Preparation of New Fibers on the Basis of Codeine Imprinted Polymer

A monolithic copolymer of methacrylic acid-ethylene glycol dimathacrylate as a fiber with 2 cm length and 0.3 mm diameter, containing codeine (CO) template was prepared through thermal radical co-polymerization procedure. This fiber is a robust recognition material capable of mimicking natural systems, combined with solid-phase micro-extraction (SPME) and gas chromatography/mass spectrometry for the extraction of trace CO from various street-drug samples. Effective experimental parameters such as Methacrylic Acid (MAA), Ethylene glycol dimethacrylate (EDMA), and CO proportions, nature, and dimension of mold, copolymerization time and temperature were optimized. Experimental studies such as scanning electron microscopy (SEM) reveal that highly homogenate fiber was achieved that can preciously be used for the above mentioned goals.     

Texture databases – A comprehensive survey

Texture analysis is a very important area in the field of computer vision and related fields. There are a good number of databases developed by different research groups for various texture analysis, in the field of medical analysis, robotics, recognition, analysis, image processing, etc. However, till-to-date, there is no comprehensive works covering the important databases and analyze these in various perspectives. In this paper, we consider this important task so that it becomes helpful for a researcher to choose and evaluate having crucial evaluating aspects in mind. We categorize and critically survey based on many references of the state-of-the-art related to the databases and other texture works. We strongly believe that this elegant survey will be a great contribution for the vision community, especially in the arena of texture analysis.     

FUZZY REPLACEMENT ALGORITHM FOR CACHE MEMORY

This paper reports a replacement procedure for cache memories. The procedure is essentially a fuzzy algorithm that makes use of 18 rules to select the cache block to be replaced. These rules are primarily a function of three parameters: age and the frequency of usage of a cache block, and the global hit ratio of the cache system. Computationally, the proposed algorithm calculates a replacement index for each cache block and the block with highest replacement index is selected as a victim. The performance of this fuzzy procedure is compared with traditional replacement algorithms such as least recently used (LRU) and first in First out (FIFO). Our simulation experiments indicate that the proposed algorithm is a strong contender to the traditional counterparts. The unique feature of the proposed algorithm is its flexibility; that is, one can always improve its performance further by fine-tuning the rules.     

A new image binarization method using iterative partitioning

This paper proposes a new method for image binarization that uses an iterative partitioning approach. The proposed method has been tested towards binarization of both document and graphic images. The quantitative comparisons with other standard methods reveal that the proposed approach outperforms existing widely used binarization techniques in terms of accuracy of binarization. The experimental results further establish the superiority of the proposed method, especially for degraded documents and graphic images. The proposed algorithm is suitable for a multi-core processing environment as it can be split into multiple parallel units of executions after the initial partitioning.     

Intelligent facial emotion recognition and semantic-based topic detection for a humanoid robot

Automatic perception of human affective behaviour from facial expressions and recognition of intentions and social goals from dialogue contexts would greatly enhance natural human robot interaction. This research concentrates on intelligent neural network based facial emotion recognition and Latent Semantic Analysis based topic detection for a humanoid robot. The work has first of all incorporated Facial Action Coding System describing physical cues and anatomical knowledge of facial behaviour for the detection of neutral and six basic emotions from real-time posed facial expressions. Feedforward neural networks (NN) are used to respectively implement both upper and lower facial Action Units (AU) analysers to recognise six upper and 11 lower facial actions including Inner and Outer Brow Raiser, Lid Tightener, Lip Corner Puller, Upper Lip Raiser, Nose Wrinkler, Mouth Stretch etc. An artificial neural network based facial emotion recogniser is subsequently used to accept the derived 17 Action Units as inputs to decode neutral and six basic emotions from facial expressions. Moreover, in order to advise the robot to make appropriate responses based on the detected affective facial behaviours, Latent Semantic Analysis is used to focus on underlying semantic structures of the data and go beyond linguistic restrictions to identify topics embedded in the users’ conversations. The overall development is integrated with a modern humanoid robot platform under its Linux C++ SDKs. The work presented here shows great potential in developing personalised intelligent agents/robots with emotion and social intelligence.     

GaInAsP-InP distributed feedback waveguides for all-opticalswitching

All-optical switching characteristics of waveguide devices having a nonlinear distributed feedback structure are reported theoretically and experimentally. These devices were composed of a strip-loaded GaInAsP-InP waveguide and a Bragg reflector, which were suitable for optical integrated circuit. In the experiments, all-optical and gate operation and set-reset operation for two output ports were successfully demonstrated     

Anaerobic biogas generation from sugar industry wastewaters in three‐phase fluidized‐bed bioreactor

In the present study, attempts are made to optimize digestion time, initial feed pH, feed temperature, and feed flow rate (organic loading rate, OLR) for maximum yield of methane gas and maximum removal of chemical oxygen demand (COD) and biological oxygen demand (BOD) of sugar industry wastewaters in three‐phase fluidized‐bed bioreactor. Methane gas is analysed by using flame‐ionisation detector (FID). The optimum digestion time is 8 h and optimum initial pH of feed is observed as 7.5. The optimum temperature of feed is 40°C and optimum feed flow rate is 14 L/min with OLR 39.513 kg COD/m³ h. OLR is calculated on the basis of COD inlet in the bioreactor at different flow rates. The maximum methane gas concentration is 61.56% (v/v) of the total biogas generation at optimum biomethanation process parameters. The maximum biogas yield rate is 0.835 m³/kg COD/m³ h with maximum methane gas yield rate (61.56%, v/v) of 0.503 m³/kg COD/m³ h at optimum parameters. The maximum COD and BOD reduction of the sugar industry wastewaters are 76.82% (w/w) and 81.65% (w/w) at optimum biomethanation parameters, respectively.     

Alumina Dissolution into Silicate Slag

Dissolution of commercial white fused and tabular Al₂O₃ grains into a model silicate slag was investigated after 1 h at 1450° and 1600°C. Formation of CA₆ and hercynitic spinel layers was observed at all Al₂O₃/slag interfaces. The spinel layer was not always continuous, and so, compared with the CA₆ layer, it had a less-significant effect on the dissolution process. The CA₆ layer that formed adjacent to the tabular Al₂O₃ was incomplete at both temperatures, so that its dissolution was not a totally indirect process. These incomplete CA₆ and spinel layers meant that slag penetrated into the tabular Al₂O₃ grains, which, thus, were corroded and disintegrated by the penetrating slag. There was evidence of liquid in the CA₆ layer adjacent to the fused Al₂O₃ after 1 h at 1450°C, which also enabled direct dissolution. After 1 h at 1600°C, fused Al₂O₃ revealed a thick (∼60 μm), continuous and unpene-trated CA₆ layer, indicating fully indirect dissolution at this temperature.     

Validation of caregiver interviews to diagnose common causes of severe neonatal illness

The objective of this study was to validate retrospective caregiver interviews for diagnosing major causes of severe neonatal illness and death. A convenience sample of 149 infants aged < 28 days with one or more suspected diagnoses of interest (low birthweight/severe malnutrition, preterm birth, birth asphyxia, birth trauma, neonatal tetanus, pneumonia, meningitis, septicaemia, diarrhoea, congenital malformation or injury) was taken from patients admitted to two hospitals in Dhaka, Bangladesh. Study paediatricians performed a standardised history and physical examination and ordered laboratory and radiographic tests according to study criteria. With a median interval of 64.5 days after death or hospital discharge, caregivers of 118 (79%) infants were interviewed about their child's illness. Using reference diagnoses based on predefined clinical and laboratory criteria, the sensitivity and specificity of particular combinations of signs (algorithms) reported by the caregivers were ascertained. Sufficient numbers of children with five reference standard diagnoses were studied to validate caregiver reports. Algorithms with sensitivity and specificity > 80% were identified for neonatal tetanus, low birthweight/severe malnutrition and preterm delivery. Algorithms with specificities > 80% for birth asphyxia and pneumonia had sensitivities < 70%, or alternatively had high sensitivity with lower specificity. In settings with limited access to medical care, retrospective caregiver interviews provide a valid means of diagnosing several of the most common causes of severe neonatal illness and death.     

A LAN emulation model for wireless ATM

An architecture based on emulated LAN is proposed which can efficiently provide the required bandwidth of mobiles as they migrate between cells. The proposed solution (1) ensures the required bandwidth of a mobile when its path changes because of handoff, (2) efficiently reserves bandwidth resulting in higher bandwidth/network utilization, (3) has the flexibility of reserving bandwidth depending upon the mobility (rate of handoff). Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.