Last Planner System: Experiences From Pilot Implementation in the Middle East

The work described in this paper is devoted to evaluate the effectiveness of implementing Last Planner to improve construction planning practice in Saudi construction industry. Firstly, the primary results of implementing Last Planner System (LPS) in two construction projects in Saudi Arabia are presented. Action research strategy was undertaken with different data collection methods employed included interviews, observation and survey questionnaire. Secondly, benefits gained in terms of improving construction management practice are presented, the critical success factors for LPS implementation are discussed, and potential barriers for implementing LPS revealed from the studies are presented. The results demonstrated numerous benefits were gained in terms of improving construction planning and site management. The fact that the structural work in one of the sites finished two weeks ahead of schedule is a clear evident of this improvement. However, there are some potential barriers reported which hindered the achievement of full potentials of LPS. Finally, a comparison between the outcome of this study and some previous studies on Last Planner in other countries is briefly carried out

Model of Empowerment to Improve Autonomy Directly Observed Treatment (DOT) Tuberculosis Patients

Empowerment as not yet optimal health promotion efforts done to enhance the autonomy of Directly Observed Treatment (DOT), which affect the success of the recovery of patients with pulmonary tuberculosis. The purpose of research was to develop a model empowerment based on Health Promotion and Health Literacy with approach to nursing intervention in an effort enhance the autonomy of the DOT - pulmonary TB patients. The method was an observational analytic with cross sectional approach. Multistage random sampling was DOT-pulmonary TB patients to decide the district and simple random sampling was assigned to choose the participants, a total of 253 DOT- pulmonary TB patients new case with acid resistant bacilli positive on the advanced phase in this study. The study conducted in five districts in Surabaya City (center, north, south, east and west). Data were collected by questionnaire on variables namely personal, cognitive and affective, nursing intervention, commitment, family supports, health literacy and DOT- autonomy. Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) with LISREL is used for constructing predictive model. Result : This study found a new model which was developed based on combination of Health Promotion Model (HPM) and Health Literacy (HL). Statistical result confirm that personal, cognitive and affective, health literacy and family support considered as important factors in improving DOT-autonomy. Conclusion : DOT- autonomy will improve by considering four main factors, personal, cognitive and affective, health literacy, family support. This model can be adapted by District Health Office Surabaya City as the main actor regional health development. In addition, this model may become a reference for other district in improving their nursing intervention in community setting

Application of neural network observer for on-line estimation of salient-pole synchronous generators' dynamic parameters using the operating data

Parameter identification is critical for modern control strategies in electrical power systems which is considered both dynamic performance and energy efficiency. This paper presents a novel application of ANN observers in estimating and tracking Salient-Pole Synchronous Generator Dynamic Parameters using time-domain, on-line disturbance measurements. The data for training ANN Observers are obtained through off-line simulations of a salient-pole synchronous generator operating in a one-machine-infinite-bus environment. The Levenberg-Marquardt algorithm has been adopted and assimilated into the back-propagation learning algorithm for training feed-forward neural networks. The inputs of ANNs are organized in conformity with the results of the observability analysis of synchronous generator dynamic parameters in its dynamic behavior. A collection of ANNs with same inputs but different outputs are developed to determine a set of the dynamic parameters. The ANNs are employed to estimate the dynamic parameters by the measurements which are carried out within each kind of fault separately. The trained ANNs are tested with on-line measurements to identify the dynamic parameters. Simulation studies indicate the ANN observer has a great ability to identify the dynamic parameters of salient-pole synchronous generator. The results also show that the tests which have given better results in estimation of each dynamic parameter can be obtained

Detection of streptomycin residues in local meat of bovine and ovine

From meat retails in Mosul province, forty-five meat samples of local ovine and bovine (23 bovine samples and 22 ovine samples) were collected. The period of collection was during November 2010 to May 2011, by means of multistage random sampling for detection of streptomycin residues. Enzyme linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) was used for detection of streptomycin residues. The results revealed that eleven ovine meat samples (50%) were positive to streptomycin residue, with a mean value 35.06 µg kg-1, while 14 bovine meat samples (60.86%) were positive to residual streptomycin with a mean value 59.56 µg kg-1. From the results, it is clear that all tested meat samples (ovine and bovine) were safe enough for human consumption

Challenges for Malaria Elimination in Zanzibar: Pyrethroid Resistance in Malaria Vectors and Poor Performance of Long-Lasting Insecticide Nets.

Long-lasting insecticide treated nets (LLINs) and indoor residual house spraying (IRS) are the main interventions for the control of malaria vectors in Zanzibar. The aim of the present study was to assess the susceptibility status of malaria vectors against the insecticides used for LLINs and IRS and to determine the durability and efficacy of LLINs on the island. Mosquitoes were sampled from Pemba and Unguja islands in 2010--2011 for use in WHO susceptibility tests. One hundred and fifty LLINs were collected from households on Unguja, their physical state was recorded and then tested for efficacy as well as total insecticide content. Species identification revealed that over 90% of the Anopheles gambiae complex was An. arabiensis with a small number of An. gambiae s.s. and An. merus being present. Susceptibility tests showed that An. arabiensis on Pemba was resistant to the pyrethroids used for LLINs and IRS. Mosquitoes from Unguja Island, however, were fully susceptible to all pyrethroids tested. A physical examination of 150 LLINs showed that two thirds were damaged after only three years in use. All used nets had a significantly lower (p < 0.001) mean permethrin concentration of 791.6 mg/m2 compared with 944.2 mg/m2 for new ones. Their efficacy decreased significantly against both susceptible An. gambiae s.s. colony mosquitoes and wild-type mosquitoes from Pemba after just six washes (p < 0.001). The sustainability of the gains achieved in malaria control in Zanzibar is seriously threatened by the resistance of malaria vectors to pyrethroids and the short-lived efficacy of LLINs. This study has revealed that even in relatively well-resourced and logistically manageable places like Zanzibar, malaria elimination is going to be difficult to achieve with the current control measures

Spatial Evolutionary Generative Adversarial Networks

Generative adversary networks (GANs) suffer from training pathologies such as instability and mode collapse. These pathologies mainly arise from a lack of diversity in their adversarial interactions. Evolutionary generative adversarial networks apply the principles of evolutionary computation to mitigate these problems. We hybridize two of these approaches that promote training diversity. One, E-GAN, at each batch, injects mutation diversity by training the (replicated) generator with three independent objective functions then selecting the resulting best performing generator for the next batch. The other, Lipizzaner, injects population diversity by training a two-dimensional grid of GANs with a distributed evolutionary algorithm that includes neighbor exchanges of additional training adversaries, performance based selection and population-based hyper-parameter tuning. We propose to combine mutation and population approaches to diversity improvement. We contribute a superior evolutionary GANs training method, Mustangs, that eliminates the single loss function used across Lipizzaner's grid. Instead, each training round, a loss function is selected with equal probability, from among the three E-GAN uses. Experimental analyses on standard benchmarks, MNIST and CelebA, demonstrate that Mustangs provides a statistically faster training method resulting in more accurate networks

Mediating Cognitive Transformation with VR 3D Sketching during Conceptual Architectural Design Process

Communications for information synchronization during the conceptual design phase require designers to employ more intuitive digital design tools. This paper presents findings of a feasibility study for using VR 3D sketching interface in order to replace current non-intuitive CAD tools. We used a sequential mixed method research methodology including a qualitative case study and a cognitive-based quantitative protocol analysis experiment. Foremost, the case study research was conducted in order to understand how novice designers make intuitive decisions. The case study documented the failure of conventional sketching methods in articulating complicated design ideas and shortcomings of current CAD tools in intuitive ideation. The case study’s findings then became the theoretical foundations for testing the feasibility of using VR 3D sketching interface during design. The latter phase of study evaluated the designers’ spatial cognition and collaboration at six different levels: “physical-actions”, “perceptualac ons”, “functional-actions”, “conceptual-actions”, “cognitive synchronizations”, and “gestures”. The results and confirmed hypotheses showed that the utilized tangible 3D sketching interface improved novice designers’ cognitive and collaborative design activities. In summary this paper presents the influences of current external representation tools on designers’ cognition and collaboration as well as providing the necessary theoretical foundations for implementing VR 3D sketching interface. It contributes towards transforming conceptual architectural design phase from analogue to digital by proposing a new VR design interface. The paper proposes this transformation to fill in the existing gap between analogue conceptual architectural design process and remaining digital engineering parts of building design process hence expediting digital design process

Parasitological and serological investigation into lymphatic filariasis among immigrants at Semenyih Detention Centre, Selangor, West Malaysia

Parasitological and serological investigations for lymphatic filariasis were performed on 450 immigrants detained at the Immigration Centre at Semenyih, Seiangor, West Malaysia. The country of origin of these immigrants were Indonesia, The Philippines, Myanmar, Bangladesh, India and Pakistan. Brugia malayi adult worm homogenate (BmAH) antigen was used for the detection of antifilarial IgG. A monoclonal antibody-based ELISA (MAb.XC3~ELISA) specific for filarial circulating antigens and non-phosphorylcholine reactive was used to detect antigenemia in these immigrants. Parasitologically 67 (14.89 %) were positive for W, bancrofti and 54 (12.0%) for Brugia malayi. Serologically 63 % had antifilarial IgG titre to the BmAH antigen. While Bancroftian filariasis is now unknown in Peninsular Malaysia, the potential of it to be reintroduced into Peninsular Malaysia by the immigrant population is discussed

Tarekat Naqshabandiyyah Khalidiyyah in Malaysia: a Study on the Leadership of Haji Ishaq Bin Muhammad Arif

: The Tarekat Naqshabandiyyah Khalidiyyah lead by Haji Ishaq has many followers and is also known especially among other tarekat followers in Malaysia. This article is navigating through the leadership of Haji Ishaq Bin Muhammad Arif, the emergence of tarekat Naqshabandiyyah Khalidiyyah he lead and its evolution in Malaysia. Beside the data collected through the manuscript written by Haji Ishaq, his murids works were also studied. Field observations were also performed at several sites that are identified to be the centers of the movement. Also, some senior students of Haji Ishaq were interviewed to strengthen the arguments of the manuscript data. This study had discovered that tarekat Naqshabandiyyah Khalidiyyah lead by Haji Ishaq was large group with many followers, made up of diverse backgrounds, including academicians and professionals. The power of this group is reflected in the extensive network of centers that are located in several states in Malaysia

FSM-F: finite state machine based framework for denial of service and intrusion detection in manet

Due to the continuous advancements in wireless communication in terms of quality of communication and affordability of the technology, the application area of Mobile Adhoc Networks (MANETs) significantly growing particularly in military and disaster management. Considering the sensitivity of the application areas, security in terms of detection of Denial of Service (DoS) and intrusion has become prime concern in research and development in the area. The security systems suggested in the past has state recognition problem where the system is not able to accurately identify the actual state of the network nodes due to the absence of clear definition of states of the nodes. In this context, this paper proposes a framework based on Finite State Machine (FSM) for denial of service and intrusion detection in MANETs. In particular, an Interruption Detection system for Adhoc On-demand Distance Vector (ID-AODV) protocol is presented based on finite state machine. The packet dropping and sequence number attacks are closely investigated and detection systems for both types of attacks are designed. The major functional modules of ID-AODV includes network monitoring system, finite state machine and attack detection model. Simulations are carried out in network simulator NS-2 to evaluate the performance of the proposed framework. A comparative evaluation of the performance is also performed with the state-of-theart techniques: RIDAN and AODV. The performance evaluations attest the benefits of proposed framework in terms of providing better security for denial of service and intrusion detection attacks