Abstract: In this paper, the detection of a fault in the Global Positioning System (GPS) measurement is addressed. The class of faults considered is a bias in the GPS pseudorange measurements. This bias is modeled as an unknown constant. The fault could be the result of a receiver fault or signal fault such as multipath error. A bias bank is constructed based on set of possible fault hypotheses. Initially, there is equal probability of occurrence for any of the biases in the bank. Subsequently, as the measurements are processed, the probability of occurrence for each of the biases is sequentially updated. The fault with a probability approaching unity will be declared as the current fault in the GPS measurement. The residual formed from the GPS and Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU) measurements is used to update the probability of each fault. Results will be presented to show the performance of the presented algorithm.
Abstract: Requirements that should be met when determining the regimes of circuits with variable elements are formulated. The interpretation of the variations in the regimes, based on projective geometry, enables adequate expressions for determining and comparing the regimes to be derived. It is proposed to use as the parameters of a generalized equivalent generator of an active two-pole with changeable resistor such load current and voltage which provide the current through this resistor equal to zero.
Abstract: In this study, the Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris L.) C
needles (i.e. the current-year-needles) were used as bioindicators in
determining the aerial distribution pattern of sulphur emissions
around industrial point sources at Kemi, Northern Finland. The
average sulphur concentration in the C needles was 897 mg/kg
(d.w.), with a standard deviation of 118 mg/kg (d.w.) and range 740 –
1350 mg/kg (d.w.). According to results in this study, Scots pine
needles (Pinus sylvestris L.) appear to be an ideal bioindicators for
identifying atmospheric sulphur pollution derived from industrial
plants and can complement the information provided by plant
mapping studies around industrial plants.
Abstract: In this paper, the construction of a detailed spine
model is presented using the LifeMOD Biomechanics Modeler. The
detailed spine model is obtained by refining spine segments in
cervical, thoracic and lumbar regions into individual vertebra
segments, using bushing elements representing the intervertebral
discs, and building various ligamentous soft tissues between
vertebrae. In the sagittal plane of the spine, constant force will be
applied from the posterior to anterior during simulation to determine
dynamic characteristics of the spine. The force magnitude is
gradually increased in subsequent simulations. Based on these
recorded dynamic properties, graphs of displacement-force
relationships will be established in terms of polynomial functions by
using the least-squares method and imported into a haptic integrated
graphic environment. A thoracolumbar spine model with complex
geometry of vertebrae, which is digitized from a resin spine
prototype, will be utilized in this environment. By using the haptic
technique, surgeons can touch as well as apply forces to the spine
model through haptic devices to observe the locomotion of the spine
which is computed from the displacement-force relationship graphs.
This current study provides a preliminary picture of our ongoing
work towards building and simulating bio-fidelity scoliotic spine
models in a haptic integrated graphic environment whose dynamic
properties are obtained from LifeMOD. These models can be helpful
for surgeons to examine kinematic behaviors of scoliotic spines and
to propose possible surgical plans before spine correction operations.
Abstract: This paper presents a procedure of forming the
mathematical model of radial electric power systems for simulation
of both transient and steady-state conditions. The research idea has
been based on nodal voltages technique and on differentiation of
Kirchhoff's current law (KCL) applied to each non-reference node of
the radial system, the result of which the nodal voltages has been
calculated by solving a system of algebraic equations. Currents of the
electric power system components have been determined by solving
their respective differential equations. Transforming the three-phase
coordinate system into Cartesian coordinate system in the model
decreased the overall number of equations by one third. The use of
Cartesian coordinate system does not ignore the DC component
during transient conditions, but restricts the model's implementation
for symmetrical modes of operation only. An example of the input
data for a four-bus radial electric power system has been calculated.
Abstract: With the development of ubiquitous computing,
current user interaction approaches with keyboard, mouse and pen
are not sufficient. Due to the limitation of these devices the useable
command set is also limited. Direct use of hands as an input device is
an attractive method for providing natural Human Computer
Interaction which has evolved from text-based interfaces through 2D
graphical-based interfaces, multimedia-supported interfaces, to fully
fledged multi-participant Virtual Environment (VE) systems.
Imagine the human-computer interaction of the future: A 3Dapplication
where you can move and rotate objects simply by moving
and rotating your hand - all without touching any input device. In this
paper a review of vision based hand gesture recognition is presented.
The existing approaches are categorized into 3D model based
approaches and appearance based approaches, highlighting their
advantages and shortcomings and identifying the open issues.
Abstract: The study of proteomics reached unexpected levels of
interest, as a direct consequence of its discovered influence over some
complex biological phenomena, such as problematic diseases like
cancer. This paper presents the latest authors- achievements regarding
the analysis of the networks of proteins (interactome networks), by
computing more efficiently the betweenness centrality measure. The
paper introduces the concept of betweenness centrality, and then
describes how betweenness computation can help the interactome net-
work analysis. Current sequential implementations for the between-
ness computation do not perform satisfactory in terms of execution
times. The paper-s main contribution is centered towards introducing
a speedup technique for the betweenness computation, based on
modified shortest path algorithms for sparse graphs. Three optimized
generic algorithms for betweenness computation are described and
implemented, and their performance tested against real biological
data, which is part of the IntAct dataset.
Abstract: Conflicts identification among non-functional requirements is often identified intuitively which impairs conflict analysis practices. This paper proposes a new model to identify conflicts among non-functional requirements. The proposed model uses the matrix mechanism to identify the quality based conflicts among non-functional requirements. The potential conflicts are identified through the mapping of low level conflicting quality attributes to low level functionalities using the matrices. The proposed model achieves the identification of conflicts among product and process requirements, identifies false conflicts, decreases the documentation overhead, and maintains transparency of identified conflicts. The attributes are not concomitantly taken into account by current models in practice.
Abstract: MRAM technology provides a combination of fast
access time, non-volatility, data retention and endurance. While a
growing interest is given to two-terminal Magnetic Tunnel Junctions
(MTJ) based on Spin-Transfer Torque (STT) switching as the
potential candidate for a universal memory, its reliability is
dramatically decreased because of the common writing/reading path.
Three-terminal MTJ based on Spin-Orbit Torque (SOT) approach
revitalizes the hope of an ideal MRAM. It can overcome the
reliability barrier encountered in current two-terminal MTJs by
separating the reading and the writing path. In this paper, we study
two possible writing schemes for the SOT-MTJ device based on
recently fabricated samples. While the first is based on precessional
switching, the second requires the presence of permanent magnetic
field. Based on an accurate Verilog-A model, we simulate the two
writing techniques and we highlight advantages and drawbacks of
each one. Using the second technique, pioneering logic circuits based
on the three-terminal architecture of the SOT-MTJ described in this
work are under development with preliminary attractive results.
Abstract: Web usage mining is an interesting application of data
mining which provides insight into customer behaviour on the Internet. An important technique to discover user access and navigation trails is based on sequential patterns mining. One of the
key challenges for web access patterns mining is tackling the problem
of mining richly structured patterns. This paper proposes a novel
model called Web Access Patterns Graph (WAP-Graph) to represent all of the access patterns from web mining graphically. WAP-Graph
also motivates the search for new structural relation patterns, i.e. Concurrent Access Patterns (CAP), to identify and predict more
complex web page requests. Corresponding CAP mining and modelling methods are proposed and shown to be effective in the
search for and representation of concurrency between access patterns
on the web. From experiments conducted on large-scale synthetic
sequence data as well as real web access data, it is demonstrated that
CAP mining provides a powerful method for structural knowledge discovery, which can be visualised through the CAP-Graph model.
Abstract: Abdominal aortic aneurysms rupture (AAAs) is one of the main causes of death in the world. This is a very complex phenomenon that usually occurs “without previous warning". Currently, criteria to assess the aneurysm rupture risk (peak diameter and growth rate) can not be considered as reliable indicators. In a first approach, the main geometric parameters of aneurysms have been linked into five biomechanical factors. These are combined to obtain a dimensionless rupture risk index, RI(t), which has been validated preliminarily with a clinical case and others from literature. This quantitative indicator is easy to understand, it allows estimating the aneurysms rupture risks and it is expected to be able to identify the one in aneurysm whose peak diameter is less than the threshold value. Based on initial results, a broader study has begun with twelve patients from the Clinic Hospital of Valladolid-Spain, which are submitted to periodic follow-up examinations.
Abstract: The procurement and cost management approach adopted for mechanical and electrical (M&E) services in Malaysian construction industry have been criticized for its inefficiency. The study examined early cost estimating practices adopted for mechanical and electrical services (M&E) in Malaysia so as to understand the level of compliance of the current techniques with best practices. The methodology adopted for the study is a review of bidding documents used on both completed and on – going building projects awarded between 2008 – 2010 under 9th Malaysian Plan. The analysis revealed that, M&E services cost cannot be reliably estimated at pre-contract stage; the bidding techniques adopted for M&E services failed to provide uniform basis for contractors to submit tender; detailed measurement of items were not made which could complicate post contract cost control and financial management. The paper concluded that, there is need to follow a structured approach in determining the pre-contract cost estimate for M&E services which will serve as a virile tool for post contract cost control.
Abstract: Yeast cells live in a constantly changing environment that requires the continuous adaptation of their genomic program in order to sustain their homeostasis, survive and proliferate. Due to the advancement of high throughput technologies, there is currently a large amount of data such as gene expression, gene deletion and protein-protein interactions for S. Cerevisiae under various environmental conditions. Mining these datasets requires efficient computational methods capable of integrating different types of data, identifying inter-relations between different components and inferring functional groups or 'modules' that shape intracellular processes. This study uses computational methods to delineate some of the mechanisms used by yeast cells to respond to environmental changes. The GRAM algorithm is first used to integrate gene expression data and ChIP-chip data in order to find modules of coexpressed and co-regulated genes as well as the transcription factors (TFs) that regulate these modules. Since transcription factors are themselves transcriptionally regulated, a three-layer regulatory cascade consisting of the TF-regulators, the TFs and the regulated modules is subsequently considered. This three-layer cascade is then modeled quantitatively using artificial neural networks (ANNs) where the input layer corresponds to the expression of the up-stream transcription factors (TF-regulators) and the output layer corresponds to the expression of genes within each module. This work shows that (a) the expression of at least 33 genes over time and for different stress conditions is well predicted by the expression of the top layer transcription factors, including cases in which the effect of up-stream regulators is shifted in time and (b) identifies at least 6 novel regulatory interactions that were not previously associated with stress-induced changes in gene expression. These findings suggest that the combination of gene expression and protein-DNA interaction data with artificial neural networks can successfully model biological pathways and capture quantitative dependencies between distant regulators and downstream genes.
Abstract: A new OTA-based logarithmic-control variable gain
current amplifier (LCCA) is presented. It consists of two Operational
Transconductance Amplifier (OTA) and two PMOS transistors
biased in weak inversion region. The circuit operates from 0.6V DC
power supply and consumes 0.6 μW. The linear-dB controllable
output range is 43 dB with maximum error less than 0.5dB. The
functionality of the proposed design was confirmed using HSPICE in
0.35μm CMOS process technology.
Abstract: Knowledge bases are basic components of expert
systems or intelligent computational programs. Knowledge bases
provide knowledge, events that serve deduction activity,
computation and control. Therefore, researching and developing of
models for knowledge representation play an important role in
computer science, especially in Artificial Intelligence Science and
intelligent educational software. In this paper, the extensive
deduction computational model is proposed to design knowledge
bases whose attributes are able to be real values or functional values.
The system can also solve problems based on knowledge bases.
Moreover, the models and algorithms are applied to produce the
educational software for solving alternating current problems or
solving set of equations automatically.
Abstract: In mechanical and environmental engineering, mixed
convection is a frequently encountered thermal fluid phenomenon
which exists in atmospheric environment, urban canopy flows, ocean
currents, gas turbines, heat exchangers, and computer chip cooling
systems etc... . This paper deals with a numerical investigation of
mixed convection in a vertical heated channel. This flow results from
the mixing of the up-going fluid along walls of the channel with the
one issued from a flat nozzle located in its entry section. The fluiddynamic
and heat-transfer characteristics of vented vertical channels
are investigated for constant heat-flux boundary conditions, a
Rayleigh number equal to 2.57 1010, for two jet Reynolds number
Re=3 103 and 2104 and the aspect ratio in the 8-20 range. The system
of governing equations is solved with a finite volumes method and an
implicit scheme. The obtained results show that the turbulence and
the jet-wall interaction activate the heat transfer, as does the drive of
ambient air by the jet. For low Reynolds number Re=3 103, the
increase of the aspect Ratio enhances the heat transfer of about 3%,
however; for Re=2 104, the heat transfer enhancement is of about
12%. The numerical velocity, pressure and temperature fields are
post-processed to compute the quantities of engineering interest such
as the induced mass flow rate, and average Nusselt number, in terms
of Rayleigh, Reynolds numbers and dimensionless geometric
parameters are presented.
Abstract: All Text processing systems allow their users to
search a pattern of string from a given text. String matching is
fundamental to database and text processing applications. Every text
editor must contain a mechanism to search the current document for
arbitrary strings. Spelling checkers scan an input text for words in the
dictionary and reject any strings that do not match. We store our
information in data bases so that later on we can retrieve the same
and this retrieval can be done by using various string matching
algorithms. This paper is describing a new string matching algorithm
for various applications. A new algorithm has been designed with the
help of Rabin Karp Matcher, to improve string matching process.
Abstract: Since water resources of desert Naein City are very
limited, a approach which saves water resources and meanwhile
meets the needs of the greenspace for water is to use city-s sewage
wastewater. Proper treatment of Naein-s sewage up to the standards
required for green space uses may solve some of the problems of
green space development of the city. The present paper closely
examines available statistics and information associated with city-s
sewage system, and determines complementary stages of sewage
treatment facilities of the city. In the present paper, population, per
capita water use, and required discharge for various greenspace
pieces including different plants are calculated. Moreover, in order to
facilitate the application of water resources, a Crude water
distribution network apart from drinking water distribution network is
designed, and a plan for mixing municipal wells- water with sewage
wastewater in proposed mixing tanks is suggested. Hence, following
greenspace irrigation reform and complementary plan, per capita
greenspace of the city will be increased from current amount of 13.2
square meters to 32 square meters.
Abstract: Multiport diffusers are the effective engineering
devices installed at the modern marine outfalls for the steady
discharge of effluent streams from the coastal plants, such as
municipal sewage treatment, thermal power generation and seawater
desalination. A mathematical model using a two-dimensional
advection-diffusion equation based on a flat seabed and incorporating
the effect of a coastal tidal current is developed to calculate the
compounded concentration following discharges of desalination
brine from a sea outfall with multiport diffusers. The analytical
solutions are computed graphically to illustrate the merging of
multiple brine plumes in shallow coastal waters, and further
approximation will be made to the maximum shoreline's
concentration to formulate dilution of a multiport diffuser discharge.
Abstract: Previous studies have shown that there are arguments
regarding the reliability and validity of the Ashworth and Modified
Ashworth Scale towards evaluating patients diagnosed with upper
limb disorders. These evaluations depended on the raters’ experiences.
This initiated us to develop an upper limb disorder part-task trainer
that is able to simulate consistent upper limb disorders, such as
spasticity and rigidity signs, based on the Modified Ashworth Scale to
improve the variability occurring between raters and intra-raters
themselves. By providing consistent signs, novice therapists would be
able to increase training frequency and exposure towards various
levels of signs. A total of 22 physiotherapists and occupational
therapists participated in the study. The majority of the therapists
agreed that with current therapy education, they still face problems
with inter-raters and intra-raters variability (strongly agree 54%; n =
12/22, agree 27%; n = 6/22) in evaluating patients’ conditions. The
therapists strongly agreed (72%; n = 16/22) that therapy trainees
needed to increase their frequency of training; therefore believe that
our initiative to develop an upper limb disorder training tool will help
in improving the clinical education field (strongly agree and agree
63%; n = 14/22).