A Study on Fuzzy Systems

We use princiles of fuzzy logic to develop a general model representing several processes in a system's operation characterized by a degree of vagueness and/or uncertainy. Further, we introduce three altenative measures of a fuzzy system's effectiveness connected to the above model. An applcation is also developed for the Mathematical Modelling process illustrating our results.Comment: 9 pages, 3 figures, 1 tabl

Assessing the players'performance in the game of bridge: A fuzzy logic approach

Contract bridge occupies nowadays a position of great prestige being, together with chess, the only mind games officially recognized by the International Olympic Committee. In the present paper an innovative method for assessing the total performance of bridge- players' belonging to groups of special interest(e.g. different bridge clubs during a tournament, men and women, new and old players, etc) is introduced, which is based on principles of fuzzy logic. For this, the cohorts under assessment are represented as fuzzy subsets of a set of linguistic labels characterizing their performance and the centroid defuzzification method is used to convert the fuzzy data collected from the game to a crisp number. This new method of assessment could be used informally as a complement of the official bridge-scoring methods for statistical and other obvious reasons. Two real applications related to simultaneous tournaments with pre-dealt boards, organized by the Hellenic Bridge Federation, are also presented, illustrating the importance of our results in practice.Comment: 6 pages, 2 figures, 2 table

Culture and e-commerce: An exploration of the perceptions and attitudes of Egyptian internet users

This paper examines the perceptions and attitudes that Egyptian users hold towards electronic shopping sites. Internet sites are globally available, opening up huge potential markets for online retailers. However, it remains unclear whether sites designed for the US or European markets will be acceptable in other cultures. This paper describes an exploratory card sorting study conducted with Egyptian consumers. The study was designed to examine the e-commerce interface features that are most salient to this user group and to explore how these relate to user intentions to engage in internet shopping. The results support the role of site familiarity in predicting purchase intentions within this cultural setting

Eastern Antarctic Peninsula precipitation delivery mechanisms: Process studies and back trajectory evaluation

Copyright @ 2008 Royal Meteorological SocietyThe atmospheric circulation patterns that result in precipitation events at a site on the eastern Antarctic Peninsula (AP) are investigated using back trajectories (BTs) driven by ERA-40 data. Moisture delivery occurs from the east and west depending on the location of blocking events in the South Atlantic and Pacific Oceans. Observations are sparse in this region, so our process studies compare the trajectories (and the ERA-40 fields from which they were derived) with advanced very high resolution radiometer (AVHRR) satellite images. It is found that the trajectories represent these transport mechanisms very well and that they are relatively insensitive to the initial trajectory elevation

Determinants of inspiratory muscle strength in healthy humans

We investigated 1) the relationship between the baseline and inspiratory muscle training (IMT) induced increase in maximal inspiratory pressure (PI,max) and 2) the relative contributions of the inspiratory chest wall muscles and the diaphragm (Poes/Pdi) to PI,max prior to and following-IMT. Experiment 1: PI,max was assessed during a Müeller manoeuvre before and after 4-wk IMT (n=30). Experiment 2: PI,max and the relative contribution of the inspiratory chest wall muscles to the diaphragm (Poes/Pdi) were assessed during a Müeller manoeuvre before and after 4-wk IMT (n=20). Experiment 1: PI,max increased 19% (P<0.01) post-IMT and was correlated with baseline PI,max (r=−0.373, P<0.05). Experiment 2: baseline PI,max was correlated with Poe/Pdi (r=0.582, P<0.05) and after IMT PI,max increased 22% and Poe/Pdi increased 5% (P<0.05). In conclusion, baseline PI,max and the contribution of the chest wall inspiratory muscles relative to the diaphragm affect, in part, baseline and IMT-induced ΔPI,max. Great care should be taken when designing future IMT studies to ensure parity in the between-subject baseline PI,max

The DPSEEA model: one way to support the 'multiple narratives' of ecological Public Health

This poster was presented at the UK Public Health Association Conference (UKPHA) in March 2009.Ecological Public Health highlights the impact of globalization & capitalism on our physical & human landscapes. A shift in the Public Health paradigm, is argued, to move from an ideological-laden "single narrative" of unsustainable "risk assessment" to "multiple narratives" of sustainability, considering ecological breakdown and climate change. Public Health, globally is a more blended community, with an awareness of a diversity of philosophical and culturally-defined values, perspectives & thoughts but the "single narrative" (Atran 2007) of unecological, unsustainable Public Health persists. Drawing on Berlin's work he provides insight how certain political movements inspired individuals and nations' devotion to their 'ideology', by harnessing humans' ability for cognitively inflexibility, intellectual acquiescence and self-interested... These powerful prerequisites for the maintenance of Unsustainable Public Health ideology in the 21st Century remain. We should recognise these intellectual barriers, when striving for ecological, sustainable PH in the face of self-interested global Capitalism. The DPSEEA framework is one way to connect distal determinants of health and explain health development as interplay between humans and their surroundings. It highlights the intellectual shift required to move from a single narrative of "biological risk-assessment" to "multiple narratives" of environmentally contextualized, ecological, sustainable Public Health