Enhancing the performance of the aggregated bit vector algorithm in network packet classification using GPU

Packet classification is a computationally intensive, highly parallelizable task in many advanced network systems like high-speed routers and firewalls that enable different functionalities through discriminating incoming traffic. Recently, graphics processing units (GPUs) have been exploited as efficient accelerators for parallel implementation of software classifiers. The aggregated bit vector is a highly parallelizable packet classification algorithm. In this work, first we present a parallel kernel for running this algorithm on GPUs. Next, we adapt an asymptotic analysis method which predicts any empirical result of the proposed kernel. Experimental results not only confirm the efficiency of the proposed parallel kernel but also reveal the accuracy of the analysis method in predicting important trends in experimental results

Farmers’ Behavior toward Membership in Water User Associations (WUAs) in Iran: Applying the Theory of Planned Behavior

In many countries today, irrigation systems have been transferred to the water users associations. This study aimed at analyzing farmers’ behavior toward membership in water users associations based on the theory of planned behavior. This research was designed as a descriptive-correlation survey. All farmers from the two villages, Lishter and Kheir Abad, the city of Gachsaran, Iran, who were under the cover of Lishter irrigation and drainage network (N=572) formed the population for this study. Using Krejcie and Morgan’s (1970) table and a proportional stratified random sampling technique 230 farmers was selected (n=230) from the population. The main research tool was a questionnaire. The validity of the questionnaire was confirmed by a panel of experts of faculty members of Agricultural Extension and Education at Tarbiat-Modares University and Rural Development department at Yasuj University. The reliability of the questionnaire was calculated at pre-test stage for different parts of the questionnaire ranging from 0.650-0.922. The collected data was analyzed using SPSS 19 software. Results revealed that two variables, tendency and perceived behavioral control, had direct and meaningful effect on the farmers’ behavior for membership in water users associations. The variables of tendency and subjective norms had the most direct and indirect effect on the farmer’s behavior, respectively. In sum, tendency, perceived behavioral control and subjective norms had the causal effect on the farmers’ behavior toward membership in water users associations.

Comparison of patient’s prognostic based on Madras Head Injury Prognostic Scale and Glasgow Outcome Scale in head trauma patients admitted in emergency ward of 5th Azar educative and therapeutic center in Gorgan, 2011

زمینه و هدف: آسیب‌ های تروماتیک سر بزرگترین علت مرگ و ناتوانی در میان بیماران ترومایی است. تخمین پیش‌ آگهی بیمار بلافاصله پس از بروز ضربه سر، می ‌تواند اساس تصمیمات بالینی صحیح در آینده، صرفه‌ جویی در هزینه‌ ها، توان بخشی به موقع و افزایش رضایت بیماران باشد؛ بنابراین این مطالعه با هدف تعیین پیش ‌آگهی بیماران ضربه سر مراجعه ‌کننده به بخش فوریت مرکز آموزشی درمانی پنجم آذر گرگان با مقیاس پیش‌ گویی کننده مدراس انجام گردید. روش بررسی: در این مطالعه توصیفی- همبستگی 117 نفر از بیماران ضربه سر مراجعه‌ کننده به بخش فوریت مرکز آموزشی درمانی پنجم آذر گرگان با روش نمونه‌ گیری در دسترس انتخاب و بررسی شدند. جمع ‌آوری داده ‌ها با استفاده از برگه اطلاعات دموگرافیک، مقیاس پیش ‌گویی جراحات سر مدراس و مقیاس برآیند گلاسکو (GOS) انجام شد. داده‌ ها در محیط نرم ‌افزار آماری SPSS با استفاده از آمار توصیفی و آزمون ‌های آنالیز واریانس، کای مجذور، ضریب همبستگی پیرسون و تی مستقل تحلیل شد. یافته‌ ها: میانگین و انحراف معیار سن بیماران 54/1±51/32 بود. بر حسب مقیاس پیش‌ گویی ضربه سر مدراس، پیش‌ آگهی اغلب بیماران (7/54) خوب بود. بیماران با ضایعات داخل جمجمه و شکستگی ‌های جمجمه از پیش ‌آگهی ضعیف ‌تری برخوردار بودند و این تفاوت از نظر آماری معنی ‌دار بود (001/0P<). بین نمرات حاصل از مقیاس پیش‌ گویی ضربه سر مدراس در بدو پذیرش با نتایج نهایی ضربه سر بر اساس مقیاس برآیند گلاسکو، ارتباط مستقیم و معنی‌ دار آماری وجود داشت (001/0P<، 688/0r=). نتیجه ‌گیری: با توجه به یافته ‌های این مطالعه، مقیاس پیش ‌گویی ضربه سر مدراس، در مقایسه با سایر مقیاس‌ های مورد استفاده در این زمینه مقیاسی دقیق، سریع و در عین حال ساده‌ تر و کاربردی ‌تر است؛ لذا انجام پژوهش‌ های بیشتر با هدف کاربرد جهت تریاژ بیماران در اورژانس توصیه می ‌شود

Relationship between occupational stress and cardiovascular diseases risk factors in drivers

Objectives: Of all work stressors, occupational stress is the leading cause of many disorders among workers. Drivers are classified as a high risk group for work related stress. This study set out to determine the relationship between risk factors of cardiovascular diseases and occupational stress among drivers. Material and Methods: Two hundred and twenty two Ilam’s intercity drivers were selected for the study. For measuring work stress, the Osipow work stress questionnaire was used. After a 10-h fasting period, systolic and diastolic blood pressure was recorded. Intravenous blood samples were taken to determine cholesterol, triglyceride and blood glucose levels. The independent samples t-test and Pearson’s correlation test were used to assess the relationship between variables and occupational stress. Results: Seventy-one percent of the intercity drivers suffered from average to acute stress, and 3.1% of them suffered from acute stress. There was no significant relationship between occupational stress and diastolic blood pressure (p = 0.254) among the drivers. Nevertheless, the Pearson’s correlation test demonstrated a strong relationship between work stress and blood glucose (p < 0.01), while no strong correlation was found for blood triglycerides and cholesterol levels. Conclusions: Based on the results, high rates of occupational stress were observed in the Ilam’s intercity drivers. Occupational stress may have effect on blood glucose levels but the results did not suggest a considerable relationship between risk factors of cardiovascular diseases and occupational stress among intercity drivers. Int J Occup Med Environ Health 2016;29(6):895–90

Economic and Environmental Evaluation and Optimal Ratio of Natural and Recycled Aggregate Production

Steady increase in overexploitation of stone quarries, generation of construction and demolition waste, and costs of preparing extra landfill space have become environmental and waste management challenges in metropolises. In this paper, aggregate production is studied in two scenarios: scenario 1 representing the production of natural aggregates (NA) and scenario 2 representing the production of recycled aggregates (RA). This study consists of two parts. In the first part, the objective is the environmental assessment (energy consumption and CO2 emission) and economic (cost) evaluation of these two scenarios, which is pursued by life-cycle assessment (LCA) method. In the second part, the results of the first part are used to estimate the optimal combination of production of NA and RA and thereby find an optimal solution (scenario) for a more eco-friendly aggregate production. The defined formulas and relationship are used to develop a model. The results of model validation show that the optimal ratio, in optimal scenario, is 50%. The results show that, compared to scenario 1, optimal scenario improves the energy consumption, CO2 emissions, and production cost by, respectively, 30%, 36%, and 31%, which demonstrate the effectiveness of this optimization

Flexible and scalable software defined radio based testbed for large scale body movement

Human activity (HA) sensing is becoming one of the key component in future healthcare system. The prevailing detection techniques for IHA uses ambient sensors, cameras and wearable devices that primarily require strenuous deployment overheads and raise privacy concerns as well. This paper proposes a novel, non-invasive, easily-deployable, flexible and scalable test-bed for identifying large-scale body movements based on Software Defined Radios (SDRs). Two Universal Software Radio Peripheral (USRP) models, working as SDR based transceivers, are used to extract the Channel State Information (CSI) from continuous stream of multiple frequency subcarriers. The variances of amplitude information obtained from CSI data stream are used to infer daily life activities. Different machine learning algorithms namely K-Nearest Neighbour, Decision Tree, Discriminant Analysis and Naïve Bayes are used to evaluate the overall performance of the test-bed. The training, validation and testing processes are performed by considering the time-domain statistical features obtained from CSI data. The K-nearest neighbour outperformed all aforementioned classifiers, providing an accuracy of 89.73%. This preliminary non-invasive work will open a new direction for design of scalable framework for future healthcare systems

Design of New High-Performance Full Adder Using Hybrid-CMOS Logic Style for High-Speed Applications

This paper, presents a new design for 1-bit full adder cell using hybrid-CMOS logic style. Using a novel structure for implementation of the proposed full adder caused it has better performance in terms of propagation delay and power-delay product (PDP) compared to its counterparts. According to the simulation results, the propagation delay of the proposed full adder is 22.8% less than the propagation delay of next fastest full adder, and the power-delay product of the proposed full adder is 22.7% less than the next best PDP. HSpice simulations using 65nm technology with a power supply of 1.2V was utilized to evaluate the performance of the circuits

Job Burnout, Stress, and Satisfaction among Emergency Nursing Staff after Health System Transformation Plan in Iran

Introduction: Job burnout, stress, and satisfaction are linked to quality of care, patient outcomes and retention of staff. This study was conducted to determine the mentioned issues among emergency nurses.Methods: This cross-sectional study was conducted on all nurses working in the emergency departments of 10 hospitals in Tehran, Iran, in 2017. Standard questionnaires were used for gathering the data of participants regarding job burnout, stress, and satisfaction. Results: 709 (90%) participants returned the completed questionnaires (58.9% female). The mean age of the nurses was 33 (SD = 7) years. The level of job burnout was moderate in 76.1%, low in 22.5%, and high in 1.4% of the nurses. The level of burnout in the married nursing staff was lower than single nurses (3.78 ± 0.98 versus 4.14 ± 0.58, p = 0.049). The level of job satisfaction was moderate in 61.1%, low in 22.2%, and high in 16.7%. There was a significant correlation between age and job satisfaction (p = 0.027, r = 0.3). Job burnout was directly correlated with job stress (p ≤0.001, r = 0.57) and job burnout was negatively correlated with job satisfaction (p = 0.001, r = -0.41). Conclusion: More than 60% of the studied emergency nurses had moderate levels of job burnout, stress, and satisfaction. Job burnout had a direct correlation with job stress and indirect correlation with job satisfaction. Planning to reduce burnout of the emergency nursing staff seems to be necessary