Abstract: This paper treats a discrete-time finite buffer batch arrival queue with a single working vacation and partial batch rejection in which the inter-arrival and service times are, respectively, arbitrary and geometrically distributed. The queue is analyzed by using the supplementary variable and the imbedded Markov-chain techniques. We obtain steady-state system length distributions at prearrival, arbitrary and outside observer-s observation epochs. We also present probability generation function (p.g.f.) of actual waiting-time distribution in the system and some performance measures.
Abstract: Several researchers have proposed methods about
combination of Genetic Algorithm (GA) and Fuzzy Logic (the use of
GA to obtain fuzzy rules and application of fuzzy logic in
optimization of GA). In this paper, we suggest a new method in
which fuzzy decision making is used to improve the performance of
genetic algorithm. In the suggested method, we determine the alleles
that enhance the fitness of chromosomes and try to insert them to the
next generation.
In this algorithm we try to present an innovative vaccination in the
process of reproduction in genetic algorithm, with considering the
trade off between exploration and exploitation.
Abstract: Business Process Management (BPM) helps in optimizing the business processes inside an enterprise. But BPM architecture does not provide any help for extending the enterprise. Modern business environments and rapidly changing technologies are asking for brisk changes in the business processes. Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) can help in enabling the success of enterprise-wide BPM. SOA supports agility in software development that is directly related to achieve loose coupling of interacting software agents. Agility is a premium concern of the current software designing architectures. Together, BPM and SOA provide a perfect combination for enterprise computing. SOA provides the capabilities for services to be combined together and to support and create an agile, flexible enterprise. But there are still many questions to answer; BPM is better or SOA? and what is the future track of BPM and SOA? This paper tries to answer some of these important questions.
Abstract: The Constraints imposed by non-thermal
leptogenesis on the survival of the neutrino mass models describing
the presently available neutrino mass patterns, are studied
numerically. We consider the Majorana CP violating phases coming
from right-handed Majorana mass matrices to estimate the baryon
asymmetry of the universe, for different neutrino mass models
namely quasi-degenerate, inverted hierarchical and normal
hierarchical models, with tribimaximal mixings. Considering two
possible diagonal forms of Dirac neutrino mass matrix as either
charged lepton or up-quark mass matrix, the heavy right-handed
mass matrices are constructed from the light neutrino mass matrix.
Only the normal hierarchical model leads to the best predictions of
baryon asymmetry of the universe, consistent with observations in
non-thermal leptogenesis scenario.
Abstract: The objective of this paper is to present a
comparative study of Homotopy Perturbation Method (HPM),
Variational Iteration Method (VIM) and Homotopy Analysis
Method (HAM) for the semi analytical solution of Kortweg-de
Vries (KdV) type equation called KdV. The study have been
highlighted the efficiency and capability of aforementioned methods
in solving these nonlinear problems which has been arisen from a
number of important physical phenomenon.
Abstract: In a representative democracy political parties
promote vital competition on different policy issues and play
essential roles by offering ideological alternatives. They also give
channels for citizens- participation in government decision-making
processes and they are significant conduits and interpreters of
information about government. This paper attempts to examine how
opposition political parties and rebel fronts emerged in Ethiopia, and
examines their present conditions. In this paper, selected case studies
of political parties and rebel fronts are included to highlight the status
and the role of opposition groups in the country in the three
successive administrations: Haile Selassie (1930-1974), Derg (1974-
1991), and EPRDF (1991-Present).
Abstract: Quality of school meals is one of the major concerns of governments and international organizations worldwide. This study aims to evaluate nutritional compliance of meals served at a Portuguese primary school considering the portions stated by Portuguese Education Ministry. To evaluate adequacy of portions served, weighing of all meal components offered to students and leftovers was performed during ten consecutive days at two different moments. Plate waste (%) was calculated by the ratio of food discarded and food served to the children. Nutritional evaluation of menus was made using the Portuguese Food Composition Table. Meals evaluated showed a percent contribution to energetic daily intake higher than recommendations. Meals served to children were considered high energy and protein dense. No significant waste of soup was accounted and the main meal components wasted were fish and vegetables. It will be necessary to adjust portions indicated by Ministry of Education in order to comply with recommendations and reduce food waste.
Abstract: Due to adverse pressure gradient along the diverging
walls of wide-angled diffusers, the attached flow separates from
one wall and remains attached permanently to the other wall in a
process called stalling. Stalled diffusers render the whole fluid flow
system, in which they are part of, very inefficient. There is then an
engineering need to try to understand the whole process of diffuser
stall if any meaningful attempts to improve on diffuser efficiency
are to be made. In this regard, this paper provides a data bank
contribution for the mean flow-field in wide-angled diffusers where
the complete velocity and static pressure fields, and pressure recovery
data for diffusers in the fully stalled flow regime are experimentally
measured. The measurements were carried out at Reynolds numbers
between 1.07×105 and 2.14×105 based on inlet hydraulic diameter
and centreline velocity for diffusers whose divergence angles were
between 30Ôùª and 50Ôùª. Variation of Reynolds number did not significantly
affect the velocity and static pressure profiles. The wall static
pressure recovery was found to be more sensitive to changes in the
Reynolds number. By increasing the velocity from 10 m/s to 20 m/s,
the wall static pressure recovery increased by 8.31%. However, as the
divergence angle was increased, a similar increase in the Reynolds
number resulted in a higher percentage increase in pressure recovery.
Experimental results showed that regardless of the wall to which
the flow was attached, both the velocity and pressure fields were
replicated with discrepancies below 2%.
Abstract: Banyan networks are really attractive for serving as
the optical switching architectures due to their unique properties of
small depth and absolute signal loss uniformity. The fact has been
established that the limitations of blocking nature and the nonavailability
of proper connections due to non-rearrangeable property
can be easily ruled out using electro-optic MZI switches as basic
switching elements. Combination of the horizontal expansion and
vertical stacking of optical banyan networks is an appropriate scheme
for constructing non-blocking banyan-based optical switching
networks. The interconnected banyan switching fabrics (IBSF) have
been considered and analyzed to best serve the purpose of optical
switching with electro-optic MZI basic elements. The cross/bar state
interchange for the switches has been facilitated by appropriate
voltage switching or the by the switching of operating wavelength.
The paper is dedicated to the modification of the basic switching
element being used as well as the architecture of the switching
network.
Abstract: Most HWRs currently use natural uranium fuel. Using enriched uranium fuel results in a significant improvement in fuel cycle costs and uranium utilization. On the other hand, reactivity changes of HWRs over the full range of operating conditions from cold shutdown to full power are small. This reduces the required reactivity worth of control devices and minimizes local flux distribution perturbations, minimizing potential problems due to transient local overheating of fuel. Analyzing heavy water effectiveness on neutronic parameters such as enrichment requirements, peaking factor and reactivity is important and should pay attention as primary concepts of a HWR core designing. Two nuclear nuclear reactors of CANDU-type and hexagonal-type reactor cores of 33 fuel assemblies and 19 assemblies in 1.04 P/D have been respectively simulated using MCNP-4C code. Using heavy water and light water as moderator have been compared for achieving less reactivity insertion and enrichment requirements. Two fuel matrixes of (232Th/235U)O2 and (238/235U)O2 have been compared to achieve more economical and safe design. Heavy water not only decreased enrichment needs, but it concluded in negative reactivity insertions during moderator density variations. Thorium oxide fuel assemblies of 2.3% enrichment loaded into the core of heavy water moderator resulted in 0.751 fission to absorption ratio and peaking factor of 1.7 using. Heavy water not only provides negative reactivity insertion during temperature raises which changes moderator density but concluded in 2 to 10 kg reduction of enrichment requirements, depend on geometry type.
Abstract: Social-economic variables influence transportation
demand largely. Analyses of discrete choice model consider
social-economic variables to study traveler-s mode choice and
demand. However, to calibrate the discrete choice model needs to have
plenty of questionnaire survey. Also, an aggregative model is
proposed. The historical data of passenger volumes for high speed rail
and domestic civil aviation are employed to calibrate and validate the
model. In this study, models with different social-economic variables,
which are oil price, GDP per capita, CPI and economic growth rate,
are compared. From the results, the model with the oil price is better
than models with the other social-economic variables.
Abstract: This article discusses the problem of estimating the
orientation of inclined ground on which a human subject stands based
on information provided by the vestibular system consisting of the
otolith and semicircular canals. It is assumed that body segments are
not necessarily aligned and thus forming an open kinematic chain.
The semicircular canals analogues to a technical gyrometer provide a
measure of the angular velocity whereas the otolith analogues to a
technical accelerometer provide a measure of the translational
acceleration. Two solutions are proposed and discussed. The first is
based on a stand-alone Kalman filter that optimally fuses the two
measurements based on their dynamic characteristics and their noise
properties. In this case, no body dynamic model is needed. In the
second solution, a central extended disturbance observer that
incorporates a body dynamic model (internal model) is employed.
The merits of both solutions are discussed and demonstrated by
experimental and simulation results.
Abstract: Internet addiction has become a critical problem on
adolescents in Taiwan, and its negative effects on various dimensions
of adolescent development caught the attention of educational and
psychological experts. This study examined the correlation between
cognitive (locus of control) and emotion (emotion venting strategies)
factors on internet addiction of adolescents in Taiwan. Using the
Compulsive Internet Use (CIU) and the Emotion Venting Strategy
scales, a survey was conducted and 215 effective samples (students
ranging from12 to14 years old) returned. Quantitative analysis
methods such as descriptive statistics, t-test, ANOVA, Pearson
correlations and multiple regression were adopted. The results were as
follows: 1. Severity of Internet addiction has significant gender
differences; boys were at a higher risk than girls in becoming addicted
to the Internet. 2. Emotion venting, locus of control and internet
addiction have been shown to be positive correlated with one another.
3. Setting the locus of control as the control variable, emotion venting
strategy has positive and significant contribution to internet addiction.
The results of this study suggest that coaching deconstructive emotion
strategies and cognitive believes are encouraged to integrate with
actual field work.
Abstract: Constant amplitude fatigue crack growth (FCG) tests
were performed on dissimilar metal welded plates of Type 316L
Stainless Steel (SS) and IS 2062 Grade A Carbon steel (CS). The
plates were welded by TIG welding using SS E309 as electrode. FCG
tests were carried on the Side Edge Notch Tension (SENT)
specimens of 5 mm thickness, with crack initiator (notch) at base
metal region (BM), weld metal region (WM) and heat affected zones
(HAZ). The tests were performed at a test frequency of 10 Hz and at
load ratios (R) of 0.1 & 0.6. FCG rate was found to increase with
stress ratio for weld metals and base metals, where as in case of
HAZ, FCG rates were almost equal at high ΔK. FCG rate of HAZ of
stainless steel was found to be lowest at low and high ΔK. At
intermediate ΔK, WM showed the lowest FCG rate. CS showed
higher crack growth rate at all ΔK. However, the scatter band of data
was found to be narrow. Fracture toughness (Kc) was found to vary
in different locations of weldments. Kc was found lowest for the
weldment and highest for HAZ of stainless steel. A novel method of
characterizing the FCG behavior using an Infrared thermography
(IRT) camera was attempted. By monitoring the temperature rise at
the fast moving crack tip region, the amount of plastic deformation
was estimated.
Abstract: Visual information is very important in human perception
of surrounding world. Video is one of the most common ways to
capture visual information. The video capability has many benefits
and can be used in various applications. For the most part, the
video information is used to bring entertainment and help to relax,
moreover, it can improve the quality of life of deaf people. Visual
information is crucial for hearing impaired people, it allows them to
communicate personally, using the sign language; some parts of the
person being spoken to, are more important than others (e.g. hands,
face). Therefore, the information about visually relevant parts of the
image, allows us to design objective metric for this specific case. In
this paper, we present an example of an objective metric based on
human visual attention and detection of salient object in the observed
scene.
Abstract: The back-propagation algorithm calculates the weight
changes of an artificial neural network, and a two-term algorithm
with a dynamically optimal learning rate and a momentum factor
is commonly used. Recently the addition of an extra term, called a
proportional factor (PF), to the two-term BP algorithm was proposed.
The third term increases the speed of the BP algorithm. However,
the PF term also reduces the convergence of the BP algorithm, and
optimization approaches for evaluating the learning parameters are
required to facilitate the application of the three terms BP algorithm.
This paper considers the optimization of the new back-propagation
algorithm by using derivative information. A family of approaches
exploiting the derivatives with respect to the learning rate, momentum
factor and proportional factor is presented. These autonomously
compute the derivatives in the weight space, by using information
gathered from the forward and backward procedures. The three-term
BP algorithm and the optimization approaches are evaluated using
the benchmark XOR problem.
Abstract: A simple network model is developed in OPNET to
study the performance of the Wi-Fi protocol. The model is simulated
in OPNET and performance factors such as load, throughput and delay
are analysed from the model. Four applications such as oracle, http, ftp
and voice are applied over the Wireless LAN network to determine the
throughput. The voice application utilises a considerable amount of
bandwidth of up to 5Mbps, as a result the 802.11g standard of the
Wi-Fi protocol was chosen which can support a data rate of up to
54Mbps. Results indicate that when the load in the Wi-Fi network is
increased the queuing delay on the point-to-point links in the Wi-Fi
network significantly reduces until it is comparable to that of WiMAX.
In conclusion, the queuing delay of the Wi-Fi protocol for the network
model simulated was about 0.00001secs comparable to WiMAX
network values.
Abstract: Acute toxicity of nano SiO2, ZnO, MCM-41 (Meso
pore silica), Cu, Multi Wall Carbon Nano Tube (MWCNT), Single
Wall Carbon Nano Tube (SWCNT) , Fe (Coated) to bacteria Vibrio
fischeri using a homemade luminometer , was evaluated. The values
of the nominal effective concentrations (EC), causing 20% and 50%
inhibition of biouminescence, using two mathematical models at two
times of 5 and 30 minutes were calculated. Luminometer was
designed with Photomultiplier (PMT) detector. Luminol
chemiluminescence reaction was carried out for the calibration graph.
In the linear calibration range, the correlation coefficients and
coefficient of Variation (CV) were 0.988 and 3.21% respectively
which demonstrate the accuracy and reproducibility of the instrument
that are suitable. The important part of this research depends on how
to optimize the best condition for maximum bioluminescence. The
culture of Vibrio fischeri with optimal conditions in liquid media,
were stirring at 120 rpm at a temperature of 150C to 180C and were
incubated for 24 to 72 hours while solid medium was held at 180C
and for 48 hours. Suspension of nanoparticles ZnO, after 30 min
contact time to bacteria Vibrio fischeri, showed the highest toxicity
while SiO2 nanoparticles showed the lowest toxicity. After 5 min
exposure time, the toxicity of ZnO was the strongest and MCM-41
was the weakest toxicant component.
Abstract: Innovations and innovative activity get the increasing
value for successful financial and economic activity of the countries
and regions. The level of innovative sphere development determines
place of a country or a region in world economy and forms a basis of
steady economic growth. This article is devoted to different aspects
of organization of the national economic safety in the conditions of
innovative development, its problems, risks and threats. Economy
can be considered as aspiring for transition to innovative way only
with finding of economic safety: financial independence, power
stability and technological progress. There are statistical indicators,
defining the level of economic security and factors, threatening
economic safety of the state. The research is based on the analysis of
factors and indicators in conditions of innovative development. The
paper is illustrated by the examples of possible estimated system of
the economic safety level.
Abstract: The aim of this study was to analyse the most
important parameters determining the quality of the motion structure
of the basic classical dance jump – grand jeté.Research sample
consisted of 8 students of the Dance Conservatory in Brno. Using the
system Simi motion we performed a 3D kinematic analysis of the
jump. On the basis of the comparison of structure quality and
measured data of the grand jeté, we defined the optimal values of the
relevant parameters determining the quality of the performance. The
take-off speed should achieve about 2.4 m·s-1, the optimum take-off
angle is 28 - 30º. The take-off leg should swing backward at the
beginning of the flight phase with the minimum speed of 3.3 m·s-1.If
motor abilities of dancers achieve the level necessary for optimal
performance of a classical dance jump, there is room for certain
variability of the structure of the dance jump.