Abstract: Zeolite A and MCM-41 have extensive applications in basic science, petrochemical science, energy conservation/storage, medicine, chemical sensor, air purification, environmentally benign composite structure and waste remediation. However, the use of zeolite A and MCM-41 in these areas, especially environmental remediation, are restricted due to prohibitive production cost. Efficient recycling of and resource recovery from coal fly ash has been a major topic of current international research interest, aimed at achieving sustainable development of human society from the viewpoints of energy, economy, and environmental strategy. This project reported an original, novel, green and fast methods to produce nano-porous zeolite A and MCM-41 materials from coal fly ash. For zeolite A, this novel production method allows a reduction by half of the total production time while maintaining a high degree of crystallinity of zeolite A which exists in a narrower particle size distribution. For MCM-41, this remarkably green approach, being an environmentally friendly process and reducing generation of toxic waste, can produce pure and long-range ordered MCM-41 materials from coal fly ash. This approach took 24 h at 25 oC to produce 9 g of MCM-41 materials from 30 g of the coal fly ash, which is the shortest time and lowest reaction temperature required to produce pure and ordered MCM-41 materials (having the largest internal surface area) compared to the values reported in the literature. Performance evaluation of the produced zeolite A and MCM-41 materials in wastewater treatment and air pollution control were reported. The residual fly ash was also converted to zeolite Na-P1 which showed good performance in removal of multi-metal ions in wastewater. In wastewater treatment, compared to commercial-grade zeolite A, adsorbents produced from coal fly ash were effective in removing multi heavy metal ions in water and could be an alternative material for treatment of wastewater. In methane emission abatement, the zeolite A (produced from coal fly ash) achieved similar methane removal efficiency compared to the zeolite A prepared from pure chemicals. This report provides the guidance for production of zeolite A and MCM-41 from coal fly ash by a cost-effective approach which opens potential applications of these materials in environmental industry. Finally, environmental and economic aspects of production of zeolite A and MCM-41 from coal fly ash were discussed.
Abstract: Environment today is featured with aging population,
increasing prevalence of chronic disease and complex of medical
treatment. Safe use of pharmaceutics relied very much on the efforts
made by both the health- related organizations and as well as the
government agencies. As far as the specialization concern in providing
health services to the patients, the government actively issued and
implemented the divisions of medical treatment and pharmaceutical to
improve the quality of care and to reduce medication errors and ensure
public health. Pharmaceutical sub-sector policy has been implemented
for 13 years. This study attempts to explore the factors that affect the
patients- behavior intention of refilling a prescription from a NHIB
pharmacy. Samples were those patients refilling their prescriptions
with the case NHIB pharmacies. A self-administered questionnaire
was used to collect respondents- information while the patients or
family members visit the pharmacy for the refilling. 1,200
questionnaires were dispatched in 37 pharmacies that randomly
selected from Pingtung City, Dongkang, Chaozhou, Hengchun areas.
732 responses were gained with 604 valid samples for further analyses.
Results of data analyses indicated that respondents- attitude,
subjective norm, perceived behavior control and behavior intentions
toward refilling behavior varied from some demographic variables to
another. This research also suggested adding actual behavior, either by
a self-report or observed, into the research.
Abstract: The crystalline quality of the AlGaN/GaN high electron mobility transistor (HEMT) structure grown on a 200 mm silicon substrate has been investigated using UV-visible micro- Raman scattering and photoluminescence (PL). The visible Raman scattering probes the whole nitride stack with the Si substrate and shows the presence of a small component of residual in-plane stress in the thick GaN buffer resulting from a wafer bowing, while the UV micro-Raman indicates a tensile interfacial stress induced at the top GaN/AlGaN/AlN layers. PL shows a good crystal quality GaN channel where the yellow band intensity is very low compared to that of the near-band-edge transition. The uniformity of this sample is shown by measurements from several points across the epiwafer.
Abstract: The purpose of this paper is to improve electromagnetic characteristics on grounding grid by applying the conductive concrete. The conductive concrete in this study is under an extra high voltage (EHV, 345kV) system located in a high-tech industrial park or science park. Instead of surrounding soil of grounding grid, the application of conductive concrete can reduce equipment damage and body damage caused by switching surges. The focus of the two cases on the EHV distribution system in a high-tech industrial park is presented to analyze four soil material styles. By comparing several soil material styles, the study results have shown that the conductive concrete can effectively reduce the negative damages caused by electromagnetic transient. The adoption of the style of grounding grid located 1.0 (m) underground and conductive concrete located from the ground surface to 1.25 (m) underground can obviously improve the electromagnetic characteristics so as to advance protective efficiency.
Abstract: Flexible Job Shop Problem (FJSP) is an extension of
classical Job Shop Problem (JSP). The FJSP extends the routing
flexibility of the JSP, i.e assigning machine to an operation. Thus it
makes it more difficult than the JSP. In this study, Cooperative Coevolutionary
Genetic Algorithm (CCGA) is presented to solve the
FJSP. Makespan (time needed to complete all jobs) is used as the
performance evaluation for CCGA. In order to test performance and
efficiency of our CCGA the benchmark problems are solved.
Computational result shows that the proposed CCGA is comparable
with other approaches.
Abstract: A model is presented to find the optimal design of the
mixed renewable warranty policy for non-repairable Weibull life
products. The optimal design considers the conflict of interests
between the customer and the manufacturer: the customer interests
are longer full rebate coverage period and longer total warranty
coverage period, the manufacturer interests are lower warranty cost
and lower risk. The design factors are full rebate and total warranty
coverage periods. Results showed that mixed policy is better than full
rebate policy in terms of risk and total warranty coverage period in all
of the three bathtub regions. In addition, results showed that linear
policy is better than mixed policy in infant mortality and constant
failure regions while the mixed policy is better than linear policy in
ageing region of the model. Furthermore, the results showed that
using burn-in period for infant mortality products reduces warranty
cost and risk.
Abstract: The increasing usage of antibiotics in the animal
farming industry is an emerging worldwide problem contributing to
the development of antibiotic resistance. The purpose of this work was
to investigate the prevalence and antibiotic resistance profile of
bacterial isolates collected from aquatic environments and meats in a
peri-urban community in Daejeon, Korea. In an antibacterial
susceptibility test, the bacterial isolates showed a high incidence of
resistance (~ 26.04 %) to cefazolin, tetracycline, gentamycin,
norfloxacin, erythromycin and vancomycin. The results from a test for
multiple antibiotic resistance indicated that the isolates were
displaying an approximately 5-fold increase in the incidence of
multiple antibiotic resistance to combinations of two different
antibiotics compared to combinations of three or more antibiotics.
Most of the isolates showed multi-antibiotic resistance, and the
resistance patterns were similar among the sampling groups.
Sequencing data analysis of 16S rRNA showed that most of the
resistant isolates appeared to be dominated by the classes
Betaproteobacteria and Gammaproteobacteria in the phylum
Proteobacteria.
Abstract: This study analyzes on the Social Network Game
(SNG), ANIPANG, in order to discover its unique fun elements, so
that suggest new methodologies for development of SNGs. ANIPANG
is the most popular SNG in the South Korea on 2012. Recently, the
game industry is paying close attention to mobile-based SNGs due to
the rapid prevalence of smart-phones and social network services.
However, SNGs are not online games simply. Although the fun of
most online games is the victory through competition with other
players or the game system, the fun of SNG is the communication
through the collaboration with other players. Thus, features of users
and environments of game should be considered for the game industry
and for the fun of SNG to users.
Abstract: Employees commonly encounter unpredictable and
unavoidable work related stressors. Exposure to such stressors can
evoke negative appraisals and associated adverse mental, physical,
and behavioral responses. Because Acceptance and Commitment
Therapy (ACT) emphasizes acceptance of unavoidable stressors and
diffusion from negative appraisals, it may be particularly beneficial
for work stress. Forty-five workers were randomly assigned to an
ACT intervention for work stress (n = 21) or a waitlist control group
(n = 24). The intervention consisted of two 3-hour sessions spaced
one week apart. An examination of group process and outcomes was
conducted using the Revised Sessions Rating Scale. Results indicated
that the ACT participants reported that they perceived the
intervention to be supportive, task focused, and without adverse
therapist behaviors (e.g., feelings of being criticized or discounted).
Additionally, the second session (values clarification and
commitment to action) was perceived to be more supportive and task
focused than the first session (mindfulness, defusion). Process ratings
were correlated with outcomes. Results indicated that perceptions of
therapy supportiveness and task focus were associated with reduced
psychological distress and improved perceived physical health.
Abstract: Previously, harmonic parameters (HPs) have been
selected as features extracted from EEG signals for automatic sleep
scoring. However, in previous studies, only one HP parameter was
used, which were directly extracted from the whole epoch of EEG
signal.
In this study, two different transformations were applied to extract
HPs from EEG signals: Hilbert-Huang transform (HHT) and wavelet
transform (WT). EEG signals are decomposed by the two
transformations; and features were extracted from different
components. Twelve parameters (four sets of HPs) were extracted.
Some of the parameters are highly diverse among different stages.
Afterward, HPs from two transformations were used to building a
rough sleep stages scoring model using the classifier SVM. The
performance of this model is about 78% using the features obtained by
our proposed extractions. Our results suggest that these features may
be useful for automatic sleep stages scoring.
Abstract: This paper proposes a methodology for mitigating the occurrence of cascading failure in stressed power systems. The methodology is essentially based on predicting voltage instability in the power system using a voltage stability index and then devising a corrective action in order to increase the voltage stability margin. The paper starts with a brief description of the cascading failure mechanism which is probable root cause of severe blackouts. Then, the voltage instability indices are introduced in order to evaluate stability limit. The aim of the analysis is to assure that the coordination of protection, by adopting load shedding scheme, capable of enhancing performance of the system after the major location of instability is determined. Finally, the proposed method to generate instability prediction is introduced.
Abstract: Protein 3D structure prediction has always been an
important research area in bioinformatics. In particular, the
prediction of secondary structure has been a well-studied research
topic. Despite the recent breakthrough of combining multiple
sequence alignment information and artificial intelligence algorithms
to predict protein secondary structure, the Q3 accuracy of various
computational prediction algorithms rarely has exceeded 75%. In a
previous paper [1], this research team presented a rule-based method
called RT-RICO (Relaxed Threshold Rule Induction from Coverings)
to predict protein secondary structure. The average Q3 accuracy on
the sample datasets using RT-RICO was 80.3%, an improvement
over comparable computational methods. Although this demonstrated
that RT-RICO might be a promising approach for predicting
secondary structure, the algorithm-s computational complexity and
program running time limited its use. Herein a parallelized
implementation of a slightly modified RT-RICO approach is
presented. This new version of the algorithm facilitated the testing of
a much larger dataset of 396 protein domains [2]. Parallelized RTRICO
achieved a Q3 score of 74.6%, which is higher than the
consensus prediction accuracy of 72.9% that was achieved for the
same test dataset by a combination of four secondary structure
prediction methods [2].
Abstract: This study considers priorities of primary goals to increase policy efficiency of Green ICT. Recently several studies have been published that address how IT is linked to climate change. However, most of the previous studies are limited to Green ICT industrial statute and policy directions. This paper present Green ICT
policy making processes systematically. As a result of the analysis of
Korean Green ICT policy, the following emerged as important to accomplish for Green ICT policy: eco-friendliness, technology evolution, economic efficiency, energy efficiency, and stable supply
of energy. This is an initial study analyzing Green ICT policy, which provides an academic framework that can be used a guideline to
establish Green ICT policy.
Abstract: The advancement of smartphones, wireless
networking and Near Field Communication (NFC) technology have
opened up a new approach to indoor navigation. Although NFC
technology has been used to support electronic commerce, access
control, and ticketing, there is a lack of research work on building
NFC-based indoor navigation system for smartphone users. This
paper presents an indoor interactive navigation system (named
I2Navi) based on NFC technology for users to navigate within a
building with ease using their smartphones. The I2Navi system has
been implemented at the Faculty of Engineering (FOE), Multimedia
University (MMU) to enable students, parents, visitors who own
NFC-enabled Android smartphones to navigate themselves within the
faculty. An evaluation is carried out and the results show positive
response to the proposed indoor navigation system using NFC and
smartphone technologies.
Abstract: Resistance spot welding process comprises of electric,
thermal and mechanical phenomenon, which makes this process
complex and highly non-linear and thus, it becomes difficult to model
it. In order to obtain good weld nugget during spot welding, hit and
trial welds are usually done which is very costly. Therefore the
numerical simulation research has been conducted to understand the
whole process. In this paper three different cases were analyzed by
varying the tip contact area and it was observed that, with the
variation of tip contact area the nugget formation at the faying
surface is affected. The tip contact area of the welding electrode
becomes large with long welding cycles. Therefore in order to
maintain consistency of nugget formation during the welding process,
the current compensation in control feedback is required. If the
contact area of the welding electrode tip is reduced, a large amount of
current flows through the faying surface, as a result of which
sputtering occurs.
Abstract: The purpose of this study is to derive parameters
estimating for the Lyman–Kutcher–Burman (LKB) normal tissue
complication probability (NTCP) model using analysis of scintigraphy
assessments and quality of life (QoL) measurement questionnaires for
the parotid gland (xerostomia). In total, 31 patients with
head-and-neck (HN) cancer were enrolled. Salivary excretion factor
(SEF) and EORTC QLQ-H&N35 questionnaires datasets are used for
the NTCP modeling to describe the incidence of grade 4 xerostomia.
Assuming that n= 1, NTCP fitted parameters are given as TD50= 43.6
Gy, m= 0.18 in SEF analysis, and as TD50= 44.1 Gy, m= 0.11 in QoL
measurements, respectively. SEF and QoL datasets can validate the
Quantitative Analyses of Normal Tissue Effects in the Clinic
(QUANTEC) guidelines well, resulting in NPV-s of 100% for the both
datasets and suggests that the QUANTEC 25/20Gy gland-spared
guidelines are suitable for clinical used for the HN cohort to
effectively avoid xerostomia.
Abstract: In the present study, changes of morphology and
mechanical characteristics in the lumbar vertebrae of the
ovariectomised (OVX) rat were investigated. In previous researches,
there were many studies about morphology like volume fraction and
trabecular thickness based on Micro - Computed Tomography (Micro
- CT). However, detecting and tracking long-term changes in the
trabecular bone of the lumbar vertebrae for the OVX rat were few. For
this study, one female Sprague-Dawley rat was used: an OVX rat. The
4th Lumbar of the OVX rat was subjected to in-vivo micro-CT.
Detecting and tracking long-term changes could be investigated in the
trabecular bone of the lumbar vertebrae for an OVX rat using in-vivo
micro-CT. An OVX rat was scanned at week 0 (just before surgery), at
week 4, at week 8, week 16, week 22 and week 56 after surgery. Finite
element (FE) analysis was used to investigate mechanical
characteristics of the lumbar vertebrae for an OVX rat. When the OVX
rat (at week 56) was compared with the OVX rat (at week 0), volume
fraction was decreased by 80% and effective modulus was decreased
by 75%.
Abstract: The development of sustainable utilization water resources is crucial. The ecological environment and water resources systems form the foundation of the existence and development of the social economy. The urban ecological support system depends on these resources as well. This research studies the vulnerability, criticality, and risk of climate change on water supply and demand in the main administrative district of the Taijiang Area (Tainan City). Based on the two situations set in this paper and various factors (indexes), this research adopts two kinds of weights (equal and AHP) to conduct the calculation and establish the water supply and demand risk map for the target year 2039. According to the risk analysis result, which is based on equal weight, only one district belongs to a high-grade district (Grade 4). Based on the AHP weight, 16 districts belong to a high-grade or higher-grade district (Grades 4 and 5), and from among them, two districts belong to the highest grade (Grade 5). These results show that the risk level of water supply and demand in cities is higher than that in towns. The government generally gives more attention to the adjustment strategy in the “cities." However, it should also provide proper adjustment strategies for the “towns" to be able to cope with the risks of water supply and demand.
Abstract: Since straightness error of linear motor stage is hardly
dependent upon machining accuracy and assembling accuracy, there is
limit on maximum realizable accuracy. To cope with this limitation,
this paper proposed a servo system to compensate straightness error of
a linear motor stage. The servo system is mounted on the slider of the
linear motor stage and moves in the direction of the straightness error
so as to compensate the error. From position dependency and
repeatability of the straightness error of the slider, a feedforward
compensation control is applied to the platform servo control. In the
consideration of required fine positioning accuracy, a platform driven
by an electro-magnetic actuator is suggested and a sliding mode
control was applied. The effectiveness of the sliding mode control was
verified along with some experimental results.
Abstract: Recently there has been a growing interest in the field
of bio-mimetic robots that resemble the behaviors of an insect or an
aquatic animal, among many others. One of various bio-mimetic robot
applications is to explore pipelines, spotting any troubled areas or
malfunctions and reporting its data. Moreover, the robot is able to
prepare for and react to any abnormal routes in the pipeline. Special
types of mobile robots are necessary for the pipeline monitoring tasks.
In order to move effectively along a pipeline, the robot-s movement
will resemble that of insects or crawling animals. When situated in
massive pipelines with complex routes, the robot places fixed sensors
in several important spots in order to complete its monitoring. This
monitoring task is to prevent a major system failure by preemptively
recognizing any minor or partial malfunctions. Areas uncovered by
fixed sensors are usually impossible to provide real-time observation
and examination, and thus are dependent on periodical offline
monitoring. This paper proposes a monitoring system that is able to
monitor the entire area of pipelines–with and without fixed
sensors–by using the bio-mimetic robot.