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A Spiral-like Acquisition Strategy for 3D Huygens' Principle Based Microwave Imaging
Get PDFThis paper focuses on executing a novel methodology to achieve imaging time reduction via 3D imaging algorithm based on Huygens principle using a microwave imaging device
(MammoWave). Specifically, a three-layer cylindrical phantom with a 3D structured inclusion has been fabricated with varying dielectric properties. Various spiral-like (along z-axis) measurement scenarios have been considered to investigate the possibility of measurement time reduction. In the first scenario, we have performed measurements in spiral-like configuration-I at multiple
planes along the z-axis, while for the second scenario we have applied spiral configuration-II in an alternate way in terms of receiving points. We found that the proposed spiral-like measurement scenarios may lead to a measurement time saving of 50%, with a lower S/C ratio (decrease of
maximum 3.2 dB) and slightly higher error (approximately 3.5%) in inclusion dimensional analysis and localization
A Roundtable Conversation: Feminist Collaborative Ethos in International Law
Get PDFThis roundtable discussion focuses on the collective commitment and the praxis of a feminist collaborative ethos in international law to imagine and centre alternative futures in the field. This discussion took place as part of the virtual workshop ‘International Law Dis/Oriented: Queer Legacies, and Queer Futures Workshop’ from which this special issue emerged. In this transcript of the roundtable, Shaimaa Abdelkarim, Farnush Ghadery, and Rohini Sen discuss with Lena Holzer how turning to feminist collectivity – focused on care, collaboration, and solidarity – can help to disrupt and push against gendered, racialised, and colonial power structures embedded in academic spaces. They examine their intertwined positionalities along with various pedagogical and methodological approaches to determine the functions of critical feminist and queer thoughts in international law. Inculcating a praxis of feminist collaborative ethos in the scholarship and teaching of international law, they hope to present a challenge to the artificial individualisation of the profession and its increasing neoliberalisation
Critical reflections on autism advocacy for and against autism subtypes.
Get PDFAdvocacy relating to autism has a complicated history, no more so since 1993 with the parallel emergence of autistic rights and neurodiversity movements. Focusing on advocacy for and against dividing autism subtypes, primarily examining the advocacy efforts for “Profound Autism” and “Pathological Demand Avoidance (PDA) Profile of ASD”, to highlight how impairment category advocacy can be appropriated by those with vested interests, to control autism advocacy; for example, autistic opposition to “Profound Autism” can be construed as harassment, bullying, or stalking associated with “PDA Profile of ASD”. Consequently, through such processes, those with vested interests may overturn the consensus that autism cannot be successfully divided into subtypes and ignore the preference of most autistic persons for the autism impairment category to be undivided. While disability studies academics should validate the concerns of activists, there is a need to critically engage with claims of impairment category activists
Techno-Economic Analysis of State-of-the-Art Carbon Capture Technologies and Their Applications: Scient Metric Review
Get PDFCarbon dioxide (CO2) emissions are a serious hazard to human life and the ecosystem. This is the reason that many measures have been put in place by the International Energy Agency (IEA) to re-duce the anthropogenic-derived CO2 concentration in the atmosphere. Today, the potential of re-newable energy sources has led to an increased interest in investment in carbon capture and stor-age technologies worldwide. The aim of this paper is to investigate state-of-the-art carbon capture and storage (CCS) technologies and their derivations for the identification of effective methods during the implementation of evidence-based energy policies. To this extent, this study reviews the current methods in three concepts: post-combustion; pre-combustion; and oxy-fuel combustion processes. The objective of this study is to explore the knowledge gap in recent carbon capture methods and provide a comparison between the most influential methods with high potential to aid in carbon capture. The study presents the importance of using all available technologies during the post-combustion process. To accomplish this, an ontological approach was adopted to analyze the feasibility of the CCS technologies available on the market. The study findings demonstrate that priority should be given to the applicability of certain methods for both industrial and do-mestic applications. On the contrary, the study also suggests that using the post-combustion method has the greatest potential, whereas other studies recommend the efficiency of the oxy-fuel process. Furthermore, the study findings also highlight the importance of using life cycle assess-ment (LCA) methods for the implementation of carbon capture technologies in buildings. This study contributes to the energy policy design related to carbon capture technologies in buildings
Students' perception of future learning in Accounting education
No full textThe COVID-19 pandemic lockdown has dramatically revolutionised the higher education sector’s delivery of classes. A survey of undergraduate Accounting, Business, and Economics students’ learning preferences at a London university was sought from online, conventional campus, and hybrid teaching post-COVID-19 pandemic. The findings have implications for the design of students' learning preferences. Academics should consider diverse students' bodies and their needs and that there is no one-size-fits-all preference for learning to suit all students. The study examines the common obstacles and barriers encountered by students to their learning, as well as future solutions, in the context of post-COVID-19 pandemic delivery
A Novel 6G Conversational Orchestration Framework for Enhancing Performance and Resource Utilization in Autonomous Vehicle Networks
Get PDFA vision of 6G aims to automate versatile services by eliminating the complexity of human effort for Industry 5.0 applications. This results in an intelligent environment with cognitive and collaborative capabilities of AI conversational orchestration that enable a variety of applications across smart Autonomous Vehicle (AV) networks. In this article, an innovative framework for AI conversational orchestration is proposed by enabling on-the-fly virtual infrastructure service orchestration for Anything-as-a-Service (XaaS) to automate a network service paradigm. The proposed framework will potentially contribute to the growth of 6G conversational orchestration by enabling on-the-fly automation of cloud and network services. The orchestration aspect of the 6G vision is not limited to cognitive collaborative communications, but also extends to context-aware personalized infrastructure for 6G automation. The experimental results of the implemented proof-of-concept framework are presented. These experiments not only affirm the technical capabilities of this framework, but also push into several Industry 5.0 applications
Problematic smartphone use and sleep disturbance: the roles of metacognitions, desire thinking, and emotion regulation
Get PDFBackground: The association between problematic Smartphone use (PSU) and sleep disturbance is evidenced in the literature, but more research is required to investigate the potential factors that may influence the effect of PSU on sleep disturbance. Given the considerable prevalence of PSU (9.3 to 36.7%) and sleep disturbance (55.2%) in Iran, the current study sought to examine an interactional model to test whether metacognitions about Smartphone use, desire thinking (verbal perseveration and imaginal prefiguration), and emotion regulation (expressive suppression and cognitive reappraisal) could have a moderating effect on the above-mentioned association. Method: This present study is a cross-sectional, observational study that was conducted between June and September 2022 in a convenience sample of Iranians (n = 603, Female = 419, Age = 24.61 ± 8). Results: Despite the significant association between metacognitions about the Smartphone use, PSU, and sleep disturbance, metacognitions failed to predict sleep disturbance above PSU. A slope analysis showed, however, that a high (not low or moderate) levels of imaginal prefiguration strengthen the association between PSU and sleep disturbance, while a high (not low or moderate) level of cognitive reappraisal and expressive suppression dampen the PSU-sleep disturbance association. We also found that verbal perseveration and expressive suppression were unique predictors of sleep disturbance, while imaginal prefiguration and reappraisal only predicted sleep disturbance if they interacted with PSU. Conclusion: Theoretically, findings suggest that enhancing cognitive reappraisal (by 1 SD) and reducing imaginal prefiguration (by 1 SD), might protect against sleep disturbance by reducing its association with PSU. Limitations and future directions are discussed
A study of physical and hydraulic properties of green roof substrates including waste materials
Get PDFGreen roofs are becoming increasingly popular in the urban landscape, where levels of air pollution from numerous sources of emissions have rapidly risen compared to rural areas. Green roofs are designed to retain precipitated water, while filtering out pollutants, provide insulation, reduce roof construction costs, be lightweight, contribute to the reduction of temperatures in cities and create habitats for wildlife. When designing green roofs, substrate composition is an important consideration for water retention, plant growth and water quality of runoff. To increase further the sustainability of the green roof systems in terms of material usage, waste materials could be introduced to replace natural soils in the sustrate layer. Current standards however do not include such materials, which appears to be a missed opportunity. In this context, this paper focuses on a number of typical materials used in the green roof substrates and potential suitable alternatives to these, coming from waste streams. For the mixes, commercial growing medium/substrate (control mix) and some common natural or manufactured materials were used, trying to create appropriate substrate mixes in terms of physical and hydraulic properties. These materials were then replaced by waste materials of similar characteristics (e.g., crushed clay brick, paper sludge, and waste glass cullet aggregate, to replace respectively LECA expanded clay, peat and fines such as clay size particles, and sand). For nutrient retention, some small proportion of zeolite was also used in some of the mixes. To assess the suitability of the different mixes with waste materials as extensive green roof substrates, in comparison with commonly used substrate materials, a number of physical hydraulic property tests were performed, as well as germination tests, to attest whether the mixes with the waste materials were adequate for plant growth. The results showed that the studied mixes of different components were overall suitable as green roof substrates and supported plant growth. This encourages further research on the topic (including environmental safety testing, and microbial community studies) towards potential future inclusion of such mixes in green roof design standards
Trade Unions and Institutional Power Resources in the United Kingdom
Get PDFPurpose (limit 100 words) The paper examines the approach of UK Trade Unions to the use of institutional power resources (IPR) in the second half of the twentieth century. Design/methodology/approach (limit 100 words) using secondary material it examines the unions’ approach to IPR in three cases; collective bargaining; worker representation;and trade union structure. Findings (limit 100 words) The paper concludes that unions did not appreciate the importance of, and lacked a strategic approach to, IPR. Although employer and government action were largely responsible for the decline of industrial relations institutions, the failure of the unions to engage with IPR contributed to this process. It explains the failure of the unions to engage with IPR by reference to their lack of strategic capabilities and skills in relation to power resources in general and IPR in particular. Research limitations/implications (limit 100 words) It would have been interesting to collect primary data via interviews with union actors from the period examined to text the interpretation of secondary data contained in the article. Practical implications (limit 100 words) The paper has identified the kind of strategic decision making which is necessary for unions to engage effectively with IPR. It is has also indicated the key skills which unions need to develop to be able to manage their engagement with IPR. Originality/value (limit 100 words) Analysis of the decline of industrial relations institutions in this period has emphasized the role of employers and the state. This paper contributes to a more balanced perspective on this decline by drawing attention to the lack of a union strategy towards IPR and the importance of the detail of the management and employment of power resources. Social Implications (limit 100 words) The paper has implications for the role of trade unions in society - showing the need for them to develop narratives to convince society of the importance of their role and action and to develop the skills which enable them to connect with other social groups e.g intermediation, engagement with coalitional resources
Synthesising 3D solid models of natural heterogeneous materials from single sample image, using encoding deep convolutional generative adversarial networks
Get PDFThree-dimensional solid computational representations of natural heterogeneous materials are challenging to generate due to their high degree of randomness and varying scales of patterns, such as veins and cracks, in different sizes and directions. In this regard, this paper introduces a new architecture to synthesise 3D solid material models by using encoding deep convolutional generative adversarial networks (EDCGANs). DCGANs have been useful in generative tasks in relation to image processing by successfully recreating similar results based on adequate training. While concentrating on natural heterogeneous materials, this paper uses an encoding and a decoding DCGAN combined in a similar way to auto-encoders to convert a given image into marble, based on patches. Additionally, the method creates an input dataset from a single 2D high-resolution exemplar. Further, it translates of 2D data, used as a seed, into 3D data to create material blocks. While the results on the Z-axis do not have size restrictions, the X- and Y-axis are constrained by the given image. Using the method, the paper explores possible ways to present 3D solid textures. The modelling potentials of the developed approach as a design tool is explored to synthesise a 3D solid texture of leaf-like material from an exemplar of a leaf image