Pantograph Spark Fault Detection using YOLO

Pantograph-catenary is now the dominant form of current collection for modern electric trains because they can be used for higher voltages. Faults in pantograph-catenary systems threaten the operation and safety of railway transportation. They need to be continuously monitored and controlled to maintain safe transport. Pantograph may be damaged as a result of extreme weather conditions which can affect its normal operation, leading to failure of pantograph and overhead contact line systems. Poor contact between pantograph and overhead contact line causes thermal erosion to the wire. When the pantographs are exposed to air, they could deteriorate due to electrochemical reaction with the environment since they are made of metals. Movement of catenary lines and pantograph in high crosswinds has been found to cause the wire to be trapped in the pantograph. There is a serious issue regarding the quality of images generated by pantograph video monitoring system on high-speed railway trains which often shows inconsistencies of catenary faults. The application of traditional image processing and deep learning techniques have been unable to meet the requirements of spark detection. In this paper,  a modern deep learning algorithm is proposed to detect sparks in the pantograph. Specifically, the YOLOv3 model is used to counter this problem that traditional image processing algorithms have been unable to. The results on a very large sample of data show the efficiency and real-time performance of the proposed method, which meets the requirements of pantograph spark detection in high-speed railway. Keywords: High-speed railway pantograph; Spark detection; Deep learning; YOLOv3; DOI: 10.7176/ISDE/12-3-02 Publication date:September 30th 202

Observational Technique as an Assessment Agenda: Teacher and Student Perceptions

This studylooked at teachers’ and students’ views on the use and usefulness of observational techniques in the teaching and learning of English. Twenty nine (29) teachers and 1030 students participated.Cronbach’s Alpha Coefficient was used to estimate the internal consistency of items in the questionnaire and a coefficient above 0.6 was accepted as reliable. The Mann-Whitney test was used to determine the difference in the perception of students and teachers on the teachers’ use and usefulness of observational techniques. The Kruskal-Walis (K-W) test was used to determine the difference in perception of teachers on the use and usefulness of observational techniques.Scoring rubrics, anecdotal records and portfolios have similar impact when used in the evaluation of performance, while checklists, rating scales, and usefulness of observational techniques have different impact when used in the evaluation of English performance. Students in the girls’ schools find observational techniques more useful than the students in boys’ and mixed schools, but the teachers were in agreement that the techniques are beneficial to all schools irrespective of their types. Teachers and students had varied opinions on the use and usefulness of observational techniques in Provincial and District schools. The students’ accepted that only scoring rubrics could be used in both Provincial and District schools while the teachers agreed that all the observational techniques were useful in evaluating performance in both Provincial and District schools. Keywords:Observational techniques, scoring rubrics, anecdotal records, rating scales, Keny

Role of monooxygenases in insecticide resistant anopheles funestus(diptera: culicidae)

Student Number : 0318930A - PhD thesis - School of Animal, Plant and Environmental Studies - Faculty of ScienceThe widespread use of pyrethroid insecticides has led to the emergence of significant insecticide resistance in various parts of the world. An unprecedented increase in the number of annual malaria cases reported in Kwazulu Natal, South Africa in 1999 to 2000 was attributed to the re-emergence of pyrethroid-resistant Anopheles funestus Giles. Resistance was metabolic-based with increased monooxygenase (P450) metabolising the pyrethroid insecticides. This emphased the need to understand the molecular mechanisms conferring pyrethroid resistance in An. funestus. The present study aimed to firstly isolate P450 genes in An. funestus and secondly, to identify P450 gene over-expressed in a resistant (FUMOZ-R) strain compared to a susceptible (FANG) strain. A third aim was to construct an An. funestus cDNA library to lay the foundation for future studies on P450 monooxygenses. Degenerate primers based on conserved regions of three An. gambiae P450 families were used to amplify cDNAs from An. funestus. Eleven CYP4, four CYP6 and five CYP9 partial genes were isolated and sequenced. BLAST results revealed that An. funestus P450s have a high sequence similarity to An. gambiae with above 75% identity at the amino acid level. The exception was CYP9J14. The An. gambiae P450 with the closest similarity to CYP9J14 exhibited only 55% identity suggesting a recent duplication event in CYP9J14. Molecular phylogenetic analysis also supported this hypothesis. Intron positions were highly conserved between the two species. Expression studies using blot analysis implicated CYP6P9, an ortholog of CYP6P3 in An. gambiae, as the over-expressed P450. Dot blot analysis revealed a 500-fold expression higher in FUMOZ-R strain compared with FANG strain. Semiquantitative PCR revealed that CYP6P9 was developmentally regulated. Expression was not detected in eggs and was higher in larvae compared to pupae. Quantitative real time PCR showed that CYP6P9 expression was 4.5-fold higher in 3-day old FUMOZ-R males than females and 3.5-fold higher in the 14-day old males than 14- day old females. Statistically, this difference was not significant suggesting that CYP6P9 expression is not sex specific. The An. funestus cDNA library construction in λTriplEx2 vector was successful with a titre of 4.9 x108 pfu/ml and a transformation efficiency of 98%

RFID Technology in Real Time Attendance Register System

RFID stands for Radio Frequency Identification which provides the ability to identify, locate and sense the conditions of animate and inanimate entities. Radio frequency identification or RFID is a generic term for technologies that are used for auto identification of people or object using radio waves. In this technology a unique serial number is stored to identify a person or an object and other related information, on a microchip of silicon that is attached to an antenna which in turn is attached to a RFID reader. The antenna enables the chip to transmit the identification information to a reader then the reader converts the radio waves reflected back from the RFID tag into digital information that can then passed on to computers running RFID application middleware, that can make use of it. The system stores the absent and present student’s attendance details in electronic format so that management of attendance becomes easy. Radio-Frequency Identification (RFID) is a technology that uses radio waves to transfer data from an electronic tag, called RFID tag or label, attached to an object, through a reader for the purpose of identifying and tracking the object. RFID technology which is a matured technology that has been widely deployed by various organizations as part of their automation systems. In this study, an RFID based system has been built in order to produce a time-attendance management system. This system consists of two main parts which include: the hardware and the software. The hardware consists of the motor unit and the RFID reader. The RFID reader, which is a low-frequency reader (125 kHz), is connected to the host computer via a serial to USB converter cable. The Time-Attendance System GUI was developed using visual basic.Net. The Time-Attendance Management System provides the functionalities of the overall system such as displaying live ID tags transactions, registering ID, deleting ID, recording attendance and other minor functions. This interface was installed in the host computer. Keywords: Systems, RFID, Technology, Attendance, Register, DOI: 10.7176/CEIS/12-2-06 Publication date: September 30th 202

ダイオキシン誘発性のマウスCyp1a1プロモーター上の安定したエピジェネティックな変化

学位の種別: 課程博士審査委員会委員 : （主査）東京大学准教授 馬淵 昭彦, 東京大学教授 松崎 政紀, 東京大学准教授 田中 輝幸, 東京大学講師 細谷 紀子, 東京大学講師 栗原 由紀子University of Tokyo(東京大学

Exploring the knowledge and awareness of diabetes mellitus among inhabitants of Ho municipality in Ghana: A cross-sectional study

One of the fast-growing major non-communicable diseases (NCD) that poses a danger to global public health is Diabetes mellitus (DM). Trends in  the incidence of DM indicate a disproportionate increase in developing countries due to current rapid demographic transitions from traditional to  more westernized and urbanized lifestyles. Knowledge of DM is vital for curbing or control. The objectives of this study were to evaluate the level of  knowledge and awareness of DM among the Ho municipality general population, identify areas of deficiency for targeted health education efforts,  and identify respondent characteristics that may be associated with knowledge of diabetes. A survey involving 132 respondents (age over 18 years)  was conducted in the Ho municipality of the Volta region of Ghana. A 42-item pre-tested questionnaire was administered to participants to evaluate  general and specific knowledge and awareness of DM. The Pairwise Multiple Comparison and Fisher’s Exact tests were used to test the hypotheses  and associations between the respondents’ knowledge level and groups respectively. Of the 132 respondents, 22% were in the age range of 40-46  years; 72.7% were female. Mean over all diabetes knowledge composite score was poor: 32.99% (CI; 27.5, 38.5). Respondents performed best in the  symptoms section: mean score was 36.247% (CI; 29.0, 43.4); and worst in the section on complications: mean score was 30.909% (CI; 23.6, 38.2). In  multiple linear regression analyses, education level, older age, own self having diabetes, and having a family member/relative/friend with diabetes  were significantly associated with knowledge of diabetes. Knowledge of diabetes among the inhabitants of Ho municipality respondents was  interpreted as being inadequate 32.99% (CI; 27.5, 38.5). Some deficient portions and factors associated with knowledge of diabetes were identified.  Relevant information for targeted health education programs in Ghana and beyond may be considered as one of such benefits of these findings.  &nbsp

High Level of Pyrethroid Resistance in an Anopheles funestus Population of the Chokwe District in Mozambique

Background Although Anopheles funestus is difficult to rear, it is crucial to analyse field populations of this malaria vector in order to successfully characterise mechanisms of insecticide resistance observed in this species in Africa. In this study we carried out a large-scale field collection and rearing of An. funestus from Mozambique in order to analyse its susceptibility status to insecticides and to broadly characterise the main resistance mechanisms involved in natural populations. Methodology/Principal Findings 3,000 F1 adults were obtained through larval rearing. WHO susceptibility assays indicated a very high resistance to pyrethroids with no mortality recorded after 1h30min exposure and less than 50% mortality at 3h30min. Resistance to the carbamate, bendiocarb was also noted, with 70% mortality after 1h exposure. In contrast, no DDT resistance was observed, indicating that no kdr-type resistance was involved. The sequencing of the acetylcholinesterase gene indicated the absence of the G119S and F455W mutations associated with carbamate and organophosphate resistance. This could explain the absence of malathion resistance in this population. Both biochemical assays and quantitative PCR implicated up-regulated P450 genes in pyrethroid resistance, with GSTs playing a secondary role. The carbamate resistance observed in this population is probably conferred by the observed altered AChE with esterases also involved. Conclusion/Significance The high level of pyrethroid resistance in this population despite the cessation of pyrethroid use for IRS in 1999 is a serious concern for resistance management strategies such as rotational use of insecticides. As DDT has now been re-introduced for IRS, susceptibility to DDT needs to be closely monitored to prevent the appearance and spread of resistance to this insecticide

Field-Caught Permethrin-Resistant Anopheles gambiae Overexpress CYP6P3, a P450 That Metabolises Pyrethroids

Insects exposed to pesticides undergo strong natural selection and have developed various adaptive mechanisms to survive. Resistance to pyrethroid insecticides in the malaria vector Anopheles gambiae is receiving increasing attention because it threatens the sustainability of malaria vector control programs in sub-Saharan Africa. An understanding of the molecular mechanisms conferring pyrethroid resistance gives insight into the processes of evolution of adaptive traits and facilitates the development of simple monitoring tools and novel strategies to restore the efficacy of insecticides. For this purpose, it is essential to understand which mechanisms are important in wild mosquitoes. Here, our aim was to identify enzymes that may be important in metabolic resistance to pyrethroids by measuring gene expression for over 250 genes potentially involved in metabolic resistance in phenotyped individuals from a highly resistant, wild A. gambiae population from Ghana. A cytochrome P450, CYP6P3, was significantly overexpressed in the survivors, and we show that the translated enzyme metabolises both alpha-cyano and non–alpha-cyano pyrethroids. This is the first study to demonstrate the capacity of a P450 identified in wild A. gambiae to metabolise insecticides. The findings add to the understanding of the genetic basis of insecticide resistance in wild mosquito populations

Pyrethroid Resistance in an Anopheles funestus Population from Uganda

Background: The susceptibility status of Anopheles funestus to insecticides remains largely unknown in most parts of Africa because of the difficulty in rearing field-caught mosquitoes of this malaria vector. Here we report the susceptibility status of the An. funestus population from Tororo district in Uganda and a preliminary haracterisation of the putative resistance mechanisms involved. Methodology/Principal Findings: A new forced egg laying technique used in this study significantly increased the numbers of field-caught females laying eggs and generated more than 4000 F1 adults. WHO bioassays indicated that An. funestus in Tororo is resistant to pyrethroids (62% mortality after 1 h exposure to 0.75% permethrin and 28% mortality to 0.05% deltamethrin). Suspected DDT resistance was also observed with 82% mortality. However this population is fully susceptible to bendiocarb (carbamate), malathion (organophosphate) and dieldrin with 100% mortality observed after exposure to each of these insecticides. Sequencing of a fragment of the sodium channel gene containing the 1014 codon conferring pyrethroid/DDT resistance in An. gambiae did not detect the L1014F kdr mutation but a correlation between haplotypes and resistance phenotype was observed indicating that mutations in other exons may be conferring the knockdown resistance in this species. Biochemical assays suggest that resistance in this population is mediated by metabolic resistance with elevated level of GSTs, P450s and pNPA compared to a susceptible strain of Anopheles gambiae. RT-PCR further confirmed the involvement of P450s with a 12-fold over-expression of CYP6P9b in the Tororo population compared to the fully susceptible laboratory colony FANG. Conclusion: This study represents the first report of pyrethroid/DDT resistance in An. funestus from East Africa. With resistance already reported in southern and West Africa, this indicates that resistance in An. funestus may be more widespread than previously assumed and therefore this should be taken into account for the implementation and management of vector control programs in Africa