Abstract: Nuclear technology is a controversial issue among a great share of the Brazilian population. Misinformation and common wrong beliefs confuse public’s perceptions and the scientific community is expected to offer a wider perspective on the benefits and risks resulting from ionizing radiation in everyday life. Attentive to the need of new approaches between science and society, the Nuclear Energy Museum, in northeast Brazil, is an initiative created to communicate the growing impact of the beneficial applications of nuclear technology in medicine, industry, agriculture and electric power generation. Providing accessible scientific information, the museum offers a rich learning environment, making use of different educational strategies, such as films, interactive panels and multimedia learning tools, which not only increase the enjoyment of visitors, but also maximize their learning potential. Developed according to modern active learning instructional strategies, multimedia materials are designed to present the increasingly role of nuclear science in modern life, transforming science education into a meaningful learning experience. In year 2016, nine different interactive computer-based activities were developed, presenting curiosities about ionizing radiation in different landmarks around the world, such as radiocarbon dating works in Egypt, nuclear power generation in France and X-radiography of famous paintings in Italy. Feedback surveys have reported a high level of visitors’ satisfaction, proving the high quality experience in learning nuclear science at the museum. The Nuclear Energy Museum is the first and, up to the present time, the only permanent museum in Brazil devoted entirely to nuclear science.
Abstract: The reduction of energy consumption through improvements in energy efficiency has become an important goal for all industries, in order to improve the efficiency of the economy, and to reduce the emissions of Co2 caused by power generation. The objective of this paper is to investigate opportunities to increase process energy efficiency at the distillation unit of Shiraz oil refinery in south of Iran. The main aim of the project is to locate energy savings by use of pinch technology and to assess them. At first all the required data of hot and cold streams in preheating section of distillation unit has been extracted from the available flow sheets and then pinch analysis has been conducted. The present case study is a threshold one which does not need any utilities. After running range, targeting several heat exchanger networks were designed with respect to operating conditions and different ΔTmin. The optimal value of ΔTmin was calculated to be 22.3 °C. Based on this optimal value, there will be 5% reduction in annual total cost of heat exchanger network.
Abstract: In this paper, a shot boundary detection method is presented using octagon square search pattern. The color, edge, motion and texture features of each frame are extracted and used in shot boundary detection. The motion feature is extracted using octagon square search pattern. Then, the transition detection method is capable of detecting the shot or non-shot boundaries in the video using the feature weight values. Experimental results are evaluated in TRECVID video test set containing various types of shot transition with lighting effects, object and camera movement within the shots. Further, this paper compares the experimental results of the proposed method with existing methods. It shows that the proposed method outperforms the state-of-art methods for shot boundary detection.
Abstract: The Information Retrieval community is facing the problem of effective representation of Web search results. When we organize web search results into clusters it becomes easy to the users to quickly browse through search results. The traditional search engines organize search results into clusters for ambiguous queries, representing each cluster for each meaning of the query. The clusters are obtained according to the topical similarity of the retrieved search results, but it is possible for results to be totally dissimilar and still correspond to the same meaning of the query. People search is also one of the most common tasks on the Web nowadays, but when a particular person’s name is queried the search engines return web pages which are related to different persons who have the same queried name. By placing the burden on the user of disambiguating and collecting pages relevant to a particular person, in this paper, we have developed an approach that clusters web pages based on the association of the web pages to the different people and clusters that are based on generic entity search.
Abstract: There are about 1% of the world population suffering
from the hidden disability known as epilepsy and major developing
countries are not fully equipped to counter this problem. In order to
reduce the inconvenience and danger of epilepsy, different methods
have been researched by using a artificial neural network (ANN)
classification to distinguish epileptic waveforms from normal brain
waveforms. This paper outlines the aim of achieving massive
ANN parallelization through a dedicated hardware using bit-serial
processing. The design of this bit-serial Neural Processing Element
(NPE) is presented which implements the functionality of a complete
neuron using variable accuracy. The proposed design has been tested
taking into consideration non-idealities of a hardware ANN. The NPE
consists of a bit-serial multiplier which uses only 16 logic elements
on an Altera Cyclone IV FPGA and a bit-serial ALU as well as a
look-up table. Arrays of NPEs can be driven by a single controller
which executes the neural processing algorithm. In conclusion, the
proposed compact NPE design allows the construction of complex
hardware ANNs that can be implemented in a portable equipment
that suits the needs of a single epileptic patient in his or her daily
activities to predict the occurrences of impending tonic conic seizures.
Abstract: The exhaustion of oil and the environmental pollution from the use of fossil fuel are increasing. Tidal current power (TCP) has been proposed as an alternative energy source because of its predictability and reliability. By applying a duct and single point mooring (SPM) system, a TCP device can amplify the generating power and keep its position properly. Because the generating power is proportional to cube of the current stream velocity, amplifying the current speed by applying a duct to a TCP system is an effective way to improve the efficiency of the power device. An SPM system can be applied at any water depth and is highly cost effective. Simple installation and maintenance procedures are also merits of an SPM system. In this study, we designed an SPM system for a duct-type TCP device for use in shallow water. Motions of the duct are investigated to obtain the response amplitude operator (RAO) as the magnitude of the transfer function. Parameters affecting the stability of the SPM system such as the fairlead departure angle, current velocity, and the number of clamp weights are analyzed and/or optimized. Wadam and OrcaFlex commercial software is used to design the mooring line.
Abstract: The purpose of this study is to develop a forging process of automotive parts that satisfies the deformation characteristics. The analyses of temperature variation and deformation behavior of the material are important to obtain the optimal forging products. The hot compression test was carried out to know formability at high temperature. In order to define the optimum forging conditions including material temperature, strain and forging load, the commercial finite element analysis code was used to simulate the forging procedure of engine mounting parts. Experimental results were compared with the simulation results by finite element analysis. Test results were in good agreement with the simulations.
Abstract: MnO2 nanowires were developed as filtration media for wastewater treatment that uniquely combines several advantages. The resulting material demonstrated strong capability to remove the pollution of heavy metal ions and organic contents in water. In addition, the manufacture process of such material is practical and economical. In this work, MnO2 nanowires were integrated with the state-of-art bio-electrochemical system for wastewater treatment, to overcome problems currently encountered with organic, inorganic, heavy metal, and microbe removal, and to minimize the unit footprint (land/space occupation) at low cost. Results showed that coupling the bio-electrochemical with MnO2 resulted in very encouraging results with higher removal efficiencies of such pollutants.
Abstract: According to 3D magnetic circuit of the transverse flux PM linear machine, distribution law is presented, and analytical expression of axial end flux leakage is derived using numerical method. Maxwell stress tensor is used to solve detent force of mover. A 3D finite element model of the transverse flux PM machine is built to analyze the flux distribution and detent force. Experimental results of the prototype verified the validity of axial end flux leakage and detent force theoretical derivation, the research on axial end flux leakage and detent force provides a valuable reference to other types of linear machine.
Abstract: Web service adaptation involves the creation of adapters that solve Web services incompatibilities known as mismatches. Since the importance of Web services adaptation is increasing because of the frequent implementation and use of online Web services, this paper presents a literature review of web services to investigate the main methods of adaptation, their theoretical underpinnings and the metrics used to measure adapters performance. Eighteen publications were reviewed independently by two researchers. We found that adaptation techniques are needed to solve different types of problems that may arise due to incompatibilities in Web service interfaces, including protocols, messages, data and semantics that affect the interoperability of the services. Although adapters are non-invasive methods that can improve Web services interoperability and there are current approaches for service adaptation; there is, however, not yet one solution that fits all types of mismatches. Our results also show that only a few research projects incorporate theoretical frameworks and that metrics to measure adapters’ performance are very limited. We conclude that further research on software adaptation should improve current adaptation methods in different layers of the service interoperability and that an adaptation theoretical framework that incorporates a theoretical underpinning and measures of qualitative and quantitative performance needs to be created.
Abstract: The abiotic elicitation is one of the methods for
increasing the secondary metabolites production in plant tissue
cultures and it seems to be more effective than traditional strategies.
This study verified the use of silver nitrate as elicitor to enhance
flavonolignans and flavonoid taxifolin production in suspension
culture of Sylibum marianum (L.) Gaertn. Silver nitrate in various
concentrations (5.887.10-3 mol/L, 5.887.10-4 mol/L, 5.887.10-5
mol/L) was used as elicitor. The content of secondary metabolites in
cell suspension cultures was determined by high performance liquid
chromatography. The samples were taken after 6, 12, 24, 48, 72 and
168 hours of treatment. The highest content of taxifolin production
(2.2 mg.g-1) in cell suspension culture of Silybum marianum (L.)
Gaertn. was detected after silver nitrate (5.887.10-4 mol/L) treatment
and 72 h application. Flavonolignans such as silybinA, silybin B,
silydianin, silychristin, isosilybin A, isosilybin B were not produced
by cell suspension culture of S. marianum after elicitor treatment.
Our results show that the secondarymetabolites could be released
from S. marianum cells into the nutrient medium by changed
permeability of cell wall.
Abstract: Cavities are frequently found beneath conduits on pile
foundations in old embankments. Cavity reduces seepage length
significantly and consequently causes piping failure of embankments.
Case studies of embankment failures indicate that the relative
settlement between ground and pile supported-concrete conduit was
the main reason of the cavity. In this paper, an attempt to simulate the
cavity-induced piping failure mechanism was made using finite
element numerical method. Piping potential is examined by carrying
out parametric study for influencing factors such as cavity length,
water level, and flow conditions. The concentration of hydraulic
gradient adjacent to cavity was found. It is found that the hydraulic
gradient close to the cavity exceeds considerably the critical hydraulic
gradient causing piping. Piping failure potential due to the existence of
cavity is evaluated and contour map for the potential risk of an
embankment for piping failure is proposed.
Abstract: This paper addresses the issue of resource allocation
in the emerging cognitive technology. Focusing the Quality of
Service (QoS) of Primary Users (PU), a novel method is proposed for
the resource allocation of Secondary Users (SU). In this paper, we
propose the unique Utility Function in the game theoretic model of
Cognitive Radio which can be maximized to increase the capacity of
the Cognitive Radio Network (CRN) and to minimize the
interference scenario. Utility function is formulated to cater the need
of PUs by observing Signal to Noise ratio. Existence of Nash
Equilibrium for the postulated game is established.
Abstract: This paper studied the flow shop scheduling problem under machine availability constraints. The machines are subject to flexible preventive maintenance activities. The nonresumable scenario for the jobs was considered. That is, when a job is interrupted by an unavailability period of a machine it should be restarted from the beginning. The objective is to minimize the total tardiness time for the jobs and the advance/tardiness for the maintenance activities. To solve the problem, a genetic algorithm was developed and successfully tested and validated on many problem instances. The computational results showed that the new genetic algorithm outperforms another earlier proposed algorithm.
Abstract: This work is on decision tree-based classification for
the disbursement of scholarship. Tree-based data mining
classification technique is used in other to determine the generic rule
to be used to disburse the scholarship. The system based on the
defined rules from the tree is able to determine the class (status) to
which an applicant shall belong whether Granted or Not Granted. The
applicants that fall to the class of granted denote a successful
acquirement of scholarship while those in not granted class are
unsuccessful in the scheme. An algorithm that can be used to classify
the applicants based on the rules from tree-based classification was
also developed. The tree-based classification is adopted because of its
efficiency, effectiveness, and easy to comprehend features. The
system was tested with the data of National Information Technology
Development Agency (NITDA) Abuja, a Parastatal of Federal
Ministry of Communication Technology that is mandated to develop
and regulate information technology in Nigeria. The system was
found working according to the specification. It is therefore
recommended for all scholarship disbursement organizations.
Abstract: Human beings have the ability to make logical
decisions. Although human decision - making is often optimal, it is
insufficient when huge amount of data is to be classified. Medical
dataset is a vital ingredient used in predicting patient’s health
condition. In other to have the best prediction, there calls for most
suitable machine learning algorithms. This work compared the
performance of Artificial Neural Network (ANN) and Decision Tree
Algorithms (DTA) as regards to some performance metrics using
diabetes data. WEKA software was used for the implementation of
the algorithms. Multilayer Perceptron (MLP) and Radial Basis
Function (RBF) were the two algorithms used for ANN, while
RegTree and LADTree algorithms were the DTA models used. From
the results obtained, DTA performed better than ANN. The Root
Mean Squared Error (RMSE) of MLP is 0.3913 that of RBF is
0.3625, that of RepTree is 0.3174 and that of LADTree is 0.3206
respectively.
Abstract: Taiwan is a hyper endemic area for the Hepatitis B
virus (HBV). The estimated total number of HBsAg carriers in the
general population who are more than 20 years old is more than 3
million. Therefore, a case record review is conducted from January
2003 to June 2007 for all patients with a diagnosis of acute hepatitis
who were admitted to the Emergency Department (ED) of a
well-known teaching hospital. The cost for the use of medical
resources is defined as the total medical fee. In this study, principal
component analysis (PCA) is firstly employed to reduce the number of
dimensions. Support vector regression (SVR) and artificial neural
network (ANN) are then used to develop the forecasting model. A total
of 117 patients meet the inclusion criteria. 61% patients involved in
this study are hepatitis B related. The computational result shows that
the proposed PCA-SVR model has superior performance than other
compared algorithms. In conclusion, the Child-Pugh score and
echogram can both be used to predict the cost of medical resources for
patients with acute hepatitis in the ED.
Abstract: Power systems are operating under stressed condition
due to continuous increase in demand of load. This can lead to
voltage instability problem when face additional load increase or
contingency. In order to avoid voltage instability suitable size of
reactive power compensation at optimal location in the system is
required which improves the load margin. This work aims at
obtaining optimal size as well as location of compensation in the 39-
bus New England system with the help of Bacteria Foraging and
Genetic algorithms. To reduce the computational time the work
identifies weak candidate buses in the system, and then picks only
two of them to take part in the optimization. The objective function is
based on a recently proposed voltage stability index which takes into
account the weighted average sensitivity index is a simpler and faster
approach than the conventional CPF algorithm. BFOA has been
found to give better results compared to GA.
Abstract: Given the importance of ports as links in the global
supply chains and because they are key elements to induce
competitiveness in their hinterlands, the number of studies devoted to
port governance, management and operations has increased in the last
decades. Some of these studies address the port governance model as
an element to improve coordination among the actors of the portlogistics
chain and to generate a better port performance. In this
context, the present study analyzes the governance of Port of Santos
through individual interviews with port managers, based on a
conceptual model that considers the key dimensions associated with
port governance. The results reinforce the usefulness of the applied
model and highlight some existing improvement opportunities in the
port studied.
Abstract: Due to the importance of ports to trade and economic
development of the regions in which they are inserted, in recent
decades the number of studies devoted to this subject has increased.
Part of these studies considers the ports as business agglomerations
and focuses on port governance. This is an important approach since
the port performance is the result of activities performed by actors
belonging to the port-logistics chain, which need to be properly
coordinated. This coordination takes place through a port governance
model. Given this context, this study aims to analyze the governance
model of the port of Santos from the perspective of port customers.
To do this, a closed-ended questionnaire based on a conceptual model
that considers the key dimensions associated with port governance
was applied to the international freight forwarders that operate in the
port. The results show the applicability of the considered model and
highlight improvement opportunities to be implemented at the port of
Santos.