Managing cooperation in e-business systems

E-Business management involves monitoring and controlling all forms of business transactions conducted over the Internet, extranets, and related communications technologies and services. As such, it includes the management of networks, systems, and software applications. E-Business management is beginning to depend increasingly on knowledge of the cooperative aspects of partners in a business chain and the cooperative aspects of stake-holders in e-business operations. The study of cooperation offers many opportunities to apply social network analyses to derive software solutions for the management of e-business. This article provides a methodology and case study that recognises the dimension of cooperation among a multiplicity of organisations, coined “Awareness-based Cooperative Management.” It is aimed towards the design or re-engineering of effective e-business management systems, where the key concept involves the degree of awareness held by e-business stake-holders. Awareness is defined in terms of stake-holder interactions and artefacts used in those interactions such as buyer specifications, requests for proposals, offers, service level agreements, and the like. Since awareness is an indispensable, albeit an inherently vague concept, we cast it and reason about it with the apparatus of fuzzy logic.

Development of a Mortality Prediction Model in Hospitalised SARS-CoV-2 Positive Patients Based on Routine Kidney Biomarkers

Acute kidney injury (AKI) is a prevalent complication in severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) positive inpatients, which is linked to an increased mortality rate compared to patients without AKI. Here we analysed the difference in kidney blood biomarkers in SARS-CoV-2 positive patients with non-fatal or fatal outcome, in order to develop a mortality prediction model for hospitalised SARS-CoV-2 positive patients. A retrospective cohort study including data from suspected SARS-CoV-2 positive patients admitted to a large National Health Service (NHS) Foundation Trust hospital in the Yorkshire and Humber regions, United Kingdom, between 1 March 2020 and 30 August 2020. Hospitalised adult patients (aged ≥ 18 years) with at least one confirmed positive RT-PCR test for SARS-CoV-2 and blood tests of kidney biomarkers within 36 h of the RT-PCR test were included. The main outcome measure was 90-day in-hospital mortality in SARS-CoV-2 infected patients. The logistic regression and random forest (RF) models incorporated six predictors including three routine kidney function tests (sodium, urea; creatinine only in RF), along with age, sex, and ethnicity. The mortality prediction performance of the logistic regression model achieved an area under receiver operating characteristic (AUROC) curve of 0.772 in the test dataset (95% CI: 0.694–0.823), while the RF model attained the AUROC of 0.820 in the same test cohort (95% CI: 0.740–0.870). The resulting validated prediction model is the first to focus on kidney biomarkers specifically on in-hospital mortality over a 90-day period.     

Encapsulation of food grade antioxidant in natural biopolymer by electrospinning technique: A physicochemical study based on zein–gallic acid system

Gallic acid was successfully incorporated into zein ultra-fine fibres at different loading amount (5%, 10% and 20%) in order to develop an encapsulating technology for functional ingredient delivery using electrospinning. The produced fibres exhibit diameters ranging from 327 to 387 nm. The physical and thermal properties of encapsulated gallic acid were determined by X-ray diffraction (XRD) and differential scanning calorimetry (DSC); and the interaction between gallic acid and zein was attested by attenuated total reflection-Fourier transform infrared (ATR-FTIR). Thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) demonstrated a different thermal stability of the fabricated complex before and after the gallic acid incorporation. Lastly, the 1,1′-diphenyl-2-picrylhydrazyl (DPPH) assay showed that the gallic acid had retained its antioxidant activity after incorporation in zein electrospun fibres. Overall, electrospinning technique had shown promising results as an efficient and effective method for the preparation of sub-micron structured encapsulated functional ingredient that may find uses in food industry.     

美国火电厂烟气排放限值及控制技术

美国火电厂烟气排放限值及控制技术在过去的37年内不断发展进步.受限制的排放物越来越多,而且对每种污染物的限值日益严格.总结了当今美国使用的排放限值及控制技术,并展望了未来的排放限值及潜在的排放控制技术.     

The determination of cloud pattern motions from geosynchronous satellite image data

Cloud motion can be determined from sequential pictures obtained from the geosynchronous Applications Technology Satellites, ATS-I and ATS-III. Experiments have been conducted using two automated techniques for computing the cloud motions over the time interval between two digitized pictures. One technique is a direct application of cross-correlation using the fast Fourier Transform (fFT). In the other, a relatively simple matching technique is used in the computer to recognize binary images of cloud fields on each member of a picture pair. Results obtained from the two techniques are similar. The computed directions are in good agreement with those determined by manual methods with indications that computed speeds are more accurately resolved than those determined manually.     

Constructing virtual environments for manufacturing simulation

Virtual environments (VE) are becoming an important tool for simulating manufacturing systems. A problem in their adoption is the lack of an easy and effective approach to building large and complex virtual environments that are required by many manufacturing simulation tasks. This paper reports on research into this problem and presents a novel approach - domain-analysis-based top-down construction - to constructing complex virtual manufacturing environments. Based on this approach, a software system is designed and implemented to provide easy-to-use and flexible tools that enable users to construct virtual environments rapidly and with minimum modelling effort.     

Evaluation of fire performance of organic fire retardant free acrylic based coatings applied on various building materials by cone calorimetric method

Fire performance of water‐based plaster systems containing acrylic copolymer binder and non‐flammable mineral and ceramic fillers intended for decorative coating application was determined by cone calorimetric method. The coatings were applied on common building substrate materials used in construction sector, namely, Medium Density Fibre (MDF) boards, Gypsum Boards (GIB) and Stainless Steel (SS), and the different plaster finishes attempted on these substrates were Tierrafino, Suave and Bone China respectively. Group numbers of the different test samples were also evaluated following the Kokkala method. Based on various measurements, especially heat release, smoke evolution, mass loss data and the Group number estimates, it is evident that these organic fire retardant free coatings can offer good fire safety if applied on appropriate substrates like GIB or SS. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Hydraulic characteristics and startup of anaerobic rotating biological contactors

Abstract

In this study the hydraulic characteristics and the start‐up of anaerobic rotating biological contactor (AnRBC) were investigated experimentally and theoretically. Results of tracer study showed that the AnRBC reactor is a well‐mixed reactor in the first and second stages. Start‐up of the AnRBC reactor was successfully carried out using high strength synthetic wastewaters at hydraulic retention time of 21.6 hours, organic surface loading of 111.4 g‐COD/m²?d, organic volumetric loading of 13.33 Kg‐COD/m³?d, disk rotational speed of 12 rpm and 100% disk submergence. In the steady‐state operating condition, the removal efficiencies of soluble COD and BOD could be up to 71% and 76% for the inlet COD and BOD concentrations of 12,000 and 7,267 mgL^‐1, respectively. The microscopic observations after start‐up of the AnRBC reactor showed that the acetogenic bacteria are significant in the first two stages while the methanogenic bacteria predominate in the last two stages.     

A Critical Grain Size Concept to Predict the Impact Transition Temperature of Ti-Microalloyed Steels

Based on the assumption that local principal stress remains the same everywhere within a ferrite grain, a critical value of grain size can be determined for a fixed TiN particle size. When the grain size is smaller than the critical size, grain boundary is expected to resist the propagation of a micro-crack that is initiated from a TiN particle. Using this concept, an attempt has been made to predict the local cleavage fracture stress and 27J impact transition temperature (ITT) of different Ti-microalloyed steels, which were subjected to (instrumented) Charpy impact testing.