Abstract: In general, algorithms to find continuous k-nearest neighbors have been researched on the location based services, monitoring periodically the moving objects such as vehicles and mobile phone. Those researches assume the environment that the number of query points is much less than that of moving objects and the query points are not moved but fixed. In gaming environments, this problem is when computing the next movement considering the neighbors such as flocking, crowd and robot simulations. In this case, every moving object becomes a query point so that the number of query point is same to that of moving objects and the query points are also moving. In this paper, we analyze the performance of the existing algorithms focused on location based services how they operate under gaming environments.
Abstract: Currently, several soft switching topologies have been studied to achieve high power switching efficiency, reduced cost, improved reliability and reduced parasites. It is well known that improvement in power electronics systems always depend on advanced in power devices. The IGBT has been successfully used in a variety of switching applications such as motor drives and appliance control because of its superior characteristics.
The aim of this paper is focuses on simulation and explication of the internal dynamics of IGBTs behaviour under the most popular soft switching schemas that is Zero Current Switching (ZCS) environments.
The main purpose of this paper is to point out some mechanisms relating to current tail during the turn-off and examination of the response at turn-off with variation of temperature, inductance L, snubber capacitors Cs, and bus voltage in order to achieve an improved understanding of internal carrier dynamics. It is shown that the snubber capacitor, the inductance and even the temperature controls the magnitude and extent of the tail current, hence the turn-off time (switching speed of the device).
Moreover, it has also been demonstrated that the ZCS switching can be utilized efficiently to improve and reduce the power losses as well as the turn-off time. Furthermore, the turn-off loss in ZCS was found to depend on the time of switching of the device.
Abstract: This paper proposes frequency offset (FO) estimation
schemes robust to the non-Gaussian noise for orthogonal frequency
division multiplexing (OFDM) systems. A maximum-likelihood (ML)
scheme and a low-complexity estimation scheme are proposed by
applying the probability density function of the cyclic prefix of
OFDM symbols to the ML criterion. From simulation results, it is
confirmed that the proposed schemes offer a significant FO estimation
performance improvement over the conventional estimation scheme
in non-Gaussian noise environments.
Abstract: New diagnostic tools are urgently needed to interrupt the transmission of tuberculosis and multidrug-resistant tuberculosis. The microscopic-observation drug-susceptibility (MODS) assay is a rapid, accurate and simple liquid culture method to detect multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDR-TB). MODS were evaluated to determine a lower and same concentration of isoniazid and rifampin for detection of MDR-TB. Direct drug-susceptibility testing was performed with the use of the MODS assay. Drug-sensitive control strains were tested daily. The drug concentrations that used for both isoniazid and rifampin were at the same concentration: 0.16, 0.08 and 0.04μg per milliliter. We tested 56 M. tuberculosis clinical isolates and the control strains M. tuberculosis H37RV. All concentration showed same result. Of 53 M. tuberculosis clinical isolates, 14 were MDR-TB, 38 were susceptible with isoniazid and rifampin, 1 was resistant with isoniazid only. Drug-susceptibility testing was performed with the use of the proportion method using Mycobacteria Growth Indicator Tube (MGIT) system as reference. The result of MODS assay using lower concentration was significance (P
Abstract: A mathematical heat transfer model for the prediction of transient heating of the slab in a direct-fired walking beam type reheating furnace has been developed by considering the nongray thermal radiation with given furnace environments. The furnace is modeled as radiating nongray medium with carbon dioxide and water with five-zoned gas temperature and the furnace wall is considered as a constant temperature lower than furnace gas one. The slabs are moving with constant velocity depending on the residence time through the non-firing, charging, preheating, heating, and final soaking zones. Radiative heat flux obtained by considering the radiative heat exchange inside the furnace as well as convective one from the surrounding hot gases are introduced as boundary condition of the transient heat conduction within the slab. After validating thermal radiation model adopted in this work, thermal fields in both model and real reheating furnace are investigated in terms of radiative heat flux in the furnace and temperature inside the slab. The results show that the slab in the furnace can be more heated with higher slab emissivity and residence time.
Abstract: This research presents the first comprehensive survey of congener profiles (7 indicator congeners) of polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs) in sediment samples covering ten sites in CauBay River, Vietnam. Chemical analyses were carried out in gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (GC–MS) for tri- to hepta- brominated congeners. Results pointed out a non-homogenous contamination of the sediment with ∑7 PBDE values ranging from 8.93 to 25.64ng g−1, reflecting moderate to low contamination closely in conformity to other Asian aquatic environments. The general order of decreasing congener contribution to the total load was: BDE 47 > 99 > 100 > 154, similar to the distribution pattern worldwide. PBDEs had rare risks in the sediment of studied area. However, due to the propensity of PBDEs to accumulate in various compartments of wildlife and human food webs, evaluation of biological tissues should be undertaken as a high priority.
Abstract: This paper focuses on assessing sloshing-induced overflow of the seismically-isolated nuclear tanks based on Fluid-Structure Interaction (FSI) analysis. Typically, fluid motion in the seismically-isolated nuclear tank systems may be rather amplified and even overflowed under earthquake. Sloshing-induced overflow in those structures has to be reliably assessed and predicted since it can often cause critical damages to humans and environments. FSI analysis is herein performed to compute the total cumulative overflowed water volume more accurately, by coupling ANSYS with CFX for structural and fluid analyses, respectively. The approach is illustrated on a nuclear liquid storage tank, Spent Fuel Pool (SFP), forgiven conditions under consideration: different liquid levels, Peak Ground Accelerations (PGAs), and post earthquakes.
Abstract: A polymer cement mortar (PCM) has been widely used as the material of repair and restoration work for concrete structure; however a PCM usually induces an environmental pollutant. Therefore, there is a need to develop PCM which is less impact to
environments. Usually, UM resin is known to be harmless to the environment. Accordingly, in this paper, the properties of the PCM using UM resin were studied. The general cement mortar and UM resin were mixed in the specified ratio. A certain percentage of PVA fibers, steel fibers and mixed fibers (PVA fiber and steel fiber) were added to enhance the flexural strength. The flexural tests were performed in order to investigate the flexural strength of each PCM. Experimental results showed that the strength of proposed PCM using UM resin is improved when they are compared with general cement mortar.
Abstract: The purposes of this research is aim to build the energy saving stove for stew coconut sugar. The research started from explores ceramic raw materials in local area, create the appropriate mixture of ceramic raw materials for construction material of stove, and make it by ceramic process. It includes design and build the energy saving stove, experiment the efficiency of energy saving stove as to thermal efficiency, energy saving, performance of time, and energy cost efficiency, transfer the knowledge for community, stove manufacturers, and technicians. The findings must be useful to the coconut sugar enterprises producing, to reduce the cost of production, preserve natural resources, and environments.
Abstract: Advancement of communication technologies and smart devices in the recent times is leading to changes into the integrated wired and wireless communication environments. Since early days, businesses had started introducing environments for mobile device application to their operations in order to improve productivity (efficiency) and the closed corporate environment gradually shifted to an open structure. Recently, individual user's interest in working environment using mobile devices has increased and a new corporate working environment under the concept of BYOD is drawing attention. BYOD (bring your own device) is a concept where individuals bring in and use their own devices in business activities. Through BYOD, businesses can anticipate improved productivity (efficiency) and also a reduction in the cost of purchasing devices. However, as a result of security threats caused by frequent loss and theft of personal devices and corporate data leaks due to low security, companies are reluctant about adopting BYOD system. In addition, without considerations to diverse devices and connection environments, there are limitations in detecting abnormal behaviors, such as information leaks, using the existing network-based security equipment. This study suggests a method to detect abnormal behaviors according to individual behavioral patterns, rather than the existing signature-based malicious behavior detection, and discusses applications of this method in BYOD environment.
Abstract: In recent years, Japanese society has been aging, engendering a labor shortage of young workers. Robots are therefore expected to perform tasks such as rehabilitation, nursing elderly people, and day-to-day work support for elderly people. The pneumatic balloon actuator is a rubber artificial muscle developed for use in a robot hand in such environments. This actuator has a long stroke and a high power-to-weight ratio compared with the present pneumatic artificial muscle. Moreover, the dynamic characteristics of this actuator resemble those of human muscle. This study evaluated characteristics of force control of balloon actuator using a predictive functional control (PFC) system with disturbance observer. The predictive functional control is a model-based predictive control (MPC) scheme that predicts the future outputs of the actual plants over the prediction horizon and computes the control effort over the control horizon at every sampling instance. For this study, a 1-link finger system using a pneumatic balloon actuator is developed. Then experiments of PFC control with disturbance observer are performed. These experiments demonstrate the feasibility of its control of a pneumatic balloon actuator for a robot hand.
Abstract: Explosion in information management and information system technology has brought dramatic changes in learning and library system environments. The use of academic digital libraries does witness the spectacular impact on academic societies’ way of performing their study in Malaysia, a country with a multi-racial people. This paper highlights a research on examining the socio-demographic differences on the preference and use of academic digital libraries as compared to physical libraries at higher learning institutions. Findings indicate that preference towards digital libraries differed between ethnicity, gender and university. However none of the socio-demographic factors is statistically significant in terms of the use of digital libraries.
Abstract: In an original directed diffusion routing protocol, a sink requests sensing data from a source node by flooding interest messages to the network. Then, the source finds the sink by sending exploratory data messages to all nodes that generate incoming interest messages. This protocol signaling can cause heavy traffic in the network, an interference of the radio signal, collisions, great energy consumption of sensor nodes, etc. According to this research problem, this paper investigates the effect of sending interest and exploratory data messages on the performance of directed diffusion routing protocol. We demonstrate the research problem occurred from employing directed diffusion protocol in mobile wireless environments. For this purpose, we perform a set of experiments by using NS2 (network simulator 2). The radio propagation models; Two-ray ground reflection with and without shadow fading are included to investigate the effect of signaling. The simulation results show that the number of times of sent and received protocol signaling in the case of sending interest and exploratory data messages are larger than the case of sending other protocol signals, especially in the case of shadowing model. Additionally, the number of exploratory data message is largest in one round of the protocol procedure.
Abstract: Localization and Recognition of License registration characters from the moving vehicle is a computationally complex task in the field of machine vision and is of substantial interest because of its diverse applications such as cross border security, law enforcement and various other intelligent transportation applications. Previous research used the plate specific details such as aspect ratio, character style, color or dimensions of the plate in the complex task of plate localization. In this paper, license registration character is localized by Enhanced Weight based density map (EWBDM) method, which is independent of such constraints. In connection with our previous method, this paper proposes a method that relaxes constraints in lighting conditions, different fonts of character occurred in the plate and plates with hand-drawn characters in various aspect quotients. The robustness of this method is well suited for applications where the appearance of plates seems to be varied widely. Experimental results show that this approach is suited for recognizing license plates in different external environments.
Abstract: In this paper, we present a localization of a mobile robot with localization modules which have two ceiling-view cameras in indoor environments. We propose two kinds of localization method. The one is the localization in the local space; we use the line feature and the corner feature between the ceiling and wall. The other is the localization in the large space; we use the natural features such as bulbs, structures on the ceiling. These methods are installed on the embedded module able to mount on the robot. The embedded module has two cameras to be able to localize in both the local space and the large spaces. The experiment is practiced in our indoor test-bed and a government office. The proposed method is proved by the experimental results.
Abstract: The purpose of this paper is to examine co-creation of non-economic values in Islamic banking services and their significance for service science by comparing Islamic and conventional banking services. Although many scholars have discussed co-creation of values in services, most of them have focused on only economic values.
Following Sharia (Islamic principles that are based on Qur’an and Sunnah) traditions, Islamic banking is more concerned with such non-economic values as well-being, partnership, fairness, trust, and justice, than such economic values as money in terms of interest. Therefore, it may be more sustainable and suitable for today’s unpredictable socio-economic environments.
We also argue that Islamic banking is essentially a value co-creation business model that fits better with the so-called Service-Dominant Logic (SDL) than conventional banking. This paper explores a new frontier of value co-creation in services, thereby contributing to further development of service science.
Abstract: The protection of groundwater resources is the great
important many semiarid and arid environments. Baghan watershed
is located in the north of Kangan in the Boshehr province in Iran. The
groundwater resources have a vital role in supplying agricultural,
drinking, domestic and industrial water demand in Baghan
watershed. For our investigation into the water quality we collected
30 samples to chemical and physical analysis. The result showed the
marl and evaporation deposits that contain anhydrite and gypsum is
the main source of groundwater pollution, and one part of the
groundwater was polluted by oil and gas industrial. Another part of
the groundwater was contaminated by urban waste water. The
electrical conductivity and captions and anions increased around of
towns and gas refinery. Although the negative impact of untreated
domestic wastewater is relatively low but the results showed strongly
the negative impact of wastewater refinery is very considerable. This
negative impact increased in downstream due to shallow aquifer.
Additionally, the agents that adversely affect the quality of
groundwater come from a variety of sources, including geology,
domestic wastewater and the Jam refinery in Baghan watershed.
Abstract: In-situ chemical oxidation (ISCO) has been widely
used for source zone remediation of Dense Nonaqueous Phase
Liquids (DNAPLs) in subsurface environments. DNAPL source
zones for karst aquifers are generally located in epikarst where the
DNAPL mass is trapped either in karst soil or at the regolith contact
with carbonate bedrock. This study aims to investigate the
performance of oxidation of residual trichloroethylene found in such
environments by potassium permanganate. Batch and flow cell
experiments were conducted to determine the kinetics and the mass
removal rate of TCE. pH change, Cl production, TCE and MnO4
destruction were monitored routinely during experiments. Nonreactive
tracer tests were also conducted prior and after the oxidation
process to determine the influence of oxidation on flow conditions.
The results show that oxidant consumption rate of the calcareous
epikarst soil was significant and the oxidant demand was determined
to be 20 g KMnO4/kg soil. Oxidation rate of residual TCE (1.26x10-3
s-1) was faster than the oxidant consumption rate of the soil (2.54 -
2.92x10-4 s-1) at only high oxidant concentrations (> 40 mM
KMnO4). Half life of TCE oxidation ranged from 7.9 to 10.7 min.
Although highly significant fraction of residual TCE mass in the
system was destroyed by permanganate oxidation, TCE
concentration in the effluent remained above its MCL. Flow
interruption tests indicate that efficiency of ISCO was limited by the
rate of TCE dissolution and the rate-limited desorption of TCE. The
residence time and the initial concentration of the oxidant in the
source zone also controlled the efficiency of ISCO in epikarst.
Abstract: The paper presents an on-line recognition machine
(RM) for continuous/isolated, dynamic and static gestures that arise
in Flight Deck Officer (FDO) training. RM is based on generic pattern
recognition framework. Gestures are represented as templates using
summary statistics. The proposed recognition algorithm exploits temporal
and spatial characteristics of gestures via dynamic programming
and Markovian process. The algorithm predicts corresponding index
of incremental input data in the templates in an on-line mode.
Accumulated consistency in the sequence of prediction provides a
similarity measurement (Score) between input data and the templates.
The algorithm provides an intuitive mechanism for automatic detection
of start/end frames of continuous gestures. In the present paper,
we consider isolated gestures. The performance of RM is evaluated
using four datasets - artificial (W TTest), hand motion (Yang) and
FDO (tracker, vision-based ). RM achieves comparable results which
are in agreement with other on-line and off-line algorithms such as
hidden Markov model (HMM) and dynamic time warping (DTW).
The proposed algorithm has the additional advantage of providing
timely feedback for training purposes.
Abstract: In this paper, we introduce an mobile agent framework
with proactive load balancing for ambient intelligence (AmI) environments.
One of the main obstacles of AmI is the scalability in
which the openness of AmI environment introduces dynamic resource
requirements on agencies. To mediate this scalability problem, our
framework proposes a load balancing module to proactively analyze
the resource consumption of network bandwidth and preferred agencies
to suggest the optimal communication method to its user. The
framework generally formulates an AmI environment that consists
of three main components: (1) mobile devices, (2) hosts or agencies,
and (3) directory service center (DSC). A preliminary implementation
was conducted with NetLogo and the experimental results show that
the proposed approach provides enhanced system performance by
minimizing the network utilization to provide users with responsive
services.