Application of HSA and GA in Optimal Placement of FACTS Devices Considering Voltage Stability and Losses

Voltage collapse is instability of heavily loaded electric power systems that cause to declining voltages and blackout. Power systems are predicated to become more heavily loaded in the future decade as the demand for electric power rises while economic and environmental concerns limit the construction of new transmission and generation capacity. Heavily loaded power systems are closer to their stability limits and voltage collapse blackouts will occur if suitable monitoring and control measures are not taken. To control transmission lines, it can be used from FACTS devices. In this paper Harmony search algorithm (HSA) and Genetic Algorithm (GA) have applied to determine optimal location of FACTS devices in a power system to improve power system stability. Three types of FACTS devices (TCPAT, UPFS, and SVC) have been introduced. Bus under voltage has been solved by controlling reactive power of shunt compensator. Also a combined series-shunt compensators has been also used to control transmission power flow and bus voltage simultaneously. Different scenarios have been considered. First TCPAT, UPFS, and SVC are placed solely in transmission lines and indices have been calculated. Then two types of above controller try to improve parameters randomly. The last scenario tries to make better voltage stability index and losses by implementation of three types controller simultaneously. These scenarios are executed on typical 34-bus test system and yields efficiency in improvement of voltage profile and reduction of power losses; it also may permit an increase in power transfer capacity, maximum loading, and voltage stability margin.

Wireless Healthcare Monitoring System for Home

A healthcare monitoring system is presented in this paper. This system is based on ultra-low power sensor nodes and a personal server, which is based on hardware and software extensions to a Personal Digital Assistant (PDA)/Smartphone. The sensor node collects data from the body of a patient and sends it to the personal server where the data is processed, displayed and made ready to be sent to a healthcare network, if necessary. The personal server consists of a compact low power receiver module and equipped with a Smartphone software. The receiver module takes less than 30 × 30 mm board size and consumes approximately 25 mA in active mode.

Event Monitoring Web Services for Heterogeneous Information Systems

Heterogeneity has to be taken into account when integrating a set of existing information sources into a distributed information system that are nowadays often based on Service- Oriented Architectures (SOA). This is also particularly applicable to distributed services such as event monitoring, which are useful in the context of Event Driven Architectures (EDA) and Complex Event Processing (CEP). Web services deal with this heterogeneity at a technical level, also providing little support for event processing. Our central thesis is that such a fully generic solution cannot provide complete support for event monitoring; instead, source specific semantics such as certain event types or support for certain event monitoring techniques have to be taken into account. Our core result is the design of a configurable event monitoring (Web) service that allows us to trade genericity for the exploitation of source specific characteristics. It thus delivers results for the areas of SOA, Web services, CEP and EDA.

Soil Moisture Content in Hill-Filed Side Slope

The soil moisture content is an important property of the soil. The results of mean weekly gravimetric soil moisture content, measured for the three soil layers within the A horizon, showed that it was higher for the top 5 cm over the whole period of monitoring (15/7/2004 up to 10/11/05) with the variation becoming greater during winter time. This reflects the pattern of rainfall in Ireland which is spread over the whole year and shows that light rainfall events during summer time were compensated by loss through evapotranspiration, but only in the top 5 cm of soil. This layer had the highest porosity and highest moisture holding capacity due to the high content of organic matter. The gravimetric soil moisture contents of the top 5 cm and the underlying 5-15 and 15-25 cm layers show that bottom site of the Hill Field had higher soil moisture content than the middle and top sites during the whole period of monitoring.

Pin type Clamping Attachment for Remote Setup of Machining Process

Sharing the manufacturing facility through remote operation and monitoring of a machining process is challenge for effective use the production facility. Several automation tools in term of hardware and software are necessary for successfully remote operation of a machine. This paper presents a prototype of workpiece holding attachment for remote operation of milling process by self configuration the workpiece setup. The prototype is designed with mechanism to reorient the work surface into machining spindle direction with high positioning accuracy. Variety of parts geometry is hold by attachment to perform single setup machining. Pin type with array pattern additionally clamps the workpiece surface from two opposite directions for increasing the machining rigidity. Optimum pins configuration for conforming the workpiece geometry with minimum deformation is determined through hybrid algorithms, Genetic Algorithms (GA) and Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO). Prototype with intelligent optimization technique enables to hold several variety of workpiece geometry which is suitable for machining low of repetitive production in remote operation.

Automatic Detection and Spatio-temporal Analysis of Commercial Accumulations Using Digital Yellow Page Data

In this study, the locations and areas of commercial accumulations were detected by using digital yellow page data. An original buffering method that can accurately create polygons of commercial accumulations is proposed in this paper.; by using this method, distribution of commercial accumulations can be easily created and monitored over a wide area. The locations, areas, and time-series changes of commercial accumulations in the South Kanto region can be monitored by integrating polygons of commercial accumulations with the time-series data of digital yellow page data. The circumstances of commercial accumulations were shown to vary according to areas, that is, highly- urbanized regions such as the city center of Tokyo and prefectural capitals, suburban areas near large cities, and suburban and rural areas.

Monitoring Patents Using the Statistical Process Control

The statistical process control (SPC) is one of the most powerful tools developed to assist ineffective control of quality, involves collecting, organizing and interpreting data during production. This article aims to show how the use of CEP industries can control and continuously improve product quality through monitoring of production that can detect deviations of parameters representing the process by reducing the amount of off-specification products and thus the costs of production. This study aimed to conduct a technological forecasting in order to characterize the research being done related to the CEP. The survey was conducted in the databases Spacenet, WIPO and the National Institute of Industrial Property (INPI). Among the largest are the United States depositors and deposits via PCT, the classification section that was presented in greater abundance to F.

Acoustic Detection of the Red Date Palm Weevil

In this paper, acoustic techniques are used to detect hidden insect infestations of date palm tress (Phoenix dactylifera L.). In particular, we use an acoustic instrument for early discovery of the presence of a destructive insect pest commonly known as the Red Date Palm Weevil (RDPW) and scientifically as Rhynchophorus ferrugineus (Olivier). This type of insect attacks date palm tress and causes irreversible damages at late stages. As a result, the infected trees must be destroyed. Therefore, early presence detection is a major part in controlling the spread and economic damage caused by this type of infestation. Furthermore monitoring and early detection of the disease can asses in taking appropriate measures such as isolating or treating the infected trees. The acoustic system is evaluated in terms of its ability for early discovery of hidden bests inside the tested tree. When signal acquisitions is completed for a number of date palms, a signal processing technique known as time-frequency analysis is evaluated in terms of providing an estimate that can be visually used to recognize the acoustic signature of the RDPW. The testing instrument was tested in the laboratory first then; it was used on suspected or infested tress in the field. The final results indicate that the acoustic monitoring approach along with signal processing techniques are very promising for the early detection of presence of the larva as well as the adult pest in the date palms.

Overview of CARDIOSENSOR Project on the Development of a Nanosensor for Assessing the Risk of Cardiovascular Disease

This paper aims at overviewing the topics of a research project (CARDIOSENSOR) on the field of health sciences (biomaterials and biomedical engineering). The project has focused on the development of a nanosensor for the assessment of the risk of cardiovascular diseases by the monitoring of C-reactive protein (CRP), which has been currently considered as the best validated inflammatory biomarker associated to cardiovascular diseases. The project involves tasks such as: 1) the development of sensor devices based on field effect transistors (FET): assembly, optimization and validation; 2) application of sensors to the detection of CRP in standard solutions and comparison with enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA); and 3) application of sensors to real samples such as blood and saliva and evaluation of their ability to predict the risk of cardiovascular disease.

Robotic End-Effector Impedance Control without Expensive Torque/Force Sensor

A novel low-cost impedance control structure is proposed for monitoring the contact force between end-effector and environment without installing an expensive force/torque sensor. Theoretically, the end-effector contact force can be estimated from the superposition of each joint control torque. There have a nonlinear matrix mapping function between each joint motor control input and end-effector actuating force/torques vector. This new force control structure can be implemented based on this estimated mapping matrix. First, the robot end-effector is manipulated to specified positions, then the force controller is actuated based on the hall sensor current feedback of each joint motor. The model-free fuzzy sliding mode control (FSMC) strategy is employed to design the position and force controllers, respectively. All the hardware circuits and software control programs are designed on an Altera Nios II embedded development kit to constitute an embedded system structure for a retrofitted Mitsubishi 5 DOF robot. Experimental results show that PI and FSMC force control algorithms can achieve reasonable contact force monitoring objective based on this hardware control structure.

Web Driving Performance Monitoring System

Safer driver behavior promoting is the main goal of this paper. It is a fact that drivers behavior is relatively safer when being monitored. Thus, in this paper, we propose a monitoring system to report specific driving event as well as the potentially aggressive events for estimation of the driving performance. Our driving monitoring system is composed of two parts. The first part is the in-vehicle embedded system which is composed of a GPS receiver, a two-axis accelerometer, radar sensor, OBD interface, and GPRS modem. The design considerations that led to this architecture is described in this paper. The second part is a web server where an adaptive hierarchical fuzzy system is proposed to classify the driving performance based on the data that is sent by the in-vehicle embedded system and the data that is provided by the geographical information system (GIS). Our system is robust, inexpensive and small enough to fit inside a vehicle without distracting the driver.

Motions of Multiple Objects Detection Based On Video Frames

This paper introduces an intelligent system, which can be applied in the monitoring of vehicle speed using a single camera. The ability of motion tracking is extremely useful in many automation problems and the solution to this problem will open up many future applications. One of the most common problems in our daily life is the speed detection of vehicles on a highway. In this paper, a novel technique is developed to track multiple moving objects with their speeds being estimated using a sequence of video frames. Field test has been conducted to capture real-life data and the processed results were presented. Multiple object problems and noisy in data are also considered. Implementing this system in real-time is straightforward. The proposal can accurately evaluate the position and the orientation of moving objects in real-time. The transformations and calibration between the 2D image and the actual road are also considered.

Amberlite XAD-4 Functionalized with 1-amino-2-naphthole for Determination and Preconcentration of Copper (II) in Aqueous Solution by Flame Atomic Absorption Spectrometry

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.

B-VIS Service-oriented Middleware for RFID Sensor Network

One of the most importance of intelligence in-car and roadside systems is the cooperative vehicle-infrastructure system. In Thailand, ITS technologies are rapidly growing and real-time vehicle information is considerably needed for ITS applications; for example, vehicle fleet tracking and control and road traffic monitoring systems. This paper defines the communication protocols and software design for middleware components of B-VIS (Burapha Vehicle-Infrastructure System). The proposed B-VIS middleware architecture serves the needs of a distributed RFID sensor network and simplifies some intricate details of several communication standards.

The Use of Real Measurements and GPS Data for Noise Mapping of Riyadh City

In this paper, the noise maps for the area encircled by the Second Ring Road in Riyadh city are developed based on real measured data. Sound level meters, GPS receivers to determine measurement position, a database program to manage the measured data, and a program to develop the maps are used. A baseline noise level has been established at each short-term site so subsequent monitoring may be conducted to describe changes in Riyadh-s noise environment. Short-term sites are used to show typical daytime and nighttime noise levels at specific locations by short duration grab sampling.

Participatory Patterns of Community in Water and Waste Management: A Case Study of Municipality in Amphawa District, Samut Songkram Province

This is a survey research using quantitative and qualitative methodology. There were three objectives: 1) To study participatory level of community in water and waste environment management. 2) To study the affecting factors for community participation in water and waste environment management in Ampawa District, Samut Songkram Province. 3) To search for the participatory patterns in water and waste management. The population sample for the quantitative research was 1,364 people living in Ampawa District. The methodology was simple random sampling. Research instrument was a questionnaire and the qualitative research used purposive sampling in 6 Sub Districts which are Ta Ka, Suanluang, Bangkae, Muangmai, Kwae-om, and Bangnanglee Sub District Administration Organization. Total population is 63. For data analysis, the study used content analysis from quantitative research to synthesize and build question frame from the content for interview and conducting focus group interview. The study found that the community participatory in the issue of level in water and waste management are moderate of planning, operation, and evaluation. The issue of being beneficial is at low level. Therefore, the overall participatory level of community in water and waste environment management is at a medium level. The factors affecting the participatory of community in water and waste management are age, the period dwelling in the community and membership in which the mean difference is statistic significant at 0.05 in area of operation, being beneficial, and evaluation. For patterns of community participation, there is the correlation with water and waste management in 4 concerns which are 1) Participation in planning 2) Participation in operation 3) Participation in being beneficial both directly and indirectly benefited 4) Participation in evaluation and monitoring. The recommendation from this study is the need to create conscious awareness in order to increase participation level of people by organizing activities that promote participation with volunteer spirit. Government should open opportunities for people to participate in sharing ideas and create the culture of living together with equality which would build more concrete participation.

LabVIEW with Fuzzy Logic Controller Simulation Panel for Condition Monitoring of Oil and Dry Type Transformer

Condition monitoring of electrical power equipment has attracted considerable attention for many years. The aim of this paper is to use Labview with Fuzzy Logic controller to build a simulation system to diagnose transformer faults and monitor its condition. The front panel of the system was designed using LabVIEW to enable computer to act as customer-designed instrument. The dissolved gas-in-oil analysis (DGA) method was used as technique for oil type transformer diagnosis; meanwhile terminal voltages and currents analysis method was used for dry type transformer. Fuzzy Logic was used as expert system that assesses all information keyed in at the front panel to diagnose and predict the condition of the transformer. The outcome of the Fuzzy Logic interpretation will be displayed at front panel of LabVIEW to show the user the conditions of the transformer at any time.

Investigating the Possible use of Session Initiation Protocol for Extending Mobility Service to the Biomedical Engineers

Today, the Internet based communication has widen the opportunity of event monitoring system in the medical field. There is always a need of analyzing and designing secure and reliable mobile communication between the hospital and biomedical engineers mobile units. This study has been carried out to find possible solution using SIP-based event notification for alerting the technical staff about the Biomedical Device (BMD) status and Patients treatment session. The Session Initiation Protocol (SIP) can be used to create a medical event notification system. SIP can work on a variety of devices. Its adoption as the protocol of choice for third generation wireless networks allows for a robust and scalable environment. One of the advantages of SIP is that it supports personal mobility through the separation of user addressing and device addressing. The solution for Telemed alert notification system is based on SIP - Specific Event Notification. The aim of this project is to extend mobility service to the hospital technicians who are using Telemedicine system.

Influence of the Entropic Parameter on the Flow Geometry and Morphology

The necessity of updating the numerical models inputs, because of geometrical and resistive variations in rivers subject to solid transport phenomena, requires detailed control and monitoring activities. The human employment and financial resources of these activities moves the research towards the development of expeditive methodologies, able to evaluate the outflows through the measurement of more easily acquirable sizes. Recent studies highlighted the dependence of the entropic parameter on the kinematical and geometrical flow conditions. They showed a meaningful variability according to the section shape, dimension and slope. Such dependences, even if not yet well defined, could reduce the difficulties during the field activities, and also the data elaboration time. On the basis of such evidences, the relationships between the entropic parameter and the geometrical and resistive sizes, obtained through a large and detailed laboratory experience on steady free surface flows in conditions of macro and intermediate homogeneous roughness, are analyzed and discussed.

MiSense Hierarchical Cluster-Based Routing Algorithm (MiCRA) for Wireless Sensor Networks

Wireless sensor networks (WSN) are currently receiving significant attention due to their unlimited potential. These networks are used for various applications, such as habitat monitoring, automation, agriculture, and security. The efficient nodeenergy utilization is one of important performance factors in wireless sensor networks because sensor nodes operate with limited battery power. In this paper, we proposed the MiSense hierarchical cluster based routing algorithm (MiCRA) to extend the lifetime of sensor networks and to maintain a balanced energy consumption of nodes. MiCRA is an extension of the HEED algorithm with two levels of cluster heads. The performance of the proposed protocol has been examined and evaluated through a simulation study. The simulation results clearly show that MiCRA has a better performance in terms of lifetime than HEED. Indeed, MiCRA our proposed protocol can effectively extend the network lifetime without other critical overheads and performance degradation. It has been noted that there is about 35% of energy saving for MiCRA during the clustering process and 65% energy savings during the routing process compared to the HEED algorithm.