Abstract: The evaluation of energy release rate and centre Crack
Opening Displacement (COD) for circumferential Through-Wall
Cracked (TWC) pipes is an important issue in the assessment of
critical crack length for unstable fracture. The ability to predict crack
growth continues to be an important component of research for
several structural materials. Crack growth predictions can aid the
understanding of the useful life of a structural component and the
determination of inspection intervals and criteria. In this context,
studies were carried out at CSIR-SERC on Nuclear Power Plant
(NPP) piping components subjected to monotonic as well as cyclic
loading to assess the damage for crack growth due to low-cycle
fatigue in circumferentially TWC pipes.
Abstract: This paper examines ethical and social issues which
have proved important when initiating and creating educational spaces within a virtual environment. It focuses on one project, identifying the key decisions made, the barriers to new practice
encountered and the impact these had on the project. It demonstrates
the importance of the 'backstage' ethical and social issues involved in
the creation of a virtual education community and offers conclusions,
and questions, which will inform future research and practice in this
area. These ethical issues are considered using Knobel-s framework
of front-end, in-process and back-end concerns, and include
establishing social practices for the islands, allocating access rights,
considering personal safety and supporting researchers appropriately
within this context.
Abstract: This paper focuses attention on specific aspects of
entrepreneurial decisions relating to investment, both in the total
fixed investments and plant & machinery (separately). Demand and
financial factors, internal and external, are considered in the
investment analysis. Finally the influence of determinants of fixed
investment and investment plans are examined in Electric Power
industry in India.
Abstract: Prediction of highly non linear behavior of suspended
sediment flow in rivers has prime importance in the field of water
resources engineering. In this study the predictive performance of
two Artificial Neural Networks (ANNs) namely, the Radial Basis
Function (RBF) Network and the Multi Layer Feed Forward (MLFF)
Network have been compared. Time series data of daily suspended
sediment discharge and water discharge at Pari River was used for
training and testing the networks. A number of statistical parameters
i.e. root mean square error (RMSE), mean absolute error (MAE),
coefficient of efficiency (CE) and coefficient of determination (R2)
were used for performance evaluation of the models. Both the models
produced satisfactory results and showed a good agreement between
the predicted and observed data. The RBF network model provided
slightly better results than the MLFF network model in predicting
suspended sediment discharge.
Abstract: An on-demand routing protocol for wireless ad hoc
networks is one that searches for and attempts to discover a route to
some destination node only when a sending node originates a data
packet addressed to that node. In order to avoid the need for such a
route discovery to be performed before each data packet is sent, such
routing protocols must cache routes previously discovered. This
paper presents an analysis of the effect of intelligent caching in a non
clustered network, using on-demand routing protocols in wireless ad
hoc networks. The analysis carried out is based on the Dynamic
Source Routing protocol (DSR), which operates entirely on-demand.
DSR uses the cache in every node to save the paths that are learnt
during route discovery procedure. In this implementation, caching
these paths only at intermediate nodes and using the paths from these
caches when required is tried. This technique helps in storing more
number of routes that are learnt without erasing the entries in the
cache, to store a new route that is learnt.
The simulation results on DSR have shown that this technique
drastically increases the available memory for caching the routes
discovered without affecting the performance of the DSR routing
protocol in any way, except for a small increase in end to end delay.
Abstract: A study was conducted in greenhouse environment to
determine the response of five tissue-cultured date palm cultivars, Al-
Ahamad, Nabusaif, Barhee, Khalas, and Kasab to irrigation water
salinity of 1.6, 5, 10, or 20 dS/ m. The salinity level of 1.6dS/m, was
used as a control. The effects of high salinity on plant survival were
manifested at 360 days after planting (DAP) onwards. Three
cultivars, Khalas, Kasab and Barhee were able to tolerate 10 dS/m
salinity level at 24 months after the start of study. Khalas tolerated
the highest salinity level of 20 dS/ m and 'Nabusaif' was found to be the
least tolerant cv. The average heights of palms and the number of
fronds were decreased with increasing salinity levels as time
progressed.
Abstract: The cup method is applied for the measurement of water vapor transport properties of porous materials worldwide. However, in practical applications the experimental results are often used without taking into account some secondary effects which can play an important role under specific conditions. In this paper, the effect of temperature on water vapor transport properties of cellular concrete is studied, together with the influence of sample thickness. At first, the bulk density, matrix density, total open porosity and sorption and desorption isotherms are measured for material characterization purposes. Then, the steady state cup method is used for determination of water vapor transport properties, whereas the measurements are performed at several temperatures and for three different sample thicknesses.
Abstract: In the world of Peer-to-Peer (P2P) networking
different protocols have been developed to make the resource sharing
or information retrieval more efficient. The SemPeer protocol is a
new layer on Gnutella that transforms the connections of the nodes
based on semantic information to make information retrieval more
efficient. However, this transformation causes high clustering in the
network that decreases the number of nodes reached, therefore the
probability of finding a document is also decreased. In this paper we
describe a mathematical model for the Gnutella and SemPeer
protocols that captures clustering-related issues, followed by a
proposition to modify the SemPeer protocol to achieve moderate
clustering. This modification is a sort of link management for the
individual nodes that allows the SemPeer protocol to be more
efficient, because the probability of a successful query in the P2P
network is reasonably increased. For the validation of the models, we
evaluated a series of simulations that supported our results.
Abstract: This paper considers various channels of gammaquantum
generation via an ultra-short high-power laser pulse
interaction with different targets.We analyse the possibilities to create
a pulsed gamma-radiation source using laser triggering of some
nuclear reactions and isomer targets. It is shown that sub-MeV
monochromatic short pulse of gamma-radiation can be obtained with
pulse energy of sub-mJ level from isomer target irradiated by intense
laser pulse. For nuclear reaction channel in light- atom materials, it is
shown that sub-PW laser pulse gives rise to formation about million
gamma-photons of multi-MeV energy.
Abstract: Character segmentation is an important preprocessing step for text recognition. In degraded documents, existence of touching characters decreases recognition rate drastically, for any optical character recognition (OCR) system. In this paper a study of touching Gurmukhi characters is carried out and these characters have been divided into various categories after a careful analysis.Structural properties of the Gurmukhi characters are used for defining the categories. New algorithms have been proposed to segment the touching characters in middle zone. These algorithms have shown a reasonable improvement in segmenting the touching characters in degraded Gurmukhi script. The algorithms proposed in this paper are applicable only to machine printed text.
Abstract: The protection of parallel transmission lines has been a challenging task due to mutual coupling between the adjacent circuits of the line. This paper presents a novel scheme for detection and classification of faults on parallel transmission lines. The proposed approach uses combination of wavelet transform and neural network, to solve the problem. While wavelet transform is a powerful mathematical tool which can be employed as a fast and very effective means of analyzing power system transient signals, artificial neural network has a ability to classify non-linear relationship between measured signals by identifying different patterns of the associated signals. The proposed algorithm consists of time-frequency analysis of fault generated transients using wavelet transform, followed by pattern recognition using artificial neural network to identify the type of the fault. MATLAB/Simulink is used to generate fault signals and verify the correctness of the algorithm. The adaptive discrimination scheme is tested by simulating different types of fault and varying fault resistance, fault location and fault inception time, on a given power system model. The simulation results show that the proposed scheme for fault diagnosis is able to classify all the faults on the parallel transmission line rapidly and correctly.
Abstract: In the present article, nonlinear vibration analysis of
single layer graphene sheets is presented and the effect of small
length scale is investigated. Using the Hamilton's principle, the three
coupled nonlinear equations of motion are obtained based on the von
Karman geometrical model and Eringen theory of nonlocal
continuum. The solutions of Free nonlinear vibration, based on a one
term mode shape, are found for both simply supported and clamped
graphene sheets. A complete analysis of graphene sheets with
movable as well as immovable in-plane conditions is also carried out.
The results obtained herein are compared with those available in the
literature for classical isotropic rectangular plates and excellent
agreement is seen. Also, the nonlinear effects are presented as
functions of geometric properties and small scale parameter.
Abstract: This paper proposes a new approach for image encryption
using a combination of different permutation techniques.
The main idea behind the present work is that an image can be
viewed as an arrangement of bits, pixels and blocks. The intelligible
information present in an image is due to the correlations among the
bits, pixels and blocks in a given arrangement. This perceivable information
can be reduced by decreasing the correlation among the bits,
pixels and blocks using certain permutation techniques. This paper
presents an approach for a random combination of the aforementioned
permutations for image encryption. From the results, it is observed
that the permutation of bits is effective in significantly reducing the
correlation thereby decreasing the perceptual information, whereas
the permutation of pixels and blocks are good at producing higher
level security compared to bit permutation. A random combination
method employing all the three techniques thus is observed to be
useful for tactical security applications, where protection is needed
only against a casual observer.
Abstract: Neonatal lupus erythematous (NLE) is a rare disease marked by clinical characteristic and specific maternal autoantibody. Many cutaneous, cardiac, liver, and hematological manifestations could happen with affect of one organ or multiple. In this case, both babies were premature, low birth weight (LBW), small for gestational age (SGA) and born through caesarean section from a systemic lupus erythematous (SLE) mother. In the first case, we found a baby girl with dyspnea and grunting. Chest X ray showed respiratory distress syndrome (RDS) great I and echocardiography showed small atrial septal defect (ASD) and ventricular septal defect (VSD). She also developed anemia, thrombocytopenia, elevated C-reactive protein, hypoalbuminemia, increasing coagulation factors, hyperbilirubinemia, and positive blood culture of Klebsiella pneumonia. Anti-Ro/SSA and Anti-nRNP/sm were positive. Intravenous fluid, antibiotic, transfusion of blood, thrombocyte concentrate, and fresh frozen plasma were given. The second baby, male presented with necrotic tissue on the left ear and skin rashes, erythematous macula, athropic scarring, hyperpigmentation on all of his body with various size and facial haemorrhage. He also suffered from thrombocytopenia, mild elevated transaminase enzyme, hyperbilirubinemia, anti-Ro/SSA was positive. Intravenous fluid, methyprednisolone, intravenous immunoglobulin (IVIG), blood, and thrombocyte concentrate transfution were given. Two cases of neonatal lupus erythematous had been presented. Diagnosis based on clinical presentation and maternal auto antibody on neonate. Organ involvement in NLE can occur as single or multiple manifestations.
Abstract: Opportunistic Data Forwarding (ODF) has drawn much attention in mobile adhoc networking research in recent years. The effectiveness of ODF in MANET depends on a suitable routing protocol which provides a powerful source routing services. PLSR is featured by source routing, loop free and small routing overhead. The update messages in PLSR are integrated into a tree structure and no need to time stamp routing updates which reduces the routing overhead.
Abstract: The Iranian bentonite was first characterized by
Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM), Inductively Coupled Plasma
mass spectrometry (ICP-MS), X-ray fluorescence (XRF), X-ray
Diffraction (XRD) and BET. The bentonite was then treated
thermally between 150°C-250°C at 15min, 45min and 90min and
also was activated chemically with different concentration of
sulphuric acid (3N, 5N and 10N). Although the results of thermal
activated-bentonite didn-t show any considerable changes in specific
surface area and Cation Exchange Capacity (CEC), but the results of
chemical treated bentonite demonstrated that such properties have
been improved by acid activation process.
Abstract: This paper explores the issues that influence online retailing in Saudi Arabia. Retailers in Saudi Arabia have been reserved in their adoption of electronically delivered aspects of their business. Despite the fact that Saudi Arabia has the largest and fastest growth of ICT marketplaces in the Arab region, e-commerce activities are not progressing at the same speed. Only very few Saudi companies, mostly medium and large companies from the manufacturing sector, are involved in e-commerce implementation. Based on qualitative data collected by conducting interviews with 16 retailers and 16 potential customers in Saudi Arabia, several factors influencing online retailing diffusion in Saudi Arabia are identified. However, government support comes the highest and most influencing factor for online retailing growth as identified by both parties; retailers and potential customers in Saudi Arabia.
Abstract: Natural convection heat transfer from a heated
horizontal semi-circular cylinder (flat surface upward) has been
investigated for the following ranges of conditions; Grashof number,
and Prandtl number. The governing partial differential equations
(continuity, Navier-Stokes and energy equations) have been solved
numerically using a finite volume formulation. In addition, the role of
the type of the thermal boundary condition imposed at cylinder
surface, namely, constant wall temperature (CWT) and constant heat
flux (CHF) are explored. Natural convection heat transfer from a
heated horizontal semi-circular cylinder (flat surface upward) has
been investigated for the following ranges of conditions; Grashof
number, and Prandtl number, . The governing partial differential
equations (continuity, Navier-Stokes and energy equations) have
been solved numerically using a finite volume formulation. In
addition, the role of the type of the thermal boundary condition
imposed at cylinder surface, namely, constant wall temperature
(CWT) and constant heat flux (CHF) are explored. The resulting flow
and temperature fields are visualized in terms of the streamline and
isotherm patterns in the proximity of the cylinder. The flow remains
attached to the cylinder surface over the range of conditions spanned
here except that for and ; at these conditions, a separated flow
region is observed when the condition of the constant wall
temperature is prescribed on the surface of the cylinder. The heat
transfer characteristics are analyzed in terms of the local and average
Nusselt numbers. The maximum value of the local Nusselt number
always occurs at the corner points whereas it is found to be minimum
at the rear stagnation point on the flat surface. Overall, the average
Nusselt number increases with Grashof number and/ or Prandtl
number in accordance with the scaling considerations. The numerical
results are used to develop simple correlations as functions of
Grashof and Prandtl number thereby enabling the interpolation of the
present numerical results for the intermediate values of the Prandtl or
Grashof numbers for both thermal boundary conditions.
Abstract: We apply a particle tracking technique to track the motion of individual pathogenic Leptospira. We observe and capture images of motile Leptospira by means of CCD and darkfield microscope. Image processing, statistical theories and simulations are used for data analysis. Based on trajectory patterns, mean square displacement, and power spectral density characteristics, we found that the motion modes are most likely to be directed motion mode (70%) and the rest are either normal diffusion or unidentified mode. Our findings may support the fact that why leptospires are very well efficient toward targeting internal tissues as a result of increase in virulence factor.
Abstract: Large metal and concrete structures suffer by various kinds of deterioration, and accurate prediction of the remaining life is important. This paper informs about two methods for its assessment. One method, suitable for steel bridges and other constructions exposed to fatigue, monitors the loads and damage accumulation using information systems for the operation and the finite element model of the construction. In addition to the operation load, the dead weight of the construction and thermal stresses can be included into the model. The second method is suitable for concrete bridges and other structures, which suffer by carbonatation and other degradation processes, driven by diffusion. The diffusion constant, important for the prediction of future development, can be determined from the depth-profile of pH, obtained by pH measurement at various depths. Comparison with measurements on real objects illustrates the suitability of both methods.