Towards a Smarter organization for a Self-servicing Society

Traditional social organizations such as those for the management of healthcare are the result of designs that matched well with an operational context considerably different from the one we are experiencing today. The new context reveals all the fragility of our societies. In this paper, a platform is introduced by combining social-oriented communities and complex-event processing concepts: SELFSERV. Its aim is to complement the "old recipes" with smarter forms of social organization based on the self-service paradigm and by exploring culture-specific aspects and technological challenges.Comment: Final version of a paper published in the Proceedings of International Conference on Software Development and Technologies for Enhancing Accessibility and Fighting Info-exclusion (DSAI'16), special track on Emergent Technologies for Ambient Assisted Living (ETAAL

Catalyzed Gasoline Particulate Filters Reduce Secondary Organic Aerosol Production from Gasoline Direct Injection Vehicles

The effects of photochemical aging on exhaust emissions from two light-duty vehicles with gasoline direct injection (GDI) engines equipped with and without catalyzed gasoline particle filters (GPFs) were investigated using a mobile environmental chamber. Both vehicles with and without the GPFs were exercised over the LA92 drive cycle using a chassis dynamometer. Diluted exhaust emissions from the entire LA92 cycle were introduced to the mobile chamber and subsequently photochemically reacted. It was found that the addition of catalyzed GPFs will significantly reduce tailpipe particulate emissions and also provide benefits in gaseous emissions, including nonmethane hydrocarbons (NMHC). Tailpipe emissions composition showed important changes with the use of GPFs by practically eliminating black carbon and increasing the fractional contribution of organic mass. Production of secondary organic aerosol (SOA) was reduced with GPF addition, but was also dependent on engine design which determined the amount of SOA precursors at the tailpipe. Our findings indicate that SOA production from GDI vehicles will be reduced with the application of catalyzed GPFs through the mitigation of reactive hydrocarbon precursors

Kinetic Intersections as a Source of Information on Rate Coefficients

C

Emerging Consciousness as a Result of Complex-Dynamical Interaction Process

A quite general interaction process within a multi-component system is analysed by the extended effective potential method, liberated from usual limitations of perturbation theory or integrable model. The obtained causally complete solution of the many-body problem reveals the phenomenon of dynamic multivaluedness, or redundance, of emerging, incompatible system realisations and dynamic entanglement of system components within each realisation. The ensuing concept of dynamic complexity (and related intrinsic chaoticity) is absolutely universal and can be applied to the problem of consciousness that emerges now as a high enough, properly specified level of unreduced complexity of a suitable interaction process. This complexity level can be identified with the appearance of bound, permanently localised states in the multivalued brain dynamics from strongly chaotic states of unconscious intelligence, by analogy with classical behaviour emergence from quantum states at much lower levels of world dynamics. We show that the main properties of this dynamically emerging consciousness (and intelligence, at the preceding complexity level) correspond to empirically derived properties of natural versions and obtain causally substantiated conclusions about their artificial realisation, including the fundamentally justified paradigm of genuine machine consciousness. This rigorously defined machine consciousness is different from both natural consciousness and any mechanistic, dynamically single-valued imitation of the latter. We use then the same, truly universal concept of complexity to derive equally rigorous conclusions about mental and social implications of the machine consciousness paradigm, demonstrating its indispensable role in the next stage of civilisation development

The fractal urban coherence in biourbanism: the factual elements of urban fabric

This article is available online and will be inserted in also printed format in the Journal in October 2013.During the last few decades, modern urban fabric lost some very important elements, only because urban design and planning turned out to be stylistic aerial views or new landscapes of iconic technological landmarks. Biourbanism attempts to re-establish lost values and balance, not only in urban fabric, but also in reinforcing human-oriented design principles in either micro or macro scale. Biourbanism operates as a catalyst of theories and practices in both architecture and urban design to guarantee high standards in services, which are currently fundamental to the survival of communities worldwide. Human life in cities emerges during connectivity via geometrical continuity of grids and fractals, via path connectivity among highly active nodes, via exchange/movement of people and, finally via exchange of information (networks). In most human activities taking place in central areas of cities, people often feel excluded from design processes in the built environment. This paper aims at exploring the reasons for which, fractal cities, which have being conceived as symmetries and patterns, can have scientifically proven and beneficial impact on human fitness of body and mind; research has found that, brain traumas caused by visual agnosia become evident when patterns disappear from either 2D or 3D emergences in architectural and urban design.ADT Fund

An Investigation of Diesel PM Particle Morphology Using TEM and SEM

This research investigates the effect of engine load and combustion mode on the size, shape and microstructure of PM particles of two diesel engines using a scanning mobility particle sizer (SMPS), and electron microscopes including scanning electron microscope (SEM) and transmission electron microscope (TEM). The effect of engine load on the morphology of PM particle was investigated using a 2004 MACK MP7-355E heavy-duty diesel engine. The effect of combustion mode on the morphology of the PM particles was preliminarily examined using 2005 Opel 1.9 L light-duty diesel engine. The SEM images were processed using ImageJ V: 1.44o software to obtain a set of parameters based on the projected area. These include the maximum length, maximum width, project area equivalent diameter, shape descriptor, fractal dimension, and the size of primary PM particles. The TEM images were processed to obtain the micro-structure and chemical composition of PM particles.;The SEM images obtained in this research revealed the diverse morphology of PM particles formed in heavy-duty diesel engine. The operation at low load tends to form small sphere-like PM particles compared to medium and high load operation featured with large and chain-like PM particles. The projected area equivalent diameter of PM particles observed was in the range of 43.7 to 167.4 nm and 66.4 to 688 nm for operation at 20% and 100% load respectively. The PM particles smaller than 43 nm observed using SMPS were not observed using SEM methods. The projected area equivalent diameter of PM particles from the light duty engine during PCCI mode was smaller in size compared to the PM particles observed under normal operation. The fractal dimension of this heavy-duty diesel engine observed was 1.82, indicating spherical PM particles. The fractal dimension for the light duty engine was 1.65 and 1.7 for the traditional diesel and PCCI mode, respectively, indicating more spherical particles during PCCI mode.;The TEM images were processed to obtain the compositions and microstructure of the PM particles. The PM particles observed contain mainly carbon as well as inorganic and metallic elements such as Ca, Mg, Zn, P and Si from engine oil, Al and Fe from engine wear, and S from fuel and lubricating oil. The compositions of PM particles were also found to vary significantly from particle to particle observed under identical operating conditions indicating the random burning of lubrication oil droplets and its effect on the formation of PM particles. The microstructure of primary particles from the heavy duty diesel engine exhibited two types of structure. The first type featured with concentric layers of graphitic layers roughly parallel and equidistant similar to the structure of an onion. The second type had similar concentric structure on the outside but the core region was found to contain multiple spherical nuclei surrounded by graphitic layers. Graphitic structures were observed for the primary particles from high engine loads for the heavy duty engine. The analysis revealed that spherical primary particles were clustered together to form large agglomerates