Abstract: In this experimental work, we have shown that the
geometric shape of the grooves (furrows) plays an important role in
sediment dynamics. In addition, the rheological behaviour of solid
discharge does not depend only on the velocity discharge but also on
the geometric shape.
Abstract: This paper includes a positive analysis to quantitatively grasp the relationship among vulnerability, information security incidents, and the countermeasures by using data based on a 2007 questionnaire survey for Japanese ISPs (Internet Service Providers). To grasp the relationships, logistic regression analysis is used. The results clarify that there are relationships between information security incidents and the countermeasures. Concretely, there is a positive relationship between information security incidents and the number of information security systems introduced as well as a negative relationship between information security incidents and information security education. It is also pointed out that (especially, local) ISPs do not execute efficient information security countermeasures/ investment concerned with systems, and it is suggested that they should positively execute information security education. In addition, to further heighten the information security level of Japanese telecommunication infrastructure, the necessity and importance of the government to implement policy to support the countermeasures of ISPs is insisted.
Abstract: Insufficient Quality of Service (QoS) of Voice over
Internet Protocol (VoIP) is a growing concern that has lead the need
for research and study. In this paper we investigate the performance
of VoIP and the impact of resource limitations on the performance of
Access Networks. The impact of VoIP performance in Access
Networks is particularly important in regions where Internet
resources are limited and the cost of improving these resources is
prohibitive. It is clear that perceived VoIP performance, as measured
by mean opinion score [2] in experiments, where subjects are asked
to rate communication quality, is determined by end-to-end delay on
the communication path, delay variation, packet loss, echo, the
coding algorithm in use and noise. These performance indicators can
be measured and the affect in the Access Network can be estimated.
This paper investigates the congestion in the Access Network to the
overall performance of VoIP services with the presence of other
substantial uses of internet and ways in which Access Networks can
be designed to improve VoIP performance. Methods for analyzing
the impact of the Access Network on VoIP performance will be
surveyed and reviewed. This paper also considers some approaches
for improving performance of VoIP by carrying out experiments
using Network Simulator version 2 (NS2) software with a view to
gaining a better understanding of the design of Access Networks.
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: In this paper we investigate how wide-ranging
organizational support and the more specific form of support,
namely management support, may influence on tourism workers
satisfaction with a cash transaction system. The IS continuance
theory, proposed by Bhattacherjee in 2001, is utilized as a
theoretical framework. This implies that both perceived usefulness
and ease of use is included in the research model, in addition to
organizational and management support. The sample consists of
500 workers from 10 cruise and tourist ferries in Scandinavia that
use a cash transaction system to perform their work tasks. Using
structural equation modelling, results indicate that organizational
support and ease of use perceptions is critical for the users- level of
satisfaction with the cash transaction system.The findings have
implications for business managers and IS practitioners that want
to increase the quality of IT-based business processes within the
tourism industry.
Abstract: Leo Breimans Random Forests (RF) is a recent
development in tree based classifiers and quickly proven to be one of
the most important algorithms in the machine learning literature. It
has shown robust and improved results of classifications on standard
data sets. Ensemble learning algorithms such as AdaBoost and
Bagging have been in active research and shown improvements in
classification results for several benchmarking data sets with mainly
decision trees as their base classifiers. In this paper we experiment to
apply these Meta learning techniques to the random forests. We
experiment the working of the ensembles of random forests on the
standard data sets available in UCI data sets. We compare the
original random forest algorithm with their ensemble counterparts
and discuss the results.
Abstract: Prediction of benzene transport in soil and volatilization from soil to the atmosphere is important for the preservation of human health and management of contaminated soils. The adequacy of a simple numerical model, assuming two-phase diffusion and equilibrium of liquid/solid adsorption, was investigated by experimental data of benzene concentration in a flux chamber (with headspace) where Andosol and sand were filled. Adsorption experiment for liquid phase was performed to determine an adsorption coefficient. Furthermore, adequacy of vapor phase adsorption was also studied through two runs of experiment using sand with different water content. The results show that the model adequately predicted benzene transport and volatilization from Andosol and sand with water content of 14.0%. In addition, the experiment additionally revealed that vapor phase adsorption should be considered in diffusion model for sand with very low water content.
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 aged are faced with increasing risk for falls. The
aged have the easily fragile bones than others. When falls have
occurred, it is important to detect this emergency state because such
events often lead to more serious illness or even death. A
implementation of PDA system, for detection of emergency situation,
was developed using 3-axis accelerometer in this paper as follows.
The signals were acquired from the 3-axis accelerometer, and then
transmitted to the PDA through Bluetooth module. This system can
classify the human activity, and also detect the emergency state like
falls. When the fall occurs, the system generates the alarm on the
PDA. If a subject does not respond to the alarm, the system determines
whether the current situation is an emergency state or not, and then
sends some information to the emergency center in the case of urgent
situation. Three different studies were conducted on 12 experimental
subjects, with results indicating a good accuracy. The first study was
performed to detect the posture change of human daily activity. The
second study was performed to detect the correct direction of fall. The
third study was conducted to check the classification of the daily
physical activity. Each test was lasted at least 1 min. in third study.
The output of acceleration signal was compared and evaluated by
changing a various posture after attaching a 3-axis accelerometer
module on the chest. The newly developed system has some important
features such as portability, convenience and low cost. One of the
main advantages of this system is that it is available at home
healthcare environment. Another important feature lies in low cost to
manufacture device. The implemented system can detect the fall
accurately, so will be widely used in emergency situation.
Abstract: Plasma Wind Tunnels (PWT) are extensively used for screening and qualification of re-entry Thermel Protection System (TPS) materials. Proper design of a supersonic diffuser for plasma wind tunnel is of importance for achieving good pressurerecovery (thereby reducing vacuum pumping requirement & run time costs) and isolating downstream stream fluctuations from propagating costs) and isolating downstream stream fluctuationnts the details of a rapid design methodology successfully employed for designing supersonic diffuser for high power (several megawatts)plasma wind tunnels and numerical performance analysis of a diffuser configuration designed for one megawatt power rated plasma wind tunnel(enthalpy ~ 30 MJ/kg) using FLUENT 6.3® solver for different diffuser operating sub-atmospheric back-pressures.
Abstract: We report a lithography-free approach to fabricate the
biomimetics, quasi-beehive Si nanostructures (QBSNs), on
Si-substrates. The self-assembled SiGe nanoislands via the strain
induced surface roughening (Asaro-Tiller-Grinfeld instability) during
in-situ annealing play a key role as patterned sacrifice regions for
subsequent reactive ion etching (RIE) process performed for
fabricating quasi-beehive nanostructures on Si-substrates. As the
measurements of field emission, the bare QBSNs show poor field
emission performance, resulted from the existence of the native oxide
layer which forms an insurmountable barrier for electron emission. In
order to dramatically improve the field emission characteristics, the
platinum nanopillars (Pt-NPs) were deposited on QBSNs to form
Pt-NPs/QBSNs heterostructures. The turn-on field of Pt-NPs/QBSNs
is as low as 2.29 V/μm (corresponding current density of 1 μA/cm2),
and the field enhancement factor (β-value) is significantly increased to
6067. More importantly, the uniform and continuous electrons excite
light emission, due to the surrounding filed emitters from
Pt-NPs/QBSNs, can be easily obtained. This approach does not require
an expensive photolithographic process and possesses great potential
for applications.
Abstract: Mel Frequency Cepstral Coefficient (MFCC) features
are widely used as acoustic features for speech recognition as well
as speaker recognition. In MFCC feature representation, the Mel frequency
scale is used to get a high resolution in low frequency region,
and a low resolution in high frequency region. This kind of processing
is good for obtaining stable phonetic information, but not suitable
for speaker features that are located in high frequency regions. The
speaker individual information, which is non-uniformly distributed
in the high frequencies, is equally important for speaker recognition.
Based on this fact we proposed an admissible wavelet packet based
filter structure for speaker identification. Multiresolution capabilities
of wavelet packet transform are used to derive the new features.
The proposed scheme differs from previous wavelet based works,
mainly in designing the filter structure. Unlike others, the proposed
filter structure does not follow Mel scale. The closed-set speaker
identification experiments performed on the TIMIT database shows
improved identification performance compared to other commonly
used Mel scale based filter structures using wavelets.
Abstract: Participation in global trade means that Chinas vegetables and fruits industry faces international food safety standards and increased scrutiny worldwide. The objectives of this paper were to investigate how existing food safety standards and regulations in the importing countries impact the export of vegetables and fruits from China. This paper discussed the current and historical situations of Chinas vegetables and fruits export from 1996 to 2010, analyzed the Maximum Residual Limit (MRL) standards of pesticides imposed by importing countries, quantitatively estimated the impacts of food safety standards on Chinas vegetables and fruits export based on a gravity model. The results showed that although transportation distance between trade partners and tariff rates on vegetables and fruits were still the importantly resistant factors for China export, vegetables and fruits export was sensitive to the number of regulated pesticides, the strictness, and the level of food safety standards imposed by importing countries, which showed a significant trade flow effect, stricter food safety standards, increased number of regulated pesticides significantly inhibit China export of vegetables and fruits. Moreover, Chinas food safety standards also showed a significantly effect on vegetables and fruits export, which inhibited export to some extent. KeywordsFood safety standards, MRL, Vegetables, Fruits, Export.
Abstract: Reliable information about tool temperature
distribution is of central importance in metal cutting. In this study,
tool-chip interface temperature was determined in cutting of ST37
steel workpiece by applying HSS as the cutting tool in dry turning.
Two different approaches were implemented for temperature
measuring: an embedded thermocouple (RTD) in to the cutting tool
and infrared (IR) camera. Comparisons are made between
experimental data and results of MSC.SuperForm and FLUENT
software.
An investigation of heat generation in cutting tool was performed
by varying cutting parameters at the stable cutting tool geometry and
results were saved in a computer; then the diagrams of tool
temperature vs. various cutting parameters were obtained. The
experimental results reveal that the main factors of the increasing
cutting temperature are cutting speed (V ), feed rate ( S ) and depth
of cut ( h ), respectively. It was also determined that simultaneously
change in cutting speed and feed rate has the maximum effect on
increasing cutting temperature.
Abstract: this paper presented a survey analysis subjected on
network bandwidth management from published papers referred in
IEEE Explorer database in three years from 2009 to 2011. Network
Bandwidth Management is discussed in today-s issues for computer
engineering applications and systems. Detailed comparison is
presented between published papers to look further in the IP based
network critical research area for network bandwidth management.
Important information such as the network focus area, a few
modeling in the IP Based Network and filtering or scheduling used in
the network applications layer is presented. Many researches on
bandwidth management have been done in the broad network area
but fewer are done in IP Based network specifically at the
applications network layer. A few researches has contributed new
scheme or enhanced modeling but still the issue of bandwidth
management still arise at the applications network layer. This survey
is taken as a basic research towards implementations of network
bandwidth management technique, new framework model and
scheduling scheme or algorithm in an IP Based network which will
focus in a control bandwidth mechanism in prioritizing the network
traffic the applications layer.
Abstract: This paper addresses one of the most important issues
have been considered in hybrid MTS/MTO production environments. To cope with the problem, a mathematical programming model is
applied from a tactical point of view. The model is converted to a fuzzy goal programming model, because a degree of uncertainty is involved in hybrid MTS/MTO context. Finally, application of the
proposed model in an industrial center is reported and the results prove the validity of the model.
Abstract: In order to reduce cost, increase quality, and for
timely supplying production systems has considerably taken the
advantages of supply chain management and these advantages are
also competitive. Selection of appropriate supplier has an important
role in improvement and efficiency of systems.
The models of supplier selection which have already been used by
researchers have considered selection one or more suppliers from
potential suppliers but in this paper selecting one supplier as partner
from one supplier that have minimum one period supplying to buyer
is considered.
This paper presents a conceptual model for partner selection and
application of Degree of Adoptive (DOA) model for final selection.
The attributes weight in this model is prepared through AHP
model. After making the descriptive model, determining the
attributes and measuring the parameters of the adaptive is examined
in an auto industry of Iran(Zagross Khodro co.) and results are
presented.
Abstract: In this paper the development of a heat exchanger as a
pilot plant for educational purpose is discussed and the use of neural
network for controlling the process is being presented. The aim of the
study is to highlight the need of a specific Pseudo Random Binary
Sequence (PRBS) to excite a process under control. As the neural
network is a data driven technique, the method for data generation
plays an important role. In light of this a careful experimentation
procedure for data generation was crucial task. Heat exchange is a
complex process, which has a capacity and a time lag as process
elements. The proposed system is a typical pipe-in- pipe type heat
exchanger. The complexity of the system demands careful selection,
proper installation and commissioning. The temperature, flow, and
pressure sensors play a vital role in the control performance. The
final control element used is a pneumatically operated control valve.
While carrying out the experimentation on heat exchanger a welldrafted
procedure is followed giving utmost attention towards safety
of the system. The results obtained are encouraging and revealing
the fact that if the process details are known completely as far as
process parameters are concerned and utilities are well stabilized then
feedback systems are suitable, whereas neural network control
paradigm is useful for the processes with nonlinearity and less
knowledge about process. The implementation of NN control
reinforces the concepts of process control and NN control paradigm.
The result also underlined the importance of excitation signal
typically for that process. Data acquisition, processing, and
presentation in a typical format are the most important parameters
while validating the results.
Abstract: The development of renewable energies - particularly energy from wind, water, solar power and biomass - is a central aim of the European Commission's energy policy. There are several reasons for this choice: renewable energies are sustainable, nonpolluting, widely available and clean. Increasing the share of renewable energy in the energy balance enhances sustainability. It also helps to improve the security of energy supply by reducing the Community's growing dependence on imported energy sources.In this paper it was studied the possibility to realize three photovoltaic systems in the Italian Natural Park “Gola della Rossa e di Frasassi". The first photovoltaic system is a grid-connected system for Services and Documentation Center of Castelletta with a nominal power of about 6 kWp. The second photovoltaic system is a grid-connected integrated system on the ticket office-s roof with a nominal power of about 4 kWp. The third project is set up by five grid-connected systems integrated on the roofs of the bungalows in Natural Park-s tourist camping with a nominal power of about 10 kWp. The electricity which is generated by all these plants is purchased according to the Italian program called “Conto Energia". Economical analysis and the amount of the avoided CO2 emissions are elaborated for these photovoltaic systems.
Abstract: Bidding is a very important business function to find
latent contractors of construction projects. Moreover, bid markup is
one of the most important decisions for a bidder to gain a reasonable
profit. Since the bidding system is a complex adaptive system, bidding
agent need a learning process to get more valuable knowledge for a bid,
especially from past public bidding information. In this paper, we
proposed an iterative agent leaning model for bidders to make markup
decisions. A classifier for public bidding information named PIBS is
developed to make full use of history data for classifying new bidding
information. The simulation and experimental study is performed to
show the validity of the proposed classifier. Some factors that affect
the validity of PIBS are also analyzed at the end of this work.