A methodology for measuring interface fracture properties of composite materials

A methodology is presented for measuring interface fracture properties of composite materials. A bimaterial Brazilian disk specimen with a crack along the interface is employed. The specimen is analyzed by means of the finite element method and a conservative integral to determine stress intensity factors as a function of loading angle and crack length. A weight function is employed to determine the effect of residual curing stresses on the stress intensity factors. These are combined to determine the critical interface energy release rate _ic as a function of stress intensity phase angle for tests carried out on a glass/epoxy material pair.     

Ant colony optimization algorithm to solve for the transportation problem of cross-docking network

This paper addresses the transportation problem of cross-docking network where the loads are transferred from origins (suppliers) to destinations (retailers) through cross-docking facilities, without storing them in a distribution center (DC). We work on minimizing the transportation cost in a network by loading trucks in the supplier locations and then route them either directly to the customers or indirectly to cross-docking facilities so the loads can be consolidated. For generating a truck operating plan in this type of distribution network, the problem was formulated using an integer programming (IP) model and solved using a novel ant colony optimization (ACO) algorithm. We solved several numerical examples for verification and demonstrative purposes and found that our proposed approach finds solutions that significantly reduce the shipping cost in the network of cross-docks and considerably outperform Branch-and-Bound algorithm especially for large problems.     

A computer-aided ECG diagnostic tool

Jordan lacks companies that provide local medical facilities with products that are of help in daily performed medical procedures. Because of this, the country imports most of these expensive products. Consequently, a local interest in producing such products has emerged and resulted in serious research efforts in this area. The main goal of this paper is to provide local (the north of Jordan) clinics with a computer-aided electrocardiogram (ECG) diagnostic tool in an attempt to reduce time and work demands for busy physicians especially in areas where only one general medicine doctor is employed and a bulk of cases are to be diagnosed. The tool was designed to help in detecting heart defects such as arrhythmias and heart blocks using ECG signal analysis depending on the time-domain representation, the frequency-domain spectrum, and the relationship between them. The application studied here represents a state of the art ECG diagnostic tool that was designed, implemented, and tested in Jordan to serve wide spectrum of population who are from poor families. The results of applying the tool on randomly selected representative sample showed about 99% matching with those results obtained at specialized medical facilities. Costs, ease of interface, and accuracy indicated the usefulness of the tool and its use as an assisting diagnostic tool.     

Modified Buffalo Optimization with Big Data Analytics Assisted Intrusion Detection Model

Lately, the Internet of Things (IoT) application requires millions of structured and unstructured data since it has numerous problems, such as data organization, production, and capturing. To address these shortcomings, big data analytics is the most superior technology that has to be adapted. Even though big data and IoT could make human life more convenient, those benefits come at the expense of security. To manage these kinds of threats, the intrusion detection system has been extensively applied to identify malicious network traffic, particularly once the preventive technique fails at the level of endpoint IoT devices. As cyberattacks targeting IoT have gradually become stealthy and more sophisticated, intrusion detection systems (IDS) must continually emerge to manage evolving security threats. This study devises Big Data Analytics with the Internet of Things Assisted Intrusion Detection using Modified Buffalo Optimization Algorithm with Deep Learning (IDMBOA-DL) algorithm. In the presented IDMBOA-DL model, the Hadoop MapReduce tool is exploited for managing big data. The MBOA algorithm is applied to derive an optimal subset of features from picking an optimum set of feature subsets. Finally, the sine cosine algorithm (SCA) with convolutional autoencoder (CAE) mechanism is utilized to recognize and classify the intrusions in the IoT network. A wide range of simulations was conducted to demonstrate the enhanced results of the IDMBOA-DL algorithm. The comparison outcomes emphasized the better performance of the IDMBOA-DL model over other approaches.     

Modelling and investigation of clean power wind energy systems by using UPQC

This article presents a new clean power technique for wind energy system based on Unified Power Quality Conditioner (UPQC) with usage of various Artificial Intelligent techniques (AI). Application of AI techniques such as Artificial Neural Networks, Fuzzy Logic is growing fast in the area of power electronics equipment‐based wind energy system, for instance, UPQC. A novel control scheme is developed by using different AI techniques to mitigate the balancing issues and to control the power–quality problems in UPQC and hence to provide clean power to the grid. The proposed system is composed of shunt active power filter, and the inherent proportional integral (PI) control parameters are tuned with application of PI techniques. A detailed Matlab simulation study is carried out with an application of PI techniques under sag, swell, unbalanced, and harmonic conditions. An exhaustive simulation study is carried out to investigate the application of PI technique‐based controllers and compare its performance with the conventional PI controller with its results explored. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Optimisation of K-Out-Of-N systems subject to common-cause failures with repair provision

This paper considers K-Out-Of-N systems that is subject to two modes of failures, Common cause failures (CCFs) and Random failures, We assure that the system is repaired after each system failure. We develop an optimality criterion leading to the optimal number of units N^* for a K-Out-Of-N system, based on cost considerations. Numerical examples are included to illustrate the procedure.     

Minimizing Wavelength Conversions in WDM Path Establishment*

This paper studies algorithms for connection establishment in wavelength division multiplexing networks. Although wavelength conversion capabilities are assumed at each node in the network, the goal of this research is to minimize or impose an upper bound on the number of wavelength conversions on the established path. Two types of schemes are investigated and compared. In the first scheme, the wavelengths are selected adaptively during path establishment on a given route, and in the second scheme, both the route and the wavelength assignment are selected optimally based on global information about path costs and wavelength availability in the network. We present two efficient algorithms for globally selecting routes and wavelengths, one finds the least cost route for a maximum number of wavelength conversions, and the other selects from among the shortest routes, the one with a minimum number of wavelength conversions. The results of comparing the two path establishment schemes show that, for dynamically changing traffic, the adaptive selection of wavelengths on a fixed route during path establishment is more beneficial than the optimal selection of the route and wavelengths prior to path establishment.     

A 2 GHz Phase-Locked Loop Frequency Synthesizer with On-Chip VCO

This paper discusses the implementation of the building blocks for a 2 GHz phase-locked loop frequency synthesizer in a standard 0.5 m BiCMOS process. These blocks include a low-power optimized dual modulus prescaler which is able to operate with input frequencies up to 2.7 GHz, a phase detector with extremely constant gain throughout the input phase difference range, a chargepump with a rail-to-rail output, and an on-chip voltage-controlled oscillator.     

Performance evaluation of multiuser diversity in multiuser two‐hop cooperative multi‐relay wireless networks using maximal ratio combining over Rayleigh fading channels

Multiuser diversity (MUD) cooperative wireless networks combine the features of the MIMO systems without confronting the physical layer constraints by providing multiple copies of the transmitted signal from the source to the destination with the help of the relay node. Cooperative wireless networks have attracted the full attention in the last few years and are implemented widely in many wireless communication systems to adapt for the fading impairments, provide higher data rates, and improve the performance of the wireless communication systems. In this paper, we present an informative study for the reason of evaluating the performance of the MUD in the multiuser two‐hop cooperative multi‐relay networks using maximal ratio combining. Furthermore, we derive tight closed‐form expressions of outage probability and symbol error probability for the amplify‐and‐forward and fixed decode‐and‐forward protocols with the MUD. Additionally, we conduct a simulation study to show to what extent our analytical and simulation results agree with each other. It is worthy to mention that our analytical and simulation results agree fairly with each other under high average signal‐to‐noise ratio, whereas they show that our proposed system with multiple relays provides significant improvements over those previously proposed systems having only one relay. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.