A novel perceptually adaptive image watermarking scheme by selecting adaptive threshold in dht domain

This paper proposed a novel image watermarking technique by applying the characteristics of the human visual system, in Hadamard transform domain. Statistical information measures were used to select proper blocks for data embedding. Watermark was embedded by the modification of Discrete Hadamard transform (DHT) coefficients of selected blocks. Threshold and modification value were selected adaptively for each image block, which improved robustness and transparency. The proposed algorithm was able to withstand a variety of attacks and image processing operations like rotation, cropping, noise addition, resizing, lossy compression and etc. The experimental results showed good performance of the proposed scheme in comparison with some of the recently reported watermarking techniques.Keywords: Digital image watermarking, Hadamard transform, Entropy, Lossy compression, Adaptive Threshol

Reverse Logistics in Food Industries: A Case Study in Malaysia

This paper is demonstrated the reverse logistics in the food and beverage industries in Malaysia. Reverse logistics defined as the return, exchange, refurbishment, remarketing and disposition of products. The customer returns the products because of several reasons such as end of life, expired, product damage, products recall, poor quality and non halal products. The successful implementing reverse logistics industries can be a benchmark to the other food and beverage industries. This study is based on quantitative data collected by distributing the questionnaire to hypermarkets and one beverage company as a benchmark. The descriptive analysis shows that the significant factors those make reverse logistics success are based on the framework dimensions on: Why- Returning (the return reasons by the end user or customer), Why- Receiving (driving forces for implementing reverse logistics activities), What (the type of products and the products characteristics), How (the recovery processes and recovery option), and Who (the actors involved and their roles). The aims of this study thereby is to investigate the challenges that faced with application of reverse logistics at the organization are influenced by the internal and external barriers. The contribution of the study is to highlight the present scenario of reverse logistics practices to academicians and industries. Keywords: Reverse Logistics, Food and Beverage Industries, Challenges, Returnin

Reflection of Iranian Religion, History, Politics, and Culture in Qutb Shahi Falnama of Deccan

Problem Definition: The era of the Qutb Shahi dynasty in the Deccan is one of the top periods of Iranian culture outside its geographical borders. Due to being of Iranian origin and Shiite, the Qutb Shahi dynasty had a notable tendency towards Iranian culture, and a large number of Iranian immigrants and brokers (agents) in the Deccan added to the prosperity of Iranian culture in their territory. With the support of Iranian culture, many artistic and literary works were formed, comprising a magnificent cultural interaction between the culture of South India and Iran. One of these works is an illustrated Falnama (Book of Omens) prepared in Golconda. This Falnama includes 37 paintings with different themes, each of which can be somehow related to Iranian culture, politics, and religion. Therefore, the problem of this research is "to what extent it is possible to read out different aspects of Iranian culture and its influence in Qutb Shahi court culture through the different themes of the paintings in this book".Objective: The aim of this research is to know more about the influence of Iranian culture in the Indian subcontinent, especially in the Deccan region.Research Method: Using a descriptive-analytical method and concerning historical documents, the influence of different cultural aspects in Deccan is analyzed.Results: Khalili Falnama's paintings are a mixture of religious and Islamic themes focused on Shiism. In addition to these themes, several paintings deal with the literary issues, and ancient history of Iran and one painting of this manuscript covers the contemporary history of that time by addressing Shah Tahmasp. Scrutiny in the paintings shows that in all of them and various forms, different cultural and even political aspects of Iran are witnessed, from the formal culture to the public culture, which indicates the closeness of these two cultures

Understanding the neighbourhood choice decisions of movers: an analysis of focus group discussions

Using a qualitative methods approach, this study explores the key factors that influence household neighbourhood choice. Three newly developed residential neighbourhoods have been studied to examine resident decision making around their neighbourhood preferences. Four focus group (n = 4) discussions with 29 individuals who were recent movers to the study areas were conducted to examine the reasons behind neighbourhood choice and the needs of the household. The results revealed that household neighbourhood choice decisions were multi-faceted and complex. The key findings can be classified into six categories: safety, residential environment, neighbourhood facilities, accessibility, economic and demographic factors. Residents emphasised that the combination of land-use and transportation planning may be one important part of multi-layered solutions to improve quality of life in residential neighbourhoods

Environmental damage of different waste treatment scenarios by considering avoided emissions based on system dynamics modeling

This study aims to develop a comprehensive model for life cycle assessment and environmental damage cost calculations considering avoided emissions in different waste management scenarios using the system dynamics (SD) approach. Our analysis reveals that under the business-as-usual (BAU) scenario for the period 2020–2050, the total net greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reach 12.5 Mt, with the highest environmental damage cost being USD 689 million. In contrast, an integrated management strategy encompassing recycling, composting, anaerobic digestion, and incineration results in a 195% reduction in net GHG emissions compared to the BAU Scenario. Concurrently, the environmental damage cost drops to USD 277 million, incorporating USD 347 million in savings, leading to a net environmental damage cost of USD −71 million. The findings affirm that accounting for emissions avoided across various treatment methods offers a more accurate estimate of environmental damage costs. Additionally, policies centered on integrated waste management are more likely to achieve sustainability. The study also demonstrates the utility of the SD approach in providing a holistic view of waste management systems and in evaluating the effectiveness of various policy strategies for sustainable waste management

Land use revitalization as a consequence of bus rapid transit in Lahore based on context characteristics

Bus Rapid Transit system, the first ever experience in Pakistan, had been developed in the city of Lahore in 2013 resulting into various development growth change aspects like land use, land value, building construction mechanism and economic development. Because of it being not incorporated in the Lahore Master Plan 2004 - 2025, applicable at the time of implementation , no channelized development or restriction on the use of land could have been ensured. Where development along the corridor has brought many gains, it has also had adverse impact over the planned development of city. The needed amendment of Master Plan of city requires some grounds and solid justifications to re - project urban development along this corridor to ensure haphazard development to channelized one. The research paper is the study of BRT construction impacts on land use along the corridor. The pa per analyses the existing land uses along BRT corridor and studies the impacts of property regeneration as a consequence of revitalization along the corridor. The study identifies six revitalization trends in land pa rcels along the BRT corridor and suggest s policy measures that facilitate land use change potential along the corridor in planned manner

The Relationship between Urban Structure and Travel Behaviour: Challenges and Practices

Since urban structure indicators influence travel behaviour, they have been widely studied. The goal of these studies was identifying effective factors to have sustainable transport patterns. However, investigating these factors has been problematic and the results are not reliable enough to be used universally. There are two main reasons for this: firstly, because socio-economic indicators impact neighbourhoods with comparable design differently; and secondly, factors such as income, and age, as well as self-selection factors are not easy to be evaluated. This paper addresses challenges and practices in this area to propose new objectives for further studies that cover previous shortcomings

Concentric punching shear strength of reinforced concrete flat plates

Flat slabs are very popular and economical floor systems in the construction industry. These floor systems, supported directly on columns, are known to be susceptible to punching shear in the vicinity of the slab-column connection. The punching shear provisions of AS 3600-2009, the current Australian Concrete Structures Standard, for the case of concentric loading are based on empirical formulae developed in the early 1960s and have not improved significantly since then. These provisions do not consider some of the important parameters affecting the capacity of a slab such as flexural reinforcement ratio and slab thickness size effect. AS 3600-2009 only recognises shearheads as an effective shear reinforcement to increase the concentric punching shear strength of slabs, and it does not cover more practical types of reinforcement such as shear studs and stirrups unlike most of European and North American codes of practice. In this thesis, the available methods for calculating concentric punching shear strength of slabs are reviewed. The analytical basis of previous work by other researchers was used to propose a formula to calculate the punching shear strength of flat plates with good accuracy for a wide range of slab thicknesses, tensile reinforcement ratios, and concrete compressive strengths. In this method, it is assumed that punching shear failure occurs due to the crushing of the critical concrete strut adjacent to the column. A large number of experimental results of slab test specimen, reported in the literature were gathered to evaluate the accuracy of the proposed formula, as well as the punching shear formulae in some of the internationally recognised standards such as AS 3600-2009, ACI 318-05, CSA A23.3-04, DIN 1045-1:2001, Eurocode2, and NZS 3101:2006. The proposed formula was also extended to cover the case of prestressed flat plates with the use of the decompression method. Recent experimental results of prestressed slab test specimens, published in journal papers, were collected to assess the accuracy of the proposed formula and provisions of aforementioned standards in the prediction of the ultimate strength of prestressed flat plates. Furthermore, detailing considerations for the design of shear reinforcements such as shear studs and stirrups, which are not recognised by AS 3600-2009, were discussed. Different failure modes of flat plates with shear reinforcement were presented. A method to calculate the strength of the slab assuming a critical crack developing inside the shear reinforced region was proposed. This method considers the contribution of shear reinforcement intersecting with the critical crack and the uncracked concrete zone adjacent to the column. In addition, a control perimeter outside the shear reinforced zone was suggested to be used with the one-way shear formula of AS 3600-2009 to calculate the punching shear strength of flat plates outside their shear reinforced zone. The proposed method and provisions of ACI 318-05, CSA A23.3-04, and Eurocode2 were evaluated against some of the reported experimental results on the flat plates with shear reinforcement