 2008 a new economic crisis is present is the
entire planet. This crisis affects several domains of the economic but
also of the social life. Consumption decreases due to the lack of
necessary resources of households to increase their expenditures. The
car manufacturing is one of the main industrial activities in European
Union (EU) and the present crisis particularly affects it. The present
study examines the correlations between several socio-economic
indicators and car market in European Union. The target is to find out
the impact of the present economic crisis on the car market in EU.
Abstract: Consumer demand for products with low fat or sugar content and low levels of food additives, as well as cost factors, make exopolysaccharides (EPS) a viable alternative. EPS remain an interesting tool to modulate the sensory properties of yoghurt. This study was designed to evaluate EPS production potential of commercial yoghurt starter cultures (Yo-Flex starters: Harmony 1.0, TWIST 1.0 and YF-L902, Chr.Hansen, Denmark) and their influence on an apparent viscosity of yoghurt samples. The production of intracellularly synthesized EPS by different commercial yoghurt starters varies roughly from 144,08 to 440,81 mg/l. Analysing starters’ producing EPS, they showed large variations in concentration and supposedly composition. TWIST 1.0 had produced greater amounts of EPS in MRS medium and in yoghurt samples but there wasn’t determined significant contribution to development of texture as well as an apparent viscosity of the final product. YF-L902 and Harmony 1.0 starters differed considerably in EPS yields, but not in apparent viscosities (p>0.05) of the final yoghurts. Correlation between EPS concentration and viscosity of yoghurt samples was not established in the study.
Abstract: Spent petroleum catalyst from Korean petrochemical
industry contains trace amount of metals such as Ni, V and Mo.
Therefore an attempt was made to recover those trace metal using
bioleaching process. Different leaching parameters such as Fe(II)
concentration, pulp density, pH, temperature and particle size of
spent catalyst particle were studied to evaluate their effects on the
leaching efficiency. All the three metal ions like Ni, V and Mo
followed dual kinetics, i.e., initial faster followed by slower rate. The
percentage of leaching efficiency of Ni and V were higher than Mo.
The leaching process followed a diffusion controlled model and the
product layer was observed to be impervious due to formation of
ammonium jarosite (NH4)Fe3(SO4)2(OH)6. In addition, the lower
leaching efficiency of Mo was observed due to a hydrophobic coating
of elemental sulfur over Mo matrix in the spent catalyst.
Abstract: Human-related information security breaches within organizations are primarily caused by employees who have not been made aware of the importance of protecting the information they work with. Information security awareness is accordingly attracting more attention from industry, because stakeholders are held accountable for the information with which they work. The authors developed an Information Security Retrieval and Awareness model – entitled “ISRA" – that is tailored specifically towards enhancing information security awareness in industry amongst all users of information, to address shortcomings in existing information security awareness models. This paper is principally aimed at expounding a prototype for the ISRA model to highlight the advantages of utilizing the model. The prototype will focus on the non-technical, humanrelated information security issues in industry. The prototype will ensure that all stakeholders in an organization are part of an information security awareness process, and that these stakeholders are able to retrieve specific information related to information security issues relevant to their job category, preventing them from being overburdened with redundant information.
Abstract: This paper presents a low cost automatic system for
sampling the electric field in a limited area. The scanning area is a
flat surface parallel to the ground at a selected height. We discuss
in detail the hardware, software and all the arrangements involved
in the system operation. In order to show the system performance
we include a campaign of narrow band measurements with 6017
sample points in the surroundings of a cellular base station. A
commercial isotropic antenna with three orthogonal axes was used
as sampling device. The results are analyzed in terms of its space
average, standard deviation and statistical distribution.
Abstract: This paper proposes a low power SRAM based on
five transistor SRAM cell. Proposed SRAM uses novel word-line
decoding such that, during read/write operation, only selected cell
connected to bit-line whereas, in conventional SRAM (CV-SRAM),
all cells in selected row connected to their bit-lines, which in turn
develops differential voltages across all bit-lines, and this makes
energy consumption on unselected bit-lines. In proposed SRAM
memory array divided into two halves and this causes data-line
capacitance to reduce. Also proposed SRAM uses one bit-line and
thus has lower bit-line leakage compared to CV-SRAM.
Furthermore, the proposed SRAM incurs no area overhead, and has
comparable read/write performance versus the CV-SRAM.
Simulation results in standard 0.25μm CMOS technology shows in
worst case proposed SRAM has 80% smaller dynamic energy
consumption in each cycle compared to CV-SRAM. Besides, energy
consumption in each cycle of proposed SRAM and CV-SRAM
investigated analytically, the results of which are in good agreement
with the simulation results.
Abstract: With major technological advances and to reduce the
cost of training apprentices for real-time critical systems, it was
necessary the development of Intelligent Tutoring Systems for
training apprentices in these systems. These systems, in general, have
interactive features so that the learning is actually more efficient,
making the learner more familiar with the mechanism in question. In
the home stage of learning, tests are performed to obtain the student's
income, a measure on their use. The aim of this paper is to present a
framework to model an Intelligent Tutoring Systems using the UML
language. The various steps of the analysis are considered the
diagrams required to build a general model, whose purpose is to
present the different perspectives of its development.
Abstract: In a world worried about water resources with the
shadow of drought and famine looming all around, the quality of
water is as important as its quantity. The source of all concerns is the
constant reduction of per capita quality water for different uses.
Iran With an average annual precipitation of 250 mm compared to
the 800 mm world average, Iran is considered a water scarce country
and the disparity in the rainfall distribution, the limitations of
renewable resources and the population concentration in the margins
of desert and water scarce areas have intensified the problem.
The shortage of per capita renewable freshwater and its poor
quality in large areas of the country, which have saline, brackish or
hard water resources, and the profusion of natural and artificial
pollutant have caused the deterioration of water quality.
Among methods of treatment and use of these waters one can refer
to the application of membrane technologies, which have come into
focus in recent years due to their great advantages. This process is
quite efficient in eliminating multi-capacity ions; and due to the
possibilities of production at different capacities, application as
treatment process in points of use, and the need for less energy in
comparison to Reverse Osmosis processes, it can revolutionize the
water and wastewater sector in years to come. The article studied the
different capacities of water resources in the Persian Gulf and Oman
Sea watershed basins, and processes the possibility of using
nanofiltration process to treat brackish and non-conventional waters
in these basins.
Abstract: This paper illustrates the use of a combined neural
network model for classification of electrocardiogram (ECG) beats.
We present a trainable neural network ensemble approach to develop
customized electrocardiogram beat classifier in an effort to further
improve the performance of ECG processing and to offer
individualized health care.
We process a three stage technique for detection of premature
ventricular contraction (PVC) from normal beats and other heart
diseases. This method includes a denoising, a feature extraction and a
classification. At first we investigate the application of stationary
wavelet transform (SWT) for noise reduction of the
electrocardiogram (ECG) signals. Then feature extraction module
extracts 10 ECG morphological features and one timing interval
feature. Then a number of multilayer perceptrons (MLPs) neural
networks with different topologies are designed.
The performance of the different combination methods as well as
the efficiency of the whole system is presented. Among them,
Stacked Generalization as a proposed trainable combined neural
network model possesses the highest recognition rate of around 95%.
Therefore, this network proves to be a suitable candidate in ECG
signal diagnosis systems. ECG samples attributing to the different
ECG beat types were extracted from the MIT-BIH arrhythmia
database for the study.
Abstract: Daily production of information and importance of the sequence of produced data in forecasting future performance of market causes analysis of data behavior to become a problem of analyzing time series. But time series that are very complicated, usually are random and as a result their changes considered being unpredictable. While these series might be products of a deterministic dynamical and nonlinear process (chaotic) and as a result be predictable. Point of Chaotic theory view, complicated systems have only chaotically face and as a result they seem to be unregulated and random, but it is possible that they abide by a specified math formula. In this article, with regard to test of strange attractor and biggest Lyapunov exponent probability of chaos on several foreign exchange rates vs. IRR (Iranian Rial) has been investigated. Results show that data in this market have complex chaotic behavior with big degree of freedom.
Abstract: The clustering ensembles combine multiple partitions
generated by different clustering algorithms into a single clustering
solution. Clustering ensembles have emerged as a prominent method
for improving robustness, stability and accuracy of unsupervised
classification solutions. So far, many contributions have been done to
find consensus clustering. One of the major problems in clustering
ensembles is the consensus function. In this paper, firstly, we
introduce clustering ensembles, representation of multiple partitions,
its challenges and present taxonomy of combination algorithms.
Secondly, we describe consensus functions in clustering ensembles
including Hypergraph partitioning, Voting approach, Mutual
information, Co-association based functions and Finite mixture
model, and next explain their advantages, disadvantages and
computational complexity. Finally, we compare the characteristics of
clustering ensembles algorithms such as computational complexity,
robustness, simplicity and accuracy on different datasets in previous
techniques.
Abstract: Steel corrosion in concrete is considered as a main
engineering problems for many countries and lots of expenses has been paid for their repair and maintenance annually. This problem
may occur in all engineering structures whether in coastal and offshore or other areas. Hence, concrete structures should be able to
withstand corrosion factors existing in water or soil. Reinforcing
steel corrosion enhancement can be measured by use of concrete
electrical resistance; and maintaining high electric resistivity in concrete is necessary for steel corrosion prevention. Lots of studies
devoted to different aspects of the subjects worldwide. In this paper, an evaluation of the effects of W/C ratio, cementitious materials, and
percent increase in silica fume were investigated on electric resistivity of high strength concrete. To do that, sixteen mix design
with one aggregate grading was planned. Five of them had varying amount of W/C ratio and other eleven mixes was prepared with
constant W/C ratio but different amount of cementitious materials.
Silica fume and super plasticizer were used with different proportions
in all specimens. Specimens were tested after moist curing for 28 days. A total of 80 cube specimens (50 mm) were tested for concrete
electrical resistance. Results show that concrete electric resistivity can be increased with increasing amount of cementitious materials
and silica fume.
Abstract: The design requirements for successful human
accommodation in urban spaces are well known; and the range of
facilities available for meeting urban water quality and quantity
requirements is also well established. Their competing requirements
must be reconciled in order for urban spaces to be successful for
both. This paper outlines the separate human and water imperatives
and their interactions in urban spaces. Stormwater management
facilities- relative potential contributions to urban spaces are
contrasted, and design choices for achieving those potentials are
described. This study uses human success of urban space as the
evaluative criterion of stormwater amenity: human values call on
stormwater facilities to contribute to successful human spaces.
Placing water-s contribution under the overall idea of successful
urban space is an evolution from previous subjective evaluations.
The information is based on photographs and notes from
approximately 1,000 stormwater facilities and urban sites collected
during the last 35 years in North America and overseas, and the
author-s experience on multi-disciplinary design teams. This
conceptual study combines the disciplinary roles of engineering,
landscape architecture, and sociology in effecting successful urban
design.
Abstract: Chess is one of the indoor games, which improves the
level of human confidence, concentration, planning skills and
knowledge. The main objective of this paper is to help the chess
players to improve their chess openings using data mining
techniques. Budding Chess Players usually do practices by analyzing
various existing openings. When they analyze and correlate
thousands of openings it becomes tedious and complex for them. The
work done in this paper is to analyze the best lines of Blackmar-
Diemer Gambit(BDG) which opens with White D4... using data
mining analysis. It is carried out on the collection of winning games
by applying association rules. The first step of this analysis is
assigning variables to each different sequence moves. In the second
step, the sequence association rules were generated to calculate
support and confidence factor which help us to find the best
subsequence chess moves that may lead to winning position.
Abstract: A virtual collaborative classroom was created at East Carolina University, using videoconference technology via regular internet to bring students from 18 different countries, 2 at a time, to the ECU classroom in real time to learn about each other-s culture. Students from two countries are partnered one on one, they meet for 4-5 weeks, and submit a joint paper. Then the same process is repeated for two other countries. Lectures and student discussions are managed with pre-determined topics and questions. Classes are conducted in English and reading assignments are placed on the website. Administratively all partners are independent, students pay fees and get credits at their home institution. Familiarity with technology, knowledge in cultural understanding and attitude change were assessed, only attitude changes are reported in this paper. After taking this course, all students stated their comfort level in working with, and their desire to interact with, culturally different others grew stronger and their xenophobia and isolationist attitudes decreased.
Abstract: We developed a non-contact method for the in-situ
monitoring of the thermal forming of glass and Si foils to optimize
the manufacture of mirrors for high-resolution space x-ray
telescopes. Their construction requires precise and light-weight
segmented optics with angular resolution better than 5 arcsec. We
used 75x25 mm Desag D263 glass foils 0.75 mm thick and 0.6 mm
thick Si foils. The glass foils were shaped by free slumping on a
frame at viscosities in the range of 109.3-1012 dPa·s, the Si foils by
forced slumping above 1000°C. Using a Nikon D80 digital camera,
we took snapshots of a foil-s shape every 5 min during its isothermal
heat treatment. The obtained results we can use for computer
simulations. By comparing the measured and simulated data, we can
more precisely define material properties of the foils and optimize
the forming technology.
Abstract: Irradiation is considered one of the most efficient technological processes for the reduction of microorganisms in food. It can be used to improve the safety of food products, and to extend their shelf lives. The aim of this study was to evaluate the effects of gamma irradiation for improvement of saffron shelf life. Samples were treated with 0 (none irradiated), 1.0, 2.0, 3.0 and 4.0 kGy of gamma irradiation and held for 2 months. The control and irradiated samples were underwent microbial analysis, chemical characteristics and sensory evaluation at 30 days intervals. Microbial analysis indicated that irradiation had a significant effect (P < 0.05) on the reduction of microbial loads. There was no significant difference in sensory quality and chemical characteristics during storage in saffron.
Abstract: In order to investigate water deficit stress on 24 of
soybean (Glycine Max. L) cultivars and lines in temperate climate, an
experiment was conducted in Iran Seed and Plant Improvement
Institute. Stress levels were irrigation after evaporation of 50, 100,
150 mm water from pan, class A. Randomized Completely Block
Design was arranged for each stress levels. Some traits such as, node
number, plant height, pod number per area, grain number per pod,
grain number per area, 1000 grains weight, grain yield and harvest
index were measured. Results showed that water deficit stress had
significant effect on node number, plant height, pod number per area,
grain number per pod, grain number per area, 1000 grains weight and
harvest index. Also all of agronomic traits except harvest index
influenced significantly by cultivars and lines. The least and most
grain yield was belonged to Ronak X Williams and M41 x Clark
respectively.
Abstract: Coarse and fine particulate matter were collected at a
residential area at Vashi, Navi Mumbai and the filter samples were
analysed for trace elements using PIXE technique. The trend of
particulate matter showed higher concentrations during winter than
the summer and monsoon concentration levels. High concentrations
of elements related to soil and sea salt were found in PM10 and
PM2.5. Also high levels of zinc and sulphur found in the particulates
of both the size fractions. EF analysis showed enrichment of Cu, Cr
and Mn only in the fine fraction suggesting their origin from
anthropogenic sources. The EF value was observed to be maximum
for As, Pb and Zn in the fine particulates. However, crustal derived
elements showed very low EF values indicating their origin from
soil. The PCA based multivariate studies identified soil, sea salt,
combustion and Se sources as common sources for coarse and
additionally an industrial source has also been identified for fine
particles.