Abstract: In this paper, an attempt is made to compute the total
optimal cost of interdependent queuing system with controllable
arrival rates as an important performance measure of the system. An
example of application has also been presented to exhibit the use of
the model. Finally, numerical demonstration based on a computing
algorithm and variational effects of the model with the help of the
graph have also been presented.
Abstract: To model the human visual system (HVS) in the region of interest, we propose a new objective metric evaluation adapted to wavelet foveation-based image compression quality measurement, which exploits a foveation setup filter implementation technique in the DWT domain, based especially on the point and region of fixation of the human eye. This model is then used to predict the visible divergences between an original and compressed image with respect to this region field and yields an adapted and local measure error by removing all peripheral errors. The technique, which we call foveation wavelet visible difference prediction (FWVDP), is demonstrated on a number of noisy images all of which have the same local peak signal to noise ratio (PSNR), but visibly different errors. We show that the FWVDP reliably predicts the fixation areas of interest where error is masked, due to high image contrast, and the areas where the error is visible, due to low image contrast. The paper also suggests ways in which the FWVDP can be used to determine a visually optimal quantization strategy for foveation-based wavelet coefficients and to produce a quantitative local measure of image quality.
Abstract: Porcelain specimens were fired at 6C/min to 1250C (dwell time 0.5-3h) and cooled at 6C/min to room temperature. Additionally, three different slower firing/cooling cycles were tried. Sintering profile and effects on MOR, crystalline phase content and morphology were investigated using dilatometry, 4-point bending strength, XRD and FEG-SEM respectively. Industrial-sized specimens prepared using the promising cycle were tested basing on the ANSI standards. Increasing dwell time from 1h to 3h at peak temperature of 1250C resulted in neither a significant effect on the quartz and mullite content nor MOR. Reducing the firing/cooling rate to below 6C/min, for peak temperature of 1250C (dwell time of 1h) does not result in improvement of strength of porcelain. The industrial sized specimen exhibited flashover voltages of 20.3kV (dry) and 9.3kV (wet) respectively, transverse strength of 12.5kN and bulk density of 2.27g/cm3, which are satisfactory. There was however dye penetration during porosity test. KeywordsDwell time, Microstructure, Porcelain, Strength.
Abstract: Measuring the complexity of software has been an
insoluble problem in software engineering. Complexity measures can
be used to predict critical information about testability, reliability,
and maintainability of software systems from automatic analysis of
the source code. During the past few years, many complexity
measures have been invented based on the emerging Cognitive
Informatics discipline. These software complexity measures,
including cognitive functional size, lend themselves to the approach
of the total cognitive weights of basic control structures such as loops
and branches. This paper shows that the current existing calculation
method can generate different results that are algebraically
equivalence. However, analysis of the combinatorial meanings of this
calculation method shows significant flaw of the measure, which also
explains why it does not satisfy Weyuker's properties. Based on the
findings, improvement directions, such as measures fusion, and
cumulative variable counting scheme are suggested to enhance the
effectiveness of cognitive complexity measures.
Abstract: Within the realm of e-government, the development has moved towards testing new means for democratic decisionmaking, like e-panels, electronic discussion forums, and polls. Although such new developments seem promising, they are not problem-free, and the outcomes are seldom used in the subsequent formal political procedures. Nevertheless, process models offer promising potential when it comes to structuring and supporting transparency of decision processes in order to facilitate the integration of the public into decision-making procedures in a reasonable and manageable way. Based on real-life cases of urban planning processes in Sweden, we present an outline for an integrated framework for public decision making to: a) provide tools for citizens to organize discussion and create opinions; b) enable governments, authorities, and institutions to better analyse these opinions; and c) enable governments to account for this information in planning and societal decision making by employing a process model for structured public decision making.
Abstract: We fabricated the inverted-staggered etch stopper
structure oxide-based TFT and investigated the characteristics of oxide
TFT under the 400 nm wavelength light illumination. When 400 nm
light was illuminated, the threshold voltage (Vth) decreased and
subthreshold slope (SS) increased at forward sweep, while Vth and SS
were not altered when larger wavelength lights, such as 650 nm, 550
nm and 450 nm, were illuminated. At reverse sweep, the transfer curve
barely changed even under 400 nm light. Our experimental results
support that photo-induced hole carriers are captured by donor-like
interface trap and it caused the decrease of Vth and increase of SS. We
investigated the interface trap density increases proportionally to the
photo-induced hole concentration at active layer.
Abstract: The experiment was conducted to study the effect of
rearing systems on fatty acid composition and cholesterol content of
Thai indigenous chicken meat. Three hundred and sixty chicks were
allocated to 2 different rearing systems: conventional, housing in an
indoor pen (5 birds/m2); free-range, housing in an indoor pen (5
birds/m2) with access to a grass paddock (1 bird/m2) from 8 wk of age
until slaughter. All birds were provided with the same diet during the
experimental period. At 16 wk of age, 24 birds per group were
slaughtered to evaluate the fatty acid composition and cholesterol
content of breast and thigh meat. The results showed that the
proportion of SFA, MUFA and PUFA in breast and thigh meat were
not different among groups (P>0.05). However, the proportion of n-3
fatty acids was higher and the ratio of n-6 to n-3 fatty acids was lower
in free-range system than in conventional system (P0.05). The data indicated that the free-range system
could increase the proportion of n-3 fatty acids, but no effect on
cholesterol content in Thai indigenous chicken meat.
Abstract: In this work, the condensation fraction and transition
temperature of neutral many bosonic system are studied within the
static fluctuation approximation (SFA). The effect of the potential
parameters such as the strength and range on the condensate fraction
was investigated. A model potential consisting of a repulsive step
potential and an attractive potential well was used. As the potential
strength or the core radius of the repulsive part increases, the
condensation fraction is found to be decreased at the same
temperature. Also, as the potential depth or the range of the attractive
part increases, the condensation fraction is found to be increased. The
transition temperature is decreased as the potential strength or the
core radius of the repulsive part increases, and it increases as the
potential depth or the range of the attractive part increases.
Abstract: The present work was conducted for the synthesis of
nano size zerovalent iron (nZVI) and hexavalent chromium (Cr(VI))
removal as a highly toxic pollutant by using this nanoparticles. Batch
experiments were performed to investigate the effects of Cr(VI),
nZVI concentration, pH of solution and contact time variation on
the removal efficiency of Cr(VI). nZVI was synthesized by
reduction of ferric chloride using sodium borohydrid. SEM and
XRD examinations applied for determination of particle size and
characterization of produced nanoparticles. The results showed that
the removal efficiency decreased with Cr(VI) concentration and pH
of solution and increased with adsorbent dosage and contact time.
The Langmuir and Freundlich isotherm models were used for the
adsorption equilibrium data and the Langmuir isotherm model was
well fitted. Nanoparticle ZVI presented an outstanding ability to
remove Cr(VI) due to high surface area, low particle size and high
inherent activity.
Abstract: Weblogs are resource of social structure to discover and track the various type of information written by blogger. In this paper, we proposed to use mining weblogs technique for identifying the trends of influenza where blogger had disseminated their opinion for the anomaly disease. In order to identify the trends, web crawler is applied to perform a search and generated a list of visited links based on a set of influenza keywords. This information is used to implement the analytics report system for monitoring and analyzing the pattern and trends of influenza (H1N1). Statistical and graphical analysis reports are generated. Both types of the report have shown satisfactory reports that reflect the awareness of Malaysian on the issue of influenza outbreak through blogs.
Abstract: We consider a cooperative game played by n players against a referee. The players names are randomly distributed among n lockers, with one name per locker. Each player can open up to half the lockers and each player must find his name. Once the game starts the players may not communicate. It has been previously shown that, quite surprisingly, an optimal strategy exists for which the success probability is never worse than 1 − ln 2 ≈ 0.306. In this paper we consider an extension where the number of lockers is greater than the number of players, so that some lockers are empty. We show that the players may still win with positive probability even if there are a constant k number of empty lockers. We show that for each fixed probability p, there is a constant c so that the players can win with probability at least p if they are allowed to open cn lockers.
Abstract: One of the basic concepts in marketing is the concept
of meeting customers- needs. Since customer satisfaction is essential
for lasting survival and development of a business, screening and
observing customer satisfaction and recognizing its underlying
factors must be one of the key activities of every business.
The purpose of this study is to recognize the drivers that effect
customer satisfaction in a business-to-business situation in order to
improve marketing activities. We conducted a survey in which 93
business customers of a manufacturer of Diesel Generator in Iran
participated and they talked about their ideas and satisfaction of
supplier-s services related to its products. We developed the measures
for drivers of satisfaction first by as investigative research (by means
of feedback from executives and customers of sponsoring firm). Then
based on these measures, we created a mail survey, and asked the
respondents to explain their opinion about the sponsoring firm which
was a supplier of diesel generator and similar products. Furthermore,
the survey required the participants to mention their functional areas
and their company features.
In Conclusion we found that there are three drivers for customer
satisfaction, which are reliability, information about product, and
commercial features. Buyers/users from different functional areas
attribute different degree of importance to the last two drivers. For
instance, people from buying and management areas believe that
commercial features are more important than information about
products. But people in engineering, maintenance and production
areas believe that having information about products is more
important than commercial aspects. Marketing experts should
consider the attribute of customers regarding information about the
product and commercial features to improve market share.
Abstract: This paper proposes a delay-dependent leader-following consensus condition of multi-agent systems with both communication delay and probabilistic self-delay. The proposed methods employ a suitable piecewise Lyapunov-Krasovskii functional and the average dwell time approach. New consensus criterion for the systems are established in terms of linear matrix inequalities (LMIs) which can be easily solved by various effective optimization algorithms. Numerical example showed that the proposed method is effective.
Abstract: This research tries to analyze the role that knowledge
about foreign markets has in increasing firms- exports in clustered
spaces. We consider two interrelated sources of knowledge: firms-
direct experience and indirect experience from other clustered firms –
export externalities. In particular, it is proposed that firms would
improve their export performance by accessing to export externalities
if they have some previous direct experience that allows them to
identify, understand and exploit them. Also, we propose that this
positive influence of previous direct experience on export
externalities keeps only up to a point, where it becomes negative,
creating an inverted “U" shape. Empirical evidence gathered among
wine producers located in La Rioja tends to confirm that firms enjoy
of export externalities if they have export experience along several
years and countries increase their export performance. While this
relationship becomes less relevant as they develop a higher
experience, we could not confirm the existence of a curvilinear
relationship in their influence on export externalities and export
performance.
Abstract: An intuitive user interface for the teleoperation of mobile rescue robots is one key feature for a successful exploration of inaccessible and no-go areas. Therefore, we have developed a novel framework to embed a flexible and modular user interface into a complete 3-D virtual reality simulation system. Our approach is based on a client-server architecture to allow for a collaborative control of the rescue robot together with multiple clients on demand. Further, it is important that the user interface is not restricted to any specific type of mobile robot. Therefore, our flexible approach allows for the operation of different robot types with a consistent concept and user interface. In laboratory tests, we have evaluated the validity and effectiveness of our approach with the help of two different robot platforms and several input devices. As a result, an untrained person can intuitively teleoperate both robots without needing a familiarization time when changing the operating robot.
Abstract: In the last years, the computers have increased their capacity of calculus and networks, for the interconnection of these machines. The networks have been improved until obtaining the actual high rates of data transferring. The programs that nowadays try to take advantage of these new technologies cannot be written using the traditional techniques of programming, since most of the algorithms were designed for being executed in an only processor,in a nonconcurrent form instead of being executed concurrently ina set of processors working and communicating through a network.This paper aims to present the ongoing development of a new system for the reconfiguration of grouping of computers, taking into account these new technologies.
Abstract: In this study the mixed convection heat transfer in a
coil-in-shell heat exchanger for various Reynolds numbers and
various dimensionless coil pitch was experimentally investigated.
The experiments were conducted for both laminar and turbulent flow
inside coil and the effects of coil pitch on shell-side heat transfer
coefficient of the heat exchanger were studied. The particular
difference in this study in comparison with the other similar studies
was the boundary conditions for the helical coils. The results indicate
that with the increase of coil pitch, shell-side heat transfer coefficient
is increased.
Abstract: The intelligent fuzzy input estimator is used to estimate
the input force of the rigid bar structural system in this study. The
fuzzy Kalman filter without the input term and the fuzzy weighting
recursive least square estimator are two main portions of this method.
The practicability and accuracy of the proposed method were verified
with numerical simulations from which the input forces of a rigid bar
structural system were estimated from the output responses. In order to
examine the accuracy of the proposed method, a rigid bar structural
system is subjected to periodic sinusoidal dynamic loading. The
excellent performance of this estimator is demonstrated by comparing
it with the use of difference weighting function and improper the
initial process noise covariance. The estimated results have a good
agreement with the true values in all cases tested.
Abstract: This paper presents dynamic voltage collapse prediction on an actual power system using support vector machines.
Dynamic voltage collapse prediction is first determined based on the PTSI calculated from information in dynamic simulation output. Simulations were carried out on a practical 87 bus test system by considering load increase as the contingency. The data collected from the time domain simulation is then used as input to the SVM in which support vector regression is used as a predictor to determine the
dynamic voltage collapse indices of the power system. To reduce training time and improve accuracy of the SVM, the Kernel function type and Kernel parameter are considered. To verify the
effectiveness of the proposed SVM method, its performance is compared with the multi layer perceptron neural network (MLPNN). Studies show that the SVM gives faster and more accurate results for dynamic voltage collapse prediction compared with the MLPNN.
Abstract: The aim of this contribution is to present a new
approach in modeling the electrical activity of the human heart. A
recurrent artificial neural network is being used in order to exhibit a
subset of the dynamics of the electrical behavior of the human heart.
The proposed model can also be used, when integrated, as a
diagnostic tool of the human heart system.
What makes this approach unique is the fact that every model is
being developed from physiological measurements of an individual.
This kind of approach is very difficult to apply successfully in many
modeling problems, because of the complexity and entropy of the
free variables describing the complex system. Differences between
the modeled variables and the variables of an individual, measured at
specific moments, can be used for diagnostic purposes. The sensor
fusion used in order to optimize the utilization of biomedical sensors
is another point that this paper focuses on. Sensor fusion has been
known for its advantages in applications such as control and
diagnostics of mechanical and chemical processes.