Abstract: Emerging adulthood, between the ages of 18 and 25, as a new developmental stage extending from adolescence to young adulthood. According to Arnett [2004], there are experiments related to identity in three basic fields which are love, work and view of the world in emerging adulthood. When the literature related to identity is examined, it is seen that identity has been studied more with adolescent, and studies were concentrated on the relationship of identity with many demographic variables neglecting important variables such as marital status, parental status and SES. Thus, the main aim of this study is to determine whether identity statuses differenciate with marital status, parental status and SES. A total of 700 emerging adults participated in this study, and the mean age was 22,45 years [SD = 3.76]. The sample was made up of 347 female and 353 male. All participants in the study were students from colleges. Student responses to the Extended Version of the Objective Measure of Ego Identity Status [EOM-EIS-2] used to classify students into one of the four identity statuses. SPSS 15.00 program wasa used to analyse data. Percentage, frequency and X2 analysis were used in the analysis of data. When the findings of the study is viewed as a whole, the most frequently observed identity status in the group is found to be moratorium. Also, identity statuses differenciate with marital status, parental status and SES. Findings were discussed in the context of emerging adulthood.
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: The free and forced in-plane vibrations of axially
moving plates are investigated in this work. The plate possesses an
internal damping of which the constitutive relation obeys the
Kelvin-Voigt model, and the excitations are arbitrarily distributed on
two opposite edges. First, the equations of motion and the boundary
conditions of the axially moving plate are derived. Then, the extended
Ritz method is used to obtain discretized system equations. Finally,
numerical results for the natural frequencies and the mode shapes of
the in-plane vibration and the in-plane response of the moving plate
subjected to arbitrary edge excitations are presented. It is observed that
the symmetry class of the mode shapes of the in-plane vibration
disperses gradually as the moving speed gets higher, and the u- and
v-components of the mode shapes belong to different symmetry class.
In addition, large response amplitudes having shapes similar to the
mode shapes of the plate can be excited by the edge excitations at the
resonant frequencies and with the same symmetry class of distribution
as the u-components.
Abstract: Throughout the world, the Islamic way of banking and
financing is increasing. The same trend is also visible in Pakistan, where the Islamic banking sector is increasing in size and volume
each year. The question immediately arises as why the Pakistanis patronize the Islamic banking system? This study was carried out to
find whether following the Islamic rules in finance is the main factor for such selection or whether other factors such as customer service,
location, banking hour, physical facilities of the bank etc also have
importance. The study was carried by distributing questionnaire and
200 responses were collected from the clients of Islamic banks. The result showed that the service quality and other factors are as
important as following the Islamic rules for finance to retain old ustomers and catch new customers. The result is important and
Islamic banks can take actions accordingly to look after both the factors
Abstract: This work proposes an accurate crosstalk noise estimation method in the presence of multiple RLC lines for the use in design automation tools. This method correctly models the loading effects of non switching aggressors and aggressor tree branches using resistive shielding effect and realistic exponential input waveforms. Noise peak and width expressions have been derived. The results obtained are at good agreement with SPICE results. Results show that average error for noise peak is 4.7% and for the width is 6.15% while allowing a very fast analysis.
Abstract: This paper presents the identification of the impact
force acting on a simply supported beam. The force identification is
an inverse problem in which the measured response of the structure is
used to determine the applied force. The identification problem is
formulated as an optimization problem and the genetic algorithm is
utilized to solve the optimization problem. The objective function is
calculated on the difference between analytical and measured
responses and the decision variables are the location and magnitude
of the applied force. The results from simulation show the
effectiveness of the approach and its robustness vs. the measurement
noise and sensor location.
Abstract: Semiconductor detector arrays are widely used in
high-temperature plasma diagnostics. They have a fast response,
which allows observation of many processes and instabilities in
tokamaks. In this paper, there are reviewed several diagnostics based
on semiconductor arrays as cameras, AXUV photodiodes (referred
often as fast “bolometers") and detectors of both soft X-rays and
visible light installed on the COMPASS tokamak recently. Fresh
results from both spring and summer campaigns in 2012 are
introduced. Examples of the utilization of the detectors are shown on
the plasma shape determination, fast calculation of the radiation
center, two-dimensional plasma radiation tomography in different
spectral ranges, observation of impurity inflow, and also on
investigation of MHD activity in the COMPASS tokamak discharges.
Abstract: Today global warming, climate change and energy supply are of greater concern as it is widely realized that the planet earth does not provide an infinite capacity for absorbing human industrialization in the 21st century. The aim of this paper is to analyze upstream and downstream electricity production in selected case studies: a coal power plant, a pump system and a microwave oven covering and consumption to explore the position of energy efficiency in engineering sustainability. Collectively, the analysis presents energy efficiency as a major pathway towards sustainability that requires an inclusive and a holistic supply chain response in the engineering design process.
Abstract: In this paper we study a food chain model with three trophic levels and Michaelis-Menten type ratio-dependent functional response. Distinctive feature of this model is the sensitive dependence of the dynamical behavior on the initial populations and parameters of the real world. The stability of the equilibrium points are also investigated.
Abstract: Number of breakdowns experienced by a machinery is a highly under-dispersed count random variable and its value can be attributed to the factors related to the mechanical input and output of that machinery. Analyzing such under-dispersed count observations as a function of the explanatory factors has been a challenging problem. In this paper, we aim at estimating the effects of various factors on the number of breakdowns experienced by a passenger car based on a study performed in Mauritius over a year. We remark that the number of passenger car breakdowns is highly under-dispersed. These data are therefore modelled and analyzed using Com-Poisson regression model. We use quasi-likelihood estimation approach to estimate the parameters of the model. Under-dispersion parameter is estimated to be 2.14 justifying the appropriateness of Com-Poisson distribution in modelling under-dispersed count responses recorded in this study.
Abstract: The aims of this paper are to study the efficacy of
chitosan nanoparticles in stimulating specific antibody against
A/H1N1 influenza antigen in mice. Chitosan nanoparticles (CSN)
were characterized by TEM. The results showed that the average size
of CSN was from 80nm to 106nm. The efficacy of A/H1N1 influenza
vaccine loaded on the surface of CSN showed that loading efficiency
of A/H1N1 influenza antigen on CSN was from 93.75 to 100%. Safe
property of the vaccine were tested. In 10 days post vaccination,
group of CSN 30 kDa and 300 kDa loaded A/H1N1 influenza antigen
were the rate of immune response on mice to be 100% (9/9) higher
than Al(OH)3 and other adjuvant. 100% mice in the experiment of all
groups had immune response in 20 days post vaccination. The results
also showed that HI titer of the group using CSN 300 kDa as an
adjuvant increased significantly up to 3971 HIU, over three-fold
higher than the Al(OH)3 adjuvant, chitosan (CS), and one hundredfold
than the A/H1N1 antigen only. Stability of the vaccine
formulation was investigated.
Abstract: Phase locked loops (PLL) and delay locked loops (DLL) play an important role in establishing coherent references (phase of carrier and symbol timing) in digital communication systems. Fully digital receiver including digital carrier synchronizer and symbol timing synchronizer fulfils the conditions for universal multi-mode communication receiver with option of symbol rate setting over several digit places and long-term stability of requirement parameters. Afterwards it is necessary to realize PLL and DLL in synchronizer in digital form and to approach to these subsystems as a discrete representation of analog template. Analysis of discrete phase locked loop (DPLL) or discrete delay locked loop (DDLL) and technique to determine their characteristics based on analog (continuous-time) template is performed in this posed paper. There are derived transmission response and error function for 1st order discrete locked loop and resulting equations and graphical representations for 2nd order one. It is shown that the spectrum translation due to sampling takes effect at frequency characteristics computing for specific values of loop parameters.
Abstract: In this paper a new method for increasing the speed of
SAGCM-APD is proposed. Utilizing carrier rate equations in
different regions of the structure, a circuit model for the structure is
obtained. In this research, in addition to frequency response, the
effect of added new charge layer on some transient parameters like
slew-rate, rising and falling times have been considered. Finally, by
trading-off among some physical parameters such as different layers
widths and droppings, a noticeable decrease in breakdown voltage
has been achieved. The results of simulation, illustrate some features
of proposed structure improvement in comparison with conventional
SAGCM-APD structures.
Abstract: Utilities use operating reserve for frequency regulation.To ensure that the operating frequency and system security are well maintained, the operating grid codes always specify that the reserve quantity and response rate should meet some prescribed levels. This paper proposes a methodology to evaluate system's contingency reserve for an isolated power network. With the presented algorithm to estimate system's frequency response characteristic, an online allocation of contingency reserve would be feasible to meet the grid codes for contingency operation. Test results from the simulated conditions, and from the actual operating data verify the merits of the proposed methodology to system's frequency control, and security.
Abstract: The world's population continues to grow at a quarter of a million people per day, increasing the consumption of energy. This has made the world to face the problem of energy crisis now days. In response to the energy crisis, the principles of renewable energy gained popularity. There are much advancement made in developing the wind and solar energy farms across the world. These energy farms are not enough to meet the energy requirement of world. This has attracted investors to procure new sources of energy to be substituted. Among these sources, extraction of energy from the waves is considered as best option. The world oceans contain enough energy to meet the requirement of world. Significant advancements in design and technology are being made to make waves as a continuous source of energy. One major hurdle in launching wave energy devices in a developing country like Pakistan is the initial cost. A simple, reliable and cost effective wave energy converter (WEC) is required to meet the nation-s energy need. This paper will present a novel design proposed by team SAS for harnessing wave energy. This paper has three major sections. The first section will give a brief and concise view of ocean wave creation, propagation and the energy carried by them. The second section will explain the designing of SAS-2. A gear chain mechanism is used for transferring the energy from the buoy to a rotary generator. The third section will explain the manufacturing of scaled down model for SAS-2 .Many modifications are made in the trouble shooting stage. The design of SAS-2 is simple and very less maintenance is required. SAS-2 is producing electricity at Clifton. The initial cost of SAS-2 is very low. This has proved SAS- 2 as one of the cost effective and reliable source of harnessing wave energy for developing countries.
Abstract: The advent of multi-million gate Field Programmable
Gate Arrays (FPGAs) with hardware support for multiplication opens
an opportunity to recreate a significant portion of the front end of a
human cochlea using this technology. In this paper we describe the
implementation of the cochlear filter and show that it is entirely
suited to a single device XC3S500 FPGA implementation .The filter
gave a good fit to real time data with efficiency of hardware usage.
Abstract: NFκB activation plays a crucial role in anti-apoptotic responses in response to the apoptotic signaling during tumor necrosis factor (TNFa) stimulation in Multiple Myeloma (MM). Although several drugs have been found effective for the treatment of MM by mainly inhibiting NFκB pathway, there are no any quantitative or qualitative results of comparison assessment on inhibition effect between different single drugs or drug combinations. Computational modeling is becoming increasingly indispensable for applied biological research mainly because it can provide strong quantitative predicting power. In this study, a novel computational pathway modeling approach is employed to comparably assess the inhibition effects of specific single drugs and drug combinations on the NFκB pathway in MM, especially the prediction of synergistic drug combinations.
Abstract: Seismic qualification testing for equipments to be
mounted on upper storeys of buildings is very demanding in terms of
floor spectra. The latter is characterized by high accelerations
amplitudes within a narrow frequency band. This article presents a
method which permits to cover specified required response spectra
beyond the shaking table capability by amplifying the acceleration
amplitudes at an appropriate frequency range using a physical
intermediate mounted on the platform of the shaker.
Abstract: A 10bit, 40 MSps, sample and hold, implemented in 0.18-μm CMOS technology with 3.3V supply, is presented for application in the front-end stage of an analog-to-digital converter. Topology selection, biasing, compensation and common mode feedback are discussed. Cascode technique has been used to increase the dc gain. The proposed opamp provides 149MHz unity-gain bandwidth (wu), 80 degree phase margin and a differential peak to peak output swing more than 2.5v. The circuit has 55db Total Harmonic Distortion (THD), using the improved fully differential two stage operational amplifier of 91.7dB gain. The power dissipation of the designed sample and hold is 4.7mw. The designed system demonstrates relatively suitable response in different process, temperature and supply corners (PVT corners).
Abstract: This paper describes a CMOS four-quadrant
multiplier intended for use in the front-end receiver by utilizing the
square-law characteristic of the MOS transistor in the saturation
region. The circuit is based on 0.35 um CMOS technology simulated
using HSPICE software. The mixer has a third-order inter the power
consumption is 271uW from a single 1.2V power supply. One of the
features of the proposed design is using two MOS transistors
limitation to reduce the supply voltage, which leads to reduce the
power consumption. This technique provides a GHz bandwidth
response and low power consumption.