UWB MAC Design Constraints and Considerations

In this paper, we consider the possibility of developing an optimal medium access control (MAC)layer for high data rate ultra-wideband (UWB) transmission systems that transmit minimal power. MAC in UWB wireless networks is required to coordinate channel access among competing devices. The unique UWB characteristics offer great challenges and opportunities in effective UWB MAC design. We first study the background of UWB and available MAC protocols that have been used in UWB. Secondly, we explore the constraints on UWB MAC design. Finally we present the considerations that need to be made in designing an optimal UWB MAC protocol

Portable fingerprint-based attendance recording and monitoring system

This paper presented the development of a portable attendance monitoring system based on fingerprint identification that can be used by lecturers to monitor attendance of students. Fingerprint-based identification is one of the oldest method among all biometric or security techniques which has been successfully used in numerous applications. Every person has unique, immutable fingerprints. A fingerprint is made of a series of ridges and furrows on the surface of the finger. The distinctiveness of a fingerprint can be determined by the pattern of ridges and furrows as well as the minutiae points. Minutiae points are local ridge characteristics that occur at either a ridge bifurcation or a ridge ending. A portable fingerprint scanner has been utilized as the input to acquire fingerprint images and a laptop equipped with attendance recording and monitoring software as a mobile terminal to process the fingerprint images and record the attendance. This system can be used by lecturers to replace the old method of attendance recording, so that the integrity of the attendance record can be upheld. The actual student’s attendance can be recorded and stored in database. The system is also capable of processing the record to determine students who do not fulfill the attendance percentage requirement

Chemical composition, pH value, and points of zero charge of high calcium and high iron electric arc furnace slag

Electric arc furnace (EAF) slag as filter media has been extensively used nowadays for wastewater treatment technology. Steel slag was produced as byproduct from steelmaking processes. However, different batches of steel slag production produce different composition. Thus, this study determined the chemical composition, pH value and points of zero charge (PZC) of two different samples of electric arc furnace (EAF) slag; high iron EAF slag (Slag HFe) and high calcium EAF slag (Slag HCa). The steel slag were characterized using Xray Fluorescence Spectroscopy (XRF) analysis for the chemical composition, extraction with boiling water for pH value, and salt addition method for PZC. Slag HFe was mainly consisted of 38.2% ferric oxide and 20.4% calcium oxide, 10.20 pH value and pH 10.55 for PZC. While for Slag HCa, they were composed of 1.64% ferric oxide and 49.5% calcium oxide of pH value of 11.11 and pH 11.75 for PZC. Therefore, Slag HCa was considered as a more basic species compared to Slag HFe

Tool for collaborative temporal-based software version management

Software version management is the processes of identifying and keeping track of different versions of a software.Complexity level of this process would become complicated should software was distributed in many places.This paper present a new dimension in software version management which based on temporal elements.Temporal elements such as valid time and transaction time are the main attributes considered, to be inserted into the software version management database.By having these two attributes, it would help the people involved in software process to organize data and perform activity monitoring with more efficient. For a practical application of the model, therefore an automate tool has been developed that could be applied under collaborative software process called TEMVer

Molecular detection of genetic defects in ambiguous genitalia (AG) and congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH) due to 21-hydroxylase deficiency

Congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH) is a group of inherited disorders affecting the enzymes catalyzing the synthesis of steroids in the adrenal cortex.Malfunction of 21-hydroxylase is the most frequent defect among these disorders.This enzyme is essential for the synthesis of cortisol and aldosterone.The decreased level of serum cortisol in patients with 21-hydroxylase cleticiency stimulates ACTH secretion, which result in elevated levels of steroid precursors as 17-hydroxyprogesterone and increased production of adrenal androgens causing virilization.Deficiency of the 2 I -hydroxylase (21-0H) enzyme is by far the most common form of CA H which arises as a result of deletions or deleterious mutations in the active gene (CYP21) located on chromosome 6p21.3.Many different mutations of the CY P21 gene cause varying degrees or impairment of 21-0H activity that results in a spectrum of disease statement.There is no sharp limit between the salt-wasting, the simple virilizing and the late onset forms.The objective of our study was to determine the 21-0H deticiency mutation defects and correlate the genotype with their phenotypic statement of the disease.vVe performed mutational analysis using Polymerase Chain Reaction-Allele Specific Oligonucleotide Hybridization (PCR-ASOH) technique on patients who were suspected to have CAH as they presented with ambiguous genitalia (AG) and or electrolyte derangement.Among the 52 patients, 3 had Val281 Leu mutation (5.76%). 2 had Pro30Leu mutation (3.85%). I had Gln318stnp mutation (1.92%) and in 46 (88.l6%) patients mutation was detected.The three patients with Val281 Leu mutation had presented with adrenal crises during in infancy and was classified as salt losers and treated with glucocorticoids and mineralocorticoids.These 3 patients could well be the other 40% who are categorized as salt-losers. The two patients with Pro30Leu mutations have normal male external genitalia and presented with hyponatraemia and hyperkalaemia.Only one patients required mineralocorticoid therapy that was given for about 5 months duration.Subsequently he hold normal electrolytes level even without mineralacorticiod therapy. The Gln3I8stop mutation was identitied in one patient who presented with ambiguous and adrenal crises.Our study showed that the cases with genotype Val281 Leu, Pro30Leu and Gln318stop mutations correlated with their phenotype. The mutation analysis of CYP21 gene proved to be a good complementary investigation and supportive to the diagnosis and management of our CAH patients

A Low Profile Switchable Pattern Directivity Antenna using Circular Sectorized EBG

In this paper, a low profile patch antenna switchable radiation pattern diversity with total thickness o

A Novel Technique of Controlling Signal Propagation within Array Elements using Switchable Miniaturized Electromagnetic Band Gap

In this paper, a novel miniaturized capacitive loaded electromagnetic band gap (EBG) has been developed with the patch size of approximately !/36. The dimension is controllable using the lumped capacitive elements values. The surface impedance characteristic of the EBG structure is switchable as pin vias have been inserted and removed within the EBG center and the ground plane. Switching the EBG surface impedance characteristic within the array elements has demonstrated the novel application of miniaturized EBG to control the signal propagation within the array elements. Radiation pattern for the middle antenna is enhanced toward the antenna which connected with low surface impedance EBG structure resulting approximately 12dB improvement in gain. The propagation characteristics and gain of the array have been analyzed using CST Microwave Studio (CST MWS). The new application of the EBG can be very useful to realize the controlling and channeling the signal within the array elements

Characterization of electrostatic discharge threshold voltage of phase-shift mask reticle

A reticle is a stencil used in lithography process for forming integrated circuit (IC) on silicon substrate. It consists of a thin (100 nm) coating of masking metallic patterned (features) with critical dimension (CD) of nanometers on a thicker quartz substrate. The features can be damaged by electrostatic discharge (ESD) when exposed to the environment electrostatic charge and caused deformed IC and eventually device difunctional. Semiconductor equipment materials industry (SEMI) standard established the allowable electrostatic charge on reticle based on the characterization of ESD threshold voltage on binary reticle. However, there is another type of reticle which is phase-shift mask (PSM), has not been characterized for its ESD threshold voltage. A direct current (DC) voltage is applied directly to the structures with CD of 80 nm, 110 nm, and 160 nm. The surface current is recorded at all levels of stress from 1 to 100 V. The current–voltage (IV) curve and physical inspection results for each cell are then reviewed and classified. The results yielded which no electric field induced migration (EFM) defect and breakdown voltage occurred at any of the structures. The cathode’s metal work function has been identified as the factor that influences the PSM reticle ESD threshold voltage

Solving Incomplete Datasets in Soft Set Using Supported Sets and Aggregate Values

AbstractThe theory of soft set proposed by Molodtsovin 1999[1]is a new method for handling uncertain data and can be defined as a Boolean-valued information system. Ithas been applied to data analysis and decision support systems based on large datasets. In this paper, it is shown that calculated support value can be used to determine missing attribute value of an object. However, in cases when more than one value is missing, the aggregate values and calculated support values will be used in determining the missing values. By successfully recovering missing attribute values, the integrity of a dataset can still been maintained

Graph Theoretic Lattice Mining Based on Formal Concept Analysis (FCA) Theory for Text Mining

The growth of the semantic web has fueled the need to search for information based on the understanding of the intent of the searcher, coupled with the contextual meaning of the keywords supplied by the searcher. The common solution to enhance the searching process includes the deployment of formal concept analysis (FCA) theory to extract concepts from a set of text with the use of corresponding domain ontology. However, creating a domain ontology or cross-platform ontology is a tedious and time consuming process that requires validation from domain experts. Therefore, this study proposed an alternative solution called Lattice Mining (LM) that utilizes FCA theory and graph theory. This is because the process of matching a query to related documents is similar to the process of graph matching if both the query and the documents are represented using graphs. This study adopted the idea of FCA in the determination of the concepts based on texts and deployed the lattice diagrams obtained from an FCA tool for further analysis using graph theory. The LM technique employed in this study utilized the adjacency matrices obtained from the lattice outputs and performed a distance measure technique to calculate the similarity between two graphs. The process was realized successively via the implementation of three algorithms called the Relatedness Algorithm (RA), the Adjacency Matrix Algorithm (AMA) and the Concept-Based Lattice Mining (CBLM) Algorithm. A similarity measure between FCA output lattices yielded promising results based on the ranking of the trace values from the matrices. Recognizing the potential of this method, future work includes refinement in the steps of the CBLM algorithm for a more efficient implementation of the process