Virtual Ethology: Simulation of Aquatic Animal Heterogeneous Behaviours as Particle-Based Autonomous Agents

In the virtual world, the simulation of flocking behaviour has been actively investigated since the 1980 through the boid models. However, ethology is a niche study of animal behaviour from the biological perspective that is rarely instil in the interest of the younger learners nowadays. The keystone of the research is to be able to disseminate the study of animal behaviours through the boid model with the aid of technology. Through the simulation, complex movement of animal behaviours are reproduced based on the extension of basic behaviours of boid algorithm. The techniques here are to (i) Analyse a high-level behavioural framework of motion in the animal behaviours and (ii) Evolves particles to other animal representations to portray more real-time examples of steering behaviours. Although the generality of the results is limited by the number of case study, it also supports the hypothesis that interactive simulation system of virtual ethology can aid the improvement of animal studie

A Proposed Guideline with Building Information Modelling (BIM) for Virtual Transformation of Traditional Housing to Green Housing

Generally speaking, in search of alternative ways that is meant to prevent environment pollution and its sub hazard consequences, developers and planners as well as the masses nowadays are encouraged to use what is call a green home when building their houses. These types of houses typically use resources that are environmentally responsive. However, this new approach to house developments lacks clearly defined and globally accepted standards on what constitutes a green model. Thus, this research aims to educate the public about sustainable transformations from traditional homes to green homes by modelling the 3D model virtually to illustrate the differences between the conventional homes and green homes and its impact on the environment, and demonstrate the types of green alternatives available in Malaysia in order to construct the green homes. The ultimate goal is to create digitally a 3D model of the green homes through Building Information Modelling (BIM). BIM allows the public to run computer simulations that help to understand and visualise the evolutions of the traditional homes to green homes. The digital 3D model is effective in influencing and educating the residents about the benefits of green housing practices and ways to incorporate green building technologies

Crowd And Acoustical Modelling In Digital Cultural Heritage

The broad term of heritage refers to the study of human activity in the past and its cultural narratives and to virtualize heritage means to actualize the heritage content digitally. Istilah warisan secara meluas merujuk kepada kajian kegiatan manusia pada masa lampau dan pengkisahan budayanya dan memayakan warisan bermaksud merealisasikan kandungan warisan secara digital

Chloride-Binding Capacity of Portland Cement Paste Blended with Synthesized CA 2

A chloride-binding capacity is the major factor to mitigate the ingress of chloride into concrete. This paper presents the chloride-binding capacity of Portland cement paste containing synthesized CA2 (CaO·2Al2O3). The CA2 was synthesized in the high-temperature furnace and characterized by X-ray diffraction for inspecting the purity. The synthesized CA2 was substituted for Portland cement by 0%, 5%, and 10% by weight, and the NaCl solution was used as an internal chloride, which is assumed as a total chloride. The chloride-binding capacity of cement paste was calculated from a water-soluble chloride extraction method by the application of the Langmuir isotherm equation. And the hydration products were analyzed using X-ray diffraction and thermogravimetric analysis. We demonstrate that the CA2 increases an AFm phase in the Portland cement system, and the incorporation of CA2 consequently enhances the chloride-binding capacity of cement paste samples

Simulation of Past Life: Controlling Agent Behaviors from the Interactions between Ethnic Groups

International audienceMany efforts have been carried out in preserving the history and culture of Penang and also other regions of Malaysia since George Town was elected as a UNESCO living heritage city. This paper presents a method to simulate life in a local trading port in the 1800s, where various populations with very different social rules interacted with each other. These populations included Indian coolies, Malay vendors, British colonists and Chinese traders. The challenge is to model these ethnic groups as autonomous agents, and to capture the changes of behavior due to inter-ethnic interactions and to the arrival of boats at the pier. Agents from each population are equipped with a specific set of steering methods which are selected and parameterized according to predefined behavioral patterns (graphs of states). In this paper, we propose a new formalism where interactions between the different ethnics groups and with the boats can be either activated globally or locally. Global interactions cause changes of states for all the agents belonging to the target population, while local interactions only take place between specific agents, and result in changes of states for these agents only. The main contributions of our method are: i) Applying microscopic crowd simulation to the complex case of a multi-ethnic trading port, involving different behavioral patterns; ii) Introducing a high-level control method, through the inter- ethnic interactions formalism. The resulting system generates a variety of real-time animations, all reflecting the adequate social behaviors. Such a system would be particularly useful in a virtual tour application

A hybrid Si@FeSiy/SiOx anode structure for high performance lithium-ion batteries via ammonia-assisted one-pot synthesis

Synthesised via planetary ball-milling of Si and Fe powders in an ammonia (NH3) environment, a hybrid Si@FeSiy/SiOx structure shows exceptional electrochemical properties for lithium-ion battery anodes, exhibiting a high initial capacity of 1150 mA h g−1 and a retention capacity of 880 mA h g−1 after 150 cycles at 100 mA g−1; and a capacity of 560 mA h g−1 at 4000 mA g−1. These are considerably high for carbon-free micro-/submicro-Si-based anodes. NH3 gradually turns into N2 and H2 during the synthesis, which facilitates the formation of highly conductive FeSiy (y = 1, 2) phases, whereas such phases were not formed in an Ar atmosphere. Milling for 20–40 h leads to partial decomposition of NH3 in the atmosphere, and a hybrid structure of a Si core of mixed nanocrystalline and amorphous Si domains, shelled by a relatively thick SiOx layer with embedded FeSi nanocrystallites. Milling for 60–100 h results in full decomposition of NH3 and a hybrid structure of a much-refined Si-rich core surrounded by a mantle of a relatively low level of SiOx and a higher level of FeSi2. The formation mechanisms of the SiOx and FeSiy phases are explored. The latter structure offers an optimum combination of the high capacity of a nanostructural Si core, relatively high electric conductivity of the FeSiy phase and high structural stability of a SiOx shell accommodating the volume change for high performance electrodes. The synthesis method is new and indispensable for the large-scale production of high-performance Si-based anode materials

When cloud computing meets with semantic web: A new design for e-portfolio systems in the social media era

Abstract The need, use, benefit and potential of e-portfolios have been analysed and discussed by a substantial body of researchers in the education community. However, the development and implementation approaches of e-portfolios to date have faced with various challenges and limitations. This paper presents a new approach of an e-portfolio system design based on Private-Public (PrPl) data index system, which integrates cloud computing applications and storages with Semantic Web architecture, making semantic web-based visualisation and advanced intelligent search possible. It also discusses how the distinctive attributes of the PrPl-based digital asset management system can serve as a large-scale robust e-portfolio system that can address issues with scalability, sustainability, adoptability and interoperability. With such a new distinctive design, a large-scale deployment at a state or national level becomes possible at a very cost-effective manner and also such large-scale deployment with intelligent digital asset management and search features create numerous opportunities in education

Throughput Fairness Enhancement Using Differentiated Channel Access in Heterogeneous Sensor Networks

Nowadays, with wireless sensor networks (WSNs) being widely applied to diverse applications, heterogeneous sensor networks (HSNs), which can simultaneously support multiple sensing tasks in a common sensor field, are being considered as the general form of WSN system deployment. In HSNs, each application generates data packets with a different size, thereby resulting in fairness issues in terms of the network performance. In this paper, we present the design and performance evaluation of a differentiated channel access scheme (abbreviated to DiffCA) to resolve the fairness problem in HSNs. DiffCA achieves fair performance among the application groups by providing each node with an additional backoff counter, whose value varies according to the size of the packets. A mathematical model based on the discrete time Markov chain is presented and is analyzed to measure the performance of DiffCA. The numerical results show that the performance degradation of disadvantaged application groups can be effectively compensated for by DiffCA. Simulation results are given to verify the accuracy of the numerical model