Measurement and Analysis of Vibration Levels in Two and Three Wheel Delivery Vehicles in Southeast Asia

Different types of small vehicles such as two‐wheel and three‐wheel motorcycles are commonly used for domestic delivery in many countries in Asia, particularly in Southeast (SE) Asia. These types of vehicles are mostly used for delivery of packages in the last leg of the supply chain. This study was initiated at the Technical Council meeting of International Safe Transit Association to understand the vibration levels that exist in delivering packages in SE Asia for the ‘last leg’. The study measured the vibration levels that are experienced by packages in Thailand and Indonesia. The delivery process in these countries uses two‐wheel and three‐wheel light vehicles to deliver printers and small packages. However, this portion of data and testing has often been overlooked by packaging test standards used in North America and Europe to design and test packages during the development process. The ‘last leg’ delivery method discussed has generally been considered the fast, convenient and flexible way of product delivery. Data recorders were mounted on the vehicle floor to measure acceleration levels during delivery in commonly used routes in the major cities in these two countries. Measured data in this research show that the vibration levels in these ‘last leg’ delivery routes are actually lower than those measured in truck and container shipment across road and rail transportation in North America that has been previously studied by the authors. Vibration levels in the two‐wheel vehicles with rear trunk containers were higher than those in the three‐wheel vehicles. Copyright © 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Liquefied Capsules Coated with Multilayered Polyelectrolyte Films for Cell Immobilization

Natural‐derived polymers are used to coat liquid‐core capsules layer by layer to encapsulate cells. Human osteoblast‐like cells (SaOs‐2) are encapsulated in such spherical devices using a three‐step methodology: i) ionotropic gelation to produce alginate beads encapsulating the cells; ii) layer‐by‐layer coating using water‐soluble chitosan and alginate; and iii) core liquefaction. Cells remain viable for 3 d after the encapsulation procedure, suggesting that the developed capsules possess a semipermeable, nanostructured coating. All of the capsules exhibit a spherical shape, smooth surface and liquid‐core characteristics. All of the processes are conducted under mild conditions and physiological pH. We consider that the methodology employed in the development of the capsules obtained from natural‐based biomaterials has potential to find applicability in the development of scaffolds or cell carriers in tissue engineering and regenerative medicine.     

Numerical Simulation and Experimental Verification of CMOD in SENT Specimen: Application on FCGR of Welded Tool Steel

Single-edged notched tension (SENT) specimen is used to study the fatigue crack growth rate (FCGR) behavior of AISI 50100 steel using MTS 810. Calibration tests are run to get plots of crack mouth opening displacement (CMOD) vs. load and CMOD vs. crack length-to-width ratio with the known crack lengths. Numerical simulation is also done to try to establish a relation between crack length and CMOD. FCGR of welded and un-welded specimens are plotted against stress intensity factor range to show the effect of welding on fatigue crack growth rate of AISI 50100 steel. The experimentally obtained CMOD values are compared with values obtained by numerical simulation using ABAQUS/StandardTM software package. Results show that numerical values are in good agreement with experimental data for small crack lengths and lower values of applied load.     

Superconductivity in Co and Li Substituted Cu0.5Tl0.5Ba2Ca2Cu3?x Co x O10?��

We have tried to explore the possible sources of suppression of superconducting properties in cobalt substituted Cu_0.5Tl_0.5Ba₂Ca₂Cu_3?x Co _x O_10??? (x=0,0.05,0.1,0.5) superconductor. It can be expected from these studies that Co substitution at Cu sites in the CuO₂ planes somehow localizes the carriers and decreases the mobile carriers density. The density of mobile carriers in the CuO₂ planes can be restored by partial substitution of Li at Tl sites in Cu_0.5Tl_0.5Ba₂O_4??? charge reservoir layer of Cu_0.5Tl_0.5Ba₂Ca₂Cu_3?x Co _x O_10??? superconductor; since alkali metals are known to lose their outermost ??s-orbital?? electron easily, which can be supplied to the CuO₂ planes. The post-annealing experiments on these samples have been carried out in flowing oxygen and nitrogen and the motivation behind these extreme post-annealing conditions was to optimize the carriers density in the CuO₂ planes of Cu_0.5Tl_0.5Ba₂Ca₂Cu_3?x Co _x O_10??? superconductor. The optimized free carrier density in the CuO₂ planes enhances the superconducting properties of the final compound.     

Selection and socialization of risky drinking during the college transition: The importance of microenvironments associated with specific living units.

Risky drinking among college students differs as a function of living types, with living at Greek houses as a major risk factor. Both self-selection based on prior drinking and socialization through living environments have been shown to account for this association. However, it is not clear whether selection and socialization processes occur as a function of specific living units within living types. Multilevel models using a prospective sample of incoming college students (N = 2,392) demonstrated that (1) precollege drinking based selection into specific living units occurred within both fraternity houses and residence halls (beyond selection into the Greek system in general) and (2) socialization of extremely risky drinking among certain fraternity houses was greater than other houses (beyond greater socialization of living at fraternity houses than residence halls in general). Living unit-level precollege correlates (i.e., college attendance motives and cigarette use) and college correlates (i.e., peer drinking norms and alcohol availability) accounted for most of the selection and socialization effects. These findings highlight the importance of micro-environments associated with specific living units in risky drinking during the college transition. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

The flight activity of Prostephanus truncatus (Horn) (Coleoptera: Bostrichidae) and Teretrius nigrescens Lewis (Coleoptera: Histeridae) in Kenya

The invasive storage pest, the larger grain borer (LGB) Prostephanus truncatus (Horn), was introduced into the maize-deficit, semi-arid areas of the eastern region in Kenya in the early 1980s. In spite of containment efforts and the introduction of the predator Teretrius nigrescens Lewis from Mexico, LGB has spread to the main maize production zone in western Kenya during the past five years. The present work presents results from a 28-month monitoring effort of LGB and its predator, using pheromone traps at five locations along an east-west transect across Kenya. LGB occurred in all regions with highest trap catches in the high potential maize production zones in Western Kenya. T. nigrescens had not spread to western Kenya and trap catches were very low and mostly zero in Eastern Kenya, even in the area where it was released during the 1990s, suggesting that it became locally extinct after initial establishment. LGB flight activity was closely related to relative humidity, temperature and vapour pressure deficit. A model based on climatic factors accurately predicted seasonal trends of LGB flight behaviour in Kakamega and Mombasa but not in Kitale and Thika. It was concluded that models that rely on the direct effect of climate cannot predict LGB flight accurately enough to allow assessment of the impact of T. nigrescens on a regional basis. It is suggested that other factors such as the availability of stored grain and thus the indirect effect of climate via enhanced or reduced crop production play a major role in the flight activity of LGB and T. nigrescens.     

A new state model of liquid-vapor interfaces—to yield analytical expression for surface tension

Based on the van der Waals fluid model, a simple equation of state, unique for non-uniform fluids, is developed. It is applied to the liquid-vapor interface, to derive the density profile in the interfacial region. The density profile is used in conjunction with the gradient theory, to yield an expression for the surface tension of a saturated fluid as a function of temperature and fluid properties. The non-dimensionalized influence parameter of the gradient theory is assigned best-fit values, which are of a unity order of magnitude, as expected. The predicted surface tension values are in good agreement with experimental data, for a variety of fluids.     

Replicating data objects in large distributed database systems: an axiomatic game theoretic mechanism design approach

Data object replication onto distributed servers can potentially alleviate bottlenecks, reduce network traffic, increase scalability, add robustness, and decrease user perceived access time. The decision of selecting data object and server pairs requires solving a constraint optimization problem that in general is NP-complete. In this paper, we abstract the distributed database system as an agent-based model, wherein agents continuously compete for allocation and reallocation of data objects. Each agent aims to replicate objects onto its server such that the communication cost is minimized. However, these agents do not have a global view of the system. Thereby, the optimization process becomes highly localized. Such localized optimization may severely affect the overall system performance. To cope with such localized optimization, we propose a “semi-distributed” axiomatic game theoretical mechanism. The mechanism’s control is unique in its decision making process, wherein all the heavy processing is done on the servers of the distributed system and the central body is only required to take a binary decision: (0) not to replicate or (1) to replicate. The cost model used by the agents in the mechanism for the purpose of identifying beneficial data objects is tailored made so that even though the agents take decisions based on their local knowledge domain, the effect is translated into a system-wide performance enhancement. The proposed mechanism is extensively compared against seven well-known conventional and three game theoretical replica allocation methods, namely, branch and bound, greedy, genetic, data-aware replication, tree inspired bottom-up procedure, tree inspired min-max procedure, Benders’ decomposition based procedure, game theoretical English auction, game theoretical Dutch auction, and game theoretical selfish replication procedure. The experimental setup incorporates GT-ITM, Inet network topology generators, Soccer World Cup 1998 access logs, and NASA Kennedy Space Center access logs to closely mimic the Web in its infrastructure and user access patterns. The experimental results reveal that the proposed technique despite its non-cooperative nature improves the solution quality and reduces the execution time compared to other techniques.     

Characterizing the life stressors of children of alcoholic parents.

The current study examined differences between children of alcoholic (COAs) and nonalcoholic parents in their experience of negative life events across 3 longitudinal studies together spanning the first 3 decades of life. The authors posited that COAs would differ from their peers in the life domains in which they are vulnerable to stressors, in the recurrence of stressors, and in the severity of stressors. Scale- and item-level analyses of adjusted odds ratios based on stressors across 7 life domains showed that COAs consistently reported greater risk for stressors in the family domain. COAs were also more likely to experience stressors repetitively and to rate their stressors as more severe (in adulthood). Implications for prevention and intervention programs targeting this risk group are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)     

Dual mechanisms underlying accentuation of risky drinking via fraternity/sorority affiliation: The role of personality, peer norms, and alcohol availability.

Heavy drinkers prior to college have been shown to increase their drinking in college via their self-selection into the Greek societies and subsequent Greek influence on their drinking. This study characterized the dual mechanisms underlying these processes: (a) the Greek selection on the basis of personality and precollege drinking and (b) the Greek influence through alcohol-conducive environmental factors. Prospective data obtained in the summer prior to college and over the first 6 semesters of college (N = 3,099) indicated strong precollege drinking-based selection, strong initial influence immediately after college entrance, and sustained influence afterward. Impulsivity/novelty seeking was associated with Greek affiliation both directly and indirectly via precollege drinking, whereas extraversion and neuroticism were associated with Greek affiliation largely independent of precollege drinking. Greek affiliation was related to higher levels of drinking norms immediately after college entrance and alcohol availability by the sophomore year, but not afterward, after controlling for prior drinking. Findings highlight the diverse mechanisms underlying accentuation of risky drinking over the transition to college and during the college years, through dynamic interplay between individuals and high-risk environments. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)