Appl. Syst. Innov., Volume 1, Issue 2 (June 2018) – 11 articles

Grading of rice intents to discriminate broken and whole grain from a sample. Standard techniques for image-based rice grading using advanced statistical methods seldom take into account the domain knowledge associated with the data. In the context of a high product value basmati rice with an image based grading process, one ought to consider the physical properties of grain and the associated knowledge. In this present work, a model of quality grade testing and identification is proposed using a novel digital image processing and knowledge-based adaptive neuro-fuzzy inference system (ANFIS). The rationale behind adopting a grading system based on fuzzy rules relies on capabilities of ANFIS to simulate the behaviour of an expert in the characterization of rice grain using the physical properties of rice grains. The rice kernels are characterized with the help of morphological descriptors and geometric features which are derived from sample images of milled basmati rice. The predictive capability of the proposed technique has been tested on a sufficient number of training and test images of basmati rice grain. The proposed method outperforms with a promising result in an evaluation of rice quality with >98.5% classification accuracy for broken and whole grain as compared to standard machine learning technique viz. support vector machine (SVM) and K-nearest neighbour (KNN). The milling efficiency is also assessed using the ratio between head rice and broken rice percentage and it is 77.27% for the test sample. The overall results of the adopted methodology are promising in terms of classification accuracy and efficiency. Full article

During current high-speed cutting processing, the requirements on the CNC machine tool, controller, and cutting technique has become higher and higher. This research focuses on cutting tools, when the rake angles of different tools cause the shearing cut to change, and when the cutting force and cutting resistance are changed accordingly. In general, the rake angle is smaller in rough machining and bigger in finish machining. Therefore, the size of the rake angle should be decided on by considering the workpiece, feed-rate, cutting depth, cutting speed, cutter life, etc. In this research, we make different changes to the rake angle of the milling cutter and do real cutting tests to discuss the impact that rake angle change has on its processing characteristics. During the cutting experiment, by setting different cutting parameters, this research aims to get cutting force data using the dynamometer and the signal interceptor, and to analyze the relevance of the cutting force change, abrasion of tool, surface roughness, and chip morphology of different rake angles. This will be done through observation when the rake angle is 0°, when the cutting force in the X/Y/Z direction is the smallest, when the depth of the cut is 0.1 to 0.3 mm, and when the tangential shear cutting constant K_ts is reduced by 50%. Full article

In this study, an Industry 4.0 framework-based decision support system (DSS) was developed using a combination of wireless network and RFID identification technology to manage a production line in a traditional dental manufacturing lab. The motivation was to prevent mistakes from manual recording, to remotely monitor the working hours of employees in manufacturing processes via internet, and to evaluate the rationality of the employee’s working hours. In the DSS, four network nodes were established to track four important manufacturing processes of digital dentistry. In each of these processes, the time spent by the dental technician was recorded by scanning their ID cards. All information was simultaneously uploaded to a databank in the cloud and analyzed by the computer software MATLAB. These programs evaluated the rationality of employees’ working hours in each of the monitored processes, which can help managers to follow up or improve the process efficiency. Full article

With the rise of consumer awareness in the increasingly competitive marketplace, attracting consumers’ attention to a successful product is an important issue. Regarding consumers’ purchasing decisions for bottled beverages, decision-making is driven not only by a beverage’s flavor attributes or brand impression, but also by the visual effect of its packaging design. Accordingly, how to create an attractive beverage packaging based on consumers’ affective requirements has become one of the most important concerns to promote sales of beverages. Many studies have discussed the visual design of container form design based on consumers’ sentimental responses by means of investigation and analysis. However, most research has focused on the exploration of a single beverage category, and rarely on the discussion of various beverage categories in terms of container design. To explore the issue, three beverage categories of PET (Polyethylene terephthalate) container form samples are chosen as examples of carbonated drinks, water drinks, and tea drinks. A series of visual evaluations of the PET container form was conducted to explore how the features influence consumers’ sentimental responses, and to compare the difference between the container features for the three categories of bottled beverages. The research results can provide bottled beverage designers/manufacturers with some meaningful suggestions for developing a new container design that meets consumers’ sentimental expectations. Full article

In this paper, new fuzzy numerical methods based on the fuzzy transform (F-transform or FT) for solving the Cauchy problem are introduced and discussed. In accordance with existing methods such as trapezoidal rule, Adams Moulton methods are improved using FT. We propose three new fuzzy methods where the technique of FT is combined with one-step, two-step, and three-step numerical methods. Moreover, the FT with respect to generalized uniform fuzzy partition is able to reduce error. Thus, new representations formulas for generalized uniform fuzzy partition of FT are introduced. As an application, all these schemes are used to solve Cauchy problems. Further, the error analysis of the new fuzzy methods is discussed. Finally, numerical examples are presented to illustrate these methods and compared with the existing methods. It is observed that the new fuzzy numerical methods yield more accurate results than the existing methods. Full article

Medication non-adherence is a prevalent, complex problem. Failure to follow medication schedules may lead to major health complications, including death. Proper medication adherence is thus required in order to gain the greatest possible drug benefit during a patient’s treatment. Interventions have been proven to improve medication adherence if deviations are detected. This review focuses on recent advances in the field of technology-based medication adherence approaches and pays particular attention to their technical monitoring aspects. The taxonomy space of this review spans multiple techniques including sensor systems, proximity sensing, vision systems, and combinations of these. As each technique has unique advantages and limitations, this work describes their trade-offs in accuracy, energy consumption, acceptability and user’s comfort, and user authentication. Full article

Ubiquitous intelligence of Internet of Things (IoT) objects and new sensors provide innovative solutions for a variety of health issues. Unintentional child poisoning represents an increasingly important health issue worldwide, partially because of an increase in the use of drugs and food supplements. Although child-resistant bottle caps have probably saved many lives, they are not foolproof and do not provide warnings for parents and caregivers when children try to access the bottles. In this paper we present a design, implementation, and feasibility analysis of an intelligent “safe pill bottle” that can identify when a child is trying to open a bottle and then generate an immediate warning to deter a child from opening the bottle and send alerts to parents/guardians. The bottle controller uses capacitive sensing to identify the class of user. We present the results of pilot testing with eight adults and eight children using neural networks (NN). With 474 bottle-opening events, our NN had 96.4% accuracy of predicting whether the user was a child or an adult. Preliminary results demonstrate that smart pill bottles may be an effective tool to prevent unintentional child poisoning. Full article

Crude glycerol, a byproduct of biodiesel production, was evaluated as a potential green inhibitor for steel corrosion in an acidic environment. The study was conducted using steel specimens placed in hydrochloric acid solutions (0.5 M) at a constant room temperature (25 °C) and crude glycerol concentrations in the range 0.1%–1.0% w/w. The criteria used to evaluate the extent of corrosion were the weight loss and corrosion rate. Additionally, fresh and spent samples were characterized using scanning electron microscopy and potentiodynamic polarization measurements. It was found that, generally, the corrosion inhibition increased with the inhibitor concentration. Results also showed that the maximum inhibition efficiency was achieved at 70 h residence time after which the inhibition efficiency at a given concentration either remained unchanged or dropped slight. Additionally, the overall maximum inhibition efficiency (98%) was observed at 70 h residence time and a 1% inhibitor concentration. Full article

Problem—The conventional view of new product development (NPD) methodologies focuses on marketing and commercial prospects in developed countries. There is a need to identify both the barriers and the enablers to design within a rural context in developing countries (DC). Method—A researcher was embedded in a rural DC design project. Issues were observed and critical success and failure factors determined. These were abstracted into a set of design principles, and a new model of the NPD process was created. Findings—Whereas commercial NPD emphasizes market intelligence and a highly directive approach to the engineering workflow, in the DC situation the objective is to fulfil community needs and this necessitates co-determination regarding the engineering. There is commonality between the two NPD processes, with ours having a greater emphasis on the socio-cultural factors. The deployment principles are categorized into technical and socio-cultural. Within these are included project management, design, material selection, visualization, communication, maintainability, safety, and health. Originality—A novel representation of the process for conducting design in developing countries is provided. Critical success factors are identified. The socio-cultural perspective is explicitly included, which is absent from the conventional engineering and business perspectives. Full article

The ever-escalating rise in numbers of the aging population has preempted a revolutionary change in the healthcare sector and serves as a major counterpoint to modern life in the 21st century. Increasing demand being placed on the health sector is almost certainly an inevitable process. However, providing appropriate healthcare services is requisite for senior citizens who suffer from various health issues and conditions. To minimize these health risks, we derived an intuitive technique for determining the incongruity of health symptoms by using a symptom checker, which is embedded into a versatile mobile app named Help-to-You (H2U). The designed app helps the users and carers to determine and identify conceivable reasons for elderly ailments and to assist users in deciding when to counsel a health practitioner. The intention of this empirical study was to further analyze and foresee certain variations of infections based on the symptoms accounted for by the patient. The recommended solution consolidated conceptual design with multi-criteria decision analysis (MCDA) technique and an analytic hierarchy process (AHP) with fuzzy weights to deal with the uncertainty of imprecision and ambiguity resulting from various disease factors. Experimental results verified the effectiveness of the proposed model, subsequently providing a variety of life assistance services. Full article

Successful management of construction projects in the Building Information Modelling (BIM) era of the 21st Century should include intelligent systems to support construction project teams in making informed decisions. Project teams are routinely faced with contractual obligations to deliver projects to meet key construction parameters such as cost, time, quality and more recently stringent sustainability requirements. These sorts of pressures are no longer new as widely acknowledged by experienced project managers, contract administrators and clients. The poor performance of one or more of the aforementioned parameters will undoubtedly compromise the entire project, thus leading to the dissatisfaction of clients. This paper explores the use of mobile/cloud BIM in facilitating the adoption of an integrated approach to project delivery through automated or semi-automated dynamic information sharing processes with the ultimate goal of improving construction performance. The adopted methodology involved the use of an online-administered questionnaire survey and in-depth interviews. The study identifies the adoption and uptake of cloud/mobile BIM technologies and the benefits and barriers. Full article