Evaluation of contextual information retrieval effectiveness: overview of issues and research

The increasing prominence of information arising from a wide range of sources delivered over electronic media has made traditional information retrieval systems less effective. Indeed, users are overwhelmed by the information delivered by such systems in response to their queries, particularly when the latter are ambiguous. In order to tackle this problem, the state-of-the-art reveals that there is a growing interest towards contextual information retrieval which relies on various sources of evidence issued from the user’s search background and environment like interests, preferences, time and location, in order to improve the retrieval accuracy. Contextual information retrieval systems are based on different definitions of the core concept of user’s context, various user’s context modeling approaches and several techniques of document relevance measurement, but all share the goal of providing the most useful information to the users in accordance with their context. However, the evaluation methodologies conceived in the past several years for traditional information retrieval and widely used in the evaluation campaigns have been challenged by the consideration of user’s context in the information retrieval process. Thus, we recognize that a critical review of existing evaluation methodologies in contextual information retrieval area is needed in order to design and develop standard evaluation frameworks. We present in this paper a comprehensive survey of contextual information retrieval evaluation methodologies and provide insights into how and why they are appropriate to measure the retrieval effectiveness. We also highlight some of the research challenges ahead that would constitute substantive research area for future research.     

Plasma cell adaptation to enhance particle acceleration

A plasma study is performed in order to construct a cell for plasma acceleration purpose. As well, a multicell design is introduced for the injection of beam driver application. The suggested idea is experimentally demonstrated for two plasma cell configuration. The preformed plasma is obtained by a symmetrically driven capacitive audio frequency discharge. It is featured by its moderate pressure of 0.1-0.2 Torr, low consumption power of 130 W maximum, low discharge voltage and frequency up to 950 V and 20 kHz, respectively, and high plasma density from 10(11) to 10(15) cm(-3). The electron temperature obtained by Langmuir double probe varies from 1 up to 16 eV. It is observed that the increases of the discharge voltage and frequency enlarge the plasma parameters to their maximum values. The plasma cell filled with different gases demonstrates that the Ar and He gases manifest the highest ionization efficiency exceeding 100% at 950 V and 20 kHz. The formed plasma is cold; its density is uniform and stable along the positive column for long competitive lifetime. Showing that it follows the conditions to enhance particle acceleration and in conjunction with its periphery devices form a plasma cell that could be extended to serve this purpose. Demonstrating that an injected electron beam into the extended preformed plasma could follow, to long distance, a continuous trajectory of uniform density. Such plasma generated by H(2) or Ar gases is suggested to be used, respectively, for low-density or higher density beam driver.     

An Efficient Hybrid Particle Swarm Optimization Algorithm for Solving the Uncapacitated Continuous Location-Allocation Problem

Location-allocation problems are a class of complicated optimization problems that determine the location of facilities and the allocation of customers to the facilities. In this paper, the uncapacitated continuous location-allocation problem is considered, and a particle swarm optimization approach, which has not previously been applied to this problem, is presented. Two algorithms including classical and hybrid particle swarm optimization algorithms are developed. Local optima of the problem are obtained by two local search heuristics that exist in the literature. These algorithms are combined with particle swarm optimization to construct an efficient hybrid approach. Many large-scale problems are used to measure the effectiveness and efficiency of the proposed algorithms. Our results are compared with the best algorithms in the literature. The experimental results show that the hybrid PSO produces good solutions, is more efficient than the classical PSO, and is competitive with the best results from the literature. Additionally, the proposed hybrid PSO found better solutions for some instances than did the best known solutions in the literature.     

Behaviour of Oxidized Starches Towards Cyanoethylation

Starch of different molecular sizes brought about by oxidation of maize and rice starches were cyanoethylated under identical conditions. The degree of cyanoethylation, expressed as % N, was found to depend mainly on the molecular size of starch irrespective of its kind. As the molecular size decreases the degree of cyanoethylation increases. Cyanoethyl starches are water soluble and can be precipitated by ethanol. It was also found that the rheological properties are determined by the nitrogen content of cyanoethyl starch. When the latter acquires low nitrogen content, it exhibits non-Newtonian pseudoplastic behaviour. On the other hand, cyanoethyl starches with higher nitrogen content are characterized by non-Newtonian thixotropic. At constant rate of shear, the apparent viscosity of cyanoethyl starches is directly related to its molecular size. Storing of pastes prepared from these cyanoethyl starches for 7 d exerts considerable influence on rheological properties and apparent viscosity of these derivatives.     

Factors Affecting the Technological Properties of Starch Carbamate

Starches having different molecular sizes were obtained by subjecting rice starch and maize starch, independently, to oxidation with aqueous sodium hypochlorite solutions of different concentrations. These starches were then reacted with urea in a dry state to yield mainly starch carbamate. The latter was isolated from the reaction products by treatment of the latter with either water or 4% aqueous NaOH solution. It was observed that regardless of the kind and molecular size of starch, treatment with water brings about starch carbamate which swells but does not dissolve completely in water. Against this was water soluble starch carbamate isolated by ethyl alcohol precipitation from NaOH solution (after neutralization). Studies of the rheological properties of the water soluble starch carbamates revealed that starch carbamates derived from rice starches are characterized by either thixotropic or pseudoplastic character depending on the molecular structure of starch. On the other hand, starch carbamates derived from maize starch exhibit pseudoplastic behaviour by virtue of their relatively lower molecular weight and higher carboxyl content. It was also found that the apparent viscosity of starch carbamates is determined by the kind of starch, the degree of oxidation and the storing time.     

New Red- and Green-Emitting Phosphors, AYP2O7.5:RE3+ (A=Ca and Sr; RE=Eu and Tb) under Near-UV Irradiation

New red- and green-emitting phosphors, AY_{1− x} P₂O_7.5: x RE³⁺ (A=Ca and Sr; x =0.01, 0.03, 0.05, 0.10; RE=Eu and Tb) were synthesized by the conventional ceramic route and their photoluminescence properties under near-ultraviolet (UV) irradiation were investigated. It was found that CaYP₂O_7.5: Eu³⁺ phosphor emits strong red light when excited by a radiation of 394-nm wavelength and SrYP₂O_7.5:Eu³⁺ gives intense orange light when excited by a radiation of 396-nm wavelength. Strong green emission for AY_{1− x} P₂O_7.5:Tb³⁺ is also observed under near-UV irradiation (378 nm). When compared with emission intensity from a standard YPO₄:0.05Tb³⁺, the emission from SrYP₂O_7.5:0.05Tb³⁺ showed greater intensity values under the same excitation wavelength (378 nm). X-ray powder diffraction analysis showed that AYP₂O_7.5 has xenotime-type structure.     

New Square-Root Domain Oscillators

This paper presents phase calibration technique without using any external tone for weaver image-reject receiver. Error signal (phase mismatch information) is generated using a simple algorithm and this signal is used for mismatch elimination. Calibration system has been implemented using simulink which shows an image rejection ratio of 59.5 dB can be achieved for RF signal operating at 1.8 GHz.     

Green tissue‐specific production of a microbial endo‐cellulase in maize (Zea mays L.) endoplasmic‐reticulum and mitochondria converts cellulose into fermentable sugars

BACKGROUND: Commercial conversion of lignocellulosic biomass to fermentable sugars for biofuels and chemical byproducts uses relatively expensive bulk production of biologically active cellulase enzymes, which could alternatively be achieved by using solar energy for direct production of these enzymes within feedstock crop cellulosic biomass. RESULTS: The Acidothermus cellulolyticus endo‐cellulase E1 has been produced in transgenic maize plants. This heterologous enzyme was specifically targeted for accumulation into two sub‐cellular compartments, endoplasmic reticulum (ER) or mitochondria of plant leaves and stalks. Furthermore, successful use of this maize‐produced heterologous cellulase in converting cellulose into fermentable sugars for biofuels, has been confirmed. CONCLUSIONS: Green‐specific expression of cellulases in maize plants can avoid public controversies associated with production of transgene products in maize seeds and/or pollen. Sub‐cellular targeting of cellulases may result in better expression of transgene products because these compartments, specially ER, normally contain molecular chaperones that enhance protein folding and there the biological activity. Also, using solar energy to produce cellulases within crop cellulosic biomass can replace the costly process of cellulase production in microbial bioreactors, and therefore, save costs. Copyright © 2008 Society of Chemical Industry     

Modification of rheological and filtration characteristics of water‐based mud for drilling oil and gas wells using green SiO2 @ZnO@Xanthan nanocomposite

In this study, a green, simple and economical approach was used to synthesise the SiO₂ @ZnO@Xanthan nanocomposite (NC) to modify the rheological and filtration characteristics of the water‐based drilling mud. The green synthesised NCs were identified using scanning electron microscopy, energy dispersive X‐ray spectroscopy, elemental mapping, X‐ray diffraction and UV–Vis analytical techniques. Additionally, the effect of SiO₂ @ZnO@Xanthan NCs on the filtration and rheological properties of mud including apparent viscosity, plastic viscosity, yield point, gel strength, mud cake and fluid loss was investigated. The obtained results confirmed that the synthesised NCs effectively improved the rheological properties of drilling mud, and considerably decreased its fluid loss and filter cake by about 54 and 92.5%, respectively. The results highly recommend the SiO₂ @ZnO@Xanthan NC as an excellent additive to improve the rheological properties, and reduce the fluid loss and the filter cake of the drilling mud.Inspec keywords: X‐ray diffraction, scanning electron microscopy, nanofabrication, additives, nanocomposites, X‐ray chemical analysis, drilling (geotechnical), yield point, rheology, filtration, industrial economics, silicon compounds, zinc compounds, ultraviolet spectra, visible spectra, nanofluidics, gelsOther keywords: rheological properties, fluid loss, drilling mud, filtration characteristics, water‐based mud, green approach, economical approach, X‐ray spectroscopy, mud cake, apparent viscosity, oil‐gas wells, nanocomposite synthesis, scanning electron microscopy, energy dispersive X‐ray spectroscopy, elemental mapping, X‐ray diffraction, Uv–Vis spectroscopy, plastic viscosity, yield point, gel strength, additive, SiO₂ , ZnO