Abstract: This paper presents a simplified version of Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) - a conventional approach to evaluating the performance and ranking of competitive objects characterized by two groups of factors acting in opposite directions: inputs and outputs. DEA with a Perfect Object (DEA PO) augments the group of actual objects with a virtual Perfect Object - the one having greatest outputs and smallest inputs. It allows for obtaining an explicit analytical solution and making a step to an absolute efficiency. This paper develops this approach further and introduces a DEA model with Partially Perfect Objects. DEA PPO consecutively eliminates the smallest relative inputs or greatest relative outputs, and applies DEA PO to the reduced collections of indicators. The partial efficiency scores are combined to get the weighted efficiency score. The computational scheme remains simple, like that of DEA PO, but the advantage of the DEA PPO is taking into account all of the inputs and outputs for each actual object. Firm evaluation is considered as an example.
Abstract: The objective of this paper is to estimate realistic
principal extrusion process parameters by means of artificial neural
network. Conventionally, finite element analysis is used to derive
process parameters. However, the finite element analysis of the
extrusion model does not consider the manufacturing process
constraints in its modeling. Therefore, the process parameters
obtained through such an analysis remains highly theoretical.
Alternatively, process development in industrial extrusion is to a
great extent based on trial and error and often involves full-size
experiments, which are both expensive and time-consuming. The
artificial neural network-based estimation of the extrusion process
parameters prior to plant execution helps to make the actual extrusion
operation more efficient because more realistic parameters may be
obtained. And so, it bridges the gap between simulation and real
manufacturing execution system. In this work, a suitable neural
network is designed which is trained using an appropriate learning
algorithm. The network so trained is used to predict the
manufacturing process parameters.
Abstract: Software Development Risks Identification (SDRI),
using Fault Tree Analysis (FTA), is a proposed technique to identify
not only the risk factors but also the causes of the appearance of the
risk factors in software development life cycle. The method is based
on analyzing the probable causes of software development failures
before they become problems and adversely affect a project. It uses
Fault tree analysis (FTA) to determine the probability of a particular
system level failures that are defined by A Taxonomy for Sources of
Software Development Risk to deduce failure analysis in which an
undesired state of a system by using Boolean logic to combine a
series of lower-level events. The major purpose of this paper is to use
the probabilistic calculations of Fault Tree Analysis approach to
determine all possible causes that lead to software development risk
occurrence
Abstract: MinC plays an important role in bacterial cell division
system by inhibiting FtsZ assembly. However, the molecular
mechanism of the action is poorly understood. E. coli MinC Nterminus
domain was purified and crystallized using 1.4 M sodium
citrate pH 6.5 as a precipitant. X-ray diffraction data was collected
and processed to 2.3 Å from a native crystal. The crystal belonged to
space group P212121, with the unit cell parameters a = 52.7, b = 54.0,
c = 64.7 Å. Assuming the presence of two molecules in the
asymmetric unit, the Matthews coefficient value is 1.94 Å3 Da-1,
which corresponds to a solvent content of 36.5%. The overall
structure of MinCN is observed as a dimer form through anti-parallel
ß-strand interaction.
Abstract: Reconfigurable optical add/drop multiplexers
(ROADMs) can be classified into three categories based on their
underlying switching technologies. Category I consists of a single
large optical switch; category II is composed of a number of small
optical switches aligned in parallel; and category III has a single
optical switch and only one wavelength being added/dropped. In this
paper, to evaluate the wavelength-routing capability of ROADMs of
category-II in dynamic optical networks,the dynamic traffic models
are designed based on Bernoulli, Poisson distributions for smooth
and regular types of traffic. Through Analytical and Simulation
results, the routing power of cat-II of ROADM networks for two
traffic models are determined.
Abstract: The bypass exhaust system of a 160 MW combined cycle has been modeled and analyzed using numerical simulation in 2D prospective. Analysis was carried out using the commercial numerical simulation software, FLUENT 6.2. All inputs were based on the technical data gathered from working conditions of a Siemens V94.2 gas turbine, installed in the Yazd power plant. This paper deals with reduction of pressure drop in bypass exhaust system using turning vanes mounted in diverter box in order to alleviate turbulent energy dissipation rate above diverter box. The geometry of such turning vanes has been optimized based on the flow pattern at diverter box inlet. The results show that the use of optimized turning vanes in diverter box can improve the flow pattern and eliminate vortices around sharp edges just before the silencer. Furthermore, this optimization could decrease the pressure drop in bypass exhaust system and leads to higher plant efficiency.
Abstract: The aim of the present study is to analyze the generation of osteoporotic vertebral bone induced by lack of calcium during growth period and analyze its effects for disc degeneration, based on biomechanical and histomorphometrical study. Mechanical and histomorphological characteristics of lumbar vertebral bones and discs of rats with calcium free diet (CFD) were detected and tracked by using high resolution in-vivo micro-computed tomography (in-vivo micro-CT), finite element (FE) and histological analysis. Twenty female Sprague-Dawley rats (6 weeks old, approximate weight 170g) were randomly divided into two groups (CFD group: 10, NOR group: 10). The CFD group was maintained on a refmed calcium-controlled semisynthetic diet without added calcium, to induce osteoporosis. All lumbar (L 1-L6) were scanned by using in vivo micro-CT with 35i.un resolution at 0, 4, 8 weeks to track the effects of CFD on the generation of osteoporosis. The fmdings of the present study indicated that calcium insufficiency was the main factor in the generation of osteoporosis and it induced lumbar vertebral disc degeneration. This study is a valuable experiment to firstly evaluate osteoporotic vertebral bone and disc degeneration induced by lack of calcium during growth period from a biomechanical and histomorphometrical point of view.
Abstract: In order to assess optical fiber reliability in different environmental and stress conditions series of testing are performed simulating overlapping of chemical and mechanical controlled varying factors. Each series of testing may be compared using statistical processing: i.e. Weibull plots. Due to the numerous data to treat, a software application has appeared useful to interpret selected series of experiments in function of envisaged factors. The current paper presents a software application used in the storage, modelling and interpretation of experimental data gathered from optical fibre testing. The present paper strictly deals with the software part of the project (regarding the modelling, storage and processing of user supplied data).
Abstract: Green Forestation Plan (GFP) was expected to promote the reforestation of plains totaling 60,000 has within the first 8 years. Annual subsidies were budgeted at $120,000 per ha, and $2.4 million for 20 years. In this research we have surveyed landlords- opinions toward the GFP in an attempt to understand landlords- incentives for participating in the GFP and their levels of concern and agreement toward the policy design. Based our analysis of landlords- opinions on the policy design, we expect to derive appropriate complementary measures, establish effective promotional schemes, and raise the policy effectiveness of the GFP. According to the results of this research, there was still a relatively high proportion of population who were not aware of GFP; more than 50% of landlords were neutral or willing to participate given high reforestation subsidies; approximately 30% of landlords were unwilling to participate. In terms of the designs of GFP, more than 50% of respondents were concerned and agreed with the policy design. In terms of the period of this policy, 52.7% of respondents indicated that it should be shortened to 15 years or lower. In terms of the amount of the subsidy, 41.7% of respondents showed that it should be raised to approximately $250,000/ha. In terms of land area restrictions, 88.0% of respondents believed that the minimum should be lowered to 0.4 ha. More than 70% of respondents owned less than 0.4 has of land, and since they do not own enough land to be eligible for the program, more than 80% of landlords wished to lower the minimum requirements of land area. In addition, 59.3% of respondents were reluctant to participate in reforestation because their lands were too small to be eligible; 15.0% of respondents were reluctant because the duration was too long. Responses to the question about “how the policy can be adjusted to provide incentives for landlords- participation" revealed that almost 40% of respondents desired higher subsidies. Some policy suggestions are provided as follows: (1) many landlords are still unaware of the GFP so the government should enhance the promotion of the policy; (2) many landlords are unwilling to participate in GFP mainly because they do not own enough lands to be eligible, hence the government should consider adjusting its requirements for minimum agricultural land area; (3) for subsequent promotions on GFP, the government may consider targeting on the landlords with high income and high level of education; (4) because the subsidy of this policy alone provides limited help to landlords, the government should help the landlords to explore other revenue possibilities from afforestation in addition to the existing subsidies and raise the participation incentives.
Abstract: Contamination of heavy metals in tin tailings has
caused an interest in the scientific approach of their remediation. One
of the approaches is through phytoremediation, which is using tree
species to extract the heavy metals from the contaminated soils. Tin
tailings comprise of slime and sand tailings. This paper reports only
on the finding of the four timber species namely Acacia mangium,
Hopea odorata, Intsia palembanica and Swietenia macrophylla on
the removal of cadmium (Cd) and lead (Pb) from the slime tailings.
The methods employed for sampling and soil analysis are established
methods. Six trees of each species were randomly selected from a
0.25 ha plot for extraction and determination of their heavy metals.
The soil samples were systematically collected according to 5 x 5 m
grid from each plot. Results showed that the concentration of heavy
metals in soils and trees varied according to species. Higher
concentration of heavy metals was found in the stem than the
primary roots of all the species. A. Mangium accumulated the highest
total amount of Pb per hectare basis.
Abstract: Nothing that an effective cure for infertility happens
when we can find a unique solution, a great deal of study has been
done in this field and this is a hot research subject for to days study.
So we could analyze the men-s seaman and find out about fertility
and infertility and from this find a true cure for this, since this will be
a non invasive and low risk procedure, it will be greatly welcomed.
In this research, the procedure has been based on few Algorithms
enhancement and segmentation of images which has been done on
the images taken from microscope in different fertility institution and
have obtained a suitable result from the computer images which in
turn help us to distinguish these sperms from fluids and its
surroundings.
Abstract: The research on the effectiveness of environmental
assessment (EA) is a milestone effort to evaluate the state of the field,
including many contributors related with a lot of countries since more
than two decades. In the 1960s, there was a surge of interest between
modern industrialized countries over unexpected opposite effects of
technical invention. The interest led to choice of approaches for
assessing and prediction the impressions of technology and
advancement for social and economic, state health and safety, solidity
and the circumstances. These are consisting of risk assessment,
technology assessment, environmental impact assessment and costbenefit
analysis. In this research contribution, the authors have
described the research status for environmental assessment in
cumulative environmental system. This article discusses the methods
for cumulative effect assessment (CEA).
Abstract: This paper presents the simulation results of electric field and potential distributions along surface of silicone rubber polymer insulators under clean and various contamination conditions with/without water droplets. Straight sheds insulator having leakage distance 290 mm was used in this study. Two type of contaminants, playwood dust and cement dust, have been studied the effect of contamination on the insulator surface. The objective of this work is to comparison the effect of contamination on potential and electric field distributions along the insulator surface when water droplets exist on the insulator surface. Finite element method (FEM) is adopted for this work. The simulation results show that contaminations have no effect on potential distribution along the insulator surface while electric field distributions are obviously depended on contamination conditions.
Abstract: Acid rain occurs when sulphur dioxide (SO2) and
nitrogen oxides (Nox) gases react in the atmosphere with water,
oxygen, and other chemicals to form various acidic compounds. The
result is a mild solution of sulfuric acid and nitric acid. Soil has a
greater buffering capacity than aquatic systems. However excessive
amount of acids introduced by acid rains may disturb the entire soil
chemistry. Acidity and harmful action of toxic elements damage
vegetation while susceptible microbial species are eliminated. In
present study, the effects of simulated sulphuric acid and nitric acid
rains were investigated on crop Glycine max. The effect of acid rain
on change in soil fertility was detected in which pH of control sample
was 6.5 and pH of 1%H2SO4 and 1%HNO3 were 3.5. Nitrogen nitrate
in soil was high in 1% HNO3 treated soil & Control sample.
Ammonium nitrogen in soil was low in 1% HNO3 & H2SO4 treated
soil. Ammonium nitrogen was medium in control and other samples.
The effect of acid rain on seed germination on 3rd day of germination
control sample growth was 7 cm, 0.1% HNO3 was 8cm, and 0.001%
HNO3 & 0.001% H2SO4 was 6cm each. On 10th day fungal growth
was observed in 1% and 0.1%H2SO4 concentrations, when all plants
were dead. The effect of acid rain on crop productivity was
investigated on 3rd day roots were developed in plants. On12th day
Glycine max showed more growth in 0.1% HNO3, 0.001% HNO3 and
0.001% H2SO4 treated plants growth were same as compare to control
plants. On 20th day development of discoloration of plant pigments
were observed on acid treated plants leaves. On 38th day, 0.1, 0.001%
HNO3 and 0.1, 0.001% H2SO4 treated plants and control plants were
showing flower growth. On 42th day, acid treated Glycine max variety
and control plants were showed seeds on plants. In Glycine max
variety 0.1, 0.001% H2SO4, 0.1, 0.001% HNO3 treated plants were
dead on 46th day and fungal growth was observed. The toxicological
study was carried out on Glycine max plants exposed to 1% HNO3
cells were damaged more than 1% H2SO4. Leaf sections exposed to
0.001% HNO3 & H2SO4 showed less damaged of cells and
pigmentation observed in entire slide when compare with control
plant. The soil analysis was done to find microorganisms in HNO3 &
H2SO4 treated Glycine max and control plants. No microorganism
growth was observed in 1% HNO3 & H2SO4 but control plant showed
microbial growth.
Abstract: The present study focuses on the discussion over the
parameter of Artificial Neural Network (ANN). Sensitivity analysis is
applied to assess the effect of the parameters of ANN on the prediction
of turbidity of raw water in the water treatment plant. The result shows
that transfer function of hidden layer is a critical parameter of ANN.
When the transfer function changes, the reliability of prediction of
water turbidity is greatly different. Moreover, the estimated water
turbidity is less sensitive to training times and learning velocity than
the number of neurons in the hidden layer. Therefore, it is important to
select an appropriate transfer function and suitable number of neurons
in the hidden layer in the process of parameter training and validation.
Abstract: Digital watermarking has become an important technique for copyright protection but its robustness against attacks remains a major problem. In this paper, we propose a normalizationbased robust image watermarking scheme. In the proposed scheme, original host image is first normalized to a standard form. Zernike transform is then applied to the normalized image to calculate Zernike moments. Dither modulation is adopted to quantize the magnitudes of Zernike moments according to the watermark bit stream. The watermark extracting method is a blind method. Security analysis and false alarm analysis are then performed. The quality degradation of watermarked image caused by the embedded watermark is visually transparent. Experimental results show that the proposed scheme has very high robustness against various image processing operations and geometric attacks.
Abstract: This research proposes an algorithm for the simulation
of time-periodic unsteady problems via the solution unsteady Euler
and Navier-Stokes equations. This algorithm which is called Time
Spectral method uses a Fourier representation in time and hence
solve for the periodic state directly without resolving transients
(which consume most of the resources in a time-accurate scheme).
Mathematical tools used here are discrete Fourier transformations. It
has shown tremendous potential for reducing the computational cost
compared to conventional time-accurate methods, by enforcing
periodicity and using Fourier representation in time, leading to
spectral accuracy. The accuracy and efficiency of this technique is
verified by Euler and Navier-Stokes calculations for pitching airfoils.
Because of flow turbulence nature, Baldwin-Lomax turbulence
model has been used at viscous flow analysis. The results presented
by the Time Spectral method are compared with experimental data. It
has shown tremendous potential for reducing the computational cost
compared to the conventional time-accurate methods, by enforcing
periodicity and using Fourier representation in time, leading to
spectral accuracy, because results verify the small number of time
intervals per pitching cycle required to capture the flow physics.
Abstract: While import-substituting industrialization policy
constitute the basis for the industrialization strategies of the 1960s
and 1970s in Turkey, this policy was no longer sustainable by the
1980s. For this reason, export-oriented industrialization policy was
adopted with the decisions taken on January 24, 1980. In other words,
the post-1980 period, Turkey's economy has adopted outwardoriented
industrialization strategy.
In this study, it is aimed to analyze the effect of the change in
economic structure on foreign trade with the transformation of
foreign trade and industrialization policies in the post-1980 period. In
this respect, in order to analyze the relationship between import,
export and economic growth by using variables of the 1960-2011
period, Chow test was applied. In the analysis the reason for using
Chow test is whether there is any difference in economic terms
between import-substituting industrialization policy applied in the
1960-1980 period and the 1981-2011 period during which exportoriented
industrialization policy was applied as a result of the
structural transformation.
Abstract: A solar refrigeration system based on the adsorptiondesorption
phenomena is designed and analyzed. An annular tubular
generator filled with silica gel adsorbent and with a perforated inner
cylinder is integrated within a flat solar collector. The working fluid
in the refrigeration cycle is water. The thermodynamic analysis and
because of the temperature level that could be attained with a flat
solar collector it is required that the system operates under vacuum
conditions. In order to enhance the performance of the system and to
get uniform temperature in the silica gel and higher desorbed mass,
an apparatus for rotation of the generator is incorporated in the
system. Testing is carried out and measurements are taken on the
designed installation. The effect of rotation is checked on the
temperature distribution and on the performance of this machine and
compared to the flat solar collector with fixed generator.
Abstract: In this paper, we propose a robust scheme to work face alignment and recognition under various influences. For face representation, illumination influence and variable expressions are the important factors, especially the accuracy of facial localization and face recognition. In order to solve those of factors, we propose a robust approach to overcome these problems. This approach consists of two phases. One phase is preprocessed for face images by means of the proposed illumination normalization method. The location of facial features can fit more efficient and fast based on the proposed image blending. On the other hand, based on template matching, we further improve the active shape models (called as IASM) to locate the face shape more precise which can gain the recognized rate in the next phase. The other phase is to process feature extraction by using principal component analysis and face recognition by using support vector machine classifiers. The results show that this proposed method can obtain good facial localization and face recognition with varied illumination and local distortion.