scholarly journals Innovative passive reinforcements for the gradual stabilization of a landslide according with the observational method

Landslides ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lorenzo Brezzi ◽  
Alberto Bisson ◽  
Davide Pasa ◽  
Simonetta Cola

AbstractA large number of landslides occur in North-Eastern Italy during every rainy period due to the particular hydrogeological conditions of this area. Even if there are no casualties, the economic losses are often significant, and municipalities frequently do not have sufficient financial resources to repair the damage and stabilize all the unstable slopes. In this regard, the research for more economically sustainable solutions is a crucial challenge. Floating composite anchors are an innovative and low-cost technique set up for slope stabilization: it consists in the use of passive sub-horizontal reinforcements, obtained by coupling a traditional self-drilling bar with some tendons cemented inside it. This work concerns the application of this technique according to the observational method described within the Italian and European technical codes and mainly recommended for the design of geotechnical works, especially when performed in highly uncertain site conditions. The observational method prescribes designing an intervention and, at the same time, using a monitoring system in order to correct and adapt the project during realization of the works on the basis of new data acquired while on site. The case study is the landslide of Cischele, a medium landslide which occurred in 2010 after an exceptional heavy rainy period. In 2015, some floating composite anchors were installed to slow down the movement, even if, due to a limited budget, they were not enough to ensure the complete stabilization of the slope. Thanks to a monitoring system installed in the meantime, it is now possible to have a comparison between the site conditions before and after the intervention. This allows the evaluation of benefits achieved with the reinforcements and, at the same time, the assessment of additional improvements. Two stabilization scenarios are studied through an FE model: the first includes the stabilization system built in 2015, while the second evaluates a new solution proposed to further increase the slope stability.

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
wen-yaw chung

This paper is mainly aimed to develop a solar powered hand-held monitoring system for real-time crop-growth multiple environment parameter sensing and ZigBee-based wireless data transmission for Internet of Thing (IoT) applications. The proposed solar powered system successfully built a Wireless Sensor Network (WSN) for quality agriculture application by using the ZigBee technology standard and TI’s CC2530 chip. Commercially available sensors were utilized specifically for temperature, humidity, soil moisture, light, chlorophyll, and CO2 monitoring. With the consideration and advantages of low power, low cost and multi-node capabilities, we chose ZigBee-based wireless network to transmit data into the cloud system for further data processing and analysis. When the sensors and Zigbee transmission system are set up, the data obtained through the human machine interface on the host will be sent to the cloud database established by MySQL in XAMPP. The management and data storage of the cloud database are both processed under the phpMyAdmin system. In addition, we use another program in XAMPP - Apache HTTP Server to set up the php website. Finally, this database of the sensing information will be used for assessment and evaluation of the environmental condition, data log recording, risk management and decision making. These resources can feed back to farmer’s cell phones through a decision support system. The experimental design and field test were verified in Tai-Yuan Organic farm located in Tao-Yuan County, Taiwan. The system will have a potential to be deployed into an open-field or green-house based farm to improve the optimized crop cultivation and increase the harvest yield.


Author(s):  
E. J. G. Merin ◽  
A. L. F. Yute ◽  
C. J. S. Sarmiento ◽  
E. E. Elazagui

Abstract. Natural disasters incur many fatalities and economic losses for vulnerable and developing countries such as the Philippines. It is crucial that during calamities, on-ground surveillance is supplemented by low-cost and time-efficient methods such as satellite remote sensing. Diwata-2 is a Philippine microsatellite specifically equipped for disaster assessment. In this study, the capabilities of this satellite in ashfall detection were explored by closely examining the case of the Taal volcano eruption on January 12, 2020. Satellite images covering parts of CALABARZON and Metropolitan Manila before and after the phreatomagmatic eruption were compared. The presence and extent of heavy ash over the study area were identified after the image classification using the Support Vector Machine (SVM) algorithm. A decrease in vegetation cover and built-up areas was also observed. Upon validation, an overall accuracy of 91.4562 and Kappa coefficient of 0.8833 were achieved for the post-eruption ashfall extent map, exhibiting the potential of Diwata-2 imagery in monitoring volcanic eruptions and similar phenomena.


2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (2) ◽  
pp. 112
Author(s):  
Vita Awalia Mardiana ◽  
Mochamad Mardi Martadinata ◽  
Galih Nugraha Nurkahfi ◽  
Arumjeni Mitayani ◽  
Dayat Kurniawan ◽  
...  

COVID-19, which has become a global pandemic since March 2020, has tremendously affected human life globally. The negative impact of COVID-19 affects societies in almost all aspects. Implementing quarantine monitoring, also social distancing, and contact tracing are a series of processes that can suppress the new infected COVID-19 cases in various countries. Prior works have proposed different monitoring systems to assist the monitoring of individuals in quarantines, as well as many methods are offered for social distancing and contact tracing. These methods focus on one function to provide a reliable system. In this paper, we propose IoT-based quarantine monitoring by implementing a geofence equipped with social distancing features to offer an integrated system that provides more benefits than one system carrying one particular function. We propose a system consisting of a low cost, low complexity, and reusable wristband design and mobile apps to support the quarantine monitoring system. For the geofencing, we propose a GPS-based geofence system that was developed by taking advantage of the convenience offered by the Traccar application. Meanwhile, we add the notification for social distancing feature with adaptive distance measurement RSSI-based set up in the android application. Based on the experiment we did to validate the system, in terms of wristband-to-smartphone communication, scanning interval in smartphone and advertising interval in wristband is best to set in 7 s for both. For social distancing notification and geofence, we measure the system performance through precision, recall, accuracy, and F-measure.


Author(s):  
T. Gulik-Krzywicki ◽  
M.J. Costello

Freeze-etching electron microscopy is currently one of the best methods for studying molecular organization of biological materials. Its application, however, is still limited by our imprecise knowledge about the perturbations of the original organization which may occur during quenching and fracturing of the samples and during the replication of fractured surfaces. Although it is well known that the preservation of the molecular organization of biological materials is critically dependent on the rate of freezing of the samples, little information is presently available concerning the nature and the extent of freezing-rate dependent perturbations of the original organizations. In order to obtain this information, we have developed a method based on the comparison of x-ray diffraction patterns of samples before and after freezing, prior to fracturing and replication.Our experimental set-up is shown in Fig. 1. The sample to be quenched is placed on its holder which is then mounted on a small metal holder (O) fixed on a glass capillary (p), whose position is controlled by a micromanipulator.


1997 ◽  
Vol 503 ◽  
Author(s):  
B. K. Diefenderfer ◽  
I. L. Al-Qadi ◽  
J. J. Yoho ◽  
S. M. Riad ◽  
A. Loulizi

ABSTRACTPortland cement concrete (PCC) structures deteriorate with age and need to be maintained or replaced. Early detection of deterioration in PCC (e.g., alkali-silica reaction, freeze/thaw damage, or chloride presence) can lead to significant reductions in maintenance costs. However, it is often too late to perform low-cost preventative maintenance by the time deterioration becomes evident. By developing techniques that would enable civil engineers to evaluate PCC structures and detect deterioration at early stages (without causing further damage), optimization of life-cycle costs of the constructed facility and minimization of disturbance to the facility users can be achieved.Nondestructive evaluation (NDE) methods are potentially one of the most useful techniques ever developed for assessing constructed facilities. They are noninvasive and can be performed rapidly. Portland cement concrete can be nondestructively evaluated by electrically characterizing its complex dielectric constant. The real part of the dielectric constant depicts the velocity of electromagnetic waves in PCC. The imaginary part, termed the “loss factor,” describes the conductivity of PCC and the attenuation of electromagnetic waves.Dielectric properties of PCC have been investigated in a laboratory setting using a parallel plate capacitor operating in the frequency range of 0.1 to 40.1MIHz. This capacitor set-up consists of two horizontal-parallel plates with an adjustable separation for insertion of a dielectric specimen (PCC). While useful in research, this approach is not practical for field implementation. A new capacitor probe has been developed which consists of two plates, located within the same horizontal plane, for placement upon the specimen to be tested. Preliminary results show that this technique is feasible and results are promising; further testing and evaluation is currently underway.


Author(s):  
Binh Nguyen

Abstract For those attempting fault isolation on computer motherboard power-ground short issues, the optimal technique should utilize existing test equipment available in the debug facility, requiring no specialty equipment as well as needing a minimum of training to use effectively. The test apparatus should be both easy to set up and easy to use. This article describes the signal injection and oscilloscope technique which meets the above requirements. The signal injection and oscilloscope technique is based on the application of Ohm's law in a short-circuit condition. Two experiments were conducted to prove the effectiveness of these techniques. Both experiments simulate a short-circuit condition on the VCC3 power rail of a good working PC motherboard and then apply the signal injection and oscilloscope technique to localize the short. The technique described is a simple, low cost and non-destructive method that helps to find the location of the power-ground short quickly and effectively.


Author(s):  
I Made Oka Widyantara ◽  
I Made Dwi Asana Putra ◽  
Ida Bagus Putu Adnyana

This paper intends to explain the development of Coastal Video Monitoring System (CoViMoS) with the main characteristics including low-cost and easy implementation. CoViMoS characteristics have been realized using the device IP camera for video image acquisition, and development of software applications with the main features including detection of shoreline and it changes are automatically. This capability was based on segmentation and classification techniques based on data mining. Detection of shoreline is done by segmenting a video image of the beach, to get a cluster of objects, namely land, sea and sky, using Self Organizing Map (SOM) algorithms. The mechanism of classification is done using K-Nearest Neighbor (K-NN) algorithms to provide the class labels to objects that have been generated on the segmentation process. Furthermore, the classification of land used as a reference object in the detection of costline. Implementation CoViMoS system for monitoring systems in Cucukan Beach, Gianyar regency, have shown that the developed system is able to detect the shoreline and its changes automatically.


2021 ◽  
pp. 104687812110326
Author(s):  
Adeel Arif ◽  
Amber Arif ◽  
Kimberly Anne Fasciglione ◽  
Farrukh Nadeem Jafri

Abstract: Background Locations concentrated with High School (HS) students tend to have lower out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA) survival rates. Mobile applications (apps) have the capability to augment cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) skill retention as a low-cost, accessible training method. Methods An iterative process to develop an app to reinforce CPR skills emphasizing hand placement, compression rate, real-time feedback, and recurring tips is described. The app was tested on HS students to measure its impact on quality and comfort of CPR using Likert surveys and skills assessments before and after one month of usage. CPR Score and compression rate were measured using the Laerdal™ Little Anne Manikin QCPR software. Results Fourteen HS students participated in a prospective observational study. It was found that the use of the developed app was associated with improved CPR performance (80.43% v. 87.86%, p=0.01-0.02, 95% CI=2.20-12.66) after one month. Additionally, improvements were demonstrated in compression rate accuracy (21.43% v. 64.29%, p=0.041, 95% CI=0.132-0.725), increased comfort performing CPR (3.86 v. 4.79, p<0.001, 95% CI =0.99-1.00) and comfort performing CPR on strangers (2.71 v. 4.42, p<0.001, 95% CI=1.24-2.19). In addition, for every time the app was used, CPR performance increased by 0.5668% (p=0.0182). Conclusion Findings suggest that mobile apps may have promising implications as augmentative tools for CPR curriculums.


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