Abstract: The aim of this study was to improve the durability and quality of Bali beef (M. Longissimus dorsi) and broiler carcass through the addition of liquid smoke as a natural preservative. This study was using Longissimus dorsi muscle from male Bali beef aged 3 years, broiler breast and thigh aged 40 days. Three types of meat were marinated in liquid smoke with concentrations of 0, 5, and 10% for 30 minutes at the level of 20% of the sample weight (w/w). The samples were storage at 2-5°C for 1 month. This study designed as a factorial experiment 3 x 3 x 4 based on a completely randomized design with 5 replications; the first factor was meat type (beef, chicken breast and chicken thigh); the 2nd factor was liquid smoke concentrations (0, 5, and 10%), and the 3rd factor was storage duration (1, 2, 3, and 4 weeks). Parameters measured were TBA value, total bacterial colonies, water holding capacity (WHC), shear force value both before and after cooking (80°C – 15min.), and cooking loss. The results showed that the type of meat produced WHC, shear force value, cooking loss and TBA differed between the three types of meat. Higher concentration of liquid smoke, the WHC, shear force value, TBA, and total bacterial colonies were decreased; at a concentration of 10% of liquid smoke, the total bacterial colonies decreased by 57.3% from untreated with liquid smoke. Longer storage, the total bacterial colonies and WHC were increased, while the shear force value and cooking loss were decreased. It can be concluded that a 10% concentration of liquid smoke was able to maintain fat oxidation and bacterial growth in Bali beef and chicken breast and thigh.
Abstract: Data mining is the procedure of determining interesting patterns from the huge amount of data. With the intention of accessing the data faster the most supporting processes needed is clustering. Clustering is the process of identifying similarity between data according to the individuality present in the data and grouping associated data objects into clusters. Cluster ensemble is the technique to combine various runs of different clustering algorithms to obtain a general partition of the original dataset, aiming for consolidation of outcomes from a collection of individual clustering outcomes. The performances of clustering ensembles are mainly affecting by two principal factors such as diversity and quality. This paper presents the overview about the different cluster ensemble algorithm along with their methods used in cluster ensemble to improve the diversity and quality in the several cluster ensemble related papers and shows the comparative analysis of different cluster ensemble also summarize various cluster ensemble methods. Henceforth this clear analysis will be very useful for the world of clustering experts and also helps in deciding the most appropriate one to determine the problem in hand.
Abstract: Climate change and sea level rise is one of the greatest challenges facing human beings in the 21st century. Because of sea level rise, several low-lying coastal areas around the globe are at risk of being completely submerged, disappearing under water. Particularly in Viet Nam, the rise in sea level is predicted to result in more frequent and even permanently inundated coastal plains. As a result, land reserving fund of coastal cities is going to be narrowed in near future, while construction ground is becoming increasingly limited due to a rapid growth in population. Faced with this reality, the solutions are being discussed not only in tradition view such as accommodation is raised or moved to higher areas, or “living with the water”, but also forwards to “living on the water”. Therefore, the concept of a sustainable floating community with floating houses based on the precious value of long term historical tradition of water dwellings in Viet Nam would be a sustainable solution for adaptation of climate change and sea level rise in the coastal areas. The sustainable floating community is comprised of sustainability in four components: architecture, environment, socio-economic and living quality. This research paper is focused on sustainability in architectural component of floating community. Through detailed architectural analysis of current floating houses and floating communities in Viet Nam, this research not only accumulates precious values of traditional architecture that need to be preserved and developed in the proposed concept, but also illustrates its weaknesses that need to address for optimal design of the future sustainable floating communities. Based on these studies the research would provide guidelines with appropriate architectural solutions for the concept of sustainable floating community with floating housing units that are adapted to climate change and sea level rise in Viet Nam.
Abstract: Health diseases have a vital significance affecting human being's life and life quality. Sudden death events can be prevented owing to early diagnosis and treatment methods. Electrical signals, taken from the human being's body using non-invasive methods and showing the heart activity is called Electrocardiogram (ECG). The ECG signal is used for following daily activity of the heart by clinicians. Heart Rate Variability (HRV) is a physiological parameter giving the variation between the heart beats. ECG data taken from MITBIH Arrhythmia Database is used in the model employed in this study. The detection of arrhythmic heart beats is aimed utilizing the features extracted from the HRV time domain parameters. The developed model provides a satisfactory performance with ~89% accuracy, 91.7 % sensitivity and 85% specificity rates for the detection of arrhythmic beats.
Abstract: The safflower seed contains about 25-40% solvent extract and 20-33% fiber. It is well known that dietary phospholipids lower serum cholesterol levels effectively. The nutrient composition of safflower seed changes depending on region, soil and genotypes. This research was made by using of six natural selected (A22, A29, A30, C12, E1, F4, G8, G12, J27) and three commercial (Remzibey, Dincer, Black Sun1) varieties of safflower genotypes. The research was conducted on field conditions for two years (2009 and 2010) in randomized complete block design with three replications in Konya-Turkey ecological conditions. Oil contents, mineral contents and their correlations were determined in the research. According to the results, oil content was ranged from 22.38% to 34.26%, while the minerals were in between the following values: 1469, 04-2068.07 mg kg-1 for Ca, 7.24-11.71 mg kg-1 for B, 13.29-17.41 mg kg-1 for Cu, 51.00-79.35 mg kg-1 for Fe, 3988-6638.34 mg kg-1 for K, 1418.61-2306.06 mg kg-1 for Mg, 11.37-17.76 mg kg-1 for Mn, 4172.33-7059.58 mg kg-1 for P and 32.60-59.00 mg kg-1 for Zn. Correlation analysis that was made separately for the commercial varieties and wild lines showed that high level of oil content was negatively affected by all the investigated minerals except for K and Zn in the commercial varieties.
Abstract: Goat production is one of the activities included in
integrated farming in the Philippines. Goats are raised for its meat
and regardless of breed the animal is slaughtered for this purpose. In
order to document the carcass yield of different goats slaughtered,
five (5) different breeds of goats to include Purebred Boer and
Anglo-nubian, Crossbred Boer and Anglo-nubian and Philippine
Native goat were used in the study. Data on slaughter parameters,
carcass characteristics, and sensory evaluation were gathered and
analyzed using Complete Random Design (CRD) at 5% level of
significance and the results of carcass conformation were assessed
descriptively. Results showed that slaughter data such as
slaughter/live weight, hot and chilled carcass weights, dressing
percentage and percentage drip loss were significantly different
(P>0.05) among breeds. On carcass and meat characteristics, pure
breed and upgraded Boer were found to be moderately muscular
while Native goat was rated as thin muscular. The color of the
carcass also revealed that Purebred and crossbred Boer were
described dark red, while Native goat was noted to be slightly pale.
On sensory evaluation, the results indicated that there was no
significant difference (P>0.05) among breeds evaluated. It is
therefore concluded that purebred goat has heavier carcass, while
both purebred Boer and upgrade are rated slightly muscular. It is
further confirms that regardless of breed, goat will have the same
sensory characteristics. Thus, it is recommended to slaughter heavier
goats to obtain more carcasses with better conformation and quality.
Abstract: Natural gas sweetening process is a controlled process that must be done at maximum efficiency and with the highest quality. In this work, due to complexity and non-linearity of the process, the H2S gas separation and the intelligent fuzzy controller, which is used to enhance the process, are simulated in MATLAB – Simulink. New design of fuzzy control for Gas Separator is discussed in this paper. The design is based on the utilization of linear state-estimation to generate the internal knowledge-base that stores input-output pairs. The obtained input/output pairs are then used to design a feedback fuzzy controller. The proposed closed-loop fuzzy control system maintains the system asymptotically-stability while it enhances the system time response to achieve better control of the concentration of the output gas from the tower. Simulation studies are carried out to illustrate the Gas Separator system performance.
Abstract: Pain management is a question of quality of life and
an indicator for nursing quality. Chronic pain which is predominant
in oncology and palliative nursing situations is perceived today as a
multifactorial, individual emotional experience with specific
characteristics including the sociocultural dimension when dealing
with migrant patients. This dimension of chronic pain is of major
importance in professional nursing of migrant patients in hospices or
palliative care units. Objectives of the study are: 1. To find out more
about the sociocultural views on pain and nursing care, on customs
and nursing practices connected with pain of both Turkish Muslim
and German Christian women, 2. To improve individual and family
oriented nursing practice with view to sociocultural needs of patients
in severe pain in palliative care. In a qualitative-explorative comparative study 4 groups of women,
Turkish Muslims immigrants (4 from the first generation, 5 from the
second generation) and German Christian women of two generations
(5 of each age group) of the same age groups as the Turkish women
and with similar educational backgrounds were interviewed (semistructured
ethnographic interviews using Spradley, 1979) on their
perceptions and experiences of pain and nursing care within their
families. For both target groups the presentation will demonstrate the
following results in detail: Utterance of pain as well as “private” and
“public” pain vary within different societies and cultures. Permitted
forms of pain utterance are learned in childhood and determine
attitudes and expectations in adulthood. Language, especially when
metaphors and symbols are used, plays a major role for
misunderstandings. The sociocultural context of illness may include
specific beliefs that are important to the patients and yet seem more
than far-fetched from a biomedical perspective. Pain can be an
influential factor in family relationships where respect or hierarchies
do not allow the direct utterance of individual needs. Specific
resources are often, although not exclusively, linked to religious
convictions and are significantly helpful in reducing pain. The discussion will evaluate the results of the study with view to
the relevant literature and present nursing interventions and
instruments beyond medication that are helpful when dealing with
patients from various socio-cultural backgrounds in painful end-oflife
situations.
Abstract: River Hindon is an important river catering the
demand of highly populated rural and industrial cluster of western
Uttar Pradesh, India. Water quality of river Hindon is deteriorating at
an alarming rate due to various industrial, municipal and agricultural
activities. The present study aimed at identifying the pollution
sources and quantifying the degree to which these sources are
responsible for the deteriorating water quality of the river. Various
water quality parameters, like pH, temperature, electrical
conductivity, total dissolved solids, total hardness, calcium, chloride,
nitrate, sulphate, biological oxygen demand, chemical oxygen
demand, and total alkalinity were assessed. Water quality data
obtained from eight study sites for one year has been subjected to the
two multivariate techniques, namely, principal component analysis
and cluster analysis. Principal component analysis was applied with
the aim to find out spatial variability and to identify the sources
responsible for the water quality of the river. Three Varifactors were
obtained after varimax rotation of initial principal components using
principal component analysis. Cluster analysis was carried out to
classify sampling stations of certain similarity, which grouped eight
different sites into two clusters. The study reveals that the
anthropogenic influence (municipal, industrial, waste water and
agricultural runoff) was the major source of river water pollution.
Thus, this study illustrates the utility of multivariate statistical
techniques for analysis and elucidation of multifaceted data sets,
recognition of pollution sources/factors and understanding
temporal/spatial variations in water quality for effective river water
quality management.
Abstract: The change of conditions for production companies in
high-wage countries is characterized by the globalization of
competition and the transition of a supplier´s to a buyer´s market. The
companies need to face the challenges of reacting flexibly to these
changes. Due to the significant and increasing degree of automation,
assembly has become the most expensive production process.
Regarding the reduction of production cost, assembly consequently
offers a considerable rationalizing potential. Therefore, an
aerodynamic feeding system has been developed at the Institute of
Production Systems and Logistics (IFA), Leibniz Universitaet
Hannover. This system has been enabled to adjust itself by using a
genetic algorithm. The longer this genetic algorithm is executed the
better is the feeding quality. In this paper, the relation between the
system´s setting time and the feeding quality is observed and a
function which enables the user to achieve the minimum of the total
feeding time is presented.
Abstract: Software quality issues require special attention
especially in view of the demands of quality software product to meet
customer satisfaction. Software development projects in most
organisations need proper defect management process in order to
produce high quality software product and reduce the number of
defects. The research question of this study is how to produce high
quality software and reducing the number of defects. Therefore, the
objective of this paper is to provide a framework for managing
software defects by following defined life cycle processes. The
methodology starts by reviewing defects, defect models, best
practices, and standards. A framework for defect management life
cycle is proposed. The major contribution of this study is to define a
defect management roadmap in software development. The adoption
of an effective defect management process helps to achieve the
ultimate goal of producing high quality software products and
contributes towards continuous software process improvement.
Abstract: The purposes of this research are to make comparisons in
respect of the behaviors on the use of the services of metered taxi
classified by the demographic factor and to study the influence of the
recognition on service quality having the effect on usage behaviors of
metered taxi services of consumers in Bangkok Metropolitan Areas. The
samples used in this research were 400 metered taxi service users in
Bangkok Metropolitan Areas and questionnaire was used as the tool for
collecting the data. Analysis statistics are mean and multiple regression
analysis. Results of the research revealed that the consumers recognize the
overall quality of services in each aspect include tangible aspects of the
service, responses to customers, assurance on the confidence,
understanding and knowing of customers which is rated at the moderate
level except the aspect of the assurance on the confidence and
trustworthiness which are rated at a high level. For the result of
hypothetical test, it is found that the quality in providing the services on
the aspect of the assurance given to the customers has the effect on the
usage behaviors of metered taxi services and the aspect of the frequency
on the use of the services per month which in this connection. Such
variable can forecast at one point nine percent (1.9%). In addition, quality
in providing the services and the aspect of the responses to customers
have the effect on the behaviors on the use of metered taxi services on the
aspect of the expenses on the use of services per month which in this
connection, such variable can forecast at two point one percent (2.1%).
Abstract: Nature constantly changes as a result of human
necessities. This change mostly feels in natural water sources which
are reconstructed with an effect of dams and motorways. In other
respects, visual quality of the landscape gets a new and different
character during and after the construction of dams and motorways.
Changing and specialization new landscapes will be very important
to protection-usage balance to explore sustainable usage facilities.
The main cause of the selection of Artvin city is that it has very
important geographical location and one of the most attraction points
in the World with its biodiversity, conservation areas and natural
landscape characteristics. Many hydroelectric station and 7 dams are
situated, 3 of them have already been built on the Çoruh River in the
province of Artvin. As a result of dams, motorways route were reshaped
and the ways which have already changed because of
elevation is directly affected several of natural destruction. In
contrast, many different reservoirs in Coruh Basin provide new vista
point that has high visual quality. In this study, we would like to
evaluate with sustainable landscape design in 76 km river corridor,
which is mainly based on Deriner, Borçka and Muratlı Dams and
determination of their basin-lakes recreational potential and
opportunities. Lastly, we are going to give some suggestion about the
potential of the corridor.
Abstract: The increase of technogenic and natural accidents,
accompanied by air pollution, for example, by combustion products,
leads to the necessity of respiratory protection. This work is devoted to the development of a calorimetric method
and a device which allows investigating quickly the kinetics of
carbon dioxide sorption by chemisorbents on the base of potassium
superoxide in order to assess the protective properties of respiratory
protective closed circuit apparatus. The features of the traditional approach for determining the
sorption properties in a thin layer of chemisorbent are described, as
well as methods and devices, which can be used for the sorption
kinetics study. The authors developed an approach (as opposed to the traditional
approach) based on the power measurement of internal heat sources
in the chemisorbent layer. The emergence of the heat sources is a
result of exothermic reaction of carbon dioxide sorption. This
approach eliminates the necessity of chemical analysis of samples
and can significantly reduce the time and material expenses during
chemisorbents testing. Error of determining the volume fraction of adsorbed carbon
dioxide by the developed method does not exceed 12%. Taking into
account the efficiency of the method, we consider that it is a good
alternative to traditional methods of chemical analysis under the
assessment of the protection sorbents quality.
Abstract: Software testing has become a mandatory process in
assuring the software product quality. Hence, test management is
needed in order to manage the test activities conducted in the
software test life cycle. This paper discusses on the challenges faced
in the software test life cycle, and how the test processes and test
activities, mainly on test cases creation, test execution, and test
reporting is being managed and automated using several test
automation tools, i.e. Jira, Robot Framework, and Jenkins.
Abstract: Carbon Fiber Reinforced Plastics (CFRPs) are widely
used for advanced applications, in particular in aerospace, automotive
and wind energy industries. Once cured to near net shape, CFRP
parts need several finishing operations such as trimming, milling or
drilling in order to accommodate fastening hardware and meeting the
final dimensions. The present research aims to study the effect of the
cutting temperature in trimming on the mechanical strength of high
performance CFRP laminates used for aeronautics applications. The
cutting temperature is of great importance when dealing with
trimming of CFRP. Temperatures higher than the glass-transition
temperature (Tg) of the resin matrix are highly undesirable: they
cause degradation of the matrix in the trimmed edges area, which can
severely affect the mechanical performance of the entire component.
In this study, a 9.50mm diameter CVD diamond coated carbide tool
with six flutes was used to trim 24-plies CFRP laminates. A
300m/min cutting speed and 1140mm/min feed rate were used in the
experiments. The tool was heated prior to trimming using a
blowtorch, for temperatures ranging from 20°C to 300°C. The
temperature at the cutting edge was measured using embedded KType
thermocouples. Samples trimmed for different cutting
temperatures, below and above Tg, were mechanically tested using
three-points bending short-beam loading configurations. New cutting
tools as well as worn cutting tools were utilized for the experiments.
The experiments with the new tools could not prove any correlation
between the length of cut, the cutting temperature and the mechanical
performance. Thus mechanical strength was constant, regardless of
the cutting temperature. However, for worn tools, producing a cutting
temperature rising up to 450°C, thermal damage of the resin was
observed. The mechanical tests showed a reduced mean resistance in
short beam configuration, while the resistance in three point bending
decreases with increase of the cutting temperature.
Abstract: Biomass treatment through densification is very suitable and helpful technology before its effective energy recovery. Densification process of biomass is significantly influenced by various technological and material variables, which are ultimately reflected on the final solid biofuels quality. The paper deals with the experimental research of the relationship between technological and material variables during densification of fast-growing trees, roundly fast-growing willows. The main goal of presented experimental research is to determine the relationship between compression pressure and raw material particle size from a final briquettes density point of view. Experimental research was realized by single-axis densification. The impact of particle size with interaction of compression pressure and stabilization time on the quality properties of briquettes was determined. These variables interaction affects the final solid biofuels (briquettes) quality. From briquettes production point of view and from densification machines constructions point of view is very important to know about mutual interaction of these variables on final briquettes quality. The experimental findings presented here are showing the importance of mentioned variables during the densification process.
Abstract: One of the most important challenging factors in
medical images is nominated as noise. Image denoising refers to the
improvement of a digital medical image that has been infected by
Additive White Gaussian Noise (AWGN). The digital medical image
or video can be affected by different types of noises. They are
impulse noise, Poisson noise and AWGN. Computed tomography
(CT) images are subjects to low quality due to the noise. Quality of
CT images is dependent on absorbed dose to patients directly in such
a way that increase in absorbed radiation, consequently absorbed
dose to patients (ADP), enhances the CT images quality. In this
manner, noise reduction techniques on purpose of images quality
enhancement exposing no excess radiation to patients is one the
challenging problems for CT images processing. In this work, noise
reduction in CT images was performed using two different
directional 2 dimensional (2D) transformations; i.e., Curvelet and
Contourlet and Discrete Wavelet Transform (DWT) thresholding
methods of BayesShrink and AdaptShrink, compared to each other
and we proposed a new threshold in wavelet domain for not only
noise reduction but also edge retaining, consequently the proposed
method retains the modified coefficients significantly that result good
visual quality. Data evaluations were accomplished by using two
criterions; namely, peak signal to noise ratio (PSNR) and Structure
similarity (Ssim).
Abstract: In this article, a new method is proposed for the measuring of well-being inequality through a model composed of superimposing satisfaction waves. The displacement of households’ satisfactory state (i.e. satisfaction) is defined in a satisfaction string. The duration of the satisfactory state for a given period is measured in order to determine the relationship between utility and total satisfactory time, itself dependent on the density and tension of each satisfaction string. Thus, individual cardinal total satisfaction values are computed by way of a one-dimensional form for scalar sinusoidal (harmonic) moving wave function, using satisfaction waves with varying amplitudes and frequencies which allow us to measure wellbeing inequality. One advantage to using satisfaction waves is the ability to show that individual utility and consumption amounts would probably not commute; hence, it is impossible to measure or to know simultaneously the values of these observables from the dataset. Thus, we crystallize the problem by using a Heisenberg-type uncertainty resolution for self-adjoint economic operators. We propose to eliminate any estimation bias by correlating the standard deviations of selected economic operators; this is achieved by replacing the aforementioned observed uncertainties with households’ perceived uncertainties (i.e. corrected standard deviations) obtained through the logarithmic psychophysical law proposed by Weber and Fechner.
Abstract: The purpose of this project is to propose a quick and
environmentally friendly alternative to measure the quality of oils
used in food industry. There is evidence that repeated and
indiscriminate use of oils in food processing cause physicochemical
changes with formation of potentially toxic compounds that can
affect the health of consumers and cause organoleptic changes. In
order to assess the quality of oils, non-destructive optical techniques
such as Interferometry offer a rapid alternative to the use of reagents,
using only the interaction of light on the oil. Through this project, we
used interferograms of samples of oil placed under different heating
conditions to establish the changes in their quality. These
interferograms were obtained by means of a Mach-Zehnder
Interferometer using a beam of light from a HeNe laser of 10mW at
632.8nm. Each interferogram was captured, analyzed and measured
full width at half-maximum (FWHM) using the software from
Amcap and ImageJ. The total of FWHMs was organized in three
groups. It was observed that the average obtained from each of the
FWHMs of group A shows a behavior that is almost linear, therefore
it is probable that the exposure time is not relevant when the oil is
kept under constant temperature. Group B exhibits a slight
exponential model when temperature raises between 373 K and 393
K. Results of the t-Student show a probability of 95% (0.05) of the
existence of variation in the molecular composition of both samples.
Furthermore, we found a correlation between the Iodine Indexes
(Physicochemical Analysis) and the Interferograms (Optical
Analysis) of group C. Based on these results, this project highlights
the importance of the quality of the oils used in food industry and
shows how Interferometry can be a useful tool for this purpose.