Multi-resolution texture analysis for fingerprint based age-group estimation

Multimedia Tools and Applications - In this paper the possibility of using digital fingerprints to estimate age-groups of human being, particularly children is investigated. To our knowledge,...     

What does MIS survey research reveal about diversity and representativeness in the MIS field? A content analysis approach

Scientometrics - Diversity and representativeness are two enriching components of an academic field and for quite some time, Management Information Systems (MIS) researchers have been advocating...     

Study of Aging-Induced Degradation of Fracture Resistance of Alloy 617 Toward High-Temperature Applications

For the Alloy 617, the effect of aging on the fracture energy degradation has been investigated after aging for different time periods at 1023 K (750 °C). A sharp reduction in impact energy (by ~55 pct vis-à-vis the as-received material) after 1000 hours of aging, as evaluated from room-temperature Charpy impact tests, has been observed. Further aging up to 10,000 hours has led to a degradation of fracture energy up to ~78 pct. Fractographic examinations using scanning electron microscopy (SEM) have revealed a change in fracture mode from fibrous-ductile for the un-aged material to intergranular mode for the aged one. The extent of intergranular fracture increases with the increasing aging time, indicating a tendency of the material to undergo grain boundary embrittlement over long-term aging. Analysis of the transmission electron microscopy (TEM) micrographs along with selected area diffraction (SAD) patterns for the samples aged at 10,000 hours revealed finely dispersed γ′ precipitates of size 30 to 40 nm, rich in Al and Ti, along with extensive precipitation of M₂₃C₆ at the grain boundaries. In addition, the presence of Ni₃Si of size in the range of 110 to 120 nm also has been noticed. The extensive precipitation of M₂₃C₆ at the grain boundaries have been considered as a major reason for aging-induced embrittlement of this material.     

Methodology for implementing power plant efficiency standards for power generation: potential emission reduction

Some methods of generating power such as power generation through coal, natural gas, oil result in inevitable emissions of greenhouse gases. While power generation is necessary due to its increasing demand, it is important for power companies to generate their power in an efficient manner to reduce its effect on the environment. One of the most effective ways of tackling inefficiency issues is through the implementation of efficiency standard. While there exist a lot of studies addressing the topic of energy efficiency standards, there are very few papers that deal specifically with efficiency standard for power generation plant. This paper presents methodology for the implementation of power plant efficiency standard; as mandatory or voluntary regulatory instrument, that may be implemented by the government to control greenhouse emissions from power plants. It is hoped that through its implementation, power companies shall become more conscious of their efficiency and emission quality, hereby encouraging the adoption of more efficient energy sources and latest available technologies. In this paper, methods of calculating greenhouse intensity value and its corresponding allowable ranges have been demonstrated. Case study on a 10-year-old base-load multi-fuel-fired power plant in Malaysia has shown that the power plant is in conformance to the power plant efficiency standard, with an actual greenhouse intensity of 859.4461 kgCO₂/MWh sent-out, well within the allowable range of greenhouse intensities for that power plant which is between 760 and 890 kgCO₂/MWh sent-out. It has also been demonstrated that older power plants are allowed to have higher values of greenhouse intensity. Benefits of utilising natural gas and operating the power plant at full load have also been shown.

     

Distributed self-tuning of sensor networks

This work is motivated by the need for an ad hoc sensor network to autonomously optimise its performance for given task objectives and constraints. Arguing that communication is the main bottleneck for distributed computation in a sensor network we formulate two approaches for optimisation of computing rates. The first is a team problem for maximising the minimum communication throughput of sensors and the second is a game problem in which cost for each sensor is a measure of its communication time with its neighbours. We investigate adaptive algorithms using which sensors can tune to the optimal channel attempt rates in a distributed fashion. For the team problem, the adaptive scheme is a stochastic gradient algorithm derived from the augmented Lagrangian formulation of the optimisation problem. The game formulation not only leads to an explicit characterisation of the Nash equilibrium but also to a simple iterative scheme by which sensors can learn the equilibrium attempt probabilities using only the estimates of transmission and reception times from their local measurements. Our approach is promising and should be seen as a step towards developing optimally self-organising architectures for sensor networks. Aditya Karnik obtained his B.E. from the University of Pune, Pune, India, and M.E. and Ph.D. (2004) in electrical communication engg. from the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, India. He is currently a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Canada. He was a recipient of the IBM Research Fellowship. His research interests are in performance evaluation, optimisation and control of communication networks. Anurag Kumar obtained his B.Tech. degree from the Indian Institute of Technology at Kanpur, and the PhD degree from Cornell University, both in Electrical Engineering. He was then with Bell Laboratories, Holmdel, N.J., for over 6 years. Since 1988 he has been with the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bangalore, in the Dept. of Electrical Communication Engineering, where he is now a Professor, and is also the Chairman of the department. From 1988 to 2003 he was the Coordinator at IISc of the Education and Research Network Project (ERNET), India’s first wide-area packet switching network. His area of research is communication networking, specifically, modeling, analysis, control and optimisation problems arising in communication networks and distributed systems. Recently his research has focused primarily on wireless networking. He has been elected Fellow of the IEEE, and the Indian National Science Academy (INSA), both from 2006, and has been a Fellow of the Indian National Academy of Engineering (INAE) since 1998. He is an associate editor of IEEE Transactions on Networking, and of IEEE Communications Surveys and Tutorials. He is a coauthor of the advanced text-book “Communication Networking: An Analytical Approach,” by Kumar, Majunath and Kuri, published by Morgan-Kaufman/Elsevier. Vivek Borkar got his B. Tech. (Elec. Engg.) from Indian Institute of Technology, Mumbai, in 1976, M. S. (Systems and Control) from Case Western Reserve Uni. in 1977, and Ph.D. (Elec. Engg. and Computer Sci.) from the Uni. of California, Berkeley, in 1980. He was with TIFR Centre, Bangalore (1982–1989) and Indian Institute of Science (1989–1999) before taking up his present position at the School of Technology and Computer Science, Tata Inst. of Fundamental Research, Mumbai. He is a Fellow of the Indian Academy of Sciences, Indian National Science Academy, Indian National Academy of Engineers and the IEEE. His research interests are stochastic control, stochastic algorithms and applications. He is on the editorial boards of Sadhana, Systems and Control Letters, SIAM J. Control and Optim., and Applicationes Mathematicae. He is the author of ‘Optimal Control of Diffusion Processes’ (Longman, 1989), ‘Topics in Controlled Markov Chains’ (Longman, 1991), ‘Probability Theory: An Advanced Course’ (Springer, 1995).     

Phonon dispersion in binary metallic glasses

The theoretical computation of the phonon dynamics of two binary metallic glasses Zr₆₇Ni₃₃ and Co₆₇Zr₃₃ have been studied from the model potential formalism using three different theoretical models proposed by Hubbard-Beeby, Takeno-Goda, and Bhatia-Singh. Five local field correction functions, viz., Hartree, Taylor, Ichimaru-Utsumi, Farid et al., and Sarkar et al., are used for the first time in the present investigation to study the screening influence on the aforesaid properties. The pair potential is computed in the Wills-Harrison form and used to study the eigenfrequencies of longitudinal and transverse phonon modes. The present data on phonon dispersion curves of the Zr₆₇Ni₃₃ glass are compared with the available MD results at different temperatures. To explain the electron-ion interaction, the pseudo-alloy-atom model is applied for the first time instead of the Vegard’s law. Further, thermodynamic and elastic properties have also been calculated from the elastic part of the phonon dispersion curves. Computed yielding of the Zr₆₇Ni₃₃ glass is found in fair agreement with the available data.     

Direct synthesis of highly crystalline single-phase hexagonal tungsten oxide nanorods by spray pyrolysis

The metastable state hexagonal-tungsten oxide (h-WO₃) has been attracting attention over the past decade because of its high reactivity that arises from the hexagonal channels in its crystal structure. Simplification of the process used to synthesize h-WO₃ is an important step to facilitate the industrial applications of this material. In this study, we addressed this challenge by developing a spray pyrolysis process to synthesize highly crystalline h-WO₃. The ratio of the monoclinic to the hexagonal phase was controlled by adjusting the segregation time. Single-phase h-WO₃ nanorods were synthesized using a carrier gas flow rate of 1?L/min, which was equivalent to a segregation time of 18.4?s. The ability of the h-WO₃ nanorods to adsorb nitrogen and carbon dioxide was evaluated to confirm the presence of hexagonal channels in the crystal structure.     

An efficient face anti-spoofing and detection model using image quality assessment parameters

Multimedia Tools and Applications - Biometric authentication poses a significant problem as reconstructed sample or fake self-manufactured samples used by intruders for accessing the actual real...     

Hidden Markov models with random restarts versus boosting for malware detection

Journal of Computer Virology and Hacking Techniques - Effective and efficient malware detection is at the forefront of research into building secure digital systems. As with many other fields,...