Abstract: This work proposes an optical fiber system (OF) for
sensing various volatile organic compounds (VOCs) in human breath
for the diagnosis of some metabolic disorders as a non-invasive
methodology. The analyzed VOCs are alkanes (i.e., ethane, pentane,
heptane, octane, and decane), and aromatic compounds (i.e., benzene,
toluene, and styrene). The OF displays high analytical performance
since it provides near real-time responses, rapid analysis, and low
instrumentation costs, as well as it exhibits useful linear range and
detection limits; the developed OF sensor is also comparable to a
reference methodology (gas chromatography-mass spectrometry) for
the eight tested VOCs.
Abstract: In this paper, a vision based system has been used for
controlling an industrial 3P Cartesian robot. The vision system will
recognize the target and control the robot by obtaining images from
environment and processing them. At the first stage, images from
environment are changed to a grayscale mode then it can diverse and
identify objects and noises by using a threshold objects which are
stored in different frames and then the main object will be
recognized. This will control the robot to achieve the target. A vision
system can be an appropriate tool for measuring errors of a robot in a
situation where the experimental test is conducted for a 3P robot.
Finally, the international standard ANSI/RIA R15.05-2 is used for
evaluating the path-related characteristics of the robot. To evaluate
the performance of the proposed method experimental test is carried
out.
Abstract: Sampling and analysis of leachate from Bhalaswa
landfill and groundwater samples from nearby locations, clearly
indicated the likely contamination of groundwater due to landfill
leachate. The results of simulation studies carried out for the
migration of Chloride from landfill shows that the simulation results
are in consonance with the observed concentration of Chloride in the
vicinity of landfill facility. The solid waste disposal system presently
being practiced in Delhi consists of mere dumping of wastes
generated, at three locations Bhalaswa, Ghazipur, and Okhla without
any regard to proper care for the protection of surrounding
environment. Bhalaswa landfill site in Delhi, which is being operated
as a dump site, is expected to become cause of serious groundwater
pollution in its vicinity. The leachate from Bhalaswa landfill was
found to be having a high concentration of chlorides, as well as DOC,
COD. The present study was undertaken to determine the likely
concentrations of principle contaminants in the groundwater over a
period of time due to the discharge of such contaminants from
landfill leachates to the underlying groundwater. The observed
concentration of chlorides in the groundwater within 75m of the
radius of landfill facility was found to be in consonance with the
simulated concentration of chloride in groundwater considering one
dimensional transport model, with finite mass of contaminant source.
Governing equation of contaminant transport involving advection and
diffusion-dispersion was solved in matlab7.0 using finite difference
method.
Abstract: A new chelating resin is prepared by coupling
Amberlite XAD-4 with 1-amino-2-naphthole through an azo spacer.
The resulting sorbent has been characterized by FT-IR, elemental
analysis and thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) and studied for
preconcentrating of Cu (II) using flame atomic absorption
spectrometry (FAAS) for metal monitoring. The optimum pH value
for sorption of the copper ions was 6.5. The resin was subjected to
evaluation through batch binding of mentioned metal ion.
Quantitative desorption occurs instantaneously with 0.5 M HNO3.
The sorption capacity was found 4.8 mmol.g-1 of resin for Cu (II) in
the aqueous solution. The chelating resin can be reused for 10 cycles
of sorption-desorption without any significant change in sorption
capacity. A recovery of 99% was obtained the metal ions with 0.5 M
HNO3 as eluting agent. The method was applied for metal ions
determination from industrial waste water sample.
Abstract: Since 2005, an SRF module of CESR type serves as the
accelerating cavity at the Taiwan Light Source in the National
Synchrotron Radiation Research Center. A 500-MHz niobium cavity
is immersed in liquid helium inside this SRF module. To reduce heat
load, the liquid helium vessel is thermally shielded by
liquid-nitrogen-cooled copper layer, and the beam chambers are also
anchored with pipes of the liquid nitrogen flow in middle of the liquid
helium vessel and the vacuum vessel. A strong correlation of the
movement of the cavity-s frequency tuner with the temperature
variation of parts cooled with liquid nitrogen was observed. A
previous study on a spare SRF module with the niobium cavity cooled
by liquid nitrogen instead of liquid helium, satisfactory suppression of
the thermal oscillation was achieved by attaching a temporary buffer
tank for the vented shielding nitrogen flow from the SRF module. In
this study, a home-made buffer tank is designed and integrated to the
spare SRF module with cavity cooled by liquid helium. Design,
construction, integration, and preliminary test results of this buffer
tank are presented.
Abstract: Analyses carried out on examples of detected defects
echoes showed clearly that one can describe these detected forms according to a whole of characteristic parameters in order to be able to make discrimination between a planar defect and a volumic defect.
This work answers to a problem of ultrasonics NDT like Identification of the defects. The problems as well as the objective of
this realized work, are divided in three parts: Extractions of the parameters of wavelets from the ultrasonic echo of the detected defect - the second part is devoted to principal components analysis
(PCA) for optimization of the attributes vector. And finally to establish the algorithm of classification (SVM, Support Vector Machine) which allows discrimination between a plane defect and a
volumic defect. We have completed this work by a conclusion where we draw up a summary of the completed works, as well as the robustness of the
various algorithms proposed in this study.
Abstract: South Africa is facing a crisis with not being able to produce enough graduates in the scarce skills areas to sustain economic growth. The crisis is fuelled by a school system that does not produce enough potential students with Mathematics, Accounting and Science. Since the introduction of the new school curriculum in 2008, there is no longer an option to take pure maths on a standard grade level. Instead, only two mathematical subjects are offered: pure maths (which is on par with higher grade maths) and mathematical literacy. It is compulsory to take one or the other. As a result, lees student finishes Grade 12 with pure mathematics every year. This national problem needs urgent attention if South Africa is to make any headway in critical skills development as mathematics is a gateway to scarce skills professions. Higher education institutions initiated several initiatives in an attempt to address the above, including preparatory courses, bridging programmes and extended curricula with foundation provisions. In view of the above, and government policy directives to broaden access in the scarce skills areas to increase student throughput, foundation provision was introduced for Commerce and Information Technology programmes at the Vaal Triangle Campus (VTC) of North-West University (NWU) in 2010. Students enrolling for extended programmes do not comply with the minimum prerequisites for the normal programmes. The question then arises as to whether these programmes have the intended impact? This paper reports the results of a two year longitudinal study, tracking the first year academic achievement of the two cohorts of enrolments since 2010. The results provide valuable insight into the structuring of an extended programme and its potential impact.
Abstract: There is a general feeling that Internet crime is an
advanced type of crime that has not yet infiltrated developing
countries like Uganda. The carefree nature of the Internet in which
anybody publishes anything at anytime poses a serious security threat
for any nation. Unfortunately, there are no formal records about this
type of crime for Uganda. Could this mean that it does not exist
there? The author conducted an independent research to ascertain
whether cyber crimes have affected people in Uganda and if so, to
discover where they are reported. This paper highlights the findings.
Abstract: Availability and mobilization of revenue is the main
essential with which an economy is managed and run. While
planning or while making the budgets nations set revenue targets to
be achieved. But later when the accounts are closed the actual
collections of revenue through taxes or even the non-tax revenue
collection would invariably be different as compared to the initial
estimates and targets set to be achieved. This revenue-gap distorts the
whole system and the economy disturbing all the major macroeconomic
indicators. This study is aimed to find out short and long
term impact of revenue gap on budget deficit, debt burden and
economic growth on the economy of Pakistan. For this purpose the
study uses autoregressive distributed lag approach to cointegration
and error correction mechanism on three different models for the
period 1980 to 2009. The empirical results show that revenue gap has
a short and long run relationship with economic growth and budget
deficit. However, revenue gap has no impact on debt burden.
Abstract: The market transformation in Kazakhstan during the
last two decades has essentially strengthened a gap between
development of urban and rural areas. Implementation of market
institutes, transition from public financing to paid rendering of social
services, change of forms of financing of social and economic
infrastructure have led to strengthening of an economic inequality of
social groups, including growth of stratification of the city and the
village. Sociological survey of urban and rural households in Almaty
city and villages of Almaty region has been carried out within the
international research project “Livelihoods Strategies of Private
Households in Central Asia: A Rural–Urban Comparison in
Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan" (Germany, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan).
The analysis of statistical data and results of sociological research of
urban and rural households allows us to reveal issues of territorial
development, to investigate an availability of medical, educational
and other services in the city and the village, to reveal an evaluation
urban and rural dwellers of living conditions, to compare economic
strategies of households in the city and the village.
Abstract: At any point of time, a power system operating
condition should be stable, meeting various operational criteria and it
should also be secure in the event of any credible contingency. Present
day power systems are being operated closer to their stability limits
due to economic and environmental constraints. Maintaining a stable
and secure operation of a power system is therefore a very important
and challenging issue. Voltage instability has been given much
attention by power system researchers and planners in recent years,
and is being regarded as one of the major sources of power system
insecurity. Voltage instability phenomena are the ones in which the
receiving end voltage decreases well below its normal value and does
not come back even after setting restoring mechanisms such as VAR
compensators, or continues to oscillate for lack of damping against the
disturbances. Reactive power limit of power system is one of the major
causes of voltage instability. This paper investigates the effects of
coordinated series capacitors (SC) with static VAR compensators
(SVC) on steady-state voltage stability of a power system. Also, the
influence of the presence of series capacitor on static VAR
compensator controller parameters and ratings required to stabilize
load voltages at certain values are highlighted.
Abstract: In this paper a combined feature selection method is
proposed which takes advantages of sample domain filtering,
resampling and feature subset evaluation methods to reduce
dimensions of huge datasets and select reliable features. This method
utilizes both feature space and sample domain to improve the process
of feature selection and uses a combination of Chi squared with
Consistency attribute evaluation methods to seek reliable features.
This method consists of two phases. The first phase filters and
resamples the sample domain and the second phase adopts a hybrid
procedure to find the optimal feature space by applying Chi squared,
Consistency subset evaluation methods and genetic search.
Experiments on various sized datasets from UCI Repository of
Machine Learning databases show that the performance of five
classifiers (Naïve Bayes, Logistic, Multilayer Perceptron, Best First
Decision Tree and JRIP) improves simultaneously and the
classification error for these classifiers decreases considerably. The
experiments also show that this method outperforms other feature
selection methods.
Abstract: Two-dimensional (2D) bar codes were designed to
carry significantly more data with higher information density and
robustness than its 1D counterpart. Thanks to the popular
combination of cameras and mobile phones, it will naturally bring
great commercial value to use the camera phone for 2D bar code
reading. This paper addresses the problem of specific 2D bar code
design for mobile phones and introduces a low-level encoding
method of matrix codes. At the same time, we propose an efficient
scheme for 2D bar codes decoding, of which the effort is put on
solutions of the difficulties introduced by low image quality that is
very common in bar code images taken by a phone camera.
Abstract: As the new industrial revolution advances in the
nanotechnology have been followed with interest throughout the
world and also in Turkey. Media has an important role in conveying
these advances to public, rising public awareness and creating
attitudes related to nanotechnology. As well as representing how a
subject is treated, media frames determine how public think about
this subject. In literature definite frames related to nanoscience and
nanotechnology such as process, regulation, conflict and risks were
mentioned in studies focusing different countries. So how
nanotechnology news is treated by which frames and in which news
categories in Turkey as a one of developing countries? In this study
examining different variables about nanotechnology that affect
public attitudes such as category, frame, story tone, source in Turkish
media via framing analysis developed in agenda setting studies was
aimed. In the analysis data between 2005 and 2009 obtained from the
first five national newspapers with wide circulation in Turkey will be
used. In this study the direction of the media about nanotechnology,
in which frames nanotechnologic advances brought to agenda were
reported as news, and sectoral, legal, economic and social scenes
reflected by these frames to public related to nanotechnology in
Turkey were planned.
Abstract: There are few studies on eggshell of leatherback turtle
which is endangered species in Thailand. This study was focusing on
the ultrastructure and elemental composition of leatherback turtle
eggshells collected from Andaman Sea Shore, Thailand during the
nesting season using scanning electron microscope (SEM). Three
eggshell layers of leatherback turtle; the outer cuticle layer or
calcareous layer, the middle layer or middle multistrata layer and the
inner fibrous layer were recognized. The outer calcareous layer was
thick and porosity which consisted of loose nodular units of various
crystal shapes and sizes. The loose attachment between these units
resulted in numerous spaces and openings. The middle layer was
compact thick with several multistrata and contained numerous
openings connecting to both outer cuticle layer and inner fibrous
layer. The inner fibrous layer was compact and thin, and composed of
numerous reticular fibers. Energy dispersive X-ray microanalysis
detector revealed energy spectrum of X-rays character emitted from
all elements on each layer. The percentages of all elements were
found in the following order: carbon (C) > oxygen (O) > calcium
(Ca) > sulfur (S) > potassium (K) > aluminum (Al) > iodine (I) >
silicon (Si) > chlorine (Cl) > sodium (Na) > fluorine (F) >
phosphorus (P) > magnesium (Mg). Each layer consisted of high
percentage of CaCO3 (approximately 98%) implying that it was
essential for turtle embryonic development. A significant difference
was found in the percentages of Ca and Mo in the 3layers. Moreover,
transition metal, metal and toxic non-metal contaminations were
found in leatherback turtle eggshell samples. These were palladium
(Pd), molybdenum (Mo), copper (Cu), aluminum (Al), lead (Pb), and
bromine (Br). The contamination elements were seen in the outer
layers except for Mo. All elements were readily observed and
mapped using Smiling program. X-ray images which mapped the
location of all elements were showed. Calcium containing in the
eggshell appeared in high contents and was widely distributing in
clusters of the outer cuticle layer to form CaCO3 structure. Moreover,
the accumulation of Na and Cl was observed to form NaCl which was
widely distributing in 3 eggshell layers. The results from this study
would be valuable on assessing the emergent success in this
endangered species.
Abstract: In Thailand, the practice of pre-hospital Emergency
Medical Service (EMS) in each area reveals the different growth
rates and effectiveness of the practices. Those can be found as the
diverse quality and quantity. To shorten the learning curve prior to
speed-up the practices in other areas, story telling and lessons learnt
from the effective practices are valued as meaningful knowledge. To
this paper, it was to ascertain the factors, lessons learnt and best
practices that have impact as contributing to the success of prehospital
EMS system. Those were formulized as model prior to
speedup the practice in other areas. To develop the model, Malcolm
Baldrige National Quality Award (MBNQA), which is widely
recognized as a framework for organizational quality assessment and
improvement, was chosen as the discussion framework. Remarkably,
this study was based on the consideration of knowledge capture;
however it was not to complete the loop of knowledge activities.
Nevertheless, it was to highlight the recognition of knowledge
capture, which is the initiation of knowledge management.
Abstract: Void formation in underfill is considered as failure
in flip chip manufacturing process. Void formation possibly caused
by several factors such as poor soldering and flux residue during
die attach process, void entrapment due moisture contamination,
dispense pattern process and setting up the curing process. This
paper presents the comparison of single step and two steps curing
profile towards the void and black dots formation in underfill for
Hi-CTE Flip Chip Ceramic Ball Grid Array Package (FC-CBGA).
Statistic analysis was conducted to analyze how different factors
such as wafer lot, sawing technique, underfill fillet height and
curing profile recipe were affected the formation of voids and
black dots. A C-Mode Scanning Aqoustic Microscopy (C-SAM)
was used to scan the total count of voids and black dots. It was
shown that the 2 steps curing profile provided solution for void
elimination and black dots in underfill after curing process.
Abstract: These days we face with so many advertisements in
magazines, those mentioned coaching is pragmatic specialties which
help people make change in their lives. Up to know Specialty coaches
are not necessarily therapists, consultants or psychologist, thus they
may not know psychological theories. The International Coach
Federation identifies "facilitating learning and results" as one of its
four core coach competencies, without understanding learning
theories coaching practice hangs in theoretical abyss. Thus the aim of
this article is investigating learning theories within coaching process.
Therefore, I reviewed some cognitive and behavioral learning
theories and analyzed their contribution with coaching process which
has been introduced in mentor coaches and ICF certified coaches'
papers and books. The result demonstrated that coaching profession
is strongly grounded in learning theories, and it will be strengthened
by the validation of theories and evidence-based research as we move
forward. Thus, it needs more research in order to applying effective
theoretical frameworks.
Abstract: This paper presents a vocoder to obtain high quality synthetic speech at 600 bps. To reduce the bit rate, the algorithm is based on a sinusoidally excited linear prediction model which extracts few coding parameters, and three consecutive frames are grouped into a superframe and jointly vector quantization is used to obtain high coding efficiency. The inter-frame redundancy is exploited with distinct quantization schemes for different unvoiced/voiced frame combinations in the superframe. Experimental results show that the quality of the proposed coder is better than that of 2.4kbps LPC10e and achieves approximately the same as that of 2.4kbps MELP and with high robustness.
Abstract: A straightforward and intuitive combination of single simulations into an aggregated master-simulation is not trivial. There are lots of problems, which trigger-specific difficulties during the modeling and execution of such a simulation. In this paper we identify these problems and aim to solve them by mapping the task to the field of multi agent systems. The solution is a new meta-model named AGENTMAP, which is able to mitigate most of the problems and to support intuitive modeling at the same time. This meta-model will be introduced and explained on basis of an example from the e-commerce domain.