021835   Rakesh Kumar (NO, , ) : Renovation & modernisation of hydro power plants-general overview. Wat Energy int 2013, 70(6), 4-7.

1 illus, 5 tables, ref

021834   Raj Barath S;Kezi Selva Vijila C (ECE Dep, Christian College of Engineering ad Technology, Oddanchatram, Tamil Nadu, Email: rajharathece@gmail.com) : Congestion control algorithms in wireless sensor networks: a survey. Int J Comp Applic 2013, 8(2), 151-8.

In recent years, Wireless Sensor Networks gains attention from researchers and also users. The sensor nodes are mostly battery driven which makes Energy conservation, a key factor in this area. Successful event detection in Wireless Sensor Networks (WSN) requires reliability and timeliness. congestion is a problem for more demanding WSN and is expected to be a more prominent issue with larger systems that might process audio, video and have multiple base stations (creating more cross traffic). Even in systems with a single base station, congestion near the base station is a serious problem since traffic converges at the base station. Solutions use backpressure, reducing source node transmission rates, tbrowing out less important messages, and using scheduling to avoid as many collisions as possible which only exacerbate the congestion problem. Congestion in WSN will cause packet loss which in turn wastes energy and reduces the lifetime of the nodes. Congestion is a critical issue, it will not only affect transmission reliability, but also exploits valuable energy resources. We present a few congestion control algorithms which aims at minimizing congestion in Wireless Sensor Networks.

4 illus, 15 ref

021833   Rai D C;Jain S K;Murty C V R;Bansal D (Civil Engineering Dep, Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur, Kanpur-208 016, Email: dcrai@iitk.ac.in) : Large capacity reaction floor-wall assembly for pseudo-dynamic testing at IIT Kanpur and its load rating. Curr Sci 2014, 106(1), 93-100.

Earthquake simulation on full-scale civil engineering structures in a pseudo-dynamic testing facility provides an affordable and practical means to understand the seismic behaviour of structures as it provides accurate information about their real time response of inelastic behaviour up to failure. One such pseudo dynamic testing facility is nearing completion at IIT Kanpur, which has 15 m x 10 m L-shaped and 10.5 m high reaction wall and 1.2 m thick top slab of the box girder for the strong floor. The anchor points are located in the wall and floor in a square grid of 0.6 m with each point has load capacity of 1.7 MN in tension and 1.0 MN in shear. The 2 m thick post-tensioned wall using Freyssinet 12K15 cable system in a novel configuration can resist an overturning moment of 12.7 MNm per metre of the wall. The capacity of the reaction assembly depends upon number of loads applied, combination of loads and interaction between different components of the reaction assembly structure. A methodology based on 'influence coefficients' was developed to estimate the worst load combination for describing load rating of the reaction structure. Finite element analyses in ABAQUS environment were conducted to compute the influence coefficients matrix whose elements can be added linearly to find out the maximum loading effect on the reaction structure which can be used to determine the limiting load for a particular case of load application.

10 illus, 3 tables, 14 ref

021832   Pulkurte R;Masilamani R;Sonpatki S;Dhake R (Industrial Engineering, Vishwakarma Institute of Technology, University of Pune, Pune, Maharashtra) : Cycle time reduction in assembly line through layout improvement, ergonomics analysis and lean principles. Int J appl Sci Engng Res 2014, 3(2), 455-63.

Line Balancing is leveling the workload across all processes in a line or value stream to remove bottlenecks and excess capacity. The objective of assembly line balancing is to assign processes and tasks to the individual work station such that the total time required at each workstation is approximately same and equal to or below the Takt time. This paper mainly focuses on improving overall efficiency of multi-model assembly line by identifying and eliminating non-value added activities, making alterations in work stations, layout improvements to eliminate operator movements, and reduction of work content through postural analysis of operators using REBA (Rapid Entire Body Assessment) analysis.

6 illus, 5 tables, 8 ref

021831   Pratibha Kevre;Shrivastava L (Electronics Dep, Madhav Institute of Technology & Science, Gwalior-474 005, Email: Pratibhakevre@yahoo.co.in) : Compare three reactive routing protocols in grid based cluster wireless sensor network using qualnet simulator. Int J appl Sci Engng Res 2014, 3(2), 532-9.

This paper is comparingthe performance of three different routing protocols in grid based clustering for wireless sensor network. Sensor network iskeeping limited energy of sensor nodesand limited battery power. However the main task of sensor network energy consumption for sensor nodes. Furthermore grid based sensor working depend on location based that is divided into different parts. In grid based wireless sensor network, cluster head it works like a base station. Cluster zones are collecting all information that is passing through sensor nodes. In this paper, three routing protocols AODV ( Ad-hoc on demand distance vector routing), DYMO (Dynamic Manet on demand routing ) and DSR (Dynamic source routing) are analyzed and compared by using Qualnet simulator on the basis of performance metrics such as energy consumption in transmit mode, receive mode, idle mode, and residual battery capacity.

7 illus, 1 table, 13 ref

021830   Prakash V;Rathore M K;Borgaonkar K K (Civil Engineering Dep, M.S. Bidve Engineering College, Latur, Email: vipulprakash@yahoo.com) : Preliminary analysis of short-span suspension bridges. INROADS 2014, 3(1; Spec), 181-5.

Elastic Theory developed by Prakash can be used to analyze suspension bridges with short spans for preliminary analysis and design of bridges. In this paper, this theory has been used to study single span suspension bridges with two hinged support condition for the stiffening girders and influence line diagrams for hanger forces, bending moments, shear forces and deflections have been developed. The basic assumption used in this theory is that the hanger forces are uniform and their magnitude is such as to minimize the flexural strain energy of the stiffening girder. This assumption is likely to be valid for suspension bridges of relatively small spans, less than about 600m, wherein the geometric stiffness effects may not be very significant. This study shows that for the most common case of suspension bridge with two-hinged stiffening girders, the maximum bending moments and live load deflections occur near the quarter-span points. The theory developed gives a more economical design compared to Rankine's theory, as per which the critical section for bending moment is at mid-span with about twice the value. This study is limited to the static behavior of the single span suspension bridge with no dynamic and wind analysis.

14 illus, 15 ref

021829   Pradhan A;Khatua K K;Khuntia D (Civil Engineering Dep, NIT, Rourkela, Email: er.arpanpradhan@gmail.com) : Variation in velocity profile along a 120 meandering path. INROADS 2014, 3(1; Spec), 157-60.

Despite substantial research on various aspects of velocity distribution in curved meander rivers, no systematic effort has been made to analyse the variation of velocity profile along a meander path.In this paper variation of velocity profile along the width and depth has been analysed at different cross-sections along a 120° path (cross over angle) of a meandering channel i.e. from a cross-over to the corresponding bend apex.When flow enters a bend, the centrifugal force arising from the channel curvature leads to a transversal slope in the water surface. The interaction between the centrifugal force and transversal pressure gradient causes secondary flows in cross-sections, and the secondary flows spread further by moving along the bend. Hence at the bend these processes lead to velocity increase in the inner wall and decrease in the outer wall along the width of the channel. The above variations are investigated from the cross-over to the next corresponding bend apex.

5 illus, 9 ref

021828   Praba S;Sameem Sowbana B;Uma P (Christian College of Engineering and Technology, , Oddanchatram, Tamilnadu) : New and efficient algorithm for removal of high density salt and pepper noise for images. Int J Comp Applic 2013, 8(2), 277-82.

During the transmission of images over channels, images are often corrupted by noise and degradations due to faulty communication or noisy channels. Noises may be introduced due to faulty camera or the like. In early development of signal and image processing linear filters were the primary tools. But linear filters have poor performance in the presence of noise that is additive in nature. They do not perform well in the presence of signal dependent noise. In image processing linear filters tend to blur the edges and do not remove impulse noise effectively. Non-linear filters are developed to overcome these limitations. A standard median filter is a basic non-linear filter that will preserve the edges and remove impulse noise. Median filter replaces every pixel by its median value neighborhood. But this removes some desirable details in the image. Different remedies of the median filter have been proposed, e.g. the Standard Median Filter (SMF), Weighted Median Filter (WMF) and Adaptive Median Filter. These filters first identify possible noisy pixels and then replace them by using the median filter or its variants, while leaving all other pixels unchanged. In these filters more weight is given to some pixels in the processing window. Decision Based Median Filtering Algorithm (DBA), Robust Estimation Algorithm (REA) is proposed to remove high density impulse noise. Decision Based Algorithm removes high density salt and pepper noise. The corrupted pixels are replaced by median or the immediate neighborhood pixel. At higher noise densities the median may also be a noisy pixel and this produces streaking at higher noise densities. A new algorithm to remove high-density salt and pepper noise using modified sorting method and Decision Based Unsymmetric Trimmed Mediam Filter (DBUTM) is proposed.

5 illus, 17 ref

021827   Patel T;Amin J;Patel B (SVIT, VASAD, , Gujarat, Email: jamin_svit@yahoo.com) : Evaluation response reduction factor of RC framed staging elevated water tank using static pushover analysis. Int J civ struct Engng 2014, 4(3), 215-26.

Basic principal of earthquake resistance design of structures is that the structure should not collapse but damage to the structural elements is permitted. Since a structure is allowed to be damaged in case of severe shaking, the structure should be designed for seismic forces much less than what is expected under strong shaking, if the structures were to remain linearly elastic. Response reduction factor is the factor by which the actual base shear force should be reduced, to obtain the design lateral force. The response reduction factor (R) is depends on Over strength (Rs), Ductility (R_u), Redundancy (R_r). In the present study efforts are made to evaluate the response reduction factors of RC framed staging elevated water tanks having staging height of 12 m but having varying capacities. The effects of seismic zone and fundamental time period of water tank on the Response reduction factor are also discussed. Displacement controlled nonlinear pushover analysis is used to evaluated the base shear capacity and ductility of tanks. It is observed that value of R for elevated water tank is significantly affected by the seismic zone, time period and capacity of tanks.

13 illus, 7 tables, 12 ref

021826   Patel N;Satyajit Anand;Bhattacharya P P (ECE Dep, Mody Science and Technology Univ, Lakshmangarh, Rajasthan, Email: nikitapatel.ec2012@gmail.com) : Simulation of a low power wake-up receiver for wireless sensor network. INROADS 2014, 3(1; Spec), 12-6.

A Wireless Sensor Network (WSN) consists of spatially distributed autonomous sensors to observe physical or environmental conditions like temperature, sound, pressure, etc. and to cooperatively pass their data through the network to a main location. A wake-up receiver is employed in wireless detector networks to reduce the power consumption. Wake-up receivers are activated after detection and improve data network performance. Energy dissipation is reduced by maximizing data transceivers sleep time. In this paper, we have designed and simulated a wake-up receiver which shows power consumption of 101.7μW. The wake-up receiver is simulated at 90nm technology on Tanner EDA tool version 13.0.

6 illus, 6 ref

021825   Patel A;Shah D B (Mechanical Engineering Dep, Institute of Technology, Nirma Univ, Ahmedabad, Email: 12mmcc18@nirmauni.ac.in) : Optimization of plasma arc cutting parameters using Taguchi method. INROADS 2014, 3(1; Spec), 111-4.

One of most important non conversional machining process is plasma arc cutting due toits good accuracy cut, good dimensional accuracy andincrease the quality of material. In this paper, optimization of plasma arc cutting parameter has been carried out using Taguchi method. The appropriate orthogonal array has been selected as per number of factors and there levels to perform minimum experimentation. The material for work piece has been taken as stainless steel 316L for different sixteen experimental work. The best combination for cutting parameters has been found using signal to noise ratio and also validated same with the experimental work. The optimum values for material removal rate and surface roughness have been determined with the help of main effect plot and ANOVA Table. The response table for optimum setting parameter has been derived from Minitab software. Using this technique, one can increase productivity with minimum time by reducing numbers of experiments in plasma cutting process.

5 illus, 2 tables, 8 ref

021824   Paswan S;Chauhan M S;Swati M V;Jain P K (Centre of Research in Microwave Tubes, Electronics Engineering Dep, Institute of Technology, Banaras Hindu Univ, Varanasi-221 005, Email: sunny.rkgit@gmail.com) : Analytical studies of a five-cavity, 140 GHz gyroklystron amplifier. INROADS 2014, 3(1; Spec), 153-6.

In the present paper, five cavity gyroklystron amplifier has been analyzed for its performance evaluation in terms of output power, gain and bandwidth using nonlinear theory of gyroklystron amplifier. All the cavities of the present gyroklystron operate in the fundamental harmonic at 140 GHz, the operating mode of all five cavities is TE₀₂ mode. The dependence of output power, gain and electronic efficiency on input power and frequency has been analyzed. From the nonlinear analysis the output power is obtained 109 W with 45 dB gain and bandwidth is 0.42% for 15 kV, 0.15 A gyrating electron beam having pitch factor 1.5. The obtained results have been validated with the earlier reported results in the literature.

4 illus, 7 ref

021823   Parthasarathy1 V;Prem Anand T;Chellaram C (Computer Science and Engineering Dep, Vel Tech Multi Tech, Dr.RR Dr.SR Engineering College, Chennai-600 062, Email: chellarampublications@gmail.com) : Microbial fuel cells as an alternate strategy for sustainable energy generation. Biosci Biotechnol Res Asia 2014, 11(1), 249-52.

Globally there is steady increase in energy demands. The lack of sustainability of current fossil-centered energy strategies and safety issues relating to nuclear energy has resulted in a shift in energy policies around the world. The need for alternative non-fossil, non-nuclear technology has been stressed by experts and research on this line has produced promising results. The discovery of electro-active or electrogenic bacteria capable of producing electricity has been a potent area of research with an objective to develop microbial fuel cells. The microbial fuel cell (MFC) is a promising technology for sustainable energy generation, remediation, and sensoring. The MFC concept is based on microbial exocellular electron transfer, or the capacity of microbes to transfer electrons produced from the metabolic oxidation of organic substrates to insoluble, extracellular electron-accepting compounds. This paper presents a review of the latest developments in fuel cell technology and its future prospects.

3 illus, 23 ref

021822   Panigrahi K;Khatua K K (Civil Engineering Dep, National Institute of Technology, Rourkela, Orissa, Email: kajalpanigrahi@yahoo.in) : Roughness coefficient determination in open channel flow with vegetation. INROADS 2014, 3(1; Spec), 230-5.

The resistance to flow in open channels depends on many flow and channel parameters. Out of the many factors, vegetation is the most important parameter in vegetative channels. Vegetation in an open channel retards the water flow by causing energy loss through turbulence and by exerting additional drag forces on the moving liquid. Vegetation in channels covers from highly flexible low grass blades to dense bushes to firm trees. Presence of vegetation in a channel modifies the velocity profiles, and hence the resistance in terms of roughness coefficients. The roughness coefficients and hence the velocity profiles of such channels change with the flow depths and section to sections. Because of this complex nature, it is hard to develop a flow model based on theoretical calculations and derivations. After many researches, the outcomes have helped to find an analytical model for defining the characteristics of vegetation that determine its effect on flow roughness. The paper presents different characteristics of vegetation that affect roughness coefficient of a vegetated channel. The paper offers review of the most represented methods of roughness coefficient evaluation used in practice especially for channels with vegetative beds.

1 illus, 1 table, 30 ref

021821   Pandit N;Tiwary A K;Gupta N (Electronics and Communicationn Engineering Dep, Birla Institute of Technology, Mesra, Ranchi-835 215, Email: npandit7@gmail.com) : Improving characteristics of hairpin band pass filter using SIR concept. INROADS 2014, 3(1; Spec), 161-7.

This paper presents a novel design of an improved hairpin bandpass filter for Bluetooth application (IEEE802.15.1). Resonant properties of stepped impedance resonators (SIRs) are exploited to improve the characteristics of a hairpin bandpass filter. Due to SIR characteristics spurious response is shifted to more than four times of the fundamental frequency. A third order Chebyshev bandpass filter with central frequency 2.44 GHz is designed, fabricated and measured using the present concept. The proposed filter has wide out-of-band characteristic with rejection of 18 dB. The design and simulation are performed using 3D full wave electromagnetic simulator IE3D. An accurate design procedure is outlined here and numbers of theoretical and experimental results are presented. Good agreement between experimental and simulation results are observed.

12 illus, 2 tables, 17 ref

021820   Pande V C;Kurothe R S;Sena D R;Gopal Kumar (NO, Central Soil & Water Conservation Research & Training Institute, Resea, Vasad-388 306, Email: vcpande64@gmail.com) : Cost of siltation in Sardar Sarovar reservoir: implications for catchment treatment. Curr Sci 2014, 106(1), 35-9.

Estimates on lost reservoir capacity in India provide an alarming picture. There are several instances of soil erosion and sedimentation with run-off water. The cost of sediment removal from a large reservoir may be high, in addition to cost of dam construction. The present article estimates the loss to economy by siltation of Sardar Sarovar reservoir through loss of electricity generation and agricultural productivity. The article also suggests adoption of intensive soil and moisture conservation measures on scientific lines from protection viewpoint.

2 illus, 2 tables, 12 ref

021819   Panchal U;Tilwali M R;Kapil P N;Shah M T (Electrical Engineering Dep, Institute of Technology, Nirma Univ, Ahmedabad) : Automatic voltage regulator for uninterruptible power supplies. INROADS 2014, 3(1; Spec), 42-7.

Power distortions such as power interruptions, voltage sags and swells, voltage spikes, and voltage harmonics can cause severe impacts on sensitive loads in the electrical systems. Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS) systems are used to provide uninterrupted, reliable, and high quality power for these sensitive loads. The UPS systems are especially required in places where power outages and fluctuations occur frequently. This paper presents the concept of Automatic Voltage Regulator (AVR) section for offline UPS system. When the supply voltage is available to the oflline UPS, an AVR section regulates any ups and downs in the AC mains supply input and sends a regulated clean and constant AC output to its output socket with the help of switching of the relays as per the value of the input supply voltage. When supply voltage goes below or above the set range or the supply voltage gets cut off, the change over of supply to the load from AC supply to battery takes place.

11 illus, 12 ref

021818   Niranjana Priyadarshini M;Vijayalakshmi P (ECE Dep, SSNCE, , Email: vijayalakshmip@ssn.edu.in) : Effect of speech rate on synthetic speech quality in phoneme and consonant-vowel unit - based unit selection and HMM-based speech synthesizers. Int J Comp Applic 2013, 8(2), 169-74.

One of the major concerns of speech synthesizers is to synthesize speech rich in naturalness and intelligibility. The speech rate of the data used to train the synthesizer is expected to influence the quality of the synthetic speech. Hence, in the current work, the importance of choosing an appropriate speech rate in text to speech synthesis systems is analyzed. Two 3-hour speech corpora - one with a slow speech rate of 8 phonemes/ sec and the other with a fast speech rate of 11 phonemes/sec are developed for the South Indian language, Tamil. The effect of speech rate on the synthetic speech produced by four systems, namely, phoneme-based and consonant-vowel (CV) unit - based, unit selection synthesis (USS) and hidden Markov model (HMM) - based synthesis systems, are analyzed. Based on a subjective evaluation using the mean opinion score (MOS), it is observed that three systems perform better when trained with the fast speech corpus, with MOS ranging between 2.78 and 3.18, except in the case of CV based USS. Further, it is observed that the phoneme-based systems perform better than the CV-based systems, with three hours of data. The speech synthesized by the HMM-based systems is found to be more intelligible than that synthesized by the USS systems, owing to the elimination of sonic glitches. The memory requirement of an HMM-based system is also less, around 5 MB as against SOO MB for an USS system.

3 illus, 2 tables, 24 ref

021817   Neetu Kumari;Satyajit Anand;Bhattacharya P P (ECE Dep, Mody Science and Technology Univ, Lakshmangarh, Rajasthan, Email: neetukumari54@gmail.com) : Design and simulation of flip flop at 45 nm technology for application in WSN. INROADS 2014, 3(1; Spec), 8-11.

Efficient power management in wireless sensor network is a critical issue as the sensor nodes are low powered devices. In a sensor node maximum power is consumed by microcontroller since most of the functionalities are controlled or performed by it. Flip flop occupies maximum areas of microcontroller. Hence, designing low power flip flop cells are highly important for prolonging the life time of network. This paper presents a simulation and comparative study of different flip flop cells for WSN applications based on simulation at 45nm technology. The simulation results show that flip flop using multiplexers offers the best overall performance.

5 illus, 6 ref

021816   Nageswararao M;Narayanarao K;Ranagajanardhana G (Mechanical Engineering Dep, K.L.E.F. (K.L.) Univ, Guntur, Email: medikondu@kluniversity.in) : Simultaneous scheduling of machines and AGVs in flexible manufacturing system with mean tardiness criterion by using HGVHA. INROADS 2014, 3(1; Spec), 62-8.

High degree of flexibility and quick response times have become essential features of modern manufacturing systems where customers are demanding for a variety of products with reduced product life cycles. Flexible manufacturing system (FMS) is proved to be the right answer to meet these challenges of global competition. The performance of an FMS is highly dependent on the selection of the right scheduling policy for the control system. Traditionally scheduling problems consider machines as the only constraining resources but this is no longer correct as material handling equipment is becoming more and more valuable resource in an FMS. Hence its operations should be optimized and above all synchronized with machine operations. Scheduling of an FMS is a well known NP-hard problem which is very complex, due to additional considerations like material handling and alternative routing. Literature reveals that, in many of the cases scheduling of both the machines and material handling system was addressed independently. Hence in this work an attempt has been made to schedule both of them simultaneously Optimum Automated Guided Vehicles (AGVs) operation plays a crucial role in improving the performance of Flexible Manufacturing System (FMS). One of the main elements in the implementation of AGV is task scheduling. This will enhance the productivity, Minimize delivery cost and optimally utilize the entire fleet. This enhance article Deals with hybrid Genetic Vehicle Heuristic Algorithm (HGVHA) for simultaneous Scheduling of machines and AGVs minimization of mean tardiness function. The method is found to provide better solution.

3 illus, 4 tables, 13 ref

021815   Muthuswamy K R;Thirugnanam G S (Civil Engineering Dep, Sakthi Polytechnic College, Erode, Tamilnadu, Email: krmuthuswamy @gmail.com) : Structural behaviour of hybrid fibre reinforced concrete exterior Beam-Column joint subjected to cyclic loading. Int J civ struct Engng 2014, 4(3), 262-73.

Beam-column joints in a multistory reinforced concrete framed structure take an important role in the structural integrity of the building. Pertaining to these areas, a high percentage of transverse hoops in the core of joints are much needed to meet the requirement of strength, stiffness and ductility. A provision of high percentage of transverse hoops is certainly cause congestion of steel which results in construction difficulties. The usage of fibre reinforced concrete in beam-column joints can be an alternative solution for minimizing the congestion of transverse reinforcement. Main objective of this study is to identify the potential of hybrid fibre reinforced concrete (HFRC) as a ductile material which can be used for the construction of beam-column joints. One fifth scale model of an exterior beam-column joint made of conventional concrete and fibre reinforced concrete has been selected as test specimen for this experimental study. The specimens were subjected to cyclic loading. Such various parameters that load carrying capacity, load-deflection behavior, ductility, energy absorption, stiffness and failure patterns of the joints have been studied. The experiment results of beamcolumn joint with fibre reinforced concrete are compared with the beam-column joints which are made of conventional concrete. From the test results, it is found that the beam-column joint with HFRC results to 50 increase in ductility and 80 increase in energy absorption capacity in comparison with conventional concrete. HFRC in beam-column joint may be used to resist the earthquake in any seismic prone area.

4 tables, 14 ref

021814   Mukherjee A;Rajaram S;Miaaza Hussain;Karmakar S;Shaw A;Saha S (Civil Engineering Dep, NIT Durgapur, West Bengal-713 209, Email: asim_1990@rediffmail.com) : Fundamentals properties of air blast using coupled method- part I. INROADS 2014, 3(1; Spec), 72-9.

Accidental or intentional explosion events often damage structures and injure occupants. Terrorist bombings that have occurred in the past few years have greatly heightened the awareness of structural engineers of the threat of terrorist attack using explosive devices. Blast loading has received considerable attention in recent years. Smooth Particle Hydrodynamics gives a more accurate solution to large deformations and strains under high impact loading such as blasts as the analyzed domain is discretized with particles that are not connected with a mesh avoiding mesh distortion problems present in Finite element methodsand coupling of these two methods will provide even better results and save computational time. The fundamental properties of air blast using SPH have been assessed and studied from three R.C. examples namely, beam, portal frame and a concrete filled steel column. Air blast has been applied at particular standoff distances in all cases and the stress, strain and damage parameters have been studied. The study established that the use of SPH and FEM coupled method provided accurate results with respect to the conventional pressure time history graph plots and it can be confidently used for analysis of various other parameters of air blast subjected to structures.

15 illus, 5 tables, 30 ref

021813   Mohammad S;Dutta G;Vinay Kumar P;Krishna E; Ajay Kumar M C;Rao B V;Rao P V (NO, Vignana Bharathi Institute of Technology, Ghatkesar, Hyderabad-501 301, Email: kishansetty@gmail.com) : Madden- Julian oscillations over a tropical Indian station using radar and ERA data of winds. Indian J Radio Space Phys 2014, 43(1), 48-56.

Madden - Julian oscillation (MJO) activity over Gadanki (13.5°N, 79.2°E), a low latitude station is examined using four years MST radar data of winds (4 - 20 km) between January 2006 and December 2009. Wind data obtained from European Centre for Medium Range Weather Forecasting (ECWMF) Re-Analysis (ERA) for the same latitude - longitude and for the same period have also been used to study the wave activity in the same altitude region. MJO in two period bands, 4-7 weeks and 10-13 weeks, could be clearly identified with amplitudes of <126> 4 ms^-1 in zonal wind. Meridional winds also showed similar oscillations but with lesser amplitudes (<126> 2.5 ms^-1). Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) analyses were performed on yearly data sets and very clear inter-annual variability of the oscillations is found. Wavelet analyses were carried out to find the temporal variation of the oscillations. The results obtained using radar and ERA data are found to be in good agreement. Outgoing longwave radiation (OLR) data is also used to study the relation between convection and MJO activity. A significant correlation is not observed between convection and MJO activity.

7 illus, 1 table, 31 ref

021812   Modani P O;Mohitkar V M (Civil Engineering Dep, B N College of Engineering, Pusad-445 204, Email: pramodani83@gmail.com) : Self-compacting concrete with recycled aggregate: a solution for sustainable development. Int J civ struct Engng 2014, 4(3), 430-40.

One of the major challenges faced by civil engineering industry is to execute projects in harmony with the nature. This is achieved to some extent by judicious use of natural resources in construction practices. In the recent years the demand for construction materials has grown tremendously, so has the amount of construction and demolition waste, putting huge pressure on the environment. This has encouraged the use of recycled aggregate in concrete which not only allows for a more efficient life cycle of natural resources but also contributes to environmental protection leading to sustainable development. In this study coarse recycled aggregate (RCA) are used in the production of self compacting concrete (SCC) in varying percentage replacements of natural coarse aggregate (NCA) from 0% to 100% with increment of 20%. This investigation is an attempt to examine the influence of recycled aggregate on strength, permeability, resistance to acid attack, chloride penetration, and alkalinity of self compacting concrete. It is observed that recycled aggregate can be effectively used in the production of SCC without any significant reduction in strength and durability.

5 illus, 7 tables, 25 ref

021811   Manicka Selvam V K;Bindhu K R (Civil Engineering Dep, National Institute of Technology, Calicut, Kerala, India-673 601, Email: bindhukr@yahoo.co.in) : Split frame method for the analysis of tall moment resisting frames subjected to lateral loads. Int J civ struct Engng 2014, 4(3), 237-47.

Multistorey buildings are increasing year by year. For preliminary analysis of these buildings subjected to lateral loads, it is not possible to use the computer without the knowledge of member cross sectional dimensions. To obviate this difficulty, approximate methods are resorted to. High-rise buildings are classified as short and tall buildings. For the analysis of short buildings, many approximate methods are available. However, for tall frames the cantilever method alone is existing. In this paper, a supplement to the cantilever method is put forward. The solution of the method compares favourably well with that of the cantilever solution. The method is lucid, neat and efficacious.

4 illus, 2 tables, 7 ref

021810   Maheswari J;Deva Kumar T (ECE Dep, National Engineering College, Kovilpatti, Tuticorin, Tamil Nadu, Email: sai_mahee@gmail.com) : Smart phone based location identifier. Int J Comp Applic 2013, 8(2), 307-11.

Since the usage of smart phone and the internet service becomes the trend for information development and software applications, so that services for the mobile devices have become common. Nowadays almost all the smart phones from different vendors have GPS based location identifier along with location image as predefined application. Here the image of location is derived from common Google server. In some real-time application it is necessary to monitor location as well as to identify the movement of distant non respond user. Such kind of application is not currently available in present smart phones. The goal of this paper is to create an android based application, which receives information about the location of distant non respond user an d derive the necessary detail about that location at the monitoring end in terms of location image as well as the detail about that location in text. Moreover the paper has explored how to integrate current technologies like Gmap, browser, GPS. Overall, this should serve as a genuinely helpful for monitoring the movement of elderly people as well as for the survey of wild animals.

7 illus, 9 ref

021809   Maheswaran S;Dasuru S S;Murthy A R C; Bhuvaneshwari B;Ramesh Kumar V;Palani G S;Iyer N R;Krishnamoorthy S; Sandhya S (NO, CSIR-Structural Engineering Research Centre, CSIR Campus, Taramani, Chennai-600 113, Email: smahes@serc.res.in) : Strength improvement studies using new type wild strain Bacillus cereus on cement mortar. Curr Sci 2014, 106(1), 50-7.

This article presents details of the experimental studies carried out on cement mortar using Bacillus cereus and Bacillus pasteurii in different cell concentrations. Test results showed that the addition of bacterial cultures of both species, enhanced the compressive strength of cement mortar due to the bio-mineralization of calcium carbonate in the cement mortar matrix. The test results revealed 38% increase in compressive strength using B. cereus and 29% increase in the case of B. pasteurii over the control cement mortar. The chloride ingress capacity of B. cereus incorporated concrete found through rapid chloride permeability test confirms the reduction of chloride penetration compared to control sample. Characterization studies have been performed to confirm the calcite precipitation through different experimental techniques, viz. X-ray diffraction, scanning electron microscope, thermo-gravimetric analysis and Fourier transform-infrared spectroscopy.

4 illus, 6 tables, 23 ref

021808   Maharaj R;Maharaj C;Hosein S;Singh-Ackbarali D (NO, University of Trinidad and Tobago, Point Lisas Industrial Estate, Point Lisas, Trinidad & Tobago, W.I., Email: rean.maharaj@utt.edu.tt) : Influence of particle size and concentration of recycled tyre rubber on the rheological properties of Trinidad lake asphalt and petroleum. Int J appl Sci Engng Res 2014, 3(2), 349-65.

This study investigated the influence of the particle size of waste tyre rubber on the rheological properties of Trinidad Lake Asphalt (TLA) and Trinidad Petroleum Bitumen (TPB). Modified TLA and TPB blends containing 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 10 wt % waste tyre rubber of particle sizes ranges ≤250 μm, <62>250 μm to 355 μm, <62>355 μm to 500 μm and <62>500 μm to 710 æm were analyzed and the rheological properties of complex modulus (G*), storage modulus (G'), loss modulus (G") and phase angle (ε) of the various blends were measured over the frequency range 0 Hz to 16 Hz at a temperature of 80 °C. The TLA blend containing 1% rubber additive had a relatively higher G* (stiffness). Blends containing between 1% and 4% were less elastic (higher δ) than pure TLA whereas the blend containing 5% was more elastic (lower δ). The dependency of the parent asphalt composition on the rheological properties of modified asphalt blends was evident. In the case of TPB, the incremental addition of the tyre rubber resulted in an increase in the values of G* and a general decrease in δ as the concentration of rubber was increased. Maximum values of G* and minimum values of δ were observed for both TLA and TPB blends when the particle size of the rubber was in the range <62> 355 æm to 500 μm. This also occurred for TLA and TPB blends containing rubber of particle size ≤ 250 æm but only at the 5% added rubber concentration. The measured values of G" were always higher than those of G' for both the TLA-rubber and TPB-rubber blends indicating that both blend types exhibit a viscoelastic liquid response under shear. Higher values of G' were recorded for the TLA and TPB with the rubber particles of sizes in the ranges <62> 355 μm to 500 μm range and ≤ 250 μm at a rubber concentration of 5% suggesting that these mixtures exhibit a greater level of dispersion which can ultimately account for the unique rheological properties.

24 illus, 26 ref

021807   Madheswaran C K;Ambily P S;Rajamane N P;Arun G (CSIR-Structural Engineering Research Centre (CSIR-SERC, , Taramani, Chennai-600 113, Email: ckm@serc.res.in) : Flexural behaviour of reinforced geopolymer concrete beams with lightweight aggregates. Int J civ struct Engng 2014, 4(3), 295-305.

Portland cement(PC) is widely used as binder material for concrete in a wide variety of constructions. However, this cement is proving to be ecologically hazardous material due to its inherent high internal energy content besides occurrence of emission of large quantities of carbon dioxide during its production. Therefore, there has been intense search for alternative binder material. Geopolymer is a type of binder that can be obtained by activating silicon dioxide and aluminium oxide present in industrial wastes such as blast furnace slag powder and fly ash, to form inorganic polymer binder system. This paper describes experimental investigation on flexural behaviour of reinforced geopolymer concrete (GPC) incorporating synthetic light weight aggregate (sintered). GPC mixes with sintered FA aggregate were designed following the guidelines laid down by ACI committee 211.2 -1998. The compressive strength ranged from 23 to 30 MPa. Four sets of reinforced GPC beams (two specimens each) having different mix composition (25 and 50% FA in the binder system) incorporating fly ash aggregate and having reinforcement equal to 1.33 and 2.17 percentage of balanced section were tested for flexural behaviour under two point loading up to failure. The deflection, cracking load, failure load, and crack pattern at failure load were recorded. The ultimate load capacities ranged from 53.3 to 64.85 kN for 100% reinforcement and 24 to 32.6 kN for 50% reinforcement and about 10% difference was observed due to mix variations. The ratio of experimental to theoretical moment capacity ranged from 0.92 to 1.0. The ultimate moment carrying capacity of beams tested was calculated from the first principles using strain compatibility methods and provisions of IS: 456-2000.

3 illus, 4 tables, 10 ref

021806   Lone M R;Abbas Z;Siddiqi A H (Mathematical Sciences Dep, Baba Ghulam Shah Badshah University, Rajouri, Jammu and Kashmir, Email: mudassi2lone@gmail.com) : Correlation analysis of climatic dynamics of Jammu and Kashmir using wavelet methods. Int J appl Sci Engng Res 2014, 3(2), 546-56.

Wavelet analysis is a powerful tool that is already in use throughout science and engineering. The versatility and attractiveness of the wavelet approach lie in its decomposition properties, principally its time-scale localization. The applications of wavelet analysis are systematically increasing in the Meteorology. In the present paper, author study correlation between time series of five meteorological parameters of Jammu and Kashmir for the period 1995-2010 using wavelet methods. They also obtain the wavelet spectrum and compute the cross-correlation coefficient between the two same meteorological parameters, of the two different locations using statistical methods. In general, for all pairs of stations the time series for temperature and rainfall data were adjudged to be highly correlated, whereas wind speed, pressure and relative humidity comparatively less correlated.

20 illus, 5 tables, 25 ref

021805   Kusuma J N;Matar O K;Sahu K C (Chemical Engineering Dep, Indian Institute of Technology Hyderabad, Yeddumailaram-502 205, Email: ksahu@iith.ac.in) : Numerical simulations of miscible channel flow with chemical reactions. Curr Sci 2014, 106(6), 841-52.

Study the pressure-driven miscible displacement of one fluid by another in a horizontal channel in the presence of an exothermic chemical reaction. We solve the continuity, Navier-Stokes, and energy conservation equations coupled to convective-discussion equations of the reactant and product. The viscosity is assumed to depend on the volume fraction of the reactant and product as well as the temperature. The effects of relevant parameters such as the Reynolds number, Schmidt number, Damkohler number and viscosity ratio of the reactant and product are studied. Our results indicate that increasing the intensity of the chemical reaction by increasing the Damkohler number and decreasing the dimensionless activation energy increases the displacement rate. Also found that increasing Reynolds number leads to more pronounced instabilities and roll-up phenomena, which in turn promote rapid displacement of the resident fluid inside the channel. Variation of the relative significance of the heat of reaction and the Schmidt numbers of the reactants and products, however, has a negligible influence on the displacement rates for the parameter ranges considered in the present work.

16 illus, 47 ref

021804   Kulshreshth P (NO, , ) : Renovation modernization & upgradation (RMU) of hydro power stations. Wat Energy int 2013, 70(6), 19-29.

3 illus, 5 tables, ref

021803   Khan I;Kapoor A K (Anthropology Dep, University of Delhi, Delhi-110 007, Email: indelah_12@yahoo.com) : Diversity of Finger Patterns and Its Indices among Muslims of Daman and Diu, Western India. Int J appl Sci Engng Res 2014, 3(2), 373-82.

The human body s covered with hairs and sebaceous glands except the and plantar regions which are continuously corrugated with narrow ridges. Dermatoglyphics is considered to be one of the important as well as interesting branches in present study of highly developed science and technology.The value of Dermatoglyphics has been increased in clinical investigations with rapid growth in human genetics and with the discovery of chromosomal aberration in man. It can be used as a tool of differentiation between twins and in disputed paternity. Besides this, the finger patterns show variations among different populations and between the sexes in the same population. Hence it play many important roles in various fields since the fingerprints are always unchangeable. The purpose of the present study was to know the variations in the finger pattern among the males and females of Muslims of Daman and Diu and to compare present population group with the neighboring population of Gujarat and Maharashtra. Thus, on the basis of the parameters studied and compared, it can be summarized that Muslims of Daman are closer to the neighboring population of western India.

11 tables, 3 ref

021802   Kaur S;Singh P;Butter A S (ECE Dep, DIET, , Kharar, Email: somal1956@gmail.com) : Design and analysis of proximity microstrip patch antenna with parasitic lines. Int J appl Sci Engng Res 2014, 3(2), 393-401.

Design presented here mainly focuses on implementation of a single feed compact rectangular microstrip patch antenna (MSA) for single band application. The antenna presented here also works in dual band but its best performance has been obtained when optimized to work in single band mode. In this paper, a new feeding structure is applied in the patch antenna design to overcome undesirable features of the earlier multilayer feeding structures while maintaining their interesting features. To make the proposed antenna more efficient the optimization of the antenna design parameters have been done using HFSS's optometric. For the proposed antenna the resonant frequency has been obtained at 6.03GHz, 9.60GHz, 11.62GHz, return loss of -43.30, -37.68,-11.89db with Bandwidth of 165MHz, 271MHz, 300MHz respectively. The characteristics of the designed structure are investigated by using FEM based electromagnetic solver.

13 illus, 2 tables, 15 ref

021801   Kaliluthin A K;Kothandaraman S (Civil Engineering Dep, B S Rahman University, Chennai, Email: kalil.ak786@gmail.com) : Experimental investigation on behavior of reinforced concrete beam-column joint. Int J civ struct Engng 2014, 4(3), 248-61.

Experimental investigation carried out on the reinforced concrete exterior beam-column joint was subjected to static load, is reported in this paper. The objective of this study is to investigate the existing RC beam column joints which are designed as per BIS 4562000,which must be strengthened, since they do not meet the requirement given in the ductility code IS 13920-1993 are inadequate and it needs to be upgraded regarding the detailing of reinforcements an attempt has been made to introduced an additional reinforcement called "core reinforcements" in the joint region to improve the reinforcement detailing pattern and strength behaviour to ensure good performance of the joint as well. The experimental study was conducted on full scale exterior beam column joint specimens detailed in three different categories such as IS 456-2000 as reference joint (RJ), IS: 13920: 1993 as ductile joint (DJ) and core reinforcements as core joint (CJ) were casted and tested under static loading and the results were evaluated with respect to in terms of strength, ductility and stiffness degradation. Test results showed that the use of core reinforcement reduced the damages in the joint region and is one of the most effective techniques to improve the seismic resistance of RC structures.

14 illus, 5 tables, 17 ref

021800   Jameel A;Tarlochan Singh (Mechanical and Industrial Engineering Dep, Indian Institute of Technology Roorkee, Roorkee-247 667, Email: jameelazher@gmail.com) : Modeling and simulation of large deformation bi-material problems using EFGM. INROADS 2014, 3(1; Spec), 48-53.

In this paper, the element free Galerkin method (EFGM) has been employed to model bi-material problems containing geometric nonlinearities due to large deformations. Few modifications are made in EFGM to incorporate different types of discontinuities in the formulation. The bi-material interface between the two bodies is modeled by using appropriate enrichment functions. Finally, two bi-material problems are solved using EFGM to demonstrate the applicability of EFGM in the modeling and simulation of large deformation problems. The results obtained by the EFGM technique are compared with those obtained by FEM. The results clearly indicate that the present approach can be efficiently used to model the large deformation problems containing different types of discontinuities in the domain.

15 illus, 10 ref

021799   Jain V;Pankaj Kumar (NO, Poornima College of Engineering, Jaipur, Email: vaibhavjain.811@gmail.com) : Simulation and modeling of feedback field oriented control of an asynchronous machines. INROADS 2014, 3(1; Spec), 54-61.

There are two types of controlling of induction motors: scalar controlling and vector controlling. This paper will focus on the vector control. Vector Controlling is again having two types one is field oriented control and second is direct torque control. In this paper we will focus on field oriented control of induction machine. When field oriented-control techniques are applied to induction machines, a torque response like DC Machine may be achieved, making the induction machine a viable candidate for applications previously dominated by other electric machines so the basic of separately excited DC Machine can be taken to understand the FOC up to some extent. Some applications, however, demand high performance over a wide range of operating conditions. The field-oriented techniques needed to achieve the desired performance for which it works on two synchronously rotating axis which earlier converted by two stationary axis and by three stationary axis by using particular transformations theory. This paper presents a new feedback field oriented controller, for which voltage based model flux estimator and current based model flux estimators are designed, along with their derivations using the trapezoidal rule for improved accuracy and stability. These estimators are then combinedly implemented into a feed-back field-oriented controller using many subsystems. The resulting controller achieves an acceptable level of performance over a range of operating conditions.

15 illus, 22 ref

021798   Jain N;Agarwal P;Sharma S (NO, , Electrical Engineering Dep, Jagannath Univ, Email: nehajian@poornima.org) : Analysis of power quality improvement in voltage SAG and load sensitivity using fuzzy logic. INROADS 2014, 3(1; Spec), 148-52.

The power quality (PQ) requirement is one of the most important issues for power companies and their customers. The disturbances are voltage sag, swell, notch, spike and transients etc. The voltage sag is very severe problem for an industrial customer which needs urgent attention for its compensation. There are various methods for the compensation of voltage sag. One of the most popular methods of sag compensation is fuzzy logic technique for PQ disturbance analysis which is used in both low voltage and medium voltage applications. In this paper, the comprehensive reviews of various articles, the advantages and disadvantages of each possible configuration and control techniques pertaining to fuzzy logic are presented. This paper presents a case study application of fuzzy logic in a power quality issue. It describes the computer-based load sensitivity to voltage sags, by using fuzzy sets and IF-THEN inference rules. A fuzzy inference system is experimentally implemented for these cases, showing the general procedures of how to use this theory. It appears that fuzzy set theory can play an important role in diagnosing disturbances. And hence it can offer insights towards the satisfaction of the needs of manufacturers, Utilities and customers.

6 illus, 2 tables, 12 ref

021797   Jain A;Ajaykumar S (Civil Engineering Dep, NIT, Kurukshetra, Email: ashwani.jain@rediffmail.com) : Influence of granulated mild steel sludge on consistency limits and strength characteristics of an expansive soil. INROADS 2014, 3(1; Spec), 83-8.

Expansive soils pose certain difficulties to construction activities and hence require stabilization prior to the start of work. Apart from conventional methods, studies are going on to use waste products from various industries as additives in problematic soils to improve engineering properties of soil and make them suitable for construction activities. The present study aims at finding the effectiveness of mild steel sludge as an additive for stabilizing an expansive soil. Consistency limit tests and unconfined compressive strength tests have been conducted on remoulded samples of an expansive soil treated with various percentages (3, 6, 9, 12, 15 and 18 percent) of granulated mild steel sludge to assess the effect on liquid limit and plastic limit, and strength characteristics. It has been observed that there is a decrease in the value of consistency limits and an increase in strength of soil on addition of granulated mild steel sludge.

3 illus, 4 tables, 17 ref

021796   Ikiensikimama S S;Azubuike I I;Ajienka J A (Petroleum and gas Engineering Dep, University of Port Harcourt, , Email: ikien2003@yahoo.com) : New correlations of condensate gas ratio (cgr) - part 1: for eastern niger deita region. Int J appl Sci Engng Res 2014, 3(2), 339-48.

This work aim at the use of regression method to develop condensate gas ratio (cgr) correlations using dataset obtained from eastern niger delta region. The procedure of dividing the formation into three distinct geologic zones was adopted. These zones are transitional paralic paralic and marine paralic zones. The basic parameters used for the correlation development are reservoir pressure (psia); reservoir temperature (o f) all at (goc/gdt/gwc and these parameters are data easily obtained from the field. Matlab and excel software packages were used as the implementation platform. Both quantitative and qualitative assessments were employed to evaluate the accuracy of the new models to the experimental values. The models have very impressive statistical parameters with good ranks and b(etter performance plots. However, caution should be exercise for the use of these models since the data used for their development was not robust enough; especially their use beyond the range of data used for their development.

9 illus, 4 tables, 16 ref

021795   Hua T;Guo Y;Yu Y;Sheu G;Yao J (NO, College of Electronic Science and Engineering, Nanjing Posts and Telec, Nanjing-210 003, China) : Analytical model of triple RESURF device with linear P-layer doping profile. IETE Tech Rev 2013, 30(1), 31-7.

An analytical model of Triple RESURF device with linear P-layer doping profile is proposed in the paper. According to the analytical model and numerical simulation, the surface potential and electric field distributions of Single RESURF device, Double and Triple RESURF devices with linear-doped P-layer are investigated. The impacts of the P-layer doping profile on the breakdown voltage and specific on-resistance of Triple RESURF devices are discussed in detail, and the electric field modulation mechanism of the linear-doped P-layer is also described. In addition, the ideal P-layer doping profile, the maximum lateral breakdown voltage, and the optimal N-drift doping concentration are derived to guide the design of the Triple RESURF device. The analytical results are well supported by the simulation results, confirming the validity of the model presented here.

5 illus, 19 ref

021794   Hu K;Xiang J;Xu X K;Li H J;Yang W C;Tang Y (Basic Sciences Dep, The First Aeronautical Institute of the Air Force, Xinyang 464000, China, Email: xiaokeeie@gmail.com) : Predicting the growth of new links by new preferential attachment similarity indices. Pramana J Phys 2014, 82(3), 571-83.

By revisiting the preferential attachment (PA) mechanism for generating a classical scale-free network, we propose a class of novel preferential attachment similarity indices for predicting future links in evolving networks. Extensive experiments on 14 real-life networks show that these new indices can provide more accurate prediction than the traditional one. Due to the improved prediction accuracy and low computational complexity, these proposed preferential attachment indices can be helpful for providing both instructions for mining unknown links and new insights to understand the underlying mechanisms that drive the network evolution.

2 illus, 2 tables, 47 ref

021793   He P;Jing C G;Chen C Z;Fan T;Nik S (School of Information Science & Engineering, Northeastern University, Shenyang, Liaoning, 110819, People's Republic of China, Email: pinghecn@126.com) : Synchronization of general complex networks via adaptive control schemes. Pramana J Phys 2014, 82(3), 499-514.

The synchronization problem of general complex networks is investigated by using adaptive control schemes. Time-delay coupling, derivative coupling, nonlinear couplingetc. exist universally in real-world complex networks. The adaptive synchronization scheme isdesigned for the complex network with multiple class of coupling terms. A criterion guaranteeingsynchronization of such complex networks is established by employing the Lyapunov stability theoremand adaptive control schemes. Finally, an illustrative example with numerical simulation isgiven to show the feasibility and efficiency of theoretical results.

5 illus, 53 ref

021792   Gunturi M;Ravichandran P T;Annadurai R;Divya Krishnan K (Civil Engineering Dep, Faculty of Engineering and Technology, SRM University, Kattankulathur, Chennai, Tamil Nadu, Email: ptrsrm@gmail.com) : Experimental study on strength properties of problematic soils with RBI-81 stabiliser. Int J civ struct Engng 2014, 4(3), 441-9.

Rapid industrialization demands for developing engineering facilities even in difficult soils like soft clays and loose silts. Expansive soils which are generally termed as problematic soils cause swelling and shrinkage resulting in significant damage to the structures constructed on them. In this study an attempt is made to improve the strength and to stabilize the problematic soil by the use of chemical additive, RBI grade 81. Detailed experimental investigation including unconfined compression tests, SEM and EDAX analysis were carried out to know the effectiveness of addition of RBI grade 81 to improve the engineering properties, chemical composition and mineralogical properties of two soil samples (A1 and A2). Treated soil specimens at various stabilizer dosages (2, 4 and 6%) were tested for UCS after curing periods of 3 days and 7 days. It was observed that the unconfined compressive strength of the soil sample Al and A2 increased by 475% and 430% with addition of 6% stabilizer after 7 days curing. The increase in strength can be due to the formation of new cementitious compounds which is evident in the micrographs from SEM and EDAX analysis.

10 illus, 4 tables, 17 ref

021791   Grewal G S (Materials Technology Div, Electrical Research & Development Association (ERDA), Vadodara, Gujarat) : Duplex stainless steels: potential runner materials for Indian hydro electric porojects. Wat Energy int 2013, 70(6), 38-44.

32 illus, 4 tables, ref

021790   Florence Gnana Poovathy J;Vijayalakshmi P (ECE Dep, SSN College of Engineering, Chennai, Email: vijayalakshmip@ssn.edu.in) : Objective measures for the evaluation of synthesized speech signal. Int J Comp Applic 2013, 8(2), 175-83.

Subjective measurement with mean opinion score (MOS) is the commonly used analysis tool available for analyzing the artificial speech synthesized by a synthesizer. Though the subjective measurement provides a measure for the perceptual quality, they may not distinguish the increase or decrease in energy, shortening or elongation of the duration and the change in the shape of the pitch contour that occur in the synthesis units compared to the input units, which may greatly affect the perception. The current work proposes an efficient evaluation technique for synthetic speech namely, evaluation using objective measures. The evaluation is focused on synthetic speech synthesized from unit selection based speech synthesizer (US5), which synthesizes speech by concatenating the appropriate synthesis units available in the speech corpus. As USS suffers from sonicªglitches at the concatenation points, drastic variations that affect the perception are expected to be present at the concatenation points or in the concatenated units. Hence, the parameters namely, the short time energy, pitch contour and duration are analyzed for the concatenated units. After the analysis, based on the results a weightage is given for each parameter and deducted from the MOS. In the duration analysis, it is observed that about 57.25% of the concatenated units in the synthesized speech had less duration compared to that of the very same unit available in the corpus. Around 63.64 % of the concatenated syllables had greater energy compared to the training syllable units. The analysis of the syllable based system revealed the drastic variations in the shape of the pitch contour in the synthesized speech compared to that of the input speech.

5 illus, 4 tables, 8 ref

021789   Eveline Pregitha R;Jegathesan V;Ebbie Selva Kumar C;Kezi Selva Vijila C (NO, Karunya University, Coimbatore, Email: epregitha@gmaIl.com) : Ultrasound fetal image segmentaton using fuzzy C-means clustering method. Int J Comp Applic 2013, 8(2), 159-63.

Ultrasound fetal image segmentation using fuzzy C-means clustering method is proposed in this paper. The input image is decomposed into a multi-resolution space using the two-dimensional wavelet transform. The system builds features vector for each pixel that contains information about the gray level, moments and other texture information. These-vectors are used as inputs for the fuzzy c-means clustering method, which results in a segmented image whose regions are distinct from each other according to texture characteristic content. An Adaptive Shock filter is used to enhance fetal ultrasound images before wavelet decomposition. Experiments indicate that t:hiS method can be applied with promising results. Preliminary experiments indicate good results in image segmentation while further studies are needed to investigate the potential of wavelet analysis and fuzzy c-means clustering methods as a tool for detecting fetus organs in digital ultrasound images.

5 illus, 17 ref

021788   Eisa A S;Ragab S (Structural Engineering Dep, Faculty of Engineering, Zagazig University, Zagazig, Egypt, Email: ahmedeisa@zu.edu.eg) : Behaviour of steel fiber reinforced high strength self-compacting concrete beams under combined bending and torsion. Int J civ struct Engng 2014, 4(3), 315-31.

This paper investigates experimentally and analytically the behavior of steel fiber reinforced high strength self-compacting concrete beams under combined bending and torsion. In the recent decades, steel fiber reinforced high strength self-compacting concrete (SFHSSCC) is considered a very important material in the structural engineering field. High strength concrete attracts designers and architects as it offers good durability and the esthetics of a construction as well. One of the advantages using the SFHSSCC is to provide high ductile behavior. SFHSSCC has also a high toughness, with improvement in workability, and high residual strengths after the initiation of the first crack. The main challenge in many past studies is to select the effective fiber contents that should be added to the concrete mixture. In the present study, a Hooked shape steel fibers are used; the hooked steel fibers were evaluated using the volume fractions, which varied between 0.0%, 0.75%and 1.5%. A total of six beams were tested, and classified into three groups. The beam shapes are chosen to create the torsional and bending moments simultaneously. All beams, have 200 cm length, a cross section of (10 x 20) cm, longitudinal bottom steel reinforcement of 3φ10, longitudinal top steel reinforcement of 2φ10, additional longitudinal steel 1φ8 placed in the mid height of the cross sections, and closed stirrups of 10φ8/m. The first group is considered as a reference group consisting of a beam casted from conventional normal weight concrete. The second group is consisted of two beams casted from self- compacting concrete, the first beam in the second group was casted without steel fibers and the second beam was casted with steel fibers volume fraction equal to 0.75%. The third group is consisted of three beams that were casted from high strength self- compacting concrete (HSCC) with steel fiber volume fractions equal to 0.0%, 0.75% and 1.5% respectively. The experimental results were validated using finite element analysis. It is concluded that the effect of steel fiber reinforced high strength self- compacting concrete (SFHSSCC) enhances the behavior of beams under combined bending and torsion.

16 illus, 4 tables, 34 ref

021787   Deepak R;Wiselin R (NO, Christian College of Engg. and Tech., Oddanchatram, Tamilnadu, Email: deepakeee56@gmail.com ) : MAC decorum with obstacle based dual sensing in ad hoc networks. Int J Comp Applic 2013, 8(2), 233-8.

theoretically achieve higher spatial multiplexing gain and, thus, higher network throughput. However, in practice, deafness, hidden-terminal, and exposed terminal problems are exaggerated with directional antennas, and they cause the degradation of the overall network performance. Although there are several random-access-based medium-access control (MAC) protocols being proposed in the literature for networks with directional antennas, the deafness, hidden-terminal, and exposed terminal problems have yet to be fully solved. In this paper, we present a new MAC protocol called the dual-sensing directional MAC (DSDMAC) protocol for wireless ad hoc networks with directional antennas. Different from existing protocols, the DSDMAC protocol relies on the dual-sensing strategy to identify deafness, resolve the hidden-terminal problem, and avoid unnecessary blocking. The integrity of the DSDMAC protocol is verified and validated using Spin, which is a formal protocol verification and validation tool. We further develop an analytical framework to quantify the performance of the DSDMAC protocol and conduct extensive simulations, which verify the accuracy of the analysis. The protocol verification, analysis, and simulation results show the robustness and superior performance of the DSDMAC protocol, which can achieve a much higher network throughput and lower delay utilizing the spatial multiplexing gain of the directional antennas. The results presented in this paper show that the proposed DSDMAC protocol can substantially outperform the state-of the-art protocols.

4 illus, 10 ref

021786   Datta S;Bhuyan P K (Civil Engineering Dep, National Institute of Technology, Rourkela-769 008, Email: sdce90@gmail.com) : Estimation of critical gap for U-turn vehicles at median openings under mixed traffic conditions. INROADS 2014, 3(1; Spec), 133-41.

Installation of unsignalized median openings have increased in many Indian cities during the past few years due to the non-accommodation of minor movements like U-turns on unsignalized intersections. Gap acceptance behavior for U-turns vehicles is an important aspect at unsignalized median openings. Critical gap forms the sole parameter in gap acceptance models. Estimation of critical gaps for U-turns at median openings under mixed traffic conditions have not been addressed till today. Reason being the complex and risky vehicular interactions under mixed traffic at median openings. Data comprises video recording of 4 U-turn median openings in Bhubaneshwar city. In this paper, a new concept on merging behavior of U-turn vehicles for evaluation of gap acceptance has been introduced. Two existing methods namely Harders and Satish et al. "INAFOGA" are used for estimating critical gap considering four motorized modes of transport for all the four sections. Cluster plots for all four sections are shown to compare these two methods considering the four modes. A paired sample T-test was done in IBM SPSS 22.0 which revealed that "INAFOGA" method yield critical gap values 28-41% more than those obtained by Harders method. This explained the robustness of "INAFOGA" method in addressing mixed traffic conditions for U-turns at median openings.

5 illus, 2 tables, 22 ref