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This research investigated the hydrogen production and energy conversion from automobile shredder residues (ASRs) and paper mill sludge (PMS) co-gasified in a full-scale fluidized bed gasification plant. The results obtained from full-scale tests provided important information on the feasible assessment of ASRs-to-energy and the selection of alternative technologies for ASRs. Based on the analysis results of produced gas composition, H 2 , CO, and CH 4 composition produced from paper-mill sludge gasified were 4.17%–6.01%, 3.08%–4.32%, 1.71%–2.4%, respectively. Another C 2 gas composition ranged from 2.9% to 3.59%. The heating value of produced gas ranged between 1.64 MJ/Nm3 and 2.18 MJ/Nm3. In the case of 10% ASR addition, the heating value of produced gas was slightly increased to 1.84 MJ/Nm3-2.34 MJ/Nm3. The dioxin emission concentration of flue gas was approximately 0.064 ng I-TEQ/Nm3. It can comply with Taiwan regulation thresholds. The dioxin leaching concentrations of residues derived from gasification were also in compliance with regulation limits by the TCLP test. Meanwhile, in the case of 10% ASRs addition, the dioxin equivalence concentration of gasified residue was nearly 0.002 ng I-TEQ/Nm3. It was far below the current regulation standard limit. In summary, the results of this research have proved the performance of ASRs-to-energy by co-gasified with paper mill sludge using a full-scale gasification plant. The results obtained from this research also provided the information for selecting ASRs alternative technologies and operating full-scale gasifiers in the future. [Display omitted] • This study has confirmed the feasibility of co-gasification of calcium-rich PMS and chlorine-rich ASRs. • Adding 5%–15% of ASRs can maintain the regular operation of the full-scale commercial gasifier. • The synthesis gas has a composition of 4.91 vol% H 2 and 2.06 vol% CO, with a LHV of 1.93 MJ/Nm3. • The HCl emission could comply with regulation thresholds in co-gasification. • Dioxin reformation reduced significantly in co-gasification of PMS and ASRs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Hygroscopicity affects the chemical and physical stabilities of paper-based historical relics. In this research, the moisture sorption behavior of naturally aged bamboo paper dating from the Qing Dynasty to the Republic of China, and artificially aged and untreated modern bamboo paper was investigated using dynamic vapor sorption analysis (DVS). The results were fitted by sorption models to analyze the regularities of changes in the moisture absorption of aged bamboo paper. Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) and scanning electron microscopy (SEM) were used to characterize the chemical and physical structures of aged bamboo paper. It was found that untreated and aged bamboo paper showed similar moisture sorption isotherms at 25 °C, indicating that aging did not alter the sorption mechanism of paper. Guggenheim Anderson de Boer (GAB) and Hailwood Horrobin (H–H) models provided good fits to the experimental data and meaningful physical parameters regarding the effective sorption surface area (S GAB), monolayer water content (W 0), and multilayer water content (W s), showing that the S GAB , W 0 , and W s of naturally and artificially aged bamboo paper were decreased. Results of FTIR demonstrated that the levels of hydrophilic groups decreased, causing a reduction in the effective adsorption sites of naturally and artificially aged bamboo paper, which was the principal reason for a decrease in their hygroscopicity. The fiber structure damage of naturally and artificially aged bamboo paper was observed through microscopic morphology, which has different influences on the capillary adsorption of paper depending on the extent of degradation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: This work analyzed the energy flow of the pulp and paper industry in Taiwan. The potential technology options that were examined focus on how to capture some of the energy currently lost in the processes and then identifying the areas with energy-saving potential that could also have large impacts across a variety of industries. In addition, the energy-saving potential of these options was evaluated. The energy-saving potential of the pulp and paper industry would be around 6939.9 KLOE/M. The greatest energy-saving potential lies with improving energy distribution and equipment efficiency, which would together potentially comprise 86.8% of total energy conservation. This analysis can serve as a benchmark for current pulp and paper making operations, and as a base case for stimulating changes toward more efficient energy utilization in the pulp and paper industry. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

• Significant ionospheric disturbances during the 2021 Typhoon Chanthu were observed by GPS and GLONASS. • The ionospheric disturbances following the Typhoon are accompanied and propagated with the "N"-type wave. • The propagation velocity and center frequency of ionospheric disturbances are within the range of gravity waves. Severe typhoons often result in substantial economic and human losses. Therefore, near-real-time monitoring and forecasting of severe typhoons have a significant importance. In this paper, characteristics of ionospheric disturbances during the 2021 Typhoon Chanthu are estimated and investigated from GPS and GLONASS measurements. We calculate high-precision de-trended and filtered ionospheric vertical total electron content (VTEC) data based on GPS and GLONASS data from intensive Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) observations at 30-second intervals in Taiwan. Based on the VTEC values, we analyze the characteristics of ionospheric disturbances caused by Typhoon Chanthu, such as the time of appearance of ionospheric disturbances, changes in the magnitude of these disturbances, alterations in two-dimensional disturbances, fluctuations in the speed of disturbance propagation, and shifts in the frequency spectrum. The results reveal that both GPS-TEC and GLONASS-TEC exhibit noticeable disturbances during the specified timeframe. These disturbances are accompanied by the occurrence of "N"-type anomalies in TEC. Notably, at the occurrence of the disturbance, the elevation angle of GPS PRN32 and GLONASS PRN1 satellites is approximately 50°-55°, and their respective distances from the typhoon eye are roughly 350 km and 150 km. The propagation velocity and center frequency of the ionospheric disturbances are located in the range of gravity waves. Specifically, the disturbances propagation speeds of GPS PRN32 and GLONASS PRN1 are approximately 129.36 m/s and 128.33 m/s, respectively, while the center frequencies are about 1.17 mHz and 1.43 mHz. The ionospheric perturbations observed by GPS and GLONASS exhibit certain similarities, which provide valuable insights into the relationship between typhoons and ionospheric disturbances. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Gender pay gaps are present in a wide range of industries, with the medical profession being no exception. The aim of this systematic review was to analyse the peer-reviewed literature to identify whether there is a gender pay gap in orthopaedics. A systematic review was conducted by searching the following databases: MEDLINE, Health & Medical Collection, Nursing & Allied Health Database, Publicly Available Content Database, Consumer Health Database and Healthcare Administration Database. Original research papers pertaining to the earnings of male and female orthopaedic surgeons were included for review. Of 745 papers acquired through the database search, 12 were eligible for inclusion. These were published in the USA, Canada and Taiwan. 6 looked at the relationship between sex and annual income, 4 studied industry payments, one analysed hourly earnings and one compared payments per case between males and females. Men were found to earn significantly higher annual incomes than women, even when confounding factors such as rank, practice setting and subspeciality were accounted for. Men also receive significantly higher payments from industry, and earn more per hour than women. This systematic review has demonstrated that there is a gender pay gap in orthopaedics, with women commonly earning significantly less than their male colleagues. The reasons for this, however, remain unclear, and deserve further investigation. It is incumbent upon orthopaedic departments, healthcare providers and orthopaedic associations to raise awareness and ensure that men and women are paid the same for equal work. • There is a gender pay gap in orthopaedics • Women commonly earn significantly less than their male colleagues • Women more commonly pursue less lucrative subspecialties but the reason is unclear • Fee codes should be reviewed to ensure men and women are paid equally • Orthopaedic associations should consider raising awareness of the gender pay gap [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Current reliable strategies for information security are all chosen using incomplete information. With standards, problems resulting from incomplete information can be reduced, since with standards, we can decrease the choices and simplify the process for reliable supply and demand decision making. This paper is to study the certification of information security management systems based on specifications promulgated by the Bureau of Standards, Metrology and Inspection (BSMI), Ministry of Economic Affairs in accordance with international standards and their related organizations. And we suggest a certification requirement concept for five different levels of “Information and Communication Security Protection System” in our country, the Republic of China, Taiwan. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: To compare immunologic phenotypes between (1) hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) patients and a healthy population and (2) more advanced and early stage HCC patients, we studied 45 HCC patients and 46 healthy controls from January 2006 to January 2008. Using fluorescent activated cell sorter (FACS) analysis, HCC patients were demonstrated to exhibit stronger phagocytosis of granulocytes and monocytes and more peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) in the G2/M phase compared with healthy volunteers. By contrast, lower percentages of B and Th lymphocytes were also found in the peripheral blood of HCC patients than in the healthy population. Most importantly, a higher percentage of B cells was found in patients with advanced HCC than in those with early HCC in terms of TNM stage (II and III vs I, p = 0.004), the Japanese Integrated Scoring system (2–3 vs 0–1, p = 0.0235), and tumor numbers (≥2 vs 1, p = 0.005). In conclusion, our findings suggested that HCC patients might exhibit enhanced innate immunity and reduced adaptive immunity compared with healthy volunteers. A higher percentage of B cells was found in patients with more advanced HCC compared with patients with early stage HCC, which might serve as an indicator of the severity of HCC. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

This paper investigates the impact of tertiary education expansion on fertility outcomes of women past the usual college-entry age. We show that the tertiary education expansion in Taiwan led to a decrease in fertility for these mature women both with and without tertiary education, suggesting that the effect did not operate through education alone. Our findings also highlight two empirical concerns with previous studies: (i) the mis-classification of women past college-entry age as "unexposed" to the expansion in the difference-in-differences studies, and (ii) the potential violation of exclusion restriction when using the expansion as an instrument for female education in the instrumental variable studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Firms achieve their competitive advantage quickly through the concept framework of open innovation by integrating external inspiration with internal endowment when facing hyper-competition in the digital era. This paper deploys open innovation into building platform blocks by modular operators. These eight modular operators are splitting, augmenting, deleting, substituting, inversing, porting, configuring, and integrating. By means of case studies of two Taiwan Internet vendors, the results depict the manipulation strategies between eight modular operators to fit seven functional requirements for weaving social media, which are presence, identity, sharing, reputation, groups, conversations, and relationship. Finally, this paper advances propositions about the deployment of modularization strategies to develop a competitive platform. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The development of large scale ocean current power generally encounters difficulties associated with water depth, seafloor engineering, storms and current meanders. The Cross-stream Active Mooring (CSAM) is a recently proposed new concept to overcome these issues. It features serial mooring of multiple turbines on a common tether as a linear array, single point anchoring and applying hydro sails to position the linear array across current streams over deep seafloor or seabed not suitable for anchoring construction. The CSAM can change the linear array's horizontal position to track meandering velocity core to increase system power capacity and adjust its depth to avoid storms. This paper proposes and studies a new concentrated anchoring concept of high capacity based on slope enhancement and assembled anchors to resolve issues of anchoring on rocky undersea ridges in many areas along the Kuroshio. Two new gravity anchor designs making use of seafloor landforms are devised and analyzed. Efficiency of assembled anchor blocks is analyzed and tested using models. Anchoring sites, anchor implementation and large scale deployment with an example 1 GW power plant in the Kuroshio southeast of Taiwan are discussed. A preliminary cost analysis of the anchors and of the CSAM-based example power plant is also presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• IoT sensors and Signal Detection Theory improve flood modeling accuracy. • IoT flood sensors uniquely identify zero flooding situations. • Optimal spatial scale varies across regions for accurate flood classification. • 450 m is the optimal spatial scale for reliably validating the flood simulation. • Ensemble-based flood verification enhances validation robustness. Inundation mapping by flood simulation is subject to uncertainties which spatial accuracy assessment could not be processed as normal mapping does. This paper presents a comprehensive study on the spatial accuracy of flood verification using Internet of Things (IoT) sensors in several flood-prone regions in Taiwan, including Changhua, Yunlin, Chiayi, Tainan, Kaohsiung, and Pingtung, during three storm events in 2021. The study adopts Signal Detection Theory (SDT) and proposes an ensemble-based approach that combines multiple evaluation metrics to enhance the accuracy and reliability of flood verification in these regions. The study examines the inundation availabilities between flood observation from IoT sensors and flood simulation. A range of spatial scales varies from 100 m to 1000 m and also administrative divisions are considered including neighborhood-level and village-level scales. The results show that increasing the spatial scale generally leads to higher True Positives, indicating improved flood detection, but it also results in increased False Positives, indicating more misclassification of non-flooded points. The findings reveal that the optimal spatial scale for all cities/counties is 450 m which indicates the averaged spatial accuracy of the flood simulation. However, there is notable variation in the optimal spatial scale across different regions. The ensemble approach demonstrates high consistency in determining the optimal spatial scale, as eight out of ten metrics consistently identify the same value. Additionally, the study compares flood verification across administrative divisions in Taiwan, finding that the village-level spatial scale performs best in Changhua and Yunlin counties, while the neighborhood-level scale is preferred in Tainan, Kaohsiung, and Pingtung. This research provides a valuable framework to estimate inundation mapping accuracy under flood verification using IoT sensors in the specified region of Taiwan and highlights the importance of considering local conditions and administrative divisions in determining the optimal spatial scale. These findings can contribute to the improvement of flood detection and monitoring systems in the area with IoT flood sensors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One of the least studied eyes of any beetle taxon are those of the scarabaeoid family Passalidae. Some members of this family of around 600 species worldwide are known to have superposition eyes (Aceraius grandis; A. hikidai) while others have apposition eyes (Cylindrocaulus patalis ; Ceracupes yui). In C. yui of nearly 3 cm body length (this paper) the retinal layer is very thin and occupies approximately half of an ommatidium's total length, the latter amounting to 284 and 266 μm in the respective dorsal and ventral eye regions. The two eye regions are almost completely separated by a prominent cuticular canthus, a feature usually associated with the presence of a tracheal tapetum, a clear-zone between dioptric and light-perceiving structures and a regular array of smooth facets. In C. yui the facets are smooth (but not very regular) and a tracheal tapetum and a clear-zone are absent. The rhabdoms, formed by 8–9 retinula cells, are complicated, multilobed structures with widths and lengths of around 15 and 80 μm, respectively. The combination of some superposition and mostly apposition eye features, e.g., extensive corneal exocones, relatively small number of ommatidia, absence of a clear-zone and tracheal bush, suggest an adaptation of this species' eye to the fossorial lifestyle of C. yui , and, thus, a manifestation of the passalid eye's plasticity. • First detailed ultrastructural study of the eye of a passalid from Taiwan. • Description of a scarabaeoid beetle eye in which apposition features dominate. • Eye adaptations to accommodate the species' fossorial lifestyle. • Compromise between adaptations to protect the eye against physical damage and to retain some sensitivity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An approach involving data on wave-induced sediment transport estimates is essential for managing coastal environments. Numerical models are powerful tools to understand and investigate many processes responsible for longshore sediment transport (LST) in a systematic way, since direct measurement of LST is a difficult task. This paper presents estimates of longshore sediment transport through numerical modeling of wave-induced sediment dispersion patterns in the Formosa Bay, State of Rio de Janeiro - Southeast Brazil. The analysis was conducted using the computational package Coastal Modeling System/SMC-Brazil and mathematical formulations proposed by Cerc (1984). The results suggest average residual solid discharge (Qsr avg) in the order of 131,442.745 m3/yr in northern sector, −151,908.32 m3/yr in central sector, and 71,987.69 m3/yr in southern sector of investigated area. In addition, it is important to highlight that minor variations in the wave incidence angle may cause changes in the longshore sediment drift, promoting the convergence and divergence zones throughout the investigated area. The results presented contribute to the advancement of knowledge on the topic addressed here and will be useful in future engineering projects related to beach nourishment and the management of coastal areas subject to erosion processes. • Data are presented on simulations of wave-induced longshore sediment transport rates in Baia Formosa Bay, southeastern Brazil. • The Coastal Modeling System SMC/Brazil were used. • Results suggest different solid outflow rates for each sector of investigated area. • The model may provide a basis for planning actions and environmental management in coastal zones. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• All three discussed recycling types are profitable under current policy measures. • Chicken manure is more cost-effective for composting. • Pig manure is more cost-effective for energy recycling. • Without FITs, biogas power generation of livestock manure is not profitable. • RDF of rice straw is the most cost-effective. Agricultural waste can be recycled in different ways. Cost-effectiveness is important information for investment decision-making of enterprises and policy-making of government to choose a profitable way to recycle agricultural waste. Therefore, this paper aims to present a cost-benefit analysis to assess and compare the cost-effectiveness between feasible recycling methods, and further propose cost-effective ways for recycling agricultural waste in Taiwan. Three recycling types of agricultural wastes, namely, composting, biogas power generation and biomass fuel are selected for cost-benefit analysis based on related regulations and policy supports of agricultural waste management in Taiwan. Primary data collected by sampling surveys conducted in 2018 supplemented by secondary data from national statistics are used for this study. Study results show that all three recycling types of agricultural wastes discussed in this study are profitable under corresponding economic conditions in 2018 with benefit/cost ratio greater than 1 and positive net present value; as expected, the cost-effectiveness of agricultural waste recycling varies depending on the recycling types, composition of input materials, and economic scales. Mixing chicken manure with other agricultural wastes for composting and using rice straw to make biomass fuel rods are estimated to have higher cost-effectiveness; livestock farms with small farming scale have relatively low biogas energy recovery efficiency; the cost-effectiveness of biogas power generation highly depends on fixed-in tariffs (FITs). Results imply that policy support for establishing co-processing centers of agricultural waste and differentiated FITs would be good measures to stimulate recycling efficiency of agricultural waste in Taiwan. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: To evaluate the impact of a tailored Symptom Allergy Indication Direction Self-care (SAIDS) counseling by pharmacists on consumers' correct understanding of over-the-counter (OTC) medication use.Methods: This study used a time-based sampling of two independent cohorts at a single community pharmacy in Taiwan for two years beginning in December 2018. In the control cohort, participants received conventional counseling for the OTCs they selected. In the intervention cohort, participants received SAIDS counseling along with pointing out OTC package label instructions. A paper-and-pencil survey was administered face-to-face to evaluate participants' understanding for the correct use of OTCs. Descriptive statistics and chi-square tests were used to evaluate the effect of the SAIDS approach on cohorts' understanding of OTC use.Results: Compared with conventional OTC counseling, participants reported better understanding regarding potential side effects of OTCs that they acquired (p < 0.001) and were more aware of strategies to cope with the associated side effects (p < 0.001).Conclusions and Practice Implications: Despite the time constraints that pharmacists often can offer to each customer, the SAIDS counseling approach may refine the structure and effectiveness of pharmacists' OTC counseling skills and thereby improve consumers' understanding of their ailments and self-care medications in Taiwan. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With more than 4 billion websites on the World Wide Web, it has become essential for companies, especially those who operate worldwide, to make their websites as appealing as possible for their customer base. This paper intended to provide some insight for companies who want to offer their products online to German and Taiwanese customers. A total of 703 valid responses from participants of both countries were collected in this study. The experimental result revealed significant effect of color and price on the customers' responses. The results also indicated that not only does color have a significant main effect on arousal, but that warm and cool colors influence Taiwanese and German participants to different degrees. Additionally, price resulted in a significantly high level of Perceived Usefulness and Pleasure. This paper can provide great insight to companies who wish to sell their products in one or both of these markets, which admittedly differ greatly from each other, by appropriate interface design of web pages. • Online consumers show different responses toward different website interface design. • Consumers from different country show difference preferences of website background color. • Websites offering lower priced product are preferred by online consumers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a holistic picture of the factors that affect green port policies through the use of both quantitative and qualitative approaches. Quantitatively, fuzzy analytic hierarchy process (FAHP) method with 25 questionnaires was used to identify key factors. Questionnaire participants included 13 ocean carriers and 12 governmental officials, all of whom were senior port experts with a minimum of 10 years working experience. Qualitatively, in-depth interviews based on grounded theory with ocean carriers (5) and governmental officials (4) in three ports were conducted in Taiwan. The quantitative FAHP analysis found the key factors to be environmental policy and regulation, followed by economic leverage, human and technical leverage. The qualitative interviews contextualise and enhance these FAHP results by illustrating the complexities and subtleties of these key factors for different stakeholders. Theoretical and practical implications are considered and suggestions are made for future policy approaches and to help develop green port approaches. • This paper investigates factors affecting green port policies • Quantitative fuzzy Analytic Hierarchy Process is used • Qualitative in-depth interviews approaches are also used • This combined approach reveals subtleties and complexities for policy makers • Environmental regulation and economic leverage are the top two key factors [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• Bike repositioning problem with service requirements for rental and return requests was studied. • A mathematical model with the goal of minimizing the travel and unsatisfied costs was developed. • An efficient two-phase heuristic approach based on linear programming was proposed. • The proposed approach performs better than CPLEX optimizer and a genetic algorithm-based method. • The effects of various system parameters on the system were also investigated. An approach to overcome the bike imbalance problem is to transfer excess bikes to branches with bike shortages. This study develops a constrained mathematical model to deal with a multi-vehicle bike-repositioning problem, and aims to minimize the sum of transportation and unmet demand costs over a planning horizon through bike-transfer strategies under a minimum service requirement. A two-phase heuristic based on linear programming was proposed to solve the problem and produce compromising solutions. In the first phase, the paper developed a linear programming model to quickly develop decisions related to bike inventory, unloading, and loading for all stations for each time slot. In the second phase, this paper proposed an iterative approach through two parameter sensitive mathematical models to sequentially reduce the problem scale to develop decisions related to bike transfers. Computational results show that the proposed approach is superior to a CPLEX optimizer and a hybrid heuristic based on a genetic algorithm. The proposed approach was used to analyze the bicycle system in Taiwan. The impacts of various system parameters on the system were also investigated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Green energy has become a global development trend, with solar power generation being a critical aspect of this movement. However, the development of solar power generation requires significant land resources, which poses a challenge in Taiwan due to its small area and dense population. Nevertheless, Taiwan possesses ample land resources in the aquaculture industry, with approximately 40,000 ha of aquaculture area. Hence, a new aquaculture model called aquavoltaics can be developed by integrating the aquaculture industry with solar power generation. This paper employs the Cost-Benefit Analysis and Monte-Carlo Method to evaluate the economic feasibility and analyze the risk of whiteleg shrimp culture under six different aquavoltaic configurations. The results demonstrate that all six types of aquavoltaics for whiteleg shrimp culture are economically viable. Furthermore, among the ground-type aquavoltaic systems, the embankment type exhibits the highest profitability and the lowest investment risk. As for facility-type aquavoltaics, the greenhouse type represents the most favorable investment scheme. • Aquavoitaics farming white shrimp has potential for development in Taiwan. • Aquavoitaics facilitates the transformation and upgrading of the aquaculture industry while promoting diversified land development and increasing income sources for farmers. • The initial investment threshold of aquavoltaics is high, the successful transformation could be achieved through government or enterprise investment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research studies the characteristics of ocean current meanders from the viewpoint of power generation engineering and the potential of maximizing ocean current power generation capacity by making generator turbines to track the meanders applying a recently proposed Cross-stream Active Mooring concept. The current meanders will hurt capacity factor of marine turbines moored at fixed locations, somewhat like the issue of wind availability for wind farms. The new mooring concept features a hydro sail system that can deploy generator turbines transversely across streams in a marine current. The hydro sail system can further adjust the horizontal position of the turbines, by changing sail angle of attack, to actively track fast streams in an ocean current. This paper first reviews and discusses the characteristics of short-term track variations of the Florida Current and the Kuroshio near Taiwan and then analyzes potential improvement in power generation using measured and simulated current velocity data in the two ocean currents, suggesting a potential increase of 10–40 % power generation achievable by tracking the meanders. Operations of the hydro sail were demonstrated by tests using remote controllable and passive scale models. Control methods are discussed. Approaches to observe, predict and track the meanders are conceptualized. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research studies the characteristics of ocean current meanders from the viewpoint of power generation engineering and the potential of maximizing ocean current power generation capacity by making generator turbines to track the meanders applying a recently proposed Cross-stream Active Mooring concept. The current meanders will hurt capacity factor of marine turbines moored at fixed locations, somewhat like the issue of wind availability for wind farms. The new mooring concept features a hydro sail system that can deploy generator turbines transversely across streams in a marine current. The hydro sail system can further adjust the horizontal position of the turbines, by changing sail angle of attack, to actively track fast streams in an ocean current. This paper first reviews and discusses the characteristics of short-term track variations of the Florida Current and the Kuroshio near Taiwan and then analyzes potential improvement in power generation using measured and simulated current velocity data in the two ocean currents, suggesting a potential increase of 10–40 % power generation achievable by tracking the meanders. Operations of the hydro sail were demonstrated by tests using remote controllable and passive scale models. Control methods are discussed. Approaches to observe, predict and track the meanders are conceptualized. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Structural integrity analysis for reactor pressure vessel (RPV) nozzles has been a vital issue due to the irradiation embrittlement and especially the discontinuity of geometry in RPV nozzles, which may cause a higher stress concentration and influence the structural integrity of RPV nozzles. For the linear elastic fracture mechanics (LEFM) analysis of the RPV nozzle, a postulated crack with a specific crack depth is presumed to evaluate the stress intensity factors (SIFs) whose crack depth does not grow during LEFM analysis. Thus, this paper would discuss the crack propagation for the postulated crack with a specific crack depth under the different reference temperature of nil-ductility transition (R T N D T ), and the SIFs on the specific crack depth are also calculated. In recent research, the extended finite element method (XFEM) was developed, which is based on the enrichment solution space to simplify the computational fracture mechanics with the crack propagation of various discontinuities, and can be used to evaluate the crack propagation of RPV nozzle with a specific crack depth under R T N D T of −23.89, −10.89, 0.89, 2.69, and 2.89 °C. To investigate the crack propagation and structural integrity of RPV nozzles, the finite element analysis of Taiwan domestic boiling water reactor (BWR) nozzles containing the postulated circular corner crack with depths of one-fourth and one-tenth thickness along the 45° path from the tip of the nozzle corner is engaged. The present result shows that the crack was growing when the R T N D T was 0.89 °C and. In addition, the XFEM calculation of the SIFs for the specific crack depth is similar to the LEFM results. • The RPV nozzles with postulated cracks were established to investigate crack propagation through XFEM. • The differences in RT NDT were used to evaluate the fracture toughness and discuss the crack propagation for RPV nozzles. • The stress intensity factors (SIFs) obtained by XFEM, LEFM, and the ASME BPVC were compared. • The XFEM analysis would overestimate SIFs more than the ASME BPVC and the LEFM. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Since 2020, although Taiwan has expelled dredgers and sand-transporting vessels from areas under its control, it has failed to stop sand loss. Marine researchers have noted that such issues problematise the ontology that underlies work on territory and ocean governance, wherein the ocean is regarded as a flat space that can be zoned and territorialised. Attention has thus shifted from considering the ocean as a flat terrestrial legal boundary to regarding it as a dynamic, volumetric entity, constantly shaped by the distinct qualities of the ocean and human endeavours. While such thought-provoking work offers crucial insight into our understanding of territory, its emphasis on the distinct qualities of water unconsciously reinforces the distinction between the land and the sea. Informed by recent materials-related social studies, this paper proposes the notion of the marine environment as a solid-fluid territory that foregrounds the importance of planetary dynamic geological processes. I argue that in this sense, territory is always involved in the governance of solid-fluid transitions in different voluminous contexts. The solid-fluid territory, I suggest, is characterised by three elements: solid-fluid transitions, resources, and volumetric practices. With reference to the controversy over sand mining in the Taiwan Strait, this paper reveals that while various geotechnologies are deployed to manage solid-fluid materials, state security practices often complicate our understanding of these shifting, dynamic geological processes and challenge human boundary-making. Therefore, geopolitics must acknowledge the nuances resulting from such solid-fluid movements and transitions, as well as their impacts on territorial issues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• A new and elegant CPT method for soil liquefaction evaluation is presented with its probabilistic extension. • The model uncertainties of various CPT methods are calibrated based on case histories in Taiwan. • The consideration and applications of model uncertainties of CPT methods for liquefaction assessments are provided. This paper aims to calibrate model uncertainties of the current Cone Penetration Test (CPT) methods for assessing soil liquefaction potential and introduce a new and concise one called the hyperbolic function (HBF) method based on the unique Chi-Chi earthquake database in Taiwan. The development and features of the HBF method were introduced at first. The performance and model uncertainty of each CPT method is then evaluated with a database of historical and Chi-Chi earthquake cases using the indices of the predicted success rate and bias-factor models, respectively. The success rate evaluations show that the HBF is one of the most accurate methods. The calibrated bias-factor models can indicate the conservatism of each CPT method applied to the Taiwan sites. Afterward, the liquefaction hazard curves associated with these CPT methods for Taiwan sites are derived based on the case histories of liquefaction and non-liquefaction in Taiwan. A real case study to illustrate the applications of these calibrated models evaluating liquefaction hazards to an offshore wind farm near Taiwan western coast is also demonstrated in this paper. These above results bring not only recommendations on CPT liquefaction assessment methods incorporated into the Technical Specifications for Site Investigation and Design of offshore wind farms in Taiwan, but procedures to calibrate regional biased models for other offshore wind farms in the world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Bridge structures deteriorate due to various factors, and their maintenance can be made more efficient by utilizing relevant information. This paper describes an algorithm called Self-Organizing Map-based Cluster Merging (SOMCM) using a multi-dimensional matrix composite neural network, and a surface image identification system. The algorithm is designed to investigate the relevance between the main components of bridges and their types of deterioration. 6140 records on bridge maintenance were collected for all bridges in the Taoyuan region of Taiwan in 2021. The SOMCM algorithm involves finding the winner neuron through merging processes. 61 clusters were merged into 8 clusters after a predetermined number of iterations. Clustering analysis of the final 8 clusters revealed 9 major bridge maintenance association rules. Follow-up studies can apply the algorithm to integrate more technologies including GIS coordinates, material availability, real-time traffic conditions, and weather information to be of benefit to engineering practitioners. • The study is to develop a new algorithm, SOM-based Cluster Merging (SOMCM). • The paper is to investigate the relevance for bridge main components and their deterioration types. • The initial result involves 61 clusters being merged to 8 clusters with the predetermined iterations. • The clustering analysis for the final 8 clusters shows 9 major bridge maintenance association rules. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This is a discussion on the paper titled “Assessing feed-in tariffs on wind power installation and industry development in Taiwan” published by Hsu et al. In the discussed paper, there were several missing variables in the historical test of the system dynamics (SD) model, and thus the test was not integrated and valid. Additionally, the simulated results of the missing variables were used as important indexes to observe the behavior of the SD model. Therefore, it was highly likely that the solution and related policy analysis based on the simulated results were incorrect. Accordingly, the present study illustrated the structure characteristics of the SD model with respect to the fore-mentioned problems, discussed the reason for missing variables and proposed a method to assess whether or not the historical test was integrated. Finally, after a careful analysis, this study offered suggestions to perfect the historical test proposed in the discussed paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Taiwan would not develop reusable suborbital launch vehicle (RSLV) for commercial suborbital space tourism (SST) and intercontinental point-to-point (IP2P) transportation industry. As such, although there are many issues need be considered, spaceport becomes one of the major indices for demonstrating Taiwan's infrastructures and readiness to go from aviation tourism to SST and IP2P due to its long leading time requirement (2–3 decades usually). Currently, there are 17 civic (single use) and civic and military (dual use) airports, of which 4 are civic and one is basically civic. In this paper, these 5 airports were studied and discussed on their potential to be extended to either single use spaceport or dual use air and spaceport from the aspects of area, busyness, required extension (minor or major), redesign and reconstruction requirements, and environmental reassessment requirements. For the 5 airports included in the considerations, the 4 airports Taoyuan, Kaohsiung, Songshan and Kinmen all need minor extensions for accommodating horizontal-takeoff-horizontal-landing (HTHL) RSLV. Only the Taoyuan and Kinmen airports are suitable for major extensions to also accommodate vertical-takeoff-vertical-landing (VTVL) RSLV after major extensions. The Hengchun Airport needs environmental reassessment, redesign and reconstruction due to its very local katabatic winds weather condition. However, it is also the only one suitable for extending to become a dedicated spaceport with HTHL and VTVL RSLVs accommodated. For comparison purpose, a new spaceport dedicated to SST and IP2P with the name to be determined (TBD) is proposed as an option. For the case of considering dedicated uses for SST and IP2P, then only Hengchun and TBD are the two remaining spaceport candidates. • Upgrading of the 5 airports to become potential suborbital space tourism (SST) spaceports was studied. • Four airports could become dual use as air and spaceports after minor extension for HTHL RSLV. • All of them need major extension for operating commercial SST using VTVL RSLV. • Hengchun Airport is the only airport in Taiwan which has the potential to become dedicated spaceport. • Comparison made with a new proposed SST spaceport. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With rapid industrial developments, air pollution has become a hot issue globally. Accurate prediction of PM2.5 (a category of particulate pollutant with a diameter of less than 2. 5 μ m) has been a critical topic, as it can provide valuable information for government decision-making and policy control in environmental management affairs. In this paper, we propose a deep learning model based on graph neural networks (GNNs) to predict the next 48hr PM2.5 concentration in Taiwan. In this model, monitoring stations are regarded as nodes and edges are the distances between monitoring stations. Hence, the distribution of the stations can be perceived as a graph. GNNs are promising in processing non-grid structure data that can be represented as a graph. By incorporating the GNN and gated recurrent units (GRUs), this model can effectively capture the long-term spatial–temporal features in air quality time-series data. In addition, we also investigated the problem of predicting PM2.5 concentrations in the areas without monitoring stations or at sites far away from the stations. This problem has not captured researchers' attention whose methods are based on GNN. The problem is, however, quite challenging as these areas do not have historical air quality data, leading to low prediction quality. Finally, we performed experiments to verify the effectiveness of the proposed model based on actual data sources obtained in Taiwan. The results show that the proposed model exhibits satisfactory prediction performance compared to existing models. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Precipitable water vapor (PWV) and zenith total delay (ZTD) are highly correlated indicators used for forecasting rainfall effectively. These two factors are widely used when establishing qualitative and quantitative rainfall forecast models. Another indicator, however, convective available potential energy (CAPE), is also highly correlated with the occurrence of rainfall, but has not been combined with PWV or ZTD in previous studies. Therefore, a novel rainfall forecast model based on support vector regression that combines CAPE and Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS)-derived PWV is proposed in this paper. Moreover, annual, seasonal scales, and hourly autocorrelation for predictors were also considered, and wavelet coherence (WTC) was introduced to further reveal the correlation relationships between CAPE, PWV and rainfall in both time and frequency domains. Hourly PWV, CAPE, temperature (T) and rainfall over a time span of three years were collected from four stations in Singapore and Taiwan to evaluate the performance of the proposed model. The root mean square error (RMSE) and mean absolute error (MAE) between the measured and forecasted rainfall were calculated for each year and averaged. Subsequently, the average RMSE and MAE were determined for the annual seasonal rainfall. The annual average RMSE value was 0.71 mm and the average annual seasonal RMSE value was 0.69 mm. The annual average MAE value was 0.21 mm and the annual seasonal was 0.22 mm. The average correlation coefficient (R2) for the annual value was 0.94 and the annual seasonal R2 value was 0.93. These results indicate that the forecast accuracy at the seasonal scale is basically consistent with annual scale. Additionally, a measure called comparable RMSE (CRMS) was introduced to evaluate the forecasting accuracy across all grades of rainfall. This analysis showed that the accuracy of moderate rainfall (MR) and heavy rainfall (HR) forecasts is similar, but slight rainfall (SR) forecasts are the most accurate among seasons and schemes. • A short-term rainfall forecast method is proposed using convective available potential energy (CAPE) and GNSS-derived PWV. • The forecast accuracy of seasonal scales is consistent with annual scale. • Results showed that the forecast accuracy of moderate rainfall and heavy rainfall were comparable while that of slight rainfall was highest. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Short-term electric load forecasting is essential for the operation of power systems and the power market, including economic dispatch, unit commitment, peak load shaving, load management and bidding strategy development. This paper presents a novel method that uses a hybrid convolutional neural network (CNN) that is cascaded with a fully-connected network, to conduct 24h-ahead electric load forecasting in power systems. Spearman's rank-order correlation, which serves as input size information for the CNN, was used to measure the cross-correlation between two sets of observations (chronological loads) of time shifts or lags. Both max and average pooling operations were utilized to extract data features in concatenation while spatial and conventional dropouts were employed to avoid overfitting in the hybrid CNN. The proposed method used two loops to yield the optimal CNN. The outer loop optimizes the structure and hyperparameters (such as kernel size) of the hybrid CNN by a proposed method of enhanced elite-based particle swarm optimization (EEPSO) while the inner loop optimizes the parameters (such as values of a kernel) and weights in neural networks using the Adam optimizer. The EEPSO is based on the mean search and chaotic descending inertia weight. The proposed method was used to study the 2018 and 2019 hourly load data in Taiwan Power Company. Simulation results show that the proposed method outperforms the well-known ARIMA, Radial Basis Function Network, Support Vector Regression, Long Short-term Memory and their hybrid variants. • Structure and hyperparameters of the CNN are optimized by enhanced elite-based PSO. • Both spatial and traditional dropouts are used to avoid overfitting in the CNN model. • Both max and average pooling operations are used to extract data features. • Hourly load data in Taiwan Power Company in 2018 and 2019 are studied. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A discernible correlation emerged between global bridge disasters and bridge deterioration in recent years. To assist bridge inspectors in conducting deterioration identification, this paper presents a Pilgrimage Walk Optimization (PWO) algorithm inspired by Taiwan's unique Matsu bobee custom. The search behavior of the PWO algorithm simulates the gathering of devotees following Matsu's palanquin and their collective movements based on folk belief activities, including divination block casting, pilgrimage, the leisure ceremony, crawling beneath the palanquin, palanquin robbing, and the return palanquin ceremony. Analysis results show that the PWO outperformed contemporary metaheuristic algorithms on various multidimensional benchmark functions and was effectively applied to image segmentation for multiple types of bridge deterioration collected by an unmanned aerial vehicle. In the increasing number of engineering problems requiring edge computing to process big data, the proposed PWO algorithm is a low-cost and robust method with fault tolerance. • Presenting the innovative Pilgrimage Walk Optimization (PWO) algorithm, a revolutionary metaheuristic approach. • The new algorithm is tested on benchmark functions and applied to optimize image segmentation. • PWO algorithm outperforms contemporary metaheuristic algorithms in terms of achieving optimal solutions. • Exploring diverse bridge deterioration patterns auto-segmented using metaheuristic clustering algorithms. • PWO algorithm holds potential applications in AIoT technology and automation within the construction industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, pre-trained transformer encoders have achieved successful milestones in natural language understanding (NLU). However, they still suffer from the representations with insufficient semantics, the sequences with finite lengths, and the need for a considerable number of parameters. These issues lead to difficulties not only in practical deployment under limited computational resources but also in downstream applications. To address such issues, this paper presents ELICE, a method of embedding language through an informative contrastive-encoder. Through the strategies of unordered composition and dropout-based contrastive learning, ELICE can enhance long documents embedding under the desirable model size and producing generic textual representations by condensing multiple unstructured features, such as titles, metadata, and segments of content. Furthermore, the contrastive learning by the NT-Xent objective is experimentally proven to ameliorate the document-level embedding space for a more isotropic one. ELICE was evaluated on four tasks of the CLUE benchmark (Mandarin NLU tasks). With the basic version, the ELICE-base has 12 million parameters and achieves 99% of the performance of the BERT-base (108 million) on average. Furthermore, on the IMDb sentiment classification (English NLU task), ELICE-base (13 million) achieves 95% of the accuracy of XLNet (110 million). Additionally, we deployed ELICE in a practical system for real-time ad-hoc document retrieval regarding legal compliance in the financial industry, and the fine-tuned ELICE outperformed the pre-trained baseline and the whitening representations. These results demonstrate the effectiveness, the robustness, and the flexibility of ELICE in the field of language understanding. • Achieve desirable model size by unordered composition and contrastive learning. • Adopt normalized temperature-scaled cross-entropy loss in pre-training/fine-tuning. • Redistribute non-smooth anisotropic embedding space about generic textual semantics. • Realize the application of legal compliance in Taiwan's finance industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Prior studies primarily suggest that the generation of medical wastes maintains a positive relationship with national incomes. In contrast, higher incomes may lead to improved health status, consequently resulting in lower generation of medical wastes. Under this circumstance, an inverted U-shaped curve may be used to describe the generation of medical wastes along with economic growth. Additionally, illegal disposal is believed to have a high impact on human health. Thus, the purpose of this paper is to examine the presence of the environmental Kuznets curve for both the generation and illegal disposal of medical wastes by using a model of the environmental Kuznets curve. The results find the generation of medical wastes is positively affected by incomes, but this paper identifies the existence of the environmental Kuznets curve phenomenon for illegal disposal. Both the generation and illegal disposal of medical wastes are positively affected by medical capacity but negatively affected by medical policy. The primary contributions of this paper are three-fold. First, this paper is the first to focus on the existence of the environmental Kuznets curve phenomenon for both the generation and the illegal disposal of medical wastes. Second, this paper confirms the existence of the environmental Kuznets curve for the illegal disposal of medical wastes. Illegal disposal may be blocked when national incomes reach a specific level, and thus, the government may focus on the formulation of medical policy to encourage reduced demand for medical care. Third, this paper finds that the implementation of medical policy may have an important effect on inhibiting the generation and illegal disposal of medical wastes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes an approach to analyze the economic feasibility of offshore wind energy under influences of government financial subsidies, dynamic weather conditions (including typhoon), taxation, expectation of investor, optimal maintenance schedule, generated electricity under real weather conditions, and benefits from reduction of CO 2 emission. Economic criteria are calculated and used to assess efficiency of the government financial subsidies. This paper further proposes more appropriate subsidies for the government in term of satisfying both of investor’s expectation and the government’s target. In the case of Taiwan, government has been currently adopting Feed-in-tariff (FIT) subsidy and offering subsidy on capital cost to promote the development of offshore wind system. However, the currently applied subsidy on capital cost is not attractive enough for the investors and the current FIT subsidy is applied equally for all regions of Taiwan regardless the distinct conditions of each region. This paper proposes a more appropriate subsidy for capital cost, and suggests establishing regional FIT subsidy to subsidize differently for different regions. The results indicate that the proposed subsidy for capital cost and the proposed regional FIT subsidy are more appropriate to promote the expansion of offshore wind system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper systematically reviews the conditions of energy supply and demand in Taiwan and further investigates the energy issues it has been confronted with as well as its objective of energy policy adjustment. In view of the trend of supply-side reform in mainland China energy sector under the New Normal economy and the background of the “Belt and Road” initiative, the paper points out the significance and development prospects of cross-strait energy cooperation. Main contributions of this paper are: by forecasting the future trend of power demand growth in Taiwan, the power shortage in the future of Taiwan is analyzed. On this basis, the paper analyzes the existing contradictions between Taiwan's energy transition policy and its current problem of power shortage, and the feasibility as well as the significance of electricity transmission to Taiwan for the first time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• We present a dynamic additive model to measure and decompose revenue inefficiency. • Our model is used to measure revenue inefficiency in Taiwan's incineration plants. • The main source of electricity revenue inefficiency is technical waste. • Ownership impacts all inefficiency results for Taiwan's incineration plants. • The POO plants have the lower efficiency, inferior of other operating plants. Due to insufficient land and energy resources, municipal solid waste incineration plants are used in many countries as a means of addressing the growing volumes of generated municipal solid waste and to recover energy resources. Taiwan's government allows the private sector to offer municipal solid waste treatment services and electricity to the public. Revenue from the sale of electricity is an important source of income for municipal solid waste incineration plants. Although several studies have examined the technical efficiency of municipal solid waste incineration plants, previous studies have not measured or deconstructed the dynamic electricity revenue inefficiency of incineration plants. For our purposes, this paper presents a data envelopment analysis model that measures and deconstructs the electricity revenue inefficiency while taking into account the slacks and dynamic factors in measuring technical inefficiency levels within the context of assessing MSW incineration plants in Taiwan. This study applied the proposed model to analyze the electricity revenue inefficiency of the municipal solid waste incineration plants in Taiwan over the period of 2013–2018. In this study, we found that the main source of electricity revenue inefficiency is the technical waste from electricity production. Our empirical analysis reveals that the electricity technical, revenue and allocative efficiencies of public plants are lower than those of private plants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: While a link between parental depression and adolescent school victimization is frequently hypothesized, studies on this association have shown mixed results. In addition, adolescent depression has been considered a potential psychosocial mechanism underlying the link between parental depression and adolescent school victimization. However, studies to support this proposition are lacking. This paper examines the direct effect of parental depression on adolescent victimization by peers and teachers in school as well as indirect effect through adolescent depression in an Asian context (Taiwan) and further examines differences in the interrelationships of parental depression, adolescent depression, and school victimization by peers and teachers across gender and school age groups.Methods: Data were obtained from a random sample of 2,419 students (grades 7-12) and their parents in one of the largest metropolitan areas in Taiwan.Results: Parental depression did not have a significant direct association with either type of school victimization. However, parental depression showed a significant indirect association with both types of school victimization through adolescent depression. These findings applied to both males and females and both junior and senior high school students.Limitation: The study utilized cross-sectional data, and the findings cannot be used to build causal relationships.Conclusion: Our findings provide empirical support that parental depression has indirect associations with school victimization by peers and teachers through adolescent depression. The results support the importance of including family-based approaches for depression targeting parents and adolescents in future victim intervention/prevention school programs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Obtaining the most economic benefits while using the least resources and causing the least environmental damage is an urgent and key problem in achieving sustainable development. The concept of eco-efficiency provides a comprehensive perspective for observing and solving this problem. This paper proposes an extended data envelopment analysis model, named the WIN-US-SBM, as a comprehensive eco-efficiency evaluation method that can accommodate undesirable outputs, all the identification problems of decision-making units (DMUs), possible slacks of variables, and the problems of an insufficient number of available DMUs and intertemporal comparability. China's Western Taiwan Straits Economic Zone (WTS Economic Zone) is an important regional economic growth center. By applying WIN-US-SBM and ArcGIS software, we investigated data on the temporal and spatial evolution characteristics of eco-efficiency in the WTS Economic Zone for the years 2009–2016. Later, the global Malmquist–Luenberger index was used to decompose the sources of growth in eco-efficiency. Finally, the main driving factors of eco-efficiency were explored through a Tobit regression analysis. The empirical results show that: (1) The overall eco-efficiency of the WTS Economic Zone had greatly improved, increasing by 11.46% annually, and the cumulative growth rate of eco-efficiency was 110.84% from 2009 to 2016. (2) The eastern area had the highest average eco-efficiency, followed by the western area and the middle area in that order. Also, the growth rate of the middle area ranked first (16.68%), whereas the eastern area had the slowest growth in eco-efficiency (7.22%). (3) On the whole, the growth of eco-efficiency was driven mainly by technological progress and was restricted by the decrease in management level, which implies that policy makers should focus on improving management and technical levels. (4) High levels of economic development, population density, market openness, and industrial structure had positive effects on the eco-efficiency of the WTS Economic Zone, whereas energy intensity and expenditure on science and technology had negative impacts. • An extended DEA model is proposed to measure eco-efficiency more comprehensively. • The proposed model can be widely applied to input-output efficiency evaluations. • The eco-efficiency of the WTS Economic Zone was evaluated based on a novel model. • The growth of eco-efficiency was driven mainly by technological progress. • The eco-efficiency level is negatively related to energy intensity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

• The system shows Energy Efficiency Ratios up to 4.6. • An independent control of temperature and humidity is achieved. • The higher the total loads the better the performance of the HLDS. • 30% electrical energy savings are attained when compared to traditional systems. • Efficient alternative for HVAC systems in high latent load applications. Hybrid Liquid Desiccant systems (HLDS) combine the liquid desiccant technology for dehumidification of air with conventional compression cycle technology for cooling. They are an alternative to conventional compression cooling systems, being more efficient and offering the possibility of independently control temperature and humidity. In this paper the design and operation of a HLDS is presented, for the air conditioning of a high latent load application with high ambient humidity levels. An analysis of the daily evolution of the performance of the system under different environmental conditions has been included. The innovative demonstration unit placed in Taiwan, in continuous operation since November 2015, achieved Energy efficiency Ratios (EER) up to 4.6. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, a shapelet-based behavioral pattern extraction method (Behavior2Shapelets) is proposed to address the behavior-sparsity issue in credit risk classification. In the proposed method, three steps are involved. First, by introducing the shapelets module, the proposed model can learn the behavioral patterns from the sparse behavioral features. Then, these extracted patterns are combined with a logistic regression model to construct an interpretable classifier. Finally, to enhance the robustness of the model, a dynamic strategy for threshold determination is used, which is based on the Kolmogorov-Smirnov statistic. The performance of the Behavior2Shapelets model is validated by using the Taiwan credit dataset and its seven derivative datasets. The empirical results demonstrate that the Behavior2Shapelets model outperforms the baseline methods in terms of classification accuracy and robustness. This highlights the feasibility of the proposed model as a solution to the behavior-sparsity problem in credit risk classification. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is well known that coseismic landslides are likely to occur under stronger shaking at shorter epicentral distance under the effects of topography and amplification of shaking together with such local geology as rock and soil types. However, this paper addresses a different issue that is the role of faults played in the triggering of landslides, both coseismic and non-seismic, and the long-term slope instability that lasts for decades or centuries after devastating earthquakes. Experiences during and after gigantic landslides are important to understand what happens in and around faults. Noteworthy is that there are cases in which slope instability starts after earthquakes and lasts for some time along surface manifestation of faults, whether or not they are the causative fault. Another important issue is the recovery of stability in shallow parts of slopes. Experiences in Japan, Taiwan and China suggest that a few decades is needed for this re-stabilization. Discussion is further made of geologically generated ground water pressure that is another causative mechanism of landslides. Thus, further field study is encouraged to promote slope hazard assessment. • Long-term slope instability after major earthquakes was studied by introducing examples in the past. • Compound effects of earthquake and rainfall on slope instability are presented. • Continuous slope instability along major tectonic lines is discussed. • Landslides triggered by abnormal ground water pressure are touched upon. • The concepts of process zone and geopressure should be investigated in more details. • The studied cases suggest the importance of more geological/geomorphological studies for understanding the landslide hazards in tectonically active regions of the world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigates the long-term morphological pattern of the Hsinchu coast in northwestern Taiwan using three different methods: long-term isobath and shoreline change analysis, bathymetric volume change analysis, and the empirical orthogonal function (EOF) method. Our objectives include analyzing and understanding the effects of anthropogenic structures, natural processes, and their combined impacts on coastal morphological change. The shoreline analysis and bathymetric volume analysis briefly reveal that the morphological pattern of Hsinchu coast. Then, EOF analysis is applied to identify the dominant impact factors affecting the coastal morphology near the harbor, determine the weights of the impact factors, and infer the impact range of anthropogenic structures. Moreover, the EOF analysis is divided into two-time segments—namely, the periods 2005–2010 and 2017–2021—based on different bathymetric surveys and the corresponding values of impact factors. The primary and secondary EOF modes are strongly linked to the "interaction between wave and structure" and "interaction between river discharges and structure", respectively. The spatial components of the EOF modes demonstrate that the impact range influenced by river discharges was mainly located in the northern part of the harbor, while the minimum impact range of the structures on coastal morphological interaction changes under natural factors was 3.5 km south of Hsinchu Fishing Harbor. • The morphological patterns of the Hsinchu coast over a span of two decades were characterized in this paper. • The findings of the EOF analysis were utilized to identify the impact factors and determine the corresponding weights. • The findings can inform the development of effective strategies for coastal management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

[Display omitted] • The small dataset problem is an important issue in manufacturing and academia. • A new Newton-VSG approach generates virtual samples with non-linear distributions. • The suggested method's efficacy is verified using two real datasets. • Paired Wilcoxon test elucidates the significance of differences among four VSG methods. In today's highly competitive environment, modeling the relationship between inputs and outputs using limited data for a management system at the early stages is important, but difficult. The virtual sample generation (VSG) method has been proposed in many studies to explore potential information to improve prediction performance of learning models for small datasets. However, those studies in general must assume an underlying distribution such as a linear triangular membership function or a Gaussian distribution to generate virtual samples. Thus, previous VSG methods may not effectively upgrade learning performance when the assumed distribution is not elastic enough for small datasets. To address this issue, in this paper, we proposed a novel VSG method called Newton-VSG method to generate virtual samples for small datasets with non-linear and asymmetric distributions. In the suggested method, we used Newton's method to estimate the minimum value of data range and the shape of data distribution. Further, we developed two deep learning models including Siamese network (SN) model for screening virtual sample input values and bagging auto-encoder (AE) model for predicting virtual sample output to ensure the quality of virtual samples. One real dataset for solidification cracking susceptibility test data and an other real dataset obtained from TFT-LCD process of a leading company in Taiwan were used to demonstrate the efficacy of the proposed method. On the partial least square regression (PLSR) and the back propagation neural network (BPNN) predictive models, we compared the proposed method with three state-of-the-art VSG methods in items of the mean absolute error (MAE) and the root mean squared error (RMSE). The experimental results demonstrated that the proposed method outperforms the other three VSG methods in prediction accuracy for small datasets. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes a centralized network data envelopment analysis model that combines the centralized data envelopment analysis model and network data envelopment analysis to allocate resources among sub-units. In the proposed model, this paper also considers the situations in which undesirable outputs are jointly produced with desirable outputs, the reduction of undesirable outputs is associated with the reduction of energy inputs, and some inputs are dedicated to the specific sub-unit while some inputs are shared among sub-units. To comprehensively investigate this issue, two cases are discussed. One case explores the situation in which common inputs are shared among the first process of sub-units, while the other case explores the situation in which common inputs are also shared among two processes of sub-units. The proposed model is illustrated in an empirical example of 14 Asian shipping routes operated by a Taiwanese container shipping company. In order to avoid organizational resistance, minor and major adjustment policies are demonstrated. The minor adjustment policy transfers inputs among routes but maintains the original levels of input resources, whereas the major adjustment policy reduces the total amount of input resources. The results provide valuable information for the centralized decision-maker on how to reallocate resources among the sub-units. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The stigmatization of children with disabilities at school is a culturally widespread social justice challenge. The paper is the second of a two-part series. In the first paper (Haight, Kayama, Ku, Cho, & Lee, 2016), we described the problem of stigmatization from the perspectives of experienced elementary school educators in Japan, South Korea, Taiwan and the US. In this paper, we focus on the solutions provided by these same educators; specifically, their perspectives on socialization practices to minimize stigmatization and support the development of self for children with disabilities and their typically-developing peers. We conducted cross-cultural analyses of individual, semi-structured, audio recorded interviews with 26 Japanese, 43 South Korean, 16 Taiwanese and 18 US educators, including school social workers. Educators from all research sites described socialization practices to support children with disabilities and their typically-developing peers. For children with disabilities, US educators focused on individualized support provided in private to minimize stigmatization. East Asian educators intentionally involved peers in supporting children with disabilities. For typically-developing peers, educators described cultivating empathy (Japan), providing formal disability awareness programs (South Korea), teaching moral values (Taiwan) and respecting individual differences (US). We discuss these socialization practices within educators' sociocultural-historical contexts. Educators' perspectives can be used to develop culture- and stigma-sensitive intervention programs for children with disabilities and their peers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The stigmatization of individuals with disabilities is a widespread social justice issue. This paper introduces a study of disability, stigmatization and self for children with disabilities and their typically-developing peers. It is the first of two companion papers. It examines the problem of stigmatization from the perspectives of experienced elementary school educators practicing in diverse cultural contexts. We conducted cross-cultural analyses of individual, audio recorded interviews with 26 Japanese, 43 Korean, 16 Taiwanese and 18 US educators, including school social workers. Educators from all four cultural groups described disability and stigma as challenging children's development of self: children with disabilities may experience the self as isolated and inadequate, and typically-developing peers may experience the self as lacking culturally expected values of empathy and respect. Educators' understandings of children's experiences also were culturally nuanced. Educators variously described children with disabilities as experiencing a sense of not belonging [Japan], loss of motivation [South Korea], too much shame [Taiwan], and low self-esteem [US]. They variously described typically-developing children as challenged to show empathy [Japan], include children with disabilities in their peer group [South Korea], develop benevolence [Taiwan], and show respect for individual differences [US]. We contextualize educators' perceptions within their specific sociocultural-historical contexts. Our second paper will focus on solutions; specifically, educators' perspectives on how to minimize stigmatization and support the development of self for children with disabilities and their typically-developing peers. Together, these companion papers provide social workers with valuable perspectives for eliminating the stigmatization of children with disabilities in future generations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: The objective of this study was to conduct a survey of the academic contribution and influence of Chinese scholars in the field of burns.Method: The PubMed database was searched to obtain literature items originating from various countries and Chinese provinces from 1985 to 2014. The citation data were collected through the Google Scholar engine.Results: A total of 1037 papers published in 256 journals were included in this survey. China was second only to the USA in the number of publications on burns since 2010. In addition, the annual number of papers has increased significantly since 2001. The journal Burns published the most number of articles, but its proportion has been decreasing. Of the papers included in the survey, 58.34% were published in journals with a 5-year impact factor between 1 and 2, whereas only 3.66% were published in journals with an impact factor >5. Both total citations and citations per paper have decreased in the past decade. Randomized controlled trials or systematic reviews merely accounted for a small proportion. Twenty-nine provinces including 64 cities contributed one paper at least. The publications from Taiwan, Beijing, Chongqing, Shanghai, and Guangdong were high in both quantity and quality.Conclusion: The Chinese academic contribution to the field of burns is now on a rise. Although the quality of papers is lagging behind quantity, scholars and academies are dedicated to improving China's academic level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent major seismic events, such as the Chi-Chi (1999) and the Wenchuan (2008) earthquakes occurred in Taiwan and China, have offered a variety of case histories on the performance of structures subjected to reverse faulting–induced deformation. A novel faulting mitigation method has recently been proposed, introducing a soft deformable wall barrier in order to divert the fault rupture away from the structure. This can be materialized by constructing a thick diaphragm-type soil bentonite wall (SBW) between the structure and the fault rupture path. The paper investigates the key parameters in designing such a SBW, aiming to mitigate the fault rupture hazard on shallow foundations. The paper employs a thoroughly validated finite element analysis methodology to explore the efficiency of a weak SBW barrier in protecting slab foundations from large tectonic deformation due to reverse faulting. A dimensional analysis is conducted in order to generalize the validity of the derived conclusions. The dimensionless formulation is then used to conduct a detailed parametric study, exploring the effect of SBW thickness w / H , depth H SBWl /H, and shear strength τ soil / τ SBW , as well as the bedrock fault offset h/H , foundation surcharge load q / ρgB , and fault outcrop location s/B . It is shown that the wall thickness, depth, and shear strength should be designed on the basis of the magnitude of the bedrock fault offset, the location of the fault relative to the structure, and the shear strength of the soil. The efficiency of the weak barrier is improved using lower strength and stiffness material compared to the alluvium. A simplified preliminary design methodology is proposed, and presented in the form of a flowchart. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Airports need to manage corporate social responsibility (CSR) strategies for sustainable development. This paper develops a new structured approach for airports to evaluate, prioritize and categorize CSR strategies, using Taiwan’s Taoyuan International Airport Corporation (TIAC) as an example. Based on TIAC’s CSR-related activities, 18 CSR strategies grouped into 5 CSR goals (corporate governance and finance, green airport and environmental management, service quality and social relationship, employee and work environment management, and safety and security) are identified using the CSR value chain and diamond framework. The pairwise comparison method used in analytic hierarchy process and the decision-making trial and evaluation laboratory method are used respectively to evaluate the relative importance, feasibility and achievability of these 18 strategies and to analyze their causal relationships via expert questionnaire surveys. A new method is developed to plan and manage the implementation of CSR strategies by incorporating the viewpoints of both internal and external stakeholders, thus reflecting the practical effects and strategic implications of the CSR implementation. The result suggests that TIAC’s CSR strategies in relation to airport safety and security, service quality and corporate governance are most significant and have a high implementation priority. This paper contributes to the airport industry and CSR research by proposing a proactive mechanism for quantitatively evaluating, prioritizing and categorizing CSR strategies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Taiwan's per capita carbon emissions ranks first in Asia. Whether Taiwan's current "2025 Non-Nuclear Homeland" energy transition policy can achieve the goal of greenhouse gas reduction is an issue that needs to be studied urgently. On the basis of studying the status quo of energy supply and demand and carbon emissions in Taiwan, this paper first uses an econometric model to predict Taiwan's energy demand from 2021 to 2030, and then uses a Markov chain model to predict its energy structure changes and CO 2 emission trends under different scenarios, and evaluates the impact of its energy transition policies on carbon emission reduction goals. On this basis, by comparing the carbon trading markets on both sides of the Taiwan strait, the feasibility of and obstacles to the cross-strait cooperation in the carbon trading market are discussed in depth, and the opportunities for future cross-strait cooperation in the carbon trading market are proposed innovatively. The empirical results of this paper show that the carbon emissions in 2025 under the energy transition policy will be reduced by 59.8–61.1 million tons compared with those without planning constraints, but compared with the carbon reduction target (a reduction of 124.8–133 million tons), there is still a long way to go. The contribution potential of the annual carbon emission reduction target is only 45.9%–47.9%, and the contribution potential in 2030 is 57.2%–60.1%. The current "2025 Non-Nuclear Homeland" policy is not in line with Taiwan's current reality, and it is difficult to achieve the expected carbon reduction goal. In order to realize the energy transition in Taiwan in the future, it is necessary to make overall planning of energy policies, explore the cross-strait power cooperation model, and gradually try to build a cross-strait carbon trading market. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]