Abstract: Hospital staff and managers are under pressure and
concerned for effective use and management of scarce resources. The
hospital admissions require many decisions that have complex and
uncertain consequences for hospital resource utilization and patient
flow. It is challenging to predict risk of admissions and length of stay
of a patient due to their vague nature. There is no method to capture
the vague definition of admission of a patient. Also, current methods
and tools used to predict patients at risk of admission fail to deal with
uncertainty in unplanned admission, LOS, patients- characteristics.
The main objective of this paper is to deal with uncertainty in
health system variables, and handles uncertain relationship among
variables. An introduction of machine learning techniques along with
statistical methods like Regression methods can be a proposed
solution approach to handle uncertainty in health system variables. A
model that adapts fuzzy methods to handle uncertain data and
uncertain relationships can be an efficient solution to capture the
vague definition of admission of a patient.
Abstract: Since Network-on-Chip (NoC) uses network
interfaces (NIs) to improve the design productivity, by now, there
have been a few papers addressing the design and implementation of a
NI module. However, none of them considered the difference of
address encoding methods between NoC and the traditional
bus-shared architecture. On the basis of this difference, in the paper,
we introduce a transmit mechanism to solve such a problem for global
asynchronous locally synchronous (GALS) NoC. Furthermore, we
give the concrete implementation of the NI module in this transmit
mechanism. Finally, we evaluate its performance and area overhead
by a VHDL-based cycle-accurate RTL model and simulation results
confirm the validity of this address-oriented transmit mechanism.
Abstract: The story of Alibaba demonstrates a credible example of how a small start-up company can eventually make it big in the global economy through the Internet. This case study does not attempt to present Alibaba as a perfect formula; rather, it discusses the strategies carried out by the firm and, in the process, culls out the important lessons that can guide start-ups and aspiring entrepreneurs in the complex world of online trading. Similar to the interesting and exotic Asian cuisine that continuously evolves from the diversity of Asia-s people and their unique culture and personality, Alibaba has successfully transformed itself over the years, adapting to the changes in and demands of online businessto- business (B2B) commerce.
Abstract: High-velocity oxygen fuel (HVOF) thermal spraying
uses a combustion process to heat the gas flow and coating material.
A computational fluid dynamics (CFD) model has been developed to
predict gas dynamic behavior in a HVOF thermal spray gun in which
premixed oxygen and propane are burnt in a combustion chamber
linked to a parallel-sided nozzle. The CFD analysis is applied to
investigate axisymmetric, steady-state, turbulent, compressible,
chemically reacting, subsonic and supersonic flow inside and outside
the gun. The gas velocity, temperature, pressure and Mach number
distributions are presented for various locations inside and outside
the gun. The calculated results show that the most sensitive
parameters affecting the process are fuel-to-oxygen gas ratio and
total gas flow rate. Gas dynamic behavior along the centerline of the
gun depends on both total gas flow rate and fuel-to-oxygen gas ratio.
The numerical simulations show that the axial gas velocity and Mach
number distribution depend on both flow rate and ratio; the highest
velocity is achieved at the higher flow rate and most fuel-rich ratio.
In addition, the results reported in this paper illustrate that the
numerical simulation can be one of the most powerful and beneficial
tools for the HVOF system design, optimization and performance
analysis.
Abstract: A numerical prediction of flow in a tube bank is reported. The flow regimes considered cover a wide range of Reynolds numbers, which range from 380 to 99000 and which are equivalent to a range of inlet velocities from very low (0.072 m/s) to very high (60 m/s). In this study, calculations were made using the standard k-e model with standard wall function. The drag coefficient, skin friction drag, pressure drag, and pressure distribution around a tube were investigated. As the velocity increased, the drag coefficient decreased until the velocity exceeded 45 m/s, after which it increased. Furthermore, the pressure drag and skin friction drag depend on the velocity.
Abstract: This paper aims to scale up Dye-sensitized Solar Cell
(DSSC) production using a commonly available industrial material –
stainless steel - and industrial plasma equipment. A working DSSC
electrode formed by (1) coating titania nanotube (TiO2 NT) film on
304 stainless steel substrate using a plasma spray technique; then, (2)
filling the nano-pores of the TiO2 NT film using a TiF4 sol-gel method.
A DSSC device consists of an anode absorbed photosensitive dye
(N3), a transparent conductive cathode with platinum (Pt)
nano-catalytic particles adhered to its surface, and an electrolytic
solution sealed between the anode and the transparent conductive
cathode. The photo-current conversion efficiency of the DSSC sample
was tested under an AM 1.5 Solar Simulator. The sample has a short
current (Isc) of 0.83 mA cm-2, open voltage (Voc) of 0.81V, filling
factor (FF) of 0.52, and conversion efficiency (η) of 2.18% on a 0.16
cm2 DSSC work-piece.
Abstract: During the past several years, face recognition in video
has received significant attention. Not only the wide range of
commercial and law enforcement applications, but also the availability
of feasible technologies after several decades of research contributes
to the trend. Although current face recognition systems have reached a
certain level of maturity, their development is still limited by the
conditions brought about by many real applications. For example,
recognition images of video sequence acquired in an open
environment with changes in illumination and/or pose and/or facial
occlusion and/or low resolution of acquired image remains a largely
unsolved problem. In other words, current algorithms are yet to be
developed. This paper provides an up-to-date survey of video-based
face recognition research. To present a comprehensive survey, we
categorize existing video based recognition approaches and present
detailed descriptions of representative methods within each category.
In addition, relevant topics such as real time detection, real time
tracking for video, issues such as illumination, pose, 3D and low
resolution are covered.
Abstract: To respond to the Kyoto Protocol, the policy of Payment for Environmental Service (PES), which was entitled “Plain Landscape Afforestation Program (PLAP)", was certified by Executive Yuan in Taiwan on 31 August 2001 and has been implementing for six years since 1 January 2002. Although the PLAP has received a lot of positive comments, there are still many difficulties during the process of implementation, such as insufficient technology for afforestation, private landowners- low interests in participating in PLAP, insufficient subsidies, and so on, which are potential threats that hinder the PLAP from moving forward in future. In this paper, selecting Ping-Tung County in Taiwan as a sample region and targeting those private landowners with and without intention to participate in the PLAP, respectively, we conduct an empirical analysis based on the Logit model to investigate the factors that determine whether those private landowners join the PLAP, so as to realize the incentive effects of the PLAP upon the personal decision on afforestation. The possible factors that might determine private landowner-s participation in the PLAP include landowner-s characteristics, cropland characteristics, as well as policy factors. Among them, the policy factors include afforestation subsidy amount (+), duration of afforestation subsidy (+), the rules on adjoining and adjacent areas (+), and so on, which do not reach the remarkable level in statistics though, but the directions of variable signs are consistent with the intuition behind the policy. As for the landowners- characteristics, each of age (+), education level (–), and annual household income (+) variables reaches 10% of the remarkable level in statistics; as for the cropland characteristics, each of cropland area (+), cropland price (–), and the number of cropland parcels (–) reaches 1% of the remarkable level in statistics. In light of the above, the cropland characteristics are the dominate factor that determines the probability of landowner-s participation in the PLAP. In the Logit model established by this paper, the probability of correctly estimating nonparticipants is 98%, the probability of correctly estimating the participants is 71.8%, and the probability for the overall estimation is 95%. In addition, Hosmer-Lemeshow test and omnibus test also revealed that the Logit model in this paper may provide fine goodness of fit and good predictive power in forecasting private landowners- participation in this program. The empirical result of this paper expects to help the implementation of the afforestation programs in Taiwan.
Abstract: Sign language recognition has been a topic of research since the first data glove was developed. Many researchers have attempted to recognize sign language through various techniques. However none of them have ventured into the area of Pakistan Sign Language (PSL). The Boltay Haath project aims at recognizing PSL gestures using Statistical Template Matching. The primary input device is the DataGlove5 developed by 5DT. Alternative approaches use camera-based recognition which, being sensitive to environmental changes are not always a good choice.This paper explains the use of Statistical Template Matching for gesture recognition in Boltay Haath. The system recognizes one handed alphabet signs from PSL.
Abstract: The New Basel Capital Accord (Basel II) influences how financial institutions around the world, and especially European Union institutions, determine the amount of capital to reserve. However, as the recent global crisis has shown, the revision of Basel II is needed to reflect current trends, such as increased volatility and correlation, in the world financial markets. The overall objective of Basel II is to increase the safety and soundness of the international financial system. Basel II builds on three main pillars: Pillar I deals with the minimum capital requirements for credit, market and operational risk, Pillar II focuses on the supervisory review process and finally Pillar III promotes market discipline through enhanced disclosure requirements for banks. The aim of this paper is to provide the historical background, key features and impact of Basel II on financial markets. Moreover, we discuss new proposals for international bank regulation (sometimes referred to as Basel III) which include requirements for higher quality, constituency and transparency of banks' capital and risk management, regulation of OTC markets and introduction of new liquidity standards for internationally active banks.
Abstract: Excessive ductility demand on shorter piers is a
common problem for irregular bridges subjected to strong ground
motion. Various techniques have been developed to reduce the
likelihood of collapse of bridge due to failure of shorter piers. This
paper presents the new approach to improve the seismic behavior of
such bridges using Nitinol shape memory alloys (SMAs).
Superelastic SMAs have the ability to remain elastic under very large
deformation due to martensitic transformation. This unique property
leads to enhanced performance of controlled bridge compared with
the performance of the reference bridge. To evaluate the effectiveness
of the devices, nonlinear time history analysis is performed on a RC
single column bent highway bridge using a suite of representative
ground motions. The results show that this method is very effective in
limiting the ductility demand of shorter pier.
Abstract: Technological newness and innovativeness are
important aspects of small firm development, growth and wealth
creation. The contribution of the study to entrepreneurship
personality research and to technology-related research in
entrepreneurship is that the model of the general personality driven
technological development was developed and empirically tested.
Hypotheses relating the big five personality factors (OCEAN:
openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and
neuroticism) and technological developments were tested by using
multiple regression analysis on survey data from a sample of 160
entrepreneurs from Slovenia. The model reveals two personality
factors, which are predictive of technological developments:
openness (positive impact) and neuroticism (negative impact). In
addition, a positive impact of firm age on technological
developments was found. Other personality factors
(conscientiousness, extraversion and agreeableness) of entrepreneurs
may not be considered important for their firm technological
developments.
Abstract: A bond graph model of a two degrees of freedom
PUMA is described. System inversion gives the system input
required to generate a given system output. In order to get the system
inversion of the PUMA manipulator, a linearization of the nonlinear
bond graph is obtained. Hence, the bicausality of the linearized bond
graph of the PUMA manipulator is applied. Thus, the bicausal bond
graph provides a systematic way of generating the equations of the
system inversion. Simulation results to verify the calculated input for
a given output are shown.
Abstract: A welded structure must be inspected to guarantee that the weld quality meets the design requirements to assure safety and reliability. However, X-ray image analyses and defect recognition with the computer vision techniques are very complex. Most difficulties lie in finding the small, irregular defects in poor contrast images which requires pre processing to image, extract, and classify features from strong background noise. This paper addresses the issue of designing methodology to extract defect from noisy background radiograph with image processing. Based on the use of actives contours this methodology seems to give good results
Abstract: An artificial neural network (ANN) approach was used to model the energy consumption of wheat production. This study was conducted over 35,300 hectares of irrigated and dry land wheat fields in Canterbury in the 2007-2008 harvest year.1 In this study several direct and indirect factors have been used to create an artificial neural networks model to predict energy use in wheat production. The final model can predict energy consumption by using farm condition (size of wheat area and number paddocks), farmers- social properties (education), and energy inputs (N and P use, fungicide consumption, seed consumption, and irrigation frequency), it can also predict energy use in Canterbury wheat farms with error margin of ±7% (± 1600 MJ/ha).
Abstract: The study aimed to investigate characteristics of
vegetative tissue for taxonomic purpose and possibly trend of waste
application in industry. Stems and branches of 15 species in Solanum
found in Thailand were prepared for fiber and examined by light
microscopy. Microstructural characteristic data of fiber i.e. fiber
length and width, fiber lumen diameter and fiber cell wall thickness
were recorded. The longest average fiber cell length (>3.9 mm.) were
obtained in S. lycopersicum L. and S. tuberosum L. Fiber cells from
S. lycopersicum also revealed the widest average diameter of whole
cell and its lumen at >45.5 μm and >29 μm respectively. However
fiber cells with thickest wall of > 9.6 μm were belonged to the
ornamental tree species, S. wrightii Benth. The results showed that
the slenderness ratio, Runkel ratio, and flexibility coefficient, with
potentially suitable for feedstock in paper industry fell in 4 exotic
species, i.e. Solanumamericanum L., S. lycopersicum, S.
seaforthianum Andr., and S. tuberosum L
Abstract: Functional near infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) is a
practical non-invasive optical technique to detect characteristic of
hemoglobin density dynamics response during functional activation of
the cerebral cortex. In this paper, fNIRS measurements were made in
the area of motor cortex from C4 position according to international
10-20 system. Three subjects, aged 23 - 30 years, were participated in
the experiment.
The aim of this paper was to evaluate the effects of different motor
activation tasks of the hemoglobin density dynamics of fNIRS signal.
The chaotic concept based on deterministic dynamics is an important
feature in biological signal analysis. This paper employs the chaotic
properties which is a novel method of nonlinear analysis, to analyze
and to quantify the chaotic property in the time series of the
hemoglobin dynamics of the various motor imagery tasks of fNIRS
signal. Usually, hemoglobin density in the human brain cortex is
found to change slowly in time. An inevitable noise caused by various
factors is to be included in a signal. So, principle component analysis
method (PCA) is utilized to remove high frequency component. The
phase pace is reconstructed and evaluated the Lyapunov spectrum, and
Lyapunov dimensions. From the experimental results, it can be
conclude that the signals measured by fNIRS are chaotic.
Abstract: In order to enhance the contrast in the regions where the pixels have similar intensities, this paper presents a new histogram equalization scheme. Conventional global equalization schemes over-equalizes these regions so that too bright or dark pixels are resulted and local equalization schemes produce unexpected discontinuities at the boundaries of the blocks. The proposed algorithm segments the original histogram into sub-histograms with reference to brightness level and equalizes each sub-histogram with the limited extents of equalization considering its mean and variance. The final image is determined as the weighted sum of the equalized images obtained by using the sub-histogram equalizations. By limiting the maximum and minimum ranges of equalization operations on individual sub-histograms, the over-equalization effect is eliminated. Also the result image does not miss feature information in low density histogram region since the remaining these area is applied separating equalization. This paper includes how to determine the segmentation points in the histogram. The proposed algorithm has been tested with more than 100 images having various contrasts in the images and the results are compared to the conventional approaches to show its superiority.
Abstract: Power transformers are among the most important and
expensive equipments in the electric power systems. Consequently
the transformer protection is an essential part of the system
protection. This paper presents a new method for locating
transformer winding faults such as turn-to-turn, turn-to-core, turn-totransformer
body, turn-to-earth, and high voltage winding to low
voltage winding. In this study the current and voltage signals of input
and output terminals of the transformer are measured, which the
Fourier transform of measured signals and harmonic analysis
determine the fault's location.
Abstract: Automatic reusability appraisal is helpful in
evaluating the quality of developed or developing reusable software
components and in identification of reusable components from
existing legacy systems; that can save cost of developing the
software from scratch. But the issue of how to identify reusable
components from existing systems has remained relatively
unexplored. In this research work, structural attributes of software
components are explored using software metrics and quality of the
software is inferred by different Neural Network based approaches,
taking the metric values as input. The calculated reusability value
enables to identify a good quality code automatically. It is found that
the reusability value determined is close to the manual analysis used
to be performed by the programmers or repository managers. So, the
developed system can be used to enhance the productivity and
quality of software development.