Teaching the Right Letter Pronunciation in Reciting the Holy Quran Using Intelligent Tutoring System

An Intelligent Tutoring System (ITS) is a computer system that offers an instant, adapted instruction and customized feedback to students without human teacher interference. Reciting "Tajweed" the Holy Quran in the appropriate way is very important for all Muslims and is obligatory in Islamic devotions such as prayers. In this paper, the researchers introduce an intelligent tutoring system for teaching Reciting "Tajweed". Our "Tajweed" tutoring system is limited to "Tafkhim and Tarqiq in TAJWEED" the Holy Quran, Rewaya: Hafs from ‘Aasem. The system was evaluated by reciting teachers and students, and the results were auspicious

Active Debris Removal Mapping Project

Space debris discussions initiated with the start of the space age 55 years ago and have seen special interest in current years. This is due to the large increase in the number of space debris which has led to an increased threat of collision with operational space systems and of unsafe reentry. Due to this increased interest in this area, many different methods have been proposed in recent years for mitigation and space debris removal, some of which have even secured funding from space agencies for further development. These include ground based lasers and space based systems which use electro-dynamic tethers, solar sails or inflatable components. While each method has its own pros and cons, some of these concepts seem to be more suitable for the short term and others for the long term. This paper identifies major performance measures for space debris removal systems based on current rules and regulations and maps the performance of the ADR technologies based on these criteria. The map can help prioritize removal concepts and required technologies in order to better meet current needs

Effect of Specimen Size and Shape on the Compressive Strength of High Strength Concrete

The influence of specimen size and shape on the measured compressive strength was investigated for different high strength concrete mixes. Over 260 specimens from 30 high strength concrete mixtures were cast and tested. It was found, that on average, the ratio of the compressive strength of 150 x 300 mm cylinders to 150 mm cubes was 0.80; while for 100 x 200 mm cylinders to 150 mm cubes was 0.93. Also, on average, the ratio of the compressive strength of 150 x 300 mm cylinders to 100 x 200 mm cylinders was 0.86

Landscape as Agency: Co-Designing New School Typologies with Children in Rural Sudan

Environmental and social injustices severely impact children\u27s learning spaces in marginalized communities in Sudan. Children in those schools confront hazardous environmental conditions and systemic corruption. Their schools are disregarded by the government, lack basic amenities, and are impossible to navigate, turning them into ghost schools. Children of ghost schools are part of communities with potential, willpower, and resilience. However, these communities\u27 desperation for self-sufficiency hinders them from thriving. This research project focuses on participatory design concerning children’s schools, particularly in remote farmer\u27s communities along the Nile River in Sudan, and investigates one primary question: How can interdisciplinary architecture change the way we think about designing children\u27s learning environments in marginalized communities? I use design methodologies and interdisciplinary architecture typologies. I also planned workshops to develop means to sustain schools as environmental, and social infrastructures. Participatory design tools have helped me re-think the role of these schools. The Abu-Halima school provided significant input to develop this research. The major contribution of this research project is establishing innovative adaptive systems that can grow in complexity, such as food production, and climate and flood mitigation

A Framework for Controlling Quality of Sessions in Multimedia Systems

Collaborative multimedia systems demand overall session quality control beyond the level of quality of service (QoS) pertaining to individual connections in isolation of others. At every instant in time, the quality of the session depends on the actual QoS offered by the system to each of the application streams, as well as on the relative priorities of these streams according to the application semantics. We introduce a framework for achieving QoSess control and address the architectural issues involved in designing a QoSess control laver that realizes the proposed framework. In addition, we detail our contributions for two main components of the QoSess control layer. The first component is a scalable and robust feedback protocol, which allows for determining the worst case state among a group of receivers of a stream. This mechanism is used for controlling the transmission rates of multimedia sources in both cases of layered and single-rate multicast streams. The second component is a set of inter-stream adaptation algorithms that dynamically control the bandwidth shares of the streams belonging to a session. Additionally, in order to ensure stability and responsiveness in the inter-stream adaptation process, several measures are taken, including devising a domain rate control protocol. The performance of the proposed mechanisms is analyzed and their advantages are demonstrated by simulation and experimental results

An Evaluation of ICT Integration in Science Learning in Primary Schools in Saudi Arabia

Technology plays an important role in education, and Saudi Arabia has dedicated a huge budget to develop technology for education. The aim of this mixed-methods study is to evaluate ICT integration in science education in upper primary schools by investigating both students’ and teachers’ perceptions of ICT use. Participants perceived the ICT integration positively but faced several challenges including time and technical issues. Many participants suggested providing devices to improve Saudi science education

Coupled vibration of multi shaft-disc systems.

This thesis presents the dynamic behaviour of a rotor consisting of multidiscs on a solid or hollow shaft, of the type used in gas or steam turbines. The effect of shaft flexibility on the dynamic characteristics of discs and the coupling effects between the discs and shaft modes are investigated. The influence of the disc flexibility on the hehaviour of single span and multispan shaft system is also investigated. A new, thick, three-dimensinnal, Isoparametric, cylindrical element is developed to determine the axial, bending and torsional modes and their coupling effects on the vibrating shaft-discs systems. The element is chosen to have eight nodes at its corners with twelve degrees of freedom at each node giving ninety-six degrees of freedom for a complete element. The triple integration over the element of stiffness and mass matrices are evaluated algebraically and numerically by Gaussian Quadrature using a 4 x 4 x 4 mesh. The main objective of the research reported in this thesis is to fulfil the requirement for a theoretical solution capable of accurate analysis, and the development of finite element program using a double precision arithmetic to obtain the dynamic characteristics of a multirotor system. The effect of disc flexibility on the dynamic characteristics of a system where the discs are carried in the interior of thin-walled cylindrical hollow shafts or "drums" are also studied. This type of disc-drum assemblies are used in aeroengines. Advantage of the rotational periodicity and linear periodicity of the wave propagation technique is fully utilised in the analysis. A new technique of combination of the two methodsis developed to investigate the dynamic behaviour of multidiscs - multi span systems. The present investigation is divided in two parts. The first part deals with several applications of the study of vibration characteristics of circular and annular discs, sector plates, cylindrical shells, hollow cylinders and shafts for various boundary conditions. The results for such applications are obtained separately by using the thick , three-dimensional element, and are compared with those of existing results given by classical plate and shell theory,by exact and other numerical methods of analysis. They also show very good agreement with the experimental results. The objective of this part is to present the accuracy of the thick, three-dimensional element solution including the effects of rotary inertia and shear deformation on the vibration characteristics in the case of axisymmetric and non-symmetric modes of vibration. The effect of the radii ratio b/a and thickness variation of uniform and variable thickness disc on the frequencies of vibration is discussed. The effect of sectorial angle 0 of the sector plate, the ratio of L/R[m], R[1]./R[o] and R[m]/t of the shaft on the dynamic behaviour are also studied. A thin, two-dimensional annular sector element with twelve degrees of freedom is also developed to find the mass and stiffness matrices and to obtain the frequencies of a uniform and variable thickness disc. A comparison between the results of vibrating disc obtained by the thick three-dimensional element and by this element is made to show the superiority of the thick, three-dimensional element to the thin, two-dimensional element for the dynamic analysis and also to find the influence of shear deformation and rotary inertia on the dynamic behaviour which is not allowed for in the thin plate theory. The large size of the stiffness and mass matrices obtained in the case of a three-dimensional cylindrical element analysis are reduced by using the eigenvalue economizer technique. The second part of this investigation is to present the coupling influence and interaction between the discs and the shaft by using the thick, three-dimensional element. Results presented for various cases with differing flexibility and geometry show clearly the coupling effects in a multi disc-shaft system. An inference diagram is developed from which the dynamic behaviour of a system can be predicted for differing flexibility relationships between the solid or hollow shafts and the discs. The effect of various fixing conditions and boundary conditions on the coupling characteristics are also presented. The effectiveness, simplicitiy of use and significance of the element applied and its superiority over other elements in the dynamic analysis is studied. The theoretical results show very close agreement with the experimental results

Energy Efficiency Prediction using Artificial Neural Network

Buildings energy consumption is growing gradually and put away around 40% of total energy use. Predicting heating and cooling loads of a building in the initial phase of the design to find out optimal solutions amongst different designs is very important, as ell as in the operating phase after the building has been finished for efficient energy. In this study, an artificial neural network model was designed and developed for predicting heating and cooling loads of a building based on a dataset for building energy performance. The main factors for input variables are: relative compactness, roof area, overall height, surface area, glazing are a, wall area, glazing area distribution of a building, orientation, and the output variables: heating and cooling loads of the building. The dataset used for training are the data published in the literature for various 768 residential buildings. The model was trained and validated, most important factors affecting heating load and cooling load are identified, and the accuracy for the validation was 99.60%