Abstract: Public procurement is one of the most
important areas in the public sector that introduces a possibility for a
corruption. Due to the volume of the funds that are
allocated through this institution (in the EU countries it is between 10
– 15% of GDP), it has very serious implications for the efficiency of
public expenditures and the overall economic efficiency as
well. Indicators that are usually used for the measurement of the
corruption (such as Corruption Perceptions Index - CPI) show that
the worst situation is in the post-communist countries
and Mediterranean countries.
The presented paper uses the Czech Republic as an example of a
post-communist country and analyses the factors which influence
the scope of corruption in public procurement. Moreover, the
paper discusses indicators that could point at the public procurement
market inefficiency. The presented results show that post-communist
states use the institute of public contracts significantly more than the
old member countries of the continental Europe. It has a very
important implication because it gives more space for corruption.
Furthermore, it appears that the inefficient functioning of public
procurement market is clearly manifested in the low number of bids,
low level of market transparency and an ineffective control
system. Some of the observed indicators are statistically significantly
correlated with the CPI.
Abstract: In this paper two different Antilock braking system (ABS) are simulated and compared. One is the ordinary hydraulic ABS system which we call it ABS and the other is Electromagnetic Antilock braking system which is called (EMABS) the basis of performance of an EMABS is based upon Electromagnetic force. In this system there is no need to use servo hydraulic booster which are used in ABS system. In EMABS to generate the desired force we have use a magnetic relay which works with an input voltage through an air gap (g). The generated force will be amplified by the relay arm, and is applied to the brake shoes and thus the braking torque is generated. The braking torque is proportional to the applied electrical voltage E. to adjust the braking torque it is only necessary to regulate the electrical voltage E which is very faster and has a much smaller time constant T than the ABS system. The simulations of these two different ABS systems are done with MATLAB/SIMULINK software and the superiority of the EMABS has been shown.
Abstract: This paper summarizes and compares approaches to
solving the knapsack problem and its known application in capital
budgeting. The first approach uses deterministic methods and can be
applied to small-size tasks with a single constraint. We can also
apply commercial software systems such as the GAMS modelling
system. However, because of NP-completeness of the problem, more
complex problem instances must be solved by means of heuristic
techniques to achieve an approximation of the exact solution in a
reasonable amount of time. We show the problem representation and
parameter settings for a genetic algorithm framework.
Abstract: In space during functioning, a satellite will be heated
up due to the behavior of its components such as power electronics.
In order to prevent problems in the satellite, this heat has to be
released in space thanks to the cooling system. This system consists
of a loop heat pipe (LHP), in which a fluid streams through an
evaporator and a condenser. In the evaporator, the fluid captures the
heat from the satellite and evaporates. Then it flows to the condenser
where it releases the heat and it condenses. In this project, the two
mains parts of a cooling system are studied: the evaporator and the
condenser. The study of the diphasic loop was done starting from
digital simulations carried out under Matlab and Femlab.
Abstract: This paper presents a case study that uses processoriented
simulation to identify bottlenecks in the service delivery
system in an emergency department of a hospital in the United Arab
Emirates. Using results of the simulation, response surface models
were developed to explain patient waiting time and the total time
patients spend in the hospital system. Results of the study could be
used as a service improvement tool to help hospital management in
improving patient throughput and service quality in the hospital
system.
Abstract: Higher education has an important role to play in
advocating environmentalism. Given this responsibility, the goal of
higher education should therefore be to develop graduates with the
knowledge, skills and values related to environmentalism. However,
research indicates that there is a lack of consciousness amongst
graduates on the need to be more environmentally aware, especially
when it comes to applying the appropriate knowledge and skills
related to environmentalism. Although institutions of higher learning
do include environmental parameters within their undergraduate and
postgraduate academic programme structures, the environmental
boundaries are usually confined to specific engineering majors within
an engineering programme. This makes environmental knowledge,
skills and values exclusive to certain quarters of the higher education
system. The incorporation of environmental literacy within higher
education institutions as a whole is of utmost pertinence if a nation-s
human capital is to be nurtured to become change agents for the
preservation of environment. This paper discusses approaches that
can be adapted by institutions of higher learning to include
environmental literacy within the graduate-s higher learning
experience.
Abstract: A trustworthy voting process in democratic is
important that each vote is recorded with accuracy and impartiality.
The accuracy and impartiality are tallied in high rate with biometric
system. One of the sign is a fingerprint. Fingerprint recognition is
still a challenging problem, because of the distortions among the
different impression of the same finger. Because of the trustworthy of
biometric voting technologies, it may give a great effect on numbers
of voter-s participation and outcomes of the democratic process.
Hence in this study, the authors are interested in designing and
analyzing the Electronic Voting System and the participation of the
users. The system is based on the fingerprint minutiae with the
addition of person ID number. This is in order to enhance the
accuracy and speed of the voting process. The new design is analyzed
by conducting pilot election among a class of students for selecting
their representative.
Abstract: FAQ system can make user find answer to the problem that puzzles them. But now the research on Chinese FAQ system is still on the theoretical stage. This paper presents an approach to semantic inference for FAQ mining. To enhance the efficiency, a small pool of the candidate question-answering pairs retrieved from the system for the follow-up work according to the concept of the agriculture domain extracted from user input .Input queries or questions are converted into four parts, the question word segment (QWS), the verb segment (VS), the concept of agricultural areas segment (CS), the auxiliary segment (AS). A semantic matching method is presented to estimate the similarity between the semantic segments of the query and the questions in the pool of the candidate. A thesaurus constructed from the HowNet, a Chinese knowledge base, is adopted for word similarity measure in the matcher. The questions are classified into eleven intension categories using predefined question stemming keywords. For FAQ mining, given a query, the question part and answer part in an FAQ question-answer pair is matched with the input query, respectively. Finally, the probabilities estimated from these two parts are integrated and used to choose the most likely answer for the input query. These approaches are experimented on an agriculture FAQ system. Experimental results indicate that the proposed approach outperformed the FAQ-Finder system in agriculture FAQ retrieval.
Abstract: Particle swarm optimization (PSO) technique is applied to design the water distribution pipeline network. A simulation-optimization model is formulated with the objective of minimizing cost and is applied to a benchmark water distribution system optimization problem. The benchmark problem taken for the application of PSO technique to optimize the pipe size of the water distribution network is New York City water supply system problem. The results from the analysis infer that PSO is a potential alternative optimization technique when compared to other heuristic techniques for optimal sizing of water distribution systems.
Abstract: The objective of this study is to present the test
results of variable air volume (VAV) air conditioning system
optimized by two objective genetic algorithm (GA). The objective
functions are energy savings and thermal comfort. The optimal set
points for fuzzy logic controller (FLC) are the supply air temperature
(Ts), the supply duct static pressure (Ps), the chilled water
temperature (Tw), and zone temperature (Tz) that is taken as the
problem variables. Supply airflow rate and chilled water flow rate are
considered to be the constraints. The optimal set point values are
obtained from GA process and assigned into fuzzy logic controller
(FLC) in order to conserve energy and maintain thermal comfort in
real time VAV air conditioning system. A VAV air conditioning
system with FLC installed in a software laboratory has been taken for
the purpose of energy analysis. The total energy saving obtained in
VAV GA optimization system with FLC compared with constant air
volume (CAV) system is expected to achieve 31.5%. The optimal
duct static pressure obtained through Genetic fuzzy methodology
attributes to better air distribution by delivering the optimal quantity
of supply air to the conditioned space. This combination enhanced
the advantages of uniform air distribution, thermal comfort and
improved energy savings potential.
Abstract: Nowadays, keyless entry systems are widely adopted
for vehicle immobilizer systems due to both advantages of security and
convenience. Keyless entry systems could overcome brute-force key
guessing attack, statistics attack and masquerade attack, however,
they can't prevent from thieves stealing behavior. In this paper, we
proposed a new architecture try to improve the existent flaws. The
integration of the keyless entry system and the fingerprint
identification technology is more suitable to implement on the
portable transponder to achieve higher security needs. We also adopt
and modify AES security protocol for life expectancy and security of
the portable transponder. In addition, the identification of a driver's
fingerprint makes the service of automatic reinstatement of a driver's
preferences become possible. Our design can satisfy not only the three
kinds of previous illegal attacks, but also the stealing situation.
Furthermore, many practical factors, such as costs, life expectancy and
performance, have been well considered in the design of portable
transponder.
Abstract: In this study, the performance of a high-frequency arc
welding machine including a two-switch inverter is analyzed. The
control of the system is achieved using two different control
techniques i- fuzzy logic control (FLC) ii- state space averaging
based sliding control. Fuzzy logic control does not need accurate
mathematical model of a plant and can be used in nonlinear
applications. The second method needs the mathematical model of
the system. In this method the state space equations of the system are
derived for two different “on" and “off" states of the switches. The
derived state equations are combined with the sliding control rule
considering the duty-cycle of the converter. The performance of the
system is analyzed by simulating the system using SIMULINK tool
box of MATLAB. The simulation results show that fuzzy logic
controller is more robust and less sensitive to parameter variations.
Abstract: The power system network is becoming more
complex nowadays and it is very difficult to maintain the stability
of the system. Today-s enhancement of technology makes it
possible to include new energy storage devices in the electric
power system. In addition, with the aid of power electronic
devices, it is possible to independently exchange active and
reactive power flow with the utility grid. The main purpose of this
paper proposes a Proportional – Integral (PI) control based 48 –
pulse Inverter based Static Synchronous Series Compensator
(SSSC) with and without Superconducting Magnetic Energy
Storage (SMES) used for enhancing the transient stability and
regulating power flow in automatic mode. Using a test power
system through the dynamic simulation in Matlab/Simulink
platform validates the performance of the proposed SSSC with and
without SMES system.
Abstract: Nowadays the devices of night vision are widely used both for military and civil applications. The variety of night vision applications require a variety of the night vision devices designs. A web-based architecture of a software system for design assessment before producing of night vision devices is developed. The proposed architecture of the web-based system is based on the application of a mathematical model for designing of night vision devices. An algorithm with two components – for iterative design and for intelligent design is developed and integrated into system architecture. The iterative component suggests compatible modules combinations to choose from. The intelligent component provides compatible combinations of modules satisfying given user requirements to device parameters. The proposed web-based architecture of a system for design assessment of night vision devices is tested via a prototype of the system. The testing showed the applicability of both iterative and intelligent components of algorithm.
Abstract: The overall service performance of I/O intensive
system depends mainly on workload on its storage system. In
heterogeneous storage environment where storage elements from
different vendors with different capacity and performance are put
together, workload should be distributed according to storage
capability. This paper addresses data placement issue in short video
sharing website. Workload contributed by a video is estimated by the
number of views and life time span of existing videos in same
category. Experiment was conducted on 42,000 video titles in six
weeks. Result showed that the proposed algorithm distributed
workload and maintained balance better than round robin and random
algorithms.
Abstract: In the upgrade process of enterprise information
systems, how to deal with and utilize those legacy systems affects the
efficiency of construction and development of the new system. We
propose an evaluation system, which comprehensively describes the
capacity of legacy information systems in five aspects. Then we
propose a practical legacy systems evaluation method. Base on the
evaluation result, we can determine the current state of legacy system
which was evaluated.
Abstract: In this paper, different nonlinear dynamics analysis techniques are employed to unveil the rich nonlinear phenomena of the electromagnetic system. In particular, bifurcation diagrams, time responses, phase portraits, Poincare maps, power spectrum analysis, and the construction of basins of attraction are all powerful and effective tools for nonlinear dynamics problems. We also employ the method of Lyapunov exponents to show the occurrence of chaotic motion and to verify those numerical simulation results. Finally, two cases of a chaotic electromagnetic system being effectively controlled by a reference signal or being synchronized to another nonlinear electromagnetic system are presented.
Abstract: The primary aim of the e-government applications is
the fast citizen service and the accomplishment of governmental
functions. This paper discusses the knowledge management for egovernment
development in the needs and role. The paper focused
on analyzing the advantages of using knowledge management by
using the existing IT technologies to maximize the government
functions efficiency. The proposed new approach of providing
government services is based on using Knowledge management as a
part of e-government system.
Abstract: The novelty proposed in this study is twofold and consists in the developing of a new color similarity metric based on the human visual system and a new color indexing based on a textual approach. The new color similarity metric proposed is based on the color perception of the human visual system. Consequently the results returned by the indexing system can fulfill as much as possibile the user expectations. We developed a web application to collect the users judgments about the similarities between colors, whose results are used to estimate the metric proposed in this study. In order to index the image's colors, we used a text indexing engine to facilitate the integration of visual features in a database of text documents. The textual signature is build by weighting the image's colors in according to their occurrence in the image. The use of a textual indexing engine, provide us a simple, fast and robust solution to index images. A typical usage of the system proposed in this study, is the development of applications whose data type is both visual and textual. In order to evaluate the proposed method we chose a price comparison engine as a case of study, collecting a series of commercial offers containing the textual description and the image representing a specific commercial offer.
Abstract: In data mining, the association rules are used to search
for the relations of items of the transactions database. Following the
data is collected and stored, it can find rules of value through
association rules, and assist manager to proceed marketing strategy
and plan market framework. In this paper, we attempt fuzzy partition
methods and decide membership function of quantitative values of
each transaction item. Also, by managers we can reflect the
importance of items as linguistic terms, which are transformed as
fuzzy sets of weights. Next, fuzzy weighted frequent pattern growth
(FWFP-Growth) is used to complete the process of data mining. The
method above is expected to improve Apriori algorithm for its better
efficiency of the whole association rules. An example is given to
clearly illustrate the proposed approach.