Abstract: The purpose of the present work was to develop an
innovative food product with nutritional properties as well as
appealing organoleptic qualities. The product, a jam, was prepared
with the beans’ cooking water combined with fresh apple or carrot,
without the addition of any conservatives. Three different jams were
produced: bean and carrot, bean and apple and bean, apple and
cinnamon. The developed products underwent a sensorial analysis
that revealed that the bean, apple and cinnamon jam was globally
better accepted. However, with this study, the consumers determined
that the bean and carrot jam had the most attractive color and the
bean and apple jam the better consistency. Additionally, it was
possible to analyze the jams for their chemical components, namely
fat, fiber, protein, sugars and antioxidant activity. The obtained
results showed that the bean and carrot jam had the highest lipid
content, while the bean, apple and cinnamon jam had the highest
fiber content, when compared to the other two jams. Regarding the
sugar content, both jams with apple revealed similar sugar values,
which were higher than the sugar content of the bean and carrot jam.
The antioxidant activity was on average 10 mg TE/g.
Abstract: This work deals with parameter identification of
permanent magnet motors, a class of ac motor which is particularly
important in industrial automation due to characteristics like
applications high performance, are very attractive for applications
with limited space and reducing the need to eliminate because they
have reduced size and volume and can operate in a wide speed range,
without independent ventilation. By using experimental data and
genetic algorithm we have been able to extract values for both the
motor inductance and the electromechanical coupling constant, which
are then compared to measured and/or expected values.
Abstract: Skin aging is a slow multifactorial process influenced
by both internal as well as external factors. Ultra-violet radiations
(UV), diet, smoking and personal habits are the most common
environmental factors that affect skin aging. Fat contents and fibrous
proteins as collagen and elastin are core internal structural
components. The direct influence of UV on elastin integrity and
health is central on aging of skin especially by time. The deposition
of abnormal elastic material is a major marker in a photo-aged skin.
Searching for compounds that may protect against cutaneous photodamage
is exceedingly valued. Retinoids and alpha hydroxy acids
have been endorsed by some researchers as possible candidates for
protecting and or repairing the effect of UV damaged skin. For
consolidating a better system of anti- and protective effects of such
anti-aging agents, we evaluated the combinatory effects of various
dosages of lactic acid and retinol on the dermal fibroblast’s elastin
levels exposed to UV. The UV exposed cells showed significant
reduction in the elastin levels. A combination of drugs with a higher
concentration of lactic acid (30 -35 mM) and a lower concentration of
retinol (10-15mg/mL) showed to work better in maintaining elastin
concentration in UV exposed cells. We assume this preservation
could be the result of increased tropo-elastin gene expression
stimulated by retinol whereas lactic acid probably repaired the UV
irradiated damage by enhancing the amount and integrity of the
elastin fibers.
Abstract: The article discusses the legal framework of the
government’s environmental function and analyzes the role of the
national policy in protection of wetlands. The problem is of interest
for it deals with the most important branch of economy – utilization
of Kazakhstan’s natural resources, protection of health and
environmental wellbeing of the population. Development of a longterm
environmental program addressing the protection of wetlands
represents the final stage of the government’s environmental policy,
and is a relatively new function for the public administration system.
It appeared due to the environmental measures that require immediate
decisions to be taken. It is an integral part of the effort in the field of
management of state-owned natural resource, as well as of the
measures aimed at efficient management of natural resources to avoid
their early depletion or contamination.
Abstract: The objective of this study was to evaluate the
physical and chemical characteristics of Serra da Estrela cheese and
compare these results with those of the sensory analysis. For the
study were taken six samples of Serra da Estrela cheese produced
with 6 different ecotypes of thistle in a dairy situated in Penalva do
Castelo. The chemical properties evaluated were moisture content,
protein, fat, ash, chloride and pH; the physical properties studied
were color and texture; and finally a sensory evaluation was
undertaken. The results showed moisture varying in the range 40-
48%, protein in the range 15-20%, fat between 41-45%, ash between
3.9-5.0% and chlorides varying from 1.2 to 3.0%. The pH varied
from 4.8 to 5.4. The textural properties revealed that the crust
hardness is relatively low (maximum 7.3 N), although greater than
flesh firmness (maximum 1.7 N), and also that these cheeses are in
fact soft paste type, with measurable stickiness and intense
adhesiveness. The color analysis showed that the crust is relatively
light (L* over 50), and with a predominant yellow coloration (b*
around 20 or over) although with a slight greenish tone (a* negative).
The results of the sensory analysis did not show great variability for
most of the attributes measured, although some differences were
found in attributes such as crust thickness, crust uniformity, and
creamy flesh.
Abstract: Flours of wheat, chestnut, acorn and lupin were
evaluated in relation to phenolic compounds, antioxidant activity, and
oxalate content. At the chemical level the results show some
variability between samples by type of flour, and the sample of
chestnut flour presented the higher value of oxalate (0.00348
mg/100g) when compared to the other samples in the study.
Considering the content of phenolic compounds, the sample that
stood out was the acorn flour, having a high value of 0.812 g
AGE/100 g. All the samples presented intermediate content of
antioxidant activity and the sample that showed a slightly higher
value was the wheat flour with a value of 0.746 mM TRE/g sample.
Abstract: Game theory is the study of how people interact and
make decisions to handle competitive situations. It has mainly been
developed to study decision making in complex situations. Humans
routinely alter their behaviour in response to changes in their social
and physical environment. As a consequence, the outcomes of
decisions that depend on the behaviour of multiple decision makers
are difficult to predict and require highly adaptive decision-making
strategies. In addition to the decision makers may have preferences
regarding consequences to other individuals and choose their actions
to improve or reduce the well-being of others. Nash equilibrium is a
fundamental concept in the theory of games and the most widely used
method of predicting the outcome of a strategic interaction in the
social sciences. A Nash Equilibrium exists when there is no unilateral
profitable deviation from any of the players involved. On the other
hand, no player in the game would take a different action as long as
every other player remains the same.
Abstract: With drug resistance becoming widespread in
Plasmodium falciparum infections, the development of the alternative
drugs is the desired strategy for prevention and cure of malaria. Three
drug targets were selected to screen promising drug molecules from
the GSK library of 13469 molecules. Using an in silico structure-based
drug designing approach, the differences in binding energies of
the substrate and inhibitor were exploited between target sites of
parasite and human to design a drug molecule against Plasmodium.
The docking studies have shown several promising molecules from
GSK library with more effective binding as compared to the already
known inhibitors for the drug targets. Though stronger interaction has
been shown by several molecules as compared to the reference, few
molecules have shown the potential as drug candidates though in
vitro studies are required to validate the results. In case of
thymidylate synthase-dihydrofolatereductase (TS-DHFR), three
compounds have shown promise for future studies as potential drugs.
Abstract: The impact of Special Economic Zones (SEZs) has
been analyzed for many years by researchers. There are lot of
theoretical studies proving the SEZs importance for regional
development, however, there is lack of empirical studies (and they
are mainly focused on China market) that are based on available data.
The theoretical studies indicate the various impacts of enterprises
operating within SEZs on the economy. The article proves that, in
case of Poland, locating SEZs in municipalities is an important part
of increasing municipalities’ income. Therefore SEZs have a positive
impact on regional development. Municipality income is understood
as taxes paid by taxpayers who depend on SEZ companies’
performance. The analysis includes the Corporate Income Tax (CIT),
Personal Income Tax (PIT) and real estate tax. The effects of SEZs
on regional development were narrowed to a few variables that are
most significant for the financial system. The analysis indicates the
significant impact of SEZs on the amount of taxes influencing the
municipality budget.
Abstract: Absorptive capacity generally facilitates the adoption
of innovation. How does this relationship change when economic
return is not the sole driver of innovation uptake? We investigate
whether absorptive capacity facilitates the adoption of green
innovation based on a survey of 79 construction companies in
Scotland. Based on the results of multiple regression analyses, we
confirm that existing knowledge utilisation (EKU), knowledge
building (KB) and external knowledge acquisition (EKA) are
significant predictors of green process GP), green administrative
(GA) and green technical innovation (GT), respectively. We discuss
the implications for theories of innovation adoption and knowledge
enhancement associated with environmentally-friendly practices.
Abstract: A nanocrystalline thin film of ZnSe was successfully
electrodeposited on copper substrate using a non-aqueous solution
and subsequently annealed in air at 400°C. XRD analysis indicates
the polycrystalline deposit of (111) plane in both the cases. The
sharpness of the peak increases due to annealing of the film and
average grain size increases to 20 nm to 27nm. SEM photograph
indicate that grains are uniform and densely distributed over the
surface. Annealing increases the average grain size by 20%. The EDS
spectroscopy shows the ratio of Zn & Se is 1.1 in case of annealed
film. AFM analysis indicates the average roughness of the film
reduces from 181nm to 165nm due to annealing of the film. The
bandgap also decreases from 2.71eV to 2.62eV.
Abstract: In this paper 3D FEM analysis was carried out on
double lap bonded joint with composite adherents subjected to
dynamic shear. The adherents are made of Carbon/Epoxy while the
adhesive is epoxy Araldite 2031. The maximum average shear stress
and the stress homogeneity in the adhesive layer were examined.
Three fibers textures were considered: UD; 2.5D and 3D with same
volume fiber then a parametric study based on changing the thickness
and the type of fibers texture in 2.5D was accomplished. Moreover,
adherents’ dissimilarity was also investigated. It was found that the
main parameter influencing the behavior is the longitudinal stiffness
of the adherents. An increase in the adherents’ longitudinal stiffness
induces an increase in the maximum average shear stress in the
adhesive layer and an improvement in the shear stress homogeneity
within the joint. No remarkable improvement was observed for
dissimilar adherents.
Abstract: This work introduces a simple device designed to
perform in-situ direct shear and sinkage tests on granular materials
as sand, clays, or regolith. It consists of a box nested within a larger
box. Both have open bottoms, allowing them to be lowered into the
material. Afterwards, two rotating plates on opposite sides of the
outer box will rotate outwards in order to clear regolith on either
side, providing room for the inner box to move relative to the plates
and perform a shear test without the resistance of the surrounding
soil. From this test, Coulomb parameters, including cohesion and
internal friction angle, as well as, Bekker parameters can be inferred.
This device has been designed for a laboratory setting, but with few
modifications, could be put on the underside of a rover for use in
a remote location. The goal behind this work is to ultimately create
a compact, but accurate measuring tool to put onto a rover or any
kind of exploratory vehicle to test for regolith properties of celestial
bodies.
Abstract: Micro-alloyed steel components are used in
automotive industry for the necessity to make the manufacturing
process cycles shorter when compared to conventional steel by
eliminating heat treatment cycles, so an important saving of costs and
energy can be reached by reducing the number of operations. Microalloying
elements like vanadium, niobium or titanium have been
added to medium carbon steels to achieve grain refinement with or
without precipitation strengthening along with uniform
microstructure throughout the matrix. Present study reports the
applicability of medium carbon vanadium micro-alloyed steel in hot
forging. Forgeability has been determined with respect to different
cooling rates, after forging in a hydraulic press at 50% diameter
reduction in temperature range of 900-11000C. Final microstructures,
hardness, tensile strength, and impact strength have been evaluated.
The friction coefficients of different lubricating conditions, viz.,
graphite in hydraulic oil, graphite in furnace oil, DF 150 (Graphite,
Water-Based) die lubricant and dry or without any lubrication were
obtained from the ring compression test for the above micro-alloyed
steel. Results of ring compression tests indicate that graphite in
hydraulic oil lubricant is preferred for free forging and dry lubricant
is preferred for die forging operation. Exceptionally good forgeability
and high resistance to fracture, especially for faster cooling rate has
been observed for fine equiaxed ferrite-pearlite grains, some amount
of bainite and fine precipitates of vanadium carbides and
carbonitrides. The results indicated that the cooling rate has a
remarkable effect on the microstructure and mechanical properties at
room temperature.
Abstract: The goal of image segmentation is to cluster pixels
into salient image regions. Segmentation could be used for object
recognition, occlusion boundary estimation within motion or stereo
systems, image compression, image editing, or image database lookup.
In this paper, we present a color image segmentation using
support vector machine (SVM) pixel classification. Firstly, the pixel
level color and texture features of the image are extracted and they
are used as input to the SVM classifier. These features are extracted
using the homogeneity model and Gabor Filter. With the extracted
pixel level features, the SVM Classifier is trained by using FCM
(Fuzzy C-Means).The image segmentation takes the advantage of
both the pixel level information of the image and also the ability of
the SVM Classifier. The Experiments show that the proposed method
has a very good segmentation result and a better efficiency, increases
the quality of the image segmentation compared with the other
segmentation methods proposed in the literature.
Abstract: Although there had been a many studies that shows
the impact of air pollution on physical health, comparatively less was
known of human behavioral responses and annoyance impacts.
Annoyance caused by air pollution is a public health problem because
it can be an ambient stressor causing stress and disease and can affect
quality of life. The objective of this work is to evaluate the
annoyance caused by air pollution in two different industrialized
urban areas, Dunkirk (France) and Vitoria (Brazil). The populations
of these cities often report feeling annoyed by dust. Surveys were
conducted, and the collected data were analyzed using statistical
analyses. The results show that sociodemographic variables,
importance of air quality, perceived industrial risk, perceived air
pollution and occurrence of health problems play important roles in
the perceived annoyance. These results show the existence of a
common problem in geographically distant areas and allow
stakeholders to develop prevention strategies.
Abstract: This study presents the moisture variations of
unbound layers from April 2012 to January 2014 in the Interstate 40
(I-40) pavement section in New Mexico. Three moisture probes were
installed at different layers inside the pavement which measure the
continuous moisture variations of the unbound layers. Data show that
the moisture contents of unbound layers are typically constant
throughout the day and month unless there is rainfall. Moisture
contents of all unbound layers change with rainfall. Change in ground
water table may affect the moisture content of unbound layers which
has not been investigated in this study. In addition, the Level 3
predictions of moisture contents using the Pavement Mechanistic-
Empirical (ME) Design software were compared and found quite
reasonable. However, results presented in the current study may not
be applicable for pavement in other regions.
Abstract: This study investigates the cleaning performance of
high intensity 360 kHz frequency on removal of nano-dimensional
and sub-micron particles from various surfaces, uniformity of the
cleaning tank and run to run variation of cleaning process. The
uniformity of the cleaning tank was measured by two different
methods i.e. 1. ppbTM meter and 2. Liquid Particle Counting (LPC)
technique. The result indicates that the energy was distributed more
uniformly throughout the entire cleaning vessel even at the corners
and edges of the tank when megasonic sweeping technology is
applied. The result also shows that rinsing the parts with 360 kHz
frequency at final rinse gives lower particle counts, hence higher
cleaning efficiency as compared to other frequencies. When
megasonic sweeping technology is applied each piezoelectric
transducers will operate at their optimum resonant frequency and
generates stronger acoustic cavitational force and higher acoustic
streaming velocity. These combined forces are helping to enhance the
particle removal and at the same time improve the overall cleaning
performance. The multiple extractions study was also carried out for
various frequencies to measure the cleaning potential and asymptote
value.
Abstract: Our goal is development of an algorithm capable of
predicting the directional trend of the Standard and Poor’s 500 index
(S&P 500). Extensive research has been published attempting to
predict different financial markets using historical data testing on an
in-sample and trend basis, with many authors employing excessively
complex mathematical techniques. In reviewing and evaluating these
in-sample methodologies, it became evident that this approach was
unable to achieve sufficiently reliable prediction performance for
commercial exploitation. For these reasons, we moved to an out-ofsample
strategy based on linear regression analysis of an extensive
set of financial data correlated with historical closing prices of the
S&P 500. We are pleased to report a directional trend accuracy of
greater than 55% for tomorrow (t+1) in predicting the S&P 500.
Abstract: The management of Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori)
eradication is still a matter of discussion, full effectiveness is rarely
achieved, and it has many adverse effects. The use of probiotics may
be associated with better eradication rates and possibly prevention of
adverse events due to antibiotic therapy. The present clinical study
was undertaken to evaluate the efficacy of a specially designed
fermented milk product, containing Bifidobacterium lactis B420, on
the eradication of H. pylori infection in a prospective, randomized,
double-blind, controlled study in humans. Four test fermented milks
(FM) were specially designed in which counts of viable cells in all
products were 10^10 Log CFU. 100 mL-1 for Bifidobacterium lactis -
Bifidobacterium species 420. 190 subjects infected with H. pylori,
with previous diagnosis of functional dyspepsia according to Rome
III criteria entered the study. Bifidobacterium lactis B420,
administered twice a day for 90 days was not able to eradicate H.
pylori in Brazilian patients with functional dyspepsia.