Failure of Lightly Reinforced Concrete Floor Slabs with Planar Edge Restraints under Fire

Accepted versio

Challenges to Quit Smoking among Smokers in Bandar Baru Salak Tinggi, Sepang, Selangor, Malaysia

Cigarette smoking is the largest preventable risk factor for morbidity and mortality in developed countries.  The prevalence of smoking is increasing in Malaysia.  Over the years, we have accumulated the knowledge of the risks and dangers of smoking towards health and had used these as interventions to motivate smokers to quit smoking.  However, quitting smoking is hard as people who stop smoking often start again because of weight gain, stress and withdrawal symptoms.  Therefore, this study aimed to identify the challenges to quit smoking among smokers in Bandar Baru Salak Tinggi, Sepang, Selangor.  A cross-sectional study was conducted with a combination of stratified and simple random sampling.  The study was conducted via a face-to-face interview using a standardized questionnaire.  The data was analyzed using SPSS (Statistical Package for Social Sciences) Version 20.0.  Easy availability of cigarettes was the most challenging factor (86%) followed by seeing things that reminded the respondents of smoking (58%), feeling lost without smoking (53%) and withdrawal symptoms (47%).  To combat these challenges, it is imperative to strengthen the enforcement on regulations advertisement and display of cigarettes and develop more activities on motivation among smokers and their families, which may be organized by government or non-government organizations. Other than that, another important aspect in the promoting smoking cessation program is to encourage smoke-free homes

Modelling And Fuzzy Logic Control Of An Underactuated Tower Crane System

Tower crane is one of the flexible maneuvering systems that has been applied pervasively as a powerful big-scale construction machine. The under-actuated tower crane system has nonlinearity behavior with a coupling between translational and slew motions which increases the crane control challenge. In practical applications, most of the tower cranes are operated by a human operator which lead to unsatisfactory control tasks. Motivated to overcome the issues, this paper proposes a fuzzy logic controller based on single input rule modules dynamically connected fuzzy inference system for slew/translational positioning and swing suppressions of a 3 degree-of-freedom tower crane system. The proposed method can reduce the number of rules significantly, resulting in a simpler controller design. The proposed method achieves higher suppressions of at least 56% and 81% in the overall in-plane and out-plane swing responses, respectively as compared to PSO based PID+PD control

Effects of hospital facilities on patient outcomes after cancer surgery: an international, prospective, observational study

Background Early death after cancer surgery is higher in low-income and middle-income countries (LMICs) compared with in high-income countries, yet the impact of facility characteristics on early postoperative outcomes is unknown. The aim of this study was to examine the association between hospital infrastructure, resource availability, and processes on early outcomes after cancer surgery worldwide.Methods A multimethods analysis was performed as part of the GlobalSurg 3 study-a multicentre, international, prospective cohort study of patients who had surgery for breast, colorectal, or gastric cancer. The primary outcomes were 30-day mortality and 30-day major complication rates. Potentially beneficial hospital facilities were identified by variable selection to select those associated with 30-day mortality. Adjusted outcomes were determined using generalised estimating equations to account for patient characteristics and country-income group, with population stratification by hospital.Findings Between April 1, 2018, and April 23, 2019, facility-level data were collected for 9685 patients across 238 hospitals in 66 countries (91 hospitals in 20 high-income countries; 57 hospitals in 19 upper-middle-income countries; and 90 hospitals in 27 low-income to lower-middle-income countries). The availability of five hospital facilities was inversely associated with mortality: ultrasound, CT scanner, critical care unit, opioid analgesia, and oncologist. After adjustment for case-mix and country income group, hospitals with three or fewer of these facilities (62 hospitals, 1294 patients) had higher mortality compared with those with four or five (adjusted odds ratio [OR] 3.85 [95% CI 2.58-5.75]; p<0.0001), with excess mortality predominantly explained by a limited capacity to rescue following the development of major complications (63.0% vs 82.7%; OR 0.35 [0.23-0.53]; p<0.0001). Across LMICs, improvements in hospital facilities would prevent one to three deaths for every 100 patients undergoing surgery for cancer.Interpretation Hospitals with higher levels of infrastructure and resources have better outcomes after cancer surgery, independent of country income. Without urgent strengthening of hospital infrastructure and resources, the reductions in cancer-associated mortality associated with improved access will not be realised

Correlation of Numerical and Experimental Analysis for Dynamic Behaviour of a body-in-white (BIW) Structure

In order to determine the reliability of data gathered using computational version of finite element analysis, data obtained through experimental work are always utilized. In field of dynamic analysis, experimental data is often viewed for having better accuracy giving the availability of reliable data acquisition and measuring equipment. On the other hand, in case of finite element deviation, it can sometimes be considered as inaccurate especially subject to complex structure such as body-in-white. This is due to difficulties that might occur in modelling of joints, boundary conditions and damping of the structure. In this study, a process of comparison and validation of model based test design with modal testing results was conducted. Modal properties (natural frequencies, mode shapes, and damping ratio) of a body-in-white structure were determined using both experimental modal analysis (EMA) and finite element analysis (FEA). Correlation of both sets of data was performed for validation. The discrepancies that appear after correlation was then reduced by performing model updating procedure. The results presented here may demonstrate the effectiveness of model updating technique on improving the complex structure such as body-in-white structure

A Review on Model Updating In Structural Dynamics

This paper is a review of information and related studies concerning topic of model updating in structural dynamics. It is purposed to introduce and explain the important concept of the discussed subject in model updating area as well as to summarize the development and available guidance and method of conducting the study in this area. The review is structured by presenting an overview of general concept of finite element model updating in structural dynamics and the capabilities of finite element method as a tool in model updating. After the concept introduction, the reliable methodology to perform model updating, the limitation and the critical issues in model updating is discussed. The limitation and problems arise concerning correcting inaccurate finite element model is also discussed. This lead to issue of parameterization and regularization which the limitation and uncertainty in choosing the updating parameter is shown able to be overcome. Further studies on the elimination of systematic errors from both the measurements and the finite element model so that it can provide more reliable model updating is recommended

Experimental investigation and finite element analysis of Magnesium Alloy (AZ31B) in Micro Electrical Discharge Machining μEDM)

Abstract Electric discharge machining (EDM) is a non-conventional machining use thermal energy from overheated electron source to remove small portion of material. EDM process has an advantage on high geometric complexity and micro leveling of dimensioning. The present of thermal energy to eliminate the unwanted material in EDM are highly depending on heat affected zone. This can contribute to decreasing of the product quality with surface roughness and micro crack existing after machining. Magnesium alloys (AZ31B) material has the special characteristic to explore the heat distribution effect on the heated surface. Finite element analysis with heat flux Gaussian boundary condition is applied to understand the governing equation of the heat behavior. At the same time, finding the size of spark created on the AZ31B gap is studied. The ANSYS software applied to simulate the heat distributes on the AZ31B surface. The simulation of ANSYS indicates potential zone of material removal through heat distribution. The simulation is compare to the actual experimental of μEDM and finds the similarities. The heat distribution on AZ31B with different size of spark shows a good agreement between simulation and experimental results.</jats:p