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The Coats Island field station in northern Hudson Bay, Canada, was established by the Canadian Wildlife Service in 1984 to monitor the thick-billed murre (Uria lomvia, akpa, [Graphic: see text]) population in the context of harvest management and federal responsibilities under the Migratory Birds Convention Act. The long-term monitoring program has continued annually for 34 of the last 39 years, making it the most frequently monitored seabird colony in the Canadian Arctic. In the 1990s, the focus of efforts at the site shifted from population monitoring and harvest management to long-term monitoring of murres as an indicator of environmental change. In addition to informing harvest management of murres in Canada, long-term monitoring and research at Coats Island have helped to establish thick-billed murres as an indicator species for Arctic seabirds, identified major shifts in the marine prey communities of Hudson Bay, enabled the assessment of international agreements on reducing contaminants in Arctic wildlife, and improved the understanding of the effects of climate change on Arctic marine birds. Coats Island has developed into an essential research site for all aspects of murre ecology and served as a training site for new generations of Arctic ecologists.

La simulation virtuelle (SV) est une stratégie innovante et proactive d’application pratique de la théorie qui peut améliorer les connaissances et le savoir-faire des professionnels de la santé. Toutefois, aucun article n’a été publié à ce jour sur l’utilisation de la simulation pour améliorer les soins aux survivants du cancer. Le présent article décrit notre expérience de création d’une SV pour former les professionnels de la santé aux problèmes sexuels vécus par les femmes traitées pour un cancer du sein. Si on extrapole à partir des recherches effectuées dans d’autres contextes, la SV permettrait de bonifier les connaissances et compétences dont les professionnels ont besoin pour accompagner les survivantes ayant des préoccupations de nature sexuelle. Notre expérience de développement de SV pourra motiver et guider d’autres chercheurs qui souhaitent eux aussi déployer des interventions similaires. Mots-clés : innovation infirmière, jeu de simulation virtuelle, survivants du cancer, soins primaires

Abstract: Virtual simulation (VS) is an innovative and engaging knowledge translation strategy that can improve healthcare providers’ knowledge and skills; however, there is known literature published related to the use of simulation to improve cancer survivorship care. In this paper, we describe our experience of developing a VS to educate primary health care professionals about sexual health disturbances among breast cancer survivors. Based on literature in other contexts, this VS may help increase health professionals’ knowledge and skills needed to assist breast cancer survivors with sexual health concerns. Our VS experience can be used to guide other researchers planning to develop similar interventions in the future.

For the majority of people, having a pet is always simple, but caring for it will always be a pain in the neck since pet owners must devote a whole time to meeting the pet’s demands, which include food, shelter, medical care, love and attention. Nowadays, feeding is one of the most frequent issues that pet owners’ encounter due to heavy work schedule. As a result, the automatic solar-powered pet food dispenser system is useful for assisting pet owners in caring for their pet’s needs when they are away from home or on the road. This automatic pet feeder proposes a simple automatic pet food dispenser controlled using the Arduino as the main controller. DS3231 Real Time Clock (RTC) module that can assist in automatically giving the pets the right mealtime was employed. This helps the food dispensing process without the owner’s presence, which is unlike the manual pet feeding product. The project ensures that the pets are fed on schedule and that the amount of food released is controlled appropriately. Also, this project will employ solar energy as a green energy source for sustainable development. This project can feed the pets 20 grams or less pet food in a single meal, according to the servo motor rotation setting activated by the Arduino.

In densely populated countries, underground construction and land reclamation could be possible options to solve the demand for land space, thus securing sustainable long-term development of the nation. For example, in Singapore, land reclamation has been widely conducted using excavated materials from underground development. The excavated materials are commonly marine clays that contain sandy soils. To improve the mechanical properties of these soft soils, cement-treated soil stabilization is popularly adopted. In fact, many researchers have investigated the properties of pure cemented clay or pure cemented sand using conventional design parameters such as water content (water/solids) and cement content (cement/dry soil). However, can these terminologies be still used to accurately examine the role of sand in cemented sandy clay mixtures? Through unconfined compression testing, it is herein shown that the use of existing mix design approaches in the literature cannot properly explain the variation of strength with sand content for cemented sandy clay mixtures. A new mix design approach is thus proposed in this study, which ensures that the role of sand in a cemented clay matrix can be quantified.

Международные кинофестивали, которые с середины 1990‑х гг. проводятся в Южной Корее, имеют историческое значение. Формально кинофестивали в Южной Корее были гибридным культурным феноменом, возникшим на пересечении корейского демократического движения 1980‑х гг. и глобализации в эпоху после холодной войны в 1990‑е гг. От кинодвижения 1980‑х гг. до становления артхаусного кино в 1990‑х и Пусанского международного кинофестиваля в 1996 г. эти события развивались не как параллельные, а скорее как кульминация эпического напряжения. Основная цель статьи – расширить проблематику предыдущих дискуссий, участники которых никогда не проявляли большого интереса к тому, как международный кинофестиваль сочетает в себе глобальные и локальные аспекты. Кинодвижение, созданное корейским кинематографом, и международные кинофестивали 1980‑х и 1990‑х гг. символизировали путь к социальному резонансу, направленному на то, чтобы донести до зрителей информацию о новых корейских фильмах, подчеркивая агонистику и резонанс между ними и работами из других стран.

Construction and demolition waste are one of the major waste streams in the world. Aggregates must be used in significant quantities during road construction and maintenance as base and sub-base materials. Government and local businesses are promoting the use of recycled material in old pavement andconstruction material due to the high cost of virgin aggregates. Concrete, road subgrade, and railroad ballast materials can all be made from recycled concrete aggregate (RCA), a type of recycled material. The engineers must properly comprehend the material's qualities, including its unsaturated properties, in order to use RCA in these projects. The goal of this project is to investigate the unsaturated permeability and thewater characteristic curve of RCA. These unsaturated qualities were discovered through sophisticated laboratory experimentation. The study's findings showed that the RCA has the same qualities as gravel or natural aggregate.

Landslides bring destruction to buildings, and nearby located structures and mostly occur in rural areas. Such hazard commonly takes place in mountainous areas in Central Asia. Kazakhstan region has highly vulnerable areas to rainfall-induced landslides in South-Eastern parts due to presence of many mountains. The purpose of the research is to demonstrate the effect of slope geometry on slope stabilityunder heavy rainfall in Almaty, Kazakhstan. Transient seepage analyses were conducted using Seep/W while limit equilibrium slope stability analyses were performed using Slope/W. 15 sets of numerical analyses were carried out on different slope angle and slope height incorporating the soil-water characteristic curve and unsaturated permeability and unsaturated shear strength of soil from Almaty. According to the obtained simulation results in GeoStudio software for seepage analysis, the pore-water pressure is increased almost for 80 kPa at the mid slope of each simulation. The change of FoS for the gentlest slope with 27 degrees slope angle is the lowest for 10 m slope height and the highest for 30 m slope height, whereas the change of FoS for slope with 45 degrees of slope angle (9%) is almost the same for all slope height.

Fine particulate matter is classified as a first-class carcinogen and is receiving global attention. In particular, particulate matter (PM2.5, and PM10) are more fatal in students at a growing age while their respiratory system develops than in ordinary adults. During school hours, the main entrance is often left open for the convenience of students and staff. In this situation, the inflow of PM2.5 through the main entrance increases significantly. Thus, air curtains are widely used at the main entrance to block the inflow of PM2.5. However, few experimental studies have examined the effect of blocking PM2.5 through such air curtains. This study analyzed the effectiveness of reducing PM2.5 inflow by installing an air curtain at the main entrance of a school. The efficiency in blocking PM2.5 was determined by analyzing the average I/O ratio of PM2.5 at the respiratory height through experimental measurements. The average I/O ratio of PM2.5 in the school entrance was 0.84 before the installation of the air curtain, which was reduced to 0.46 after installing the air curtain. The blockage efficiency of the air curtain was 42%. This study quantitatively confirms that air curtains effectively reduce the inflow of PM2.5 in schools.

Background: Pain in patients with hemophilia is common and usually a result of arthropathy. Clinicians should, however, consider a wide range of etiologies for pain in patients with hemophilia including infection, osteoporotic fractures, arthritis, and osteomalacia. Aims: This case demonstrates an instance of poorly localized back and hip pain, severe enough to prevent ambulation, caused by hypophosphatemic osteomalacia due to tenofovir treatment for blood transfusion acquired Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) in a patient with hemophilia A. Methods: Case Report. Results: With termination of tenofovir treatment, this patient returned to baseline function. Conclusion: This report serves to emphasize the need for accurate diagnosis of pain in hemophilia patients, especially among the aging demographic of people with hemophilia in which there is a significant likelihood of an HIV infection and among patients who may be on Pre-exposure Prophylaxis (PrEP) or clinical trials involving tenofovir.

This paper draws on the study of 42,248 advertisements contained in the What Were Comics? corpus to analyze the transformation of the status of the American comic book between 1934 and 2014. We argue that sustained attention to patterns of advertising in American comic books challenges the dominant historiography of the publishing format. We suggest that the history of the American comic book can be understood in terms of four general periods: 1) a period of domestication during which time it was understood that the primary audience for comic books was children; 2) a period of crisis in the industry in the late-1950s brought on by the loss of the child reader; 3) a period of transition marked by smaller and lower-value advertising targeting a mixed readership of children and adults; and, 4) a period of equilibrium in which advertising is split between national brands and in-house advertisements.

This essay uses a mixed-methods approach combining scoping review, thematic qualitative analysis, and case study methodologies to identify relationships between art and political advocacy in the context of the AIDS epidemic. Thirty-four relevant articles were found through a comprehensive literature search focused on social scientific analyses. Three key themes were identified: addressing negative stereotypes; the importance of education; and giving voice to individuals affected by HIV. The significance of iconic artist Keith Haring and two important artworks related to HIV advocacy—the Keiskamma Altarpiece and the Ribbon Project—are discussed, with lessons distilled for the role that art can play in political advocacy on global health issues more broadly.

To enhance the design of mechanical systems, parametric Accelerated Life Testing (ALT) as a systematic reliability method is proposed as a way to evaluate the design of mechanical systems subjected to repeated impact stresses. It requires: (1) a parametric ALT scheme shaped on system BX lifetime, (2) a load inspection, (3) parametric ALTs with the associated design modifications, and (4) an assessment of whether the revised product design(s) reach the targeted BX life-time. We propose using a general life-stress model and sample size equation. A test example using both market data and parametric ALT was the redesign of a hinge kit system (HKS) in a refrigerator. To conduct parametric ALTs, a force and moment balance analysis was utilized. The mechanical impact loadings of the HKS were evaluated for an working refrigerator door. For the first ALT, the HKS failure happened in the crack/fracture of the kit housing and oil spilled from the damper when the HKS was disassembled. The failure modes and mechanisms constructed in the 1st ALT were similar to those of the unsuccessful samples found from the marketplace. The missing design parameters of the HKS included stress raisers such as corner roundings and the rib of the housing in HKS, the seal in the oil damper, and the material of the cover housing. In the second ALT, the cover housing fractured. The design defect of the cover housing in the HKS was the plastic material. As a corrective action plan, the cover housing was modified from plastic to aluminium. After the second ALT, the lifetime of the modified HKS was reassured to be B1 life 10 years with a yearly failure rate of 0.1%.

In Michaël Ferrier's work, the color white primarily symbolizes absence and death. However, by writing the blank, Ferrier chooses to reveal it and bring to light what has disappeared. The absence thus materialized can no longer be ignored. The writer uses white as a memory tool that allows him to rehabilitate those forgotten by History, those he calls ghosts. Ferrier uses the shades of white but also the colors that compose it to bring his ghosts back to life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Résumé: L'auteur considère la pandémie de COVID‐19 comme un choc exogène et examine si les syndicats ont accepté un ajustement des salaires et du temps de travail pour protéger l'emploi de leurs membres pendant la crise économique qu'elle a déclenchée. L'analyse, réalisée à partir de données de panel portant sur la période 2018–2020 en République de Corée, montre que les salariés syndiqués avaient une probabilité 1,9 fois plus forte de conserver leur poste. Il n'y a pas de différence significative concernant l'évolution du salaire, mais le temps de travail a davantage diminué parmi les travailleurs syndiqués. L'auteur en déduit que pendant cette période les syndicats ont protégé l'emploi en réduisant le temps de travail sans jouer sur les salaires. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Capillary barrier system (CBS) was developed as a slope protection method to prevent rainwater infiltration into the underlying soil based on the principle of unsaturated soil mechanics by harnessing the distinct difference in hydraulic properties of a fine-grained layer with those of a coarse-grained layer of soils. The CBS is commonly designed and constructed using gravel as coarse-grained material and fine sand as fine-grained material. However, due to scarcity of natural aggregates and in consideration of environmental sustainability, there is a need to utilize recycled materials in capillary barrier system. In this project, coarse and fine recycled concrete were used as the coarse- and fine-grained materials, respectively. The appearance of CBS was enhanced with an additional layer of approved soil mixture (ASM) to incorporate vegetation as green cover. CBS as a sustainable slope cover has been constructed for slope protection surrounding basement carpark in the new public housing development at Matilda, Singapore. The design, construction and monitoring system for the CBS are presented and discussed in this paper. The field measurement data provide verification of the performance of the CBS. Both field measurement and numerical analyses demonstrated that CBS performed well as designed.

Synthetic coagulants currently used to treat dye wastewater in the water treatment industry has been found to produce large amounts of waste and is bad for the environment. The research then presents two different methods of preparing Hibiscus Sabdariffa as a natural coagulant which are direct method and freeze-drying method to possibly replace synthetic coagulant in treating dye wastewater. The two different methods of preparing natural coagulant Hibiscus Sabdariffa are compared in terms of protein retention and coagulation performance at removing dye from dye wastewater. This is to determine which method of preparation is better at preparing a Hibiscus Sabdariffa as a natural coagulant to be used in the water treatment industry. Three analysis are done to determine the optimum concentration of Hibiscus Sabdariffa powder and freeze-drying duration is based on (i) surface morphology, (ii) water solubility and (iii) water activity. Optimum concentration of Hibiscus Sabdariffa powder is 20wt% and 24-hour freeze-drying duration. Another analysis is done to compare protein retention of each methods of preparation using (iv) Fourier Transform Infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy testing. Protein in Hibiscus Sabdariffa prepared using freeze drying is completely retained based on Fourier Transform Infrared spectroscopy results. Supporting data of protein retention properties of freeze drying is proven by water activity in Hibiscus Sabdariffa powder is at 0.478 and below the 0.6 threshold value. Water activity of 0.478 means that there is not enough water content in Hibiscus Sabdariffa powder for microorganisms to grow and degrade the protein. Optimum coagulant dosage and pH value that Hibiscus Sabdariffa prepared using the two different methods best works in is determined based on two experiments called (v) effects of coagulant dosage on dye removal percentage and (vi) effect of pH value of preparation methods on colour removal percentage. Coagulation performance of both preparation methods are also determined using experiment (v) and (vi). Hibiscus Sabdariffa prepared using freeze drying has better coagulation performance with higher colour removal percentage at lower required coagulant dosage and higher dye removal percentage at varied pH values compared to direct method. As a result, freeze drying is better in terms of coagulation performance compared to direct method at preparing natural coagulant Hibiscus Sabdariffa. Coagulation performance of natural and chemical coagulant is compared using (vii) jar test comparison between natural and chemical coagulant on colour removal. This is to determine if coagulation performance of natural coagulant is comparable to chemical coagulant. Coagulation performance of natural coagulant is only slightly lower than synthetic coagulant at colour removal percentage of 91.2% compared to 92.3%. This makes the coagulation performance of natural coagulant comparable to synthetic coagulant allowing it to be an alternative to synthetic coagulant based on coagulation performance. Therefore, Life Cycle Analysis (LCA) will then be conducted to compare the better method of preparation of natural coagulant which is freeze-drying of natural coagulant Hibiscus Sabdariffa to chemical coagulant alum. Life Cycle Analysis done is to determine, evaluate and compare natural against chemical coagulant based on 3 sustainability aspects economic, environment and social aspects. This is to determine the feasibility of natural coagulant Hibiscus Sabdariffa in the water treatment industry on whether it is a possible alternative or replacement to the currently used synthetic coagulant alum. Based on Life Cycle Analysis natural coagulant is the better alternative compared to chemical coagulant based on impact towards the environment and health and well-being of society. However, the implementation of natural coagulant in the water treatment industry is still not feasible as production cost of natural coagulant is 126.86 times more expensive compared to chemical coagulant. As a result, currently Hibiscus Sabdariffa as a natural coagulant is not able to replace synthetic coagulant alum in the water treatment industry.

Soil – water characteristic curve (SWCC) is an important property of unsaturated soils that can be used to estimate various parameters to describe unsaturated soil behavior. SWCC is reported to be hysteretic because the water content at a given suction in the wetting process is less than that in the drying process. In order to simulate the hysteretic characteristics of SWCC, many models have been proposed by different researchers. However, majority of the existing models are complex and their parameters are not related to the physical significances of SWCC variables. In this study, the new equations are developed to model drying and wetting SWCC. In addition, some indexes are proposed to estimate the wetting SWCC from drying SWCC. The new equations for SWCCs were evaluated with the laboratory data from published literatures. The results showed that the proposed equations performed well in modelling drying and wetting SWCC. The new equation has less parameters than the existing published equation.

Port competition is often analyzed based on individual characteristics of seaports rather than inter-port connections. A maritime network perspective is applied to the circulation of liner vessels between East Asian ports in order to reveal their relative position in 1996 and 2006. Main results confirm the progress of secondary ports over their major competitors, reflecting the importance of local port policies. However, the overall structure of the regional network tends to remain polarized by few major hub ports resisting to internal and external threats.

The long-term operation of high-speed railway leads to remarkable issues in ballast mechanical degradation and track irregularity. Particularly, in mainline of rail structure, the required time for ballast layer maintenance is strictly short. To systematically cope with this problem, a comprehensive study was proposed to develop a new cement asphalt mortar (CAM) stabilized ballast method. This solution is expected to improve the ballast structural durability with fast application time. However, the engineer properties of CAM paste with different level of initial mixing water as well as the influencing mechanisms are not clearly understood. In this work, the effects of initial mixing water and emulsifier on the mechanical performance of CAM are mainly discussed. The characteristics of the mortar were determined by conducting the flowability test, mixing stability test, and unconfined compressive strength (UCS) test. The test results revealed that the initial mixing water plays an important role in both fresh and hardened stage of CAM, especially the demulsification process of asphalt emulsion. Meanwhile, the emulsifier imposed a critical effect on the strength development of CAM mixture.

In this paper, we design and implement GPU-based non-coherent GPS signal tracking module for real-time SDR. When using CPU and GPU simultaneously, the signal tracking module should be designed considering the memory bottleneck between the two processors. The basic non-coherent module, which accumulates the 1msec correlation value 20 times, is changed to accumulate M(20/N) times of Nmsec units. From the experiments using real GPS signals, the computational performance of N=20 is improved by 80% compared to N=1. Therefore, the implemented SDR using notebook computer can tracks more channels simultaneously in the real time.

This study deals with a non-destructive evaluation technique for detecting defects in composite panels. In this non-destructive evaluation technique, various low-frequency techniques are applied such as a tapping technology. Another terahertz wave application will be utilized. In particular, the tapping technique is utilized in order to evaluate the characteristics of the honeycomb member based on the hysteresis effect analysis. Here, the area surrounded by the hysteresis loop in the force-displacement curve is related to the increased internal friction loss that is the cause of the energy absorption absorbed by the composite member after the load is applied. The loop area where the composite member was damaged was well agreed with the damage level. Artificial defects were manufactured on the surface of honeycomb sandwich composite panels. An NDE technique was proposed in order to detect defects by using terahertz waves and was discussed for tuning the practical use.

We propose search and rescue system for the both military and civil uses with minimizing burden to COSPAS SARSAT by using terrestrial communication network like LTE as an example in the paper. The terrestrial network may not be limited to LTE but extended to 5G, SigFox, LoRa, etc, later on. For security, special encryption mechanism is applied to the both COSPAS SARSAT and Terrestrial links. Also, operation concept for critical and normal situation. Implementation result and enhancing positioning accuracy by using rescue signal itself from ground signal processing is presented too.

In this study, the photocatalyst TiO2 was mixed with a general paint and applied on indoor walls as part of a mock-up test to measure the reduction in the NOx concentration affected by the on or off state of a UV lamp. The findings may be summarized as follows; the NOx concentration was reduced by approximately 7% more (0.134 ppm) with the UV lamp on than when the lamp was off in the indoor space where the paint mixed with TiO2 was applied.

This paper proposes a multi-baseline method to estimate absolute coordinates of point clouds and the camera attitude parameter utilizing feature points in successive images. Conventionally, 3D map generation methodologies have been based on images acquired by aerial or land vehicles. Pixels corresponding to known landmarks are manually identified at first. Next, the coordinates are directly geo-referenced and automatically allocated to pixels with high-quality Global Positioning System (GPS) and Inertial Navigation System (INS). However, it is difficult to obtain accurate coordinates by the conventional methodology with low-cost GPS and INS. With camera positions and attitude parameters, image-based point clouds can be compensated accurately. A simulation was carried out to evaluate the performance of the proposed method.

This paper describes the development of M&S (Modeling and Simulation) system based COSPAS-SARSAT SAR (Search and Rescue) system. SAR system transmits a distress signal to the terminal and transmits it to the satellite network or the terrestrial network. It recognized distress incident from anywhere in the world. The M&S system is designed to analyze the accuracy, reliability, and availability of the SAR (Search and Rescue) system. It is also designed to simulate the actual distress beacons of a distress situation. It was developed to enable performance analysis. We will verify the validity of the implemented results, applying the RF signal processing based on KNSS.

This paper presents result of new approach for anti-jamming using a method based on cognitive radio. To detect and get center frequency and bandwidth of jamming, a spectrum sensing based on multi-channel energy detector is implemented on the SDR. The SDR and a universal software radio peripheral is used to support real-time channel reconfiguration. And detected center frequency and bandwidth is used to select LO frequency to avoid jamming and receive GNSS signal. Then the receiver is reconfigured by the selected LO frequency. To verify the feasibility of the proposed anti-jamming process, position, carrier to noise ratio of each channel are measured using a test scenario that is consist of GPS and Beidou with a CW jamming. As a results, by switching of LO frequency, GNSS signal that is not affected by jamming can be received with the same performance as non-jamming.

Information and communication technologies have relaxed time-honored practices of space-time synchronization in higher education, allowing even a new type of open universities, namely virtual universities. Seventeen virtual universities and colleges have been established in Korea since 2001. This paper examined the distribution patterns of virtual universities and students, their changes over the past five years, and the patterns of class attendance. The study found that Seoul, the capital city, outweighed other regions in terms of the number of virtual universities and their students. The study also revealed local concentrations of off-line class meetings. The geography of distance education appeared to be resulted from a number of factors including the spatial structure of the nation and ruling of distance-decay.

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Background of the Research: This study examines the factors influencing housing prices in Malaysia. The study explores qualitatively whether there is housing bubble in Malaysia, and whether the housing prices are associated with changes in construction cost, land cost, compliance cost, housing speculation, and mortgage rate. Methodology: The paper is exploratory in nature. The data were collected via focus group discussions among nine property industry players in Malaysia and were analysed using qualitative research methodology. Main Findings: The study reaches the qualitative outcomes that rising housing prices are mainly due to cost factors and housing speculation but may not necessarily be influenced by mortgage rate. The findings suggest that the residential property market is currently not facing housing bubble issue. However the problem is partly due to PTPTN blacklisted borrowers. Conclusion: It is imperative for the Malaysian government to put in further efforts to control housing prices in order to maintain affordability of homeownership.

The concentration of six heavy metals such as Cu, Cr, Ni, Cd, Zn and Mn were studied in the soils around Perlis. The aim of the study is to assess the heavy metals contamination distribution due to industrialisation and agricultural activities. Soil samples were collected at depth of 0 – 15 cm in five stations around Perlis. The soil samples are subjected to soil extraction and the concentration of heavy metals was determined via ICP - OES. Overall concentrations of Cr, Cu, Zn, Ni, Cd and Mn in the soil samples ranged from 0.003 - 0.235 mg/L, 0.08 - 41.187 mg/L, 0.065 - 45.395 mg/L, 0.031 - 2.198 mg/L, 0.01 - 0.174 mg/L and 0.165 - 63.789 mg/L respectively. The concentration of heavy metals in the soil showed the following decreasing trend, Mn > Zn > Cu > Ni > Cr > Cd. From the result, the level of heavy metals in the soil near centralised Chuping industrial areas gives maximum value compared to other locations in Perlis. As a conclusion, increasing anthropogenic activities have influenced the environment, especially in increasing the pollution loading.

Lactic Acid as a platform chemical has broad application in various industries, especially in the production of Poly Lactic Acid (PLA) for biodegradable plastic. Empty fruit bunch (EFB), abundant by product from palm oil mill industry, is one of potential feedstock to be used in the production of lactic acid from lignocellulose biomass. EFB contains high cellulose and hemicellulose about 37– 59.7% w/w and 16–28% w/w, respectively. The aim of this paper is to study the effects of the operating conditions, such as temperature, reaction time, biomass loading, and catalyst concentration on the yield of lactic acid using barium hydroxide as alkaline catalyst. EFB pretreatment with steam explosion was applied to remove lignin content. The results showed that pretreatment reduced the lignin content from 22.66% to 9.69% w/w. Meanwhile, hemicellulose and cellulose increased from 14.40% to 16.40% w/w and 29.37% to 63.57% w/w, respectively. The highest yield of lactic acid was 21.57% C-mol, achieved by using 0.25 M Ba(OH)2 as the catalyst, with 5% w/v biomass loading, temperature 240°C, during 4 h reaction times. The yield was approximately equal to yield of lactic acid (~ 20%) compared with Pb2+ as the catalyst for EFB conversion although the later catalyst produced fewer by products during conversion.

A riffle-pool structure is a representative physical structure of bed in rivers. The change in the physical parameter of the habitat could lead to changes in the sound environment of rivers, which are expressed by underwater acoustics. This change in underwater sound affects fish habitat. In this study, the changes of underwater acoustics were analyzed according to the change of pool-riffle sequence in a natural river. And the correlation between underwater acoustics and hydraulic characteristics was investigated. The survey for underwater acoustics was performed in the Namdae stream where is in Gangwon province. This stream belongs to the Han River basin and the river length is 39.01 km and the catchment area is 127.56 km2. The Namdae stream is a river that accounts for more than 70% of salmon returning to South Korea. The spawning salmon will return to this area around November after growing in the Bering Sea. It is important to manage the fish habitat in this river so there is a lot of research on the enhancement of fish habitat. Hydraulic characteristics were changed by the river bed structure. In this study, we investigated the relationship between underwater acoustic characteristics and hydraulic factors such as riverbed material, flow rate and water depth of each habitat type at 12 sites. The characteristics of underwater acoustic differed relative to different hydraulic factors of the two habitats, which is riffle and pool. The sound pressure level of riffles was relatively higher than that of the pools due to bed materials, shallow depth and high water velocity of riffles. In the future, it is considered that the underwater sound can be utilized as a parameter to evaluate the physical habitat environment of the river.

The effect of strain range and temperature on the low-cycle fatigue behaviour and microstructure change during cyclic deformation of Alloy 617 for use in very high temperature gas-cooled reactor components were studied at elevated temperature starting from ambient condition. Increasing the strain range and the temperature was noticed to reduce the fatigue resistance of nickel-based Alloy 617 due to facilitating the transformation behavior of the carbides in the grain interior, precipitates along the grain boundary, and oxidation behavior inducing surface connected precipitates cracking. Initial hardening behavior was observed at room temperature condition during cyclic due to the pile-up dislocation of micro-precipitates. The grain size was also taking a role due to the formation of an obstacle in the matrix. In the high temperature regime, the alloy 617 was found to soften for its entire life due to the fast recovery deformation, proved by its higher plasticity compared with lower temperature. The deformation behavior also showing high environmentally assisted damage. Oxidation behavior was found to become the primary crack initiation, resulting in early intergranular surface cracking.

High precision vehicle simulation environment is required for development of control system of any newly suggested intelligent system. Hence, a high precision full-vehicle simulation environment integrated with an intelligent torque transfer system should be developed for an advanced control logic for enhancement of vehicle stability. In the perspective of making enhanced AWD system, there are many kinds of methods to make the system. And a controller part of the AWD module is regarded as a major part of the system development in consideration of enhancement of the vehicle stability with the suggested AWD system. Therefore, in this study, high precision full-vehicle simulation environment is developed for the development of an intelligent control system of the AWD module. In order to make models for the simulation, vehicle test is performed with a commercial vehicle, and the several performance tests of the developed AWD system are also conducted in a laboratory. Then, the simulation environment comprised of several models of important sub-systems is developed based on the previously conducted test results, and the developed simulation environment is verified by comparing the simulation results to the test results.

In the Korean jury system, jurors deliberate without interference of anyone, except when they cannot reach a unanimous verdict, in which case they must hear the judge’s opinion. If jurors convict the defendant, they also deliberate with the judge on sentencing and provide their opinions. This unique feature of the Korean jury system provides rare opportunities to examine the interaction of the lay people and judges in deliberation. Through direct observation and the content analysis of the shadow jury deliberations on actual cases in Korea, we will examine whether the judge’s intervention was helpful in jury decision-making or hampers the independent judgment of the jury. The result shows the collaborative deliberation amongst jurors and judges in sentencing, and in some cases in conviction, will mutually benefit both. In turn, jurors will retain the credibility of the judiciary while the judges will reflect upon their decisions in accordance with the legal consciousness of the lay people. En el sistema de jurados de Corea, los miembros del jurado deliberan sin interferencia de nadie, excepto cuando no pueden llegar a un veredicto unánime, en cuyo caso deben escuchar la opinión del juez. Si los miembros del jurado condenan al acusado, también deliberan con el juez a la hora de dictar sentencia y expresan sus opiniones. Esta característica única del sistema de jurados de Corea ofrece pocas oportunidades para examinar la interacción del jurado popular y los jueces durante su deliberación. A través de la observación directa y el análisis del contenido de las deliberaciones del jurado en la sombra sobre casos reales en Corea, se analizará si la intervención del juez fue útil en la toma de decisiones del jurado o dificulta su independencia de criterio. El resultado demuestra que la deliberación entre los miembros del jurado y los jueces a la hora de dictar sentencia, y en algunos casos al declarar culpable al acusado, beneficia a ambos. A su vez, los miembros del jurado conservan la credibilidad del poder judicial, mientras que los jueces van a dictar sentencia teniendo en cuenta la conciencia jurídica del tribunal popular. DOWNLOAD THIS PAPER FROM SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=2606614