Abstract: This report examines the current state of human gait
simulator development based on the human hip joint model. This unit
will create a database of human gait types, useful for setting up and
calibrating Mechano devices, as well as the creation of new systems
of rehabilitation, exoskeletons and walking robots. The system has
many opportunities to configure the dimensions and stiffness, while
maintaining relative simplicity.
Abstract: In this paper, a learning algorithm using neuronal networks to improve the roll stability and prevent the rollover in a single unit heavy vehicle is proposed. First, LQR control to keep balanced normalized rollovers, between front and rear axles, below the unity, then a data collected from this controller is used as a training basis of a neuronal regulator. The ANN controller is thereafter applied for the nonlinear side force model, and gives satisfactory results than the LQR one.
Abstract: This paper presents the development of a mobile
application for students at the Faculty of Information Technology,
Rangsit University (RSU), Thailand. RSU upgrades an enrollment
process by improving its information systems. Students can
download the RSU APP easily in order to access the RSU substantial
information. The reason of having a mobile application is to help
students to access the system regardless of time and place. The objectives of this paper include: 1. To develop an application
on iOS platform for those students at the Faculty of Information
Technology, Rangsit University, Thailand. 2. To obtain the students’
perception towards the new mobile app. The target group is those
from the freshman year till the senior year of the faculty of
Information Technology, Rangsit University. The new mobile application, called as RSU APP, is developed by
the department of Information Technology, Rangsit University. It
contains useful features and various functionalities particularly on
those that can give support to students. The core contents of the app
consist of RSU’s announcement, calendar, events, activities, and ebook.
The mobile app is developed on the iOS platform. The user
satisfaction is analyzed from the interview data from 81 interviewees
as well as a Google application like a Google form which 122
interviewees are involved. The result shows that users are satisfied
with the application as they score it the most satisfaction level at 4.67
SD 0.52. The score for the question if users can learn and use the
application quickly is high which is 4.82 SD 0.71. On the other hand,
the lowest satisfaction rating is in the app’s form, apps lists, with the
satisfaction level as 4.01 SD 0.45.
Abstract: As one of the convenient and noninvasive sensing
approaches, the automatic limb girth measurement has been applied
to detect intention behind human motion from muscle deformation.
The sensing validity has been elaborated by preliminary researches
but still need more fundamental studies, especially on kinetic
contraction modes. Based on the novel fabric strain sensors, a soft
and smart limb girth measurement system was developed by the
authors’ group, which can measure the limb girth in-motion.
Experiments were carried out on elbow isometric flexion and elbow
isokinetic flexion (biceps’ isokinetic contractions) of 90°/s, 60°/s, and
120°/s for 10 subjects (2 canoeists and 8 ordinary people). After
removal of natural circumferential increments due to elbow position,
the joint torque is found not uniformly sensitive to the limb
circumferential strains, but declining as elbow joint angle rises,
regardless of the angular speed. Moreover, the maximum joint torque
was found as an exponential function of the joint’s angular speed.
This research highly contributes to the application of the automatic
limb girth measuring during kinetic contractions, and it is useful to
predict the contraction level of voluntary skeletal muscles.
Abstract: Opportunistic Routing (OR) increases the
transmission reliability and network throughput. Traditional routing
protocols preselects one or more predetermined nodes before
transmission starts and uses a predetermined neighbor to forward a
packet in each hop. The opportunistic routing overcomes the
drawback of unreliable wireless transmission by broadcasting one
transmission can be overheard by manifold neighbors. The first
cooperation-optimal protocol for Multirate OR (COMO) used to
achieve social efficiency and prevent the selfish behavior of the
nodes. The novel link-correlation-aware OR improves the
performance by exploiting the miscellaneous low correlated forward
links. Context aware Adaptive OR (CAOR) uses active suppression
mechanism to reduce packet duplication. The Context-aware OR
(COR) can provide efficient routing in mobile networks. By using
Cooperative Opportunistic Routing in Mobile Ad hoc Networks
(CORMAN), the problem of opportunistic data transfer can be
tackled. While comparing to all the protocols, COMO is the best as it
achieves social efficiency and prevents the selfish behavior of the
nodes.
Abstract: During the last decades, a number of food crises such
as Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy (BSE), Mad-Cow disease,
Dioxin in chicken food, Food-and-Mouth Disease (FMD), have
certainly inflected the reliability of the food industry. Consequently,
the trend in applying different scientific methods of risk assessment
in food safety has obtained more attentions in the academic and
practice. However, lack of practical approach considering entire food
supply chain is tangible in the academic literature. In this regard, this
paper aims to apply risk assessment tool (FMEA) with integration of
Human Factor along the entire supply chain of food production and
test the method in a case study of Diary production, and analyze its
results.
Abstract: Strong anthropogenic impact has uncontrolled
consequences on the nature of the soil. Hence, up-to-date sustainable
methods of soil state improvement are essential. Investigators provide
the evidence that biochar can positively effects physical, chemical,
and biological soil properties and the abundance of mycorrhizal fungi
which are in the focus of this study. The main aim of the present
investigation is to demonstrate the effect of two types of plant growth
promoting bacteria (PGPB) inoculums along with the beech wood
biochar and mineral N additives on mycorrhizal colonization.
Experiment has been set up in laboratory conditions with containers
filled with arable soil from the protection zone of the main water
source “Brezova nad Svitavou”. Lactuca sativa (lettuce) has been
selected as a model plant. Based on the obtained data, it can be
concluded that mycorrhizal colonization increased as the result of
combined influence of biochar and PGPB inoculums amendment. In
addition, correlation analyses showed that the numbers of main
groups of cultivated bacteria were dependent on the degree of
mycorrhizal colonization.
Abstract: The main purpose of this study is to assess the
sediment quality and potential ecological risk in marine sediments in
Gymea Bay located in south Sydney, Australia. A total of 32 surface
sediment samples were collected from the bay. Current track
trajectories and velocities have also been measured in the bay. The
resultant trace elements were compared with the adverse biological
effect values Effect Range Low (ERL) and Effect Range Median
(ERM) classifications. The results indicate that the average values of
chromium, arsenic, copper, zinc, and lead in surface sediments all
reveal low pollution levels and are below ERL and ERM values. The
highest concentrations of trace elements were found close to
discharge points and in the inner bay, and were linked with high
percentages of clay minerals, pyrite and organic matter, which can
play a significant role in trapping and accumulating these elements.
The lowest concentrations of trace elements were found to be on the
shoreline of the bay, which contained high percentages of sand
fractions. It is postulated that the fine particles and trace elements are
disturbed by currents and tides, then transported and deposited in
deeper areas. The current track velocities recorded in Gymea Bay had
the capability to transport fine particles and trace element pollution
within the bay. As a result, hydrodynamic measurements were able to
provide useful information and to help explain the distribution of
sedimentary particles and geochemical properties. This may lead to
knowledge transfer to other bay systems, including those in remote
areas. These activities can be conducted at a low cost, and are
therefore also transferrable to developing countries. The advent of
portable instruments to measure trace elements in the field has also
contributed to the development of these lower cost and easily applied
methodologies available for use in remote locations and low-cost
economies.
Abstract: Escherichia coli (E. coli) is the most isolated bacteria
from blood circulation of septicemic calves. Given the prevalence of
septicemia in animals and its economic importance in veterinary
practice, better understanding of changes in clinical signs following
disease, may contribute to early detection of disorder. The present
study has been carried out to detect changes of clinical signs in
induced sepsis in calves with E. coli. Colisepticemia has been
induced in 10 twenty-day old healthy Holstein- Frisian calves with
intravenous injection of 1.5 X 109 colony forming units (cfu) of
O111:H8 strain of E. coli. Clinical signs including rectal temperature,
heart rate, respiratory rate, shock, appetite, sucking reflex, feces
consistency, general behavior, dehydration and standing ability were
recorded in experimental calves during 24 hours after induction of
colisepticemia. Blood culture was also carried out from calves four
times during experiment. ANOVA with repeated measure is used to
see changes of calves’ clinical signs to experimental colisepticemia,
and values of P≤ 0.05 was considered statistically significant. Mean
values of rectal temperature and heart rate as well as median values
of respiratory rate, appetite, suckling reflex, standing ability and feces
consistency of experimental calves increased significantly during
study (P 0.05). The
results of present study showed that total score of clinical signs in
calves with experimental colisepticemia increased significantly,
although score of some clinical signs such as shock did not change
significantly.
Abstract: Common Platform for Automated Programming
(CPAP) is defined in details. Two versions of CPAP are described:
Cloud based (including set of components for classic programming,
and set of components for combined programming); and Knowledge
Based Automated Software Engineering (KBASE) based (including
set of components for automated programming, and set of
components for ontology programming). Four KBASE products
(Module for Automated Programming of Robots, Intelligent Product
Manual, Intelligent Document Display, and Intelligent Form
Generator) are analyzed and CPAP contributions to automated
programming are presented.
Abstract: Geopolymer composites reinforced with flax fabrics
and nanoclay are fabricated and studied for physical and mechanical
properties using X-Ray Diffraction (XRD), Fourier Transform
Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR), and Scanning Electron Microscope
(SEM). Nanoclay platelets at a weight of 1.0%, 2.0%, and 3.0% were
added to geopolymer pastes. Nanoclay at 2.0 wt.% was found to
improve density and decrease porosity while improving flexural
strength and post-peak toughness. A microstructural analysis
indicated that nanoclay behaves as filler and as an activator
supporting geopolymeric reaction while producing a higher content
geopolymer gel improving the microstructure of binders. The process
enhances adhesion between the geopolymer matrix and flax fibres.
Abstract: Both steady and unsteady turbulent mixed convection
heat transfer in a 3D lid-driven enclosure, which has constant heat
flux on the middle of bottom wall and with isothermal moving
sidewalls, is reported in this paper for working fluid with Prandtl
number Pr = 0.71. The other walls are adiabatic and stationary. The
dimensionless parameters used in this research are Reynolds number,
Re = 5000, 10000 and 15000, and Richardson number, Ri = 1 and 10.
The simulations have been done by using different turbulent methods
such as RANS, URANS, and LES. The effects of using different k-ε
models such as standard, RNG and Realizable k-ε model are
investigated. Interesting behaviours of the thermal and flow fields
with changing the Re or Ri numbers are observed. Isotherm and
turbulent kinetic energy distributions and variation of local Nusselt
number at the hot bottom wall are studied as well. The local Nusselt
number is found increasing with increasing either Re or Ri number.
In addition, the turbulent kinetic energy is discernibly affected by
increasing Re number. Moreover, the LES results have shown good
ability of this method in predicting more detailed flow structures in
the cavity.
Abstract: In this study, the effects and interactions of reaction
time and capping agent assistance during sol-gel synthesis of
magnesium substituted hydroxyapatite nanopowder (MgHA) on
hydroxyapatite (HA) to β-tricalcium phosphate (β-TCP) ratio, Ca/P
ratio and mean crystallite size was examined experimentally as well
as through statistical analysis. MgHA nanopowders were synthesized
by sol-gel technique at room temperature using aqueous solution of
calcium nitrate tetrahydrate, magnesium nitrate hexahydrate and
potassium dihydrogen phosphate as starting materials. The reaction
time for sol-gel synthesis was varied between 15 to 60 minutes. Two
process routes were followed with and without addition of
triethanolamine (TEA) in the solutions. The elemental compositions
of as-synthesized powders were determined using X-ray fluorescence
(XRF) spectroscopy. The functional groups present in the assynthesized
MgHA nanopowders were established through Fourier
Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR). The amounts of phases
present, Ca/P ratio and mean crystallite sizes of MgHA nanopowders
were determined using X-ray diffraction (XRD). The HA content in
biphasic mixture of HA and β-TCP and Ca/P ratio in as-synthesized
MgHA nanopowders increased effectively with reaction time of sols
(p0.15, two way ANOVA). The MgHA nanopowders
synthesized with TEA assistance exhibited 14 nm lower crystallite
size (p
Abstract: In the past years electric mobility became part of a
public discussion. The trend to fully electrified vehicles instead of
vehicles fueled with fossil energy has notably gained momentum.
Today nearly every big car manufacturer produces and sells fully
electrified vehicles, but electrified vehicles are still not as competitive
as conventional powered vehicles. As the traction battery states the
largest cost driver, lowering its price is a crucial objective. In
addition to improvements in product and production processes a nonnegligible,
but widely underestimated cost driver of production can
be found in logistics, since the production technology is not
continuous yet and neither are the logistics systems. This paper presents an approach to evaluate cost factors on
different designs of load carrier systems. Due to numerous
interdependencies, the combination of costs factors for a particular
scenario is not transparent. This is effecting actions for cost reduction
negatively, but still cost reduction is one of the major goals for
simultaneous engineering processes. Therefore a concurrent and
phase appropriate cost valuation method is necessary to serve cost
transparency. In this paper the four phases of this cost valuation
method are defined and explained, which based upon a new approach
integrating the logistics development process in to the integrated
product and process development.
Abstract: One of the global combinatorial optimization
problems in machine learning is feature selection. It concerned with
removing the irrelevant, noisy, and redundant data, along with
keeping the original meaning of the original data. Attribute reduction
in rough set theory is an important feature selection method. Since
attribute reduction is an NP-hard problem, it is necessary to
investigate fast and effective approximate algorithms. In this paper,
we proposed two feature selection mechanisms based on memetic
algorithms (MAs) which combine the genetic algorithm with a fuzzy
record to record travel algorithm and a fuzzy controlled great deluge
algorithm, to identify a good balance between local search and
genetic search. In order to verify the proposed approaches, numerical
experiments are carried out on thirteen datasets. The results show that
the MAs approaches are efficient in solving attribute reduction
problems when compared with other meta-heuristic approaches.
Abstract: This study evaluated the acute toxicity and tissue
distribution of intravenously administered gold nanoparticles
(AuNPs) in male rabbits. Rabbits were exposed to single dose of
AuNPs (300 μg/ kg). Toxic effects were assessed via general
behavior, hematological parameters, serum biochemical parameters,
and histopathological examination of various rabbits’ organs.
Inductively coupled plasma–mass spectrometry (ICP-MS) was used
to determine gold concentrations in tissue samples collected at
predetermined time intervals. After one week, AuNPs exerted no
obvious acute toxicity in rabbits. However, inflammatory reactions
were observed in liver, lungs and kidneys accompanied with mild
absolute neutrophilia and significant monocytosis. The highest gold
levels were found in the spleen and liver followed by lungs, and
kidneys. These results indicated that AuNPs could be distributed
extensively to various tissues in the body, but primarily in the spleen
and liver.
Abstract: In this paper, for an arbitrary multiplicative functional
f from the set of all upper triangular fuzzy matrices to the fuzzy
algebra, we prove that there exist a multiplicative functional F and a
functional G from the fuzzy algebra to the fuzzy algebra such that the
image of an upper triangular fuzzy matrix under f can be represented
as the product of all the images of its main diagonal elements under
F and other elements under G.
Abstract: This paper presents the results of a study on the
influence of varying percentages of rock bridges along a basal surface
defining a biplanar failure mode. A pseudo-coupled-hydromechanical
brittle fracture analysis is adopted using the state-of-the-art code
Slope Model. Model results show that rock bridge failure is strongly
influenced by the incorporation of groundwater pressures. The
models show that groundwater pressure can promote total failure of a
5% rock bridge along the basal surface. Once the percentage of the
rock bridges increases to 10 and 15%, although, the rock bridges are
broken, full interconnection of the surface defining the basal surface
of the biplanar mode does not occur. Increased damage is caused
when the rock bridge is located at the daylighting end of the basal
surface in proximity to the blast damage zone. As expected, some
cracking damage is experienced in the blast damage zone, where
properties representing a good quality controlled damage blast
technique were assumed. Model results indicate the potential increase
of permeability towards the blast damage zone.
Abstract: The end panels of a large rectangular industrial duct,
which experience significant internal pressures, also experience
considerable transverse shear due to transfer of gravity loads to the
supports. The current design practice of such thin plate panels for
shear load is based on methods used for the design of plate girder
webs. The structural arrangements, the loadings and the resulting
behavior associated with the industrial duct end panels are, however,
significantly different from those of the web of a plate girder. The
large aspect ratio of the end panels gives rise to multiple bands of
tension fields, whereas the plate girder web design is based on one
tension field. In addition to shear, the industrial end panels are
subjected to internal pressure which in turn produces significant
membrane action. This paper reports a study which was undertaken
to review the current industrial analysis and design methods and to
propose a comprehensive method of designing industrial duct end
panels for shear resistance. In this investigation, a nonlinear finite element model was
developed to simulate the behavior of industrial duct end panel, along
with the associated edge stiffeners, subjected to transverse shear and
internal pressures. The model considered the geometric imperfections
and constitutive relations for steels. Six scale independent
dimensionless parameters that govern the behavior of such end panel
were identified and were then used in a parametric study. It was
concluded that the plate slenderness dominates the shear strength of
stockier end panels, and whereas, both the plate slenderness and the
aspect ratio influence the shear strength of slender end panels. Based
on these studies, this paper proposes design aids for estimating the
shear strength of rectangular duct end panels.
Abstract: Coal fly ash, an industrial by product of coal
combustion thermal power plants is considered as a hazardous
material and its improper disposal has become an environmental
issue. On the other hand, manufacturing conventional clay bricks
involves on consumption of large amount of clay and leads
substantial depletion of topsoil. This paper unveils the possibility of
using fly ash as a partial replacement of clay for brick manufacturing
considering the local technology practiced in Bangladesh. The effect
of fly ash with different replacing ratio (0%, 20%, 30%, 40%, and
50% by volume) of clay on properties of bricks was studied. Bricks
were made in the field parallel to ordinary bricks marked with
specific number for different percentage to identify them at time of
testing. No physical distortion is observed in fly ash brick after
burning in the kiln. Results from laboratory test show that
compressive strength of brick is decreased with the increase of fly
ash and maximum compressive strength is found to be 19.6 MPa at
20% of fly ash. In addition, water absorption of fly ash brick is
increased with the increase of fly ash. The abrasion value and
Specific gravity of coarse aggregate prepared from brick with fly ash
also studied and the results of this study suggests that 20% fly ash
can be considered as the optimum fly ash content for producing good
quality bricks utilizing present practiced technology.