Replica maintenance strategy for data grid

Data Grid is an infrastructure that manages huge amount of data files, and provides intensive computational resources across geographically distributed collaboration.Increasing the performance of such system can be achieved by improving the overall resource usage, which includes network and storage resources.Improving network resource usage is achieved by good utilization of network bandwidth that is considered as an important factor affecting job execution time.Meanwhile, improving storage resource usage is achieved by good utilization of storage space usage. Data replication is one of the methods used to improve the performance of data access in distributed systems by replicating multiple copies of data files in the distributed sites.Having distributed the replicas to various locations, they need to be monitored.As a result of dynamic changes in the data grid environment, some of the replicas need to be relocated.In this paper we proposed a maintenance replica placement strategy termed as Unwanted Replica Deletion Strategy (URDS) as a part of Replica maintenance service.The main purpose of the proposed strategy is to find the placement of unwanted replicas to be deleted.OptorSim is used to evaluate the performance of the proposed strategy. The simulation results show that URDS requires less execution time and consumes less network usage and has a best utilization of storage space usage compared to existing approaches

Characterization of an azo-dye-degrading white rot fungus isolated from Malaysia

Sixty-three local white-rot fungi were isolated from soil and wood samples on potato dextrose agar (PDA). All these isolates were screened for their ability to degrade 4 textile azo dyes;Ponceau 2R (C.I. 16450), Orange G (C.I. 16230), Direct Blue 71 (C.I. 34140) and Biebrich Scarlet (C.I. 26905). Out of 40 isolates that gave positive results, only 1 promising isolate which completely degrades all 4 dyes in the minimum amount of time was selected for further investigation. This isolate was sourced from University Putra Malaysia (UPM) Serdang campus.The isolate was tentatively identified as Coriolopsis sp. Strain arf5 based on the analysis of the internal transcribed spacer (ITS) region. Nutritional studies on defined solid medium showed that this isolate was only able to degrade the 4 azo dyes under nitrogen-limiting conditions and an additional carbon source (glucose) need to be added to provide sufficient energy for the degradation to occur. Various parameters were optimized

Techno-Environmental Analysis of Facade Integrated Photovoltaics and Electric Vehicle Charging for University Building

Electric vehicles (EV) are a relatively contemporary and emerging technology in the transportation and power sectors, with several economic and environmental advantages. However, there are still challenges associated with EV charging depending on on-grid electricity. University buildings that consume a lot of energy continue to rely on the grid and/or conventional fuel for consumption. In addition, EV Charging will create more challenges in meeting the demand; therefore, utilizing university rooftops for EV charging has high prospects of meeting the additional energy demand. In Malaysia, no such research has been presented that has explored the possibility of using academic institute rooftops for BIPV installation for EV Charging in terms of energy and environmental standpoint. The current study analyzes and evaluates a rooftop grid-connected Building Integrated photovoltaic (BIPV) system for generating electricity and EV charging at the University Malaysia Pahang, Malaysia, for EV charging. The system’s energy output has been simulated using the PVSyst in two scenarios, i.e., fully integrated with no ventilation and free mounted with air circulation. It was found that 7000 m2 of the selected building’s rooftop area could be used for panel installation. The panels’ total capacity was 1.069 MW, with total annual electricity production of 1587 MWh and 1669 MWh in respective scenarios. The proposed BIPV plant would reduce GHG emissions of 60,031 tons of CO2e in scenarios 1 and 61,191 tons of CO2 in scenario 2 compared to the emission produced by coal plants for the same amount of annual energy generation

Enhanced protein-energy provision via the enteral route in critically ill patients (PEP uP protocol): a review of evidence

Nutrition support is an integral part of care among critically ill patients. However, critically ill patients are commonly underfed, leading to consequences such as increased length of hospital and intensive care unit stay, time on mechanical ventilation, infectious complications, and mortality. Nevertheless, the prevalence of underfeeding has not resolved since the first description of this problem more than 15 years ago. This may be due to the traditional conservative feeding approaches. A novel feeding protocol (the Enhanced Protein-Energy Provision via the Enteral Route Feeding Protocol in Critically Ill Patients [PEP uP] protocol) was proposed and proven to improve feeding adequacy significantly. However, some of the components in the protocol are controversial and subject to debate. This article is a review of the supporting evidences and some of the controversy associated with each component of the PEP uP protocol

Building integrated photovoltaics powered electric vehicle charging with energy storage for residential building: Design, simulation, and assessment

Global warming poses a serious danger to the environment, animals, and the livelihoods of humans. The residential building sector & transportation sector has received significant attention in recent years due to GHG emissions. Electric vehicles (EVs) are poised to play an essential function in reducing dependency on non-renewable fuels and the transportation sector's environmental implications. On the other hand, the sustainability of EVs depends on their method of charging. This paper investigates the feasibility and design of a BIPV (building-integrated photovoltaic) powered EV charging system in a typical Malaysian house using solar energy to meet residential and EV charging demand. Three BIPV systems: Grid integrated with no battery, grid integrated with 75 % battery storage and grid integrated with 100 % battery storage have been designed, simulated, and assessed for the performance parameters. BIPV plant capacity of 5.6 kWp, roof inclination of 10°, and roof facing southeast and northwest have been sized for the proposed system. The annual energy output was 8.05MWh, 7.21MWh and 7.19MWh for the three scenarios. LCOE of the grid-connected system with no batteries showed the lowest value of 0.16RM/kwh, whereas a system with batteries had higher LCOE of 0.51RM/kWh and 0.65RM/kWh. The grid-connected system without batteries showed the highest GHG emission savings of 137,321,924 kgCO2e

Earthquake catalog-based machine learning identification of laboratory fault states and the effects of magnitude of completeness

Machine learning regression can predict macroscopic fault properties such as shear stress, friction, and time to failure using continuous records of fault zone acoustic emissions. Here we show that a similar approach is successful using event catalogs derived from the continuous data. Our methods are applicable to catalogs of arbitrary scale and magnitude of completeness. We investigate how machine learning regression from an event catalog of laboratory earthquakes performs as a function of the catalog magnitude of completeness. We find that strong model performance requires a sufficiently low magnitude of completeness, and below this magnitude of completeness, model performance saturates

Daily Energy Intake from Meals and Afternoon Snacks: Findings from the Malaysian Adults Nutrition Survey(MANS)

Meal and snack patterns are associated with energy and nutrient intakes and consequently health and nutritional status. The aim of this paper is to describe the percentage of daily energy intake from meals and afternoon snack among Malaysian adults. The study included a representative sample of adults aged 18- 59 years (n=7349) from a nationwide Food Consumption Survey conducted by the Ministry of Health. Information on dietary intake was obtained using a one day 24-hour diet recall (24-HDR). Dietary data on 6886 adults were analysed using Nutritionist ProTM and statistical analysis was carried out using the SPSS 13.0. The median percentage of daily energy intake is reported only for adults consuming meals and afternoon tea and by socio-demographic characteristics as well as body mass index (BMI) status. More than 80% of Malaysian adults consumed morning meals, lunch and dinner and 54% reported having afternoon tea. The median percentage of energy intake from morning meals, lunch, dinner and afternoon tea was 29.9%, 30.5%, 32.4% and 17%, respectively. There were variations in the median percentage of energy from meals and snacks according to the socio-demographic variables and BMI status. It is important to understand the eating patterns of Malaysians as the information can assist in efforts to address obesity and diet-related chronic diseases among adults

Production and properties of spray dried Clinacanthus nutans using modified corn starch as drying agent

Clinacanthus nutans leaves is a medicinal plant with promising therapeutic effect. The objective of this study was to produce C. nutans powder using a spray dryer and to evaluate its physicochemical properties, followed by physical observation after 3 months of storage at room temperature (21±1°C). C. nutans juice with and without the addition of 5% (w/v) of modified corn starch (MCS) was spray dried at a feed flow rate of 23 rpm, inlet air temperature of 160°C and outlet air temperature of 100°C. Results showed that significantly lower (p <0.05) values of water activity, moisture content, flowability, particle size, solubility, wettability and dispersibility times, while significantly higher (p<0.05) values of hygroscopicity, bulk and tapped densities were recorded as compared to the spray dried powder without the addition of MCS. These indicated that MCS as drying agent has significantly improved the powder properties and the physical appearance during storage. Furthermore, produced C. nutans powder had a significantly higher (p<0.05) IC50 values, percentage of inhibition and total phenolics content. Also, a strong correlation was observed between total phenolic and antioxidant activity, indicated that encapsulation using MCS successfully protected the thermally sensitive compounds which contributed to high antioxidant activity