Abstract: Computer network courses are essential parts of college computer science curriculum and hands-on networking experience is well recognized as an effective approach to help students understand better about the network concepts, the layered architecture of network protocols, and the dynamics of the networks. However, existing networking labs are usually server-based and relatively cumbersome, which require a certain level of specialty and resource to set up and maintain the lab environment. Many universities/colleges lack the resources and build-ups in this field and have difficulty to provide students with hands-on practice labs. A new affordable and easily-adoptable approach to networking labs is desirable to enhance network teaching and learning. In addition, current network labs are short on providing hands-on practice for modern wireless and mobile network learning. With the prevalence of smart mobile devices, wireless and mobile network are permeating into various aspects of our information society. The emerging and modern mobile technology provides computer science students with more authentic learning experience opportunities especially in network learning. A mobile device based hands-on labware can provide an excellent ‘real world’ authentic learning environment for computer network especially for wireless network study. In this paper, we present our mobile device-based hands-on labware (series of lab module) for computer network learning which is guided by authentic learning principles to immerse students in a real world relevant learning environment. We have been using this labware in teaching computer network, mobile security, and wireless network classes. The student feedback shows that students can learn more when they have hands-on authentic learning experience.
Abstract: This paper proposes a vertical beamforming concept
to a cellular network employing Fractional Frequency Reuse
technique including with cell sectorization. Two different beams are
utilized in cell-center and cell-edge, separately. The proposed concept
is validated through computer simulation in term of SINR and
channel capacity. Also, comparison when utilizing horizontal and
vertical beam formation is in focus. The obtained results indicate
that the proposed concept can improve the performance of the
cellular networks comparing with the one using horizontal
beamforming.
Abstract: Many of the compounds present in potato are important because of their beneficial effects on health, therefore, are highly desirable in the human diet. Potato tubers contain significant amounts of anthocyanins. The aim of this research was to determine the content of anthocyanins and its relationship with the colour of organically and conventionally cultivated potato varieties. In the research eight potato samples of three potato varieties were analyzed on anthocyanins, dry matter content and color. Obtained results show that there was no significant influence on amount of anthocyanins between different cultivation environments (p>0.05) while between varieties – significant difference (p
Abstract: The tracking allows to detect the tumor affections of cervical cancer, it is particularly complex and consuming time, because it consists in seeking some abnormal cells among a cluster of normal cells. In this paper, we present our proposed computer system for helping the doctors in tracking the cervical cancer. Knowing that the diagnosis of the malignancy is based in the set of atypical morphological details of all cells, herein, we present an unsupervised genetic algorithm for the separation of cell components since the diagnosis is doing by analysis of the core and the cytoplasm. We give also the various algorithms used for computing the morphological characteristics of cells (Ratio core/cytoplasm, cellular deformity, ...) necessary for the recognition of illness.
Abstract: The objective of the study is to investigate the
effect of a footballer-s postural on selected physical fitness
components. Twenty-one (21) subjects of the university male
footballers under the Sport Excellence Center programme were
photographed using qualitative analysis. The postural variables
were stratified manually into normal and anomalies group and
their flexibility, strength and SAQ performance were
compared using the Mann-Whitney Test. The AROM
assessment and SAQ test reported no significance difference
(Z=-.398, p=0.711, p>0.05), similar to the lower body strength
was shown with no significance different (Z=-.493, p=0.640,
p>0.05). In contrast, only 1 RM strength test for the upper
body strength test shown with a significance different (Z=-
2.537, p=0.009, p
Abstract: Due to the limited lifetime of the nodes in ad hoc and sensor networks, energy efficiency needs to be an important design consideration in any routing algorithm. It is known that by employing a virtual backbone in a wireless network, the efficiency of any routing scheme for the network can be improved. One common design for routing protocols in mobile ad hoc networks is to use positioning information; we use the node-s geometric locations to introduce an algorithm that can construct the virtual backbone structure locally in 3D environment. The algorithm construction has a constant time.
Abstract: Interaction of inorganic water-soluble salts and building stones is studied in the paper. Two types of sandstone and one type of spongillite as representatives of materials used in historical masonry are subjected to experimental testing. Within the performed experiments, measurement of moisture and chloride concentration profiles is done in order to get input data for computational inverse analysis. Using the inverse analysis, moisture diffusivity and chloride diffusion coefficient of investigated materials are accessed. Additionally, the effect of salt presence on water vapor storage is investigated using dynamic vapor sorption device. The obtained data represents valuable information for restoration of historical masonry and give evidence on the performance of studied stones in contact with water soluble salts.
Abstract: In this paper, a set of experimental data has been used to assess the influence of abrasive water jet (AWJ) process parameters in cutting 6063-T6 aluminum alloy. The process variables considered here include nozzle diameter, jet traverse rate, jet pressure and abrasive flow rate. The effects of these input parameters are studied on depth of cut (h); one of most important characteristics of AWJ. The Taguchi method and regression modeling are used in order to establish the relationships between input and output parameters. The adequacy of the model is evaluated using analysis of variance (ANOVA) technique. In the next stage, the proposed model is embedded into a Simulated Annealing (SA) algorithm to optimize the AWJ process parameters. The objective is to determine a suitable set of process parameters that can produce a desired depth of cut, considering the ranges of the process parameters. Computational results prove the effectiveness of the proposed model and optimization procedure.
Abstract: The predictability of masonry arch bridges and their
behaviour is widely considered doubtful due to the lack of knowledge
about the conditions of a given masonry arch bridge. The assessment
methods for masonry arch bridges are MEXE, ARCHIE, RING and
Frame Analysis Method. The material properties of the masonry and
fill material are extremely difficult to determine accurately.
Consequently, it is necessary to examine the effect of load dispersal
angle through the fill material, the effect of variations in the stiffness
of the masonry, the tensile strength of the masonry mortar continuum
and the compressive strength of the masonry mortar continuum. It is
also important to understand the effect of fill material on load
dispersal angle to determine their influence on ratings. In this paper a
series of parametric studies, to examine the sensitivity of assessment
ratings to the various sets of input data required by the frame analysis
method, are carried out.
Abstract: Wheat has a bimodal starch granule population and the dependency of the rate of enzymatic hydrolysis on particle size has been investigated. Ungelatinised wheaten starch granules were separated into two populations by sedimentation and decantation. Particle size was analysed by laser diffraction and morphological characteristics were viewed using SEM. The sedimentation technique though lengthy, gave satisfactory separation of the granules. Samples (10μm and original) were digested with a-amylase using a dialysis model. Granules of 10μm (p10μm. Moreover, the digestion rate was dependent on particle size whereby smaller granules produced higher rate of release. The methodology and results reported here can be used as a basis for further evaluations designed to delay the release of glucose during the digestion of native starches.
Abstract: This paper describes a method of signal process applied
on an end effects of Hilbert-Huang transform (HHT) to provide an
improvement in the reality of spectrum. The method is based on
back-propagation network (BPN). To improve the effect, the end
extension of the original signal is obtained by back-propagation
network. A full waveform including origin and its extension is
decomposed by using empirical mode decomposition (EMD) to obtain
intrinsic mode functions (IMFs) of the waveform. Then, the Hilbert
transform (HT) is applied to the IMFs to obtain the Hilbert spectrum of
the waveform. As a result, the method is superiority of the processing
of end effect of HHT to obtain the real frequency spectrum of signals.
Abstract: To assess the effects of functional protein on osteoblast, Large quantity of high-purity osteoblasts had been cultivated successfully by adopting sequential enzyme digestion. The growth curve of osteoblasts was protracted by cell counting. Proliferation of osteoblasts was assessed by MTT colorimetry. The experimental results show the functional protein can enhance proliferation, the properties of adhesion and discuss the effect of osteopontin on osteoblast.
Abstract: Among many different methods that are used for
optimizing different engineering problems mathematical (numerical)
optimization techniques are very important because they can easily
be used and are consistent with most of engineering problems. Many
studies and researches are done on stability analysis of three
dimensional (3D) slopes and the relating probable slip surfaces and
determination of factors of safety, but in most of them force
equilibrium equations, as in simplified 2D methods, are considered
only in two directions. In other words for decreasing mathematical
calculations and also for simplifying purposes the force equilibrium
equation in 3rd direction is omitted. This point is considered in just a
few numbers of previous studies and most of them have only given a
factor of safety and they haven-t made enough effort to find the most
probable slip surface. In this study shapes of the slip surfaces are
modeled, and safety factors are calculated considering the force
equilibrium equations in all three directions, and also the moment
equilibrium equation is satisfied in the slip direction, and using
nonlinear programming techniques the shape of the most probable
slip surface is determined. The model which is used in this study is a
3D model that is composed of three upper surfaces which can cover
all defined and probable slip surfaces. In this research the meshing
process is done in a way that all elements are prismatic with
quadrilateral cross sections, and the safety factor is defined on this
quadrilateral surface in the base of the element which is a part of the
whole slip surface. The method that is used in this study to find the
most probable slip surface is the non-linear programming method in
which the objective function that must get optimized is the factor of
safety that is a function of the soil properties and the coordinates of
the nodes on the probable slip surface. The main reason for using
non-linear programming method in this research is its quick
convergence to the desired responses. The final results show a good
compatibility with the previously used classical and 2D methods and
also show a reasonable convergence speed.
Abstract: Energy consumption is a very important topic these
days especially regarding air conditioning in residential buildings,
since this takes the biggest amount of energy in buildings total
consumption, residential buildings constitute the biggest percentage
of energy consumption in Bahrain.
This research reflects on the effects of shading percentage in
different solar orientations on the energy consumption inside
residential buildings (domestic dwellings).
The research as found that, there are different effects of shading in
changing building orientation:
• 0.69% for the shading percentage 25% when the building is
oriented to the north (0º);
• 18.59% for 75% of shading in north-west orientation
(325º);
• The best effect for shading is in north-west orientation
(315º);
• The less effect for shading was in case of the building
orientation is the north (0º).
Abstract: Plant growth is affected by the osmotic stress as well as toxicity of salt in leaves. In order to study of salt stress effects on stomatal conductance and growth rate and relationship between them as wells osmotic and Na+-specific effects on these traits, four bread wheat genotypes differing in salt tolerance were selected. Salinity was applied when the leaf 4 was fully expanded. Sodium (Na+) concentrations in flag leaf blade at 3 salinity levels (0, 100 and 200 mM NaCl) were measured. Salt-tolerant genotypes showed higher stomatal conductance and growth rate compared to salt-sensitive ones. After 10 and 20 days exposure to salt, stomatal conductance and relative growth rate were reduced, but the reduction was greater in sensitive genotypes. Growth rate was reduced severely in the first period (1-10 days) of salt commencements and it was due to osmotic effect of salt not Na+ toxicity. In the second period (11-20 days) after salt treatment growth reduced only when salt accumulated to toxic concentrations in the leaves. A positive relationship between stomatal conductance and relative growth rate showed that stomatal conductance can be a reliable indicator of growth rate, and finally can be considered as a sensitive indicator of the osmotic stress. It seems 20 days after salinity, the major effect of salt, especially at low to moderate salinity levels on growth properties was due to the osmotic effect of salt, not to Na+-specific effects within the plant.
Abstract: A mammal-s body can be seen as a blood vessel with
complex tunnels. When heart pumps blood periodically, blood runs
through blood vessels and rebounds from walls of blood vessels.
Blood pressure signals can be measured with complex but periodic
patterns. When an artery is clamped during a surgical operation, the
spectrum of blood pressure signals will be different from that of
normal situation. In this investigation, intestinal artery clamping
operations were conducted to a pig for simulating the situation of
intestinal blocking during a surgical operation. Similarity theory is a
convenient and easy tool to prove that patterns of blood pressure
signals of intestinal artery blocking and unblocking are surely
different. And, the algorithm of Hilbert Huang Transform can be
applied to extract the character parameters of blood pressure pattern.
In conclusion, the patterns of blood pressure signals of two different
situations, intestinal artery blocking and unblocking, can be
distinguished by these character parameters defined in this paper.
Abstract: Formulation of biological profile is one of the modern roles of forensic anthropologist. The present study was conducted to estimate height using foot and shoeprint length of Malaysian population. The present work can be very useful information in the process of identification of individual in forensic cases based on shoeprint evidence. It can help to narrow down suspects and ease the police investigation. Besides, stature is important parameters in determining the partial identify of unidentified and mutilated bodies. Thus, this study can help the problem encountered in cases of mass disaster, massacre, explosions and assault cases. This is because it is very hard to identify parts of bodies in these cases where people are dismembered and become unrecognizable. Samples in this research were collected from 200 Malaysian adults (100 males and 100 females) with age ranging from 20 to 45 years old. In this research, shoeprint length were measured based on the print of the shoes made from the flat shoes. Other information like gender, foot length and height of subject were also recorded. The data was analyzed using IBM® SPSS Statistics 19 software. Results indicated that, foot length has a strong correlation with stature than shoeprint length for both sides of the feet. However, in the unknown, where the gender was undetermined have shown a better correlation in foot length and shoeprint length parameter compared to males and females analyzed separately. In addition, prediction equations are developed to estimate the stature using linear regression analysis of foot length and shoeprint length. However, foot lengths give better prediction than shoeprint length.
Abstract: Aircraft propulsion systems often use Y-shaped
subsonic diffusing ducts as twin air-intakes to supply the ambient air
into the engine compressor for thrust generation. Due to space
constraint, the diffusers need to be curved, which causes severe flow
non-uniformity at the engine face. The present study attempt to
control flow in a mild-curved Y-duct diffuser using trapezoidalshaped
vortex generators (VG) attached on either both the sidewalls
or top and bottom walls of the diffuser at the inflexion plane. A
commercial computational fluid dynamics (CFD) code is modified
and is used to simulate the effects of SVG in flow of a Y-duct
diffuser. A few experiments are conducted for CFD code validation,
while the rest are done computationally. The best combination of Yduct
diffuser is found with VG-2 arranged in co-rotating sequence
and attached to both the sidewalls, which ensures highest static
pressure recovery, lowest total pressure loss, minimum flow
distortion and less flow separation in Y-duct diffuser. The decrease in
VG height while attached to top and bottom walls further improves
axial flow uniformity at the diffuser outlet by a great margin as
compared to the bare duct.
Abstract: Numerical design optimization is a powerful tool that
can be used by engineers during any stage of the design process.
There are many different applications for structural optimization. A
specific application that will be discussed in the following paper is
experimental data matching. Data obtained through tests on a physical
structure will be matched with data from a numerical model of that
same structure. The data of interest will be the dynamic characteristics
of an antenna structure focusing on the mode shapes and modal
frequencies. The structure used was a scaled and simplified model of
the Karoo Array Telescope-7 (KAT-7) antenna structure.
This kind of data matching is a complex and difficult task. This
paper discusses how optimization can assist an engineer during the
process of correlating a finite element model with vibration test data.
Abstract: In this research, natural canthaxanthin as one of the
most important carotenoids was extracted from Dietzia
natronolimnaea HS-1. The changes of canthaxanthin enriched in oilin-
water emulsions with vegetable oil (5 mg/ 100 mL), Arabic gum (5
mg/100 mL), and potassium sorbate (0.5 g/100 mL) was investigated.
The effects of different pH (3, 5 and 7), as well as, time treatment (3,
18 and 33 days) in the environmental temperature (24°C) on the
degradation were studied by response surface methodology (RSM).
The Hunter values (L*, a*, and b*) and the concentration of
canthaxanthin (C, mg/L) illustrated more degradation of this pigment
at low pHs (pH≤ 4) by passing the time (days≥10) with R² 97.00%,
91.31%, 97.60%, and 99.54% for C, L*, a*, and b* respectively. The
predicted model were found to be significant (p