Traffic noise attenuation solutions for naturally ventilated classrooms in South Africa

Traffic noise transmission through the open windows of naturally-ventilated classrooms can reduce speech intelligibility and can negatively impact academic performance. The findings of a numerical study are presented. Software was used to assess effective noise attenuation solutions for naturally-ventilated classrooms exposed to traffic noise. A typical situation in urban schools in Gauteng, South Africa, is considered in which classrooms are ventilated by large open windows in accordance with national building regulations and norms and standards for school design. The aim of the study was to establish a heuristic framework for early design decisions regarding how far from the road a classroom building should be set, and the effective height and position of a solid noise barrier to ensure a suitable ambient noise level inside a classroom with open windows. Efficacy was measured with reference to an indoor ambient sound level of 40 dBA. The findings show that with the insertion of barriers, the required ambient level was achieved for a classroom at least 68 m from the road, if the barrier is at least 3.5 m high. However, it was found that a significant insertion loss (>6 dB) and an improved signal to noise ratio could be achieved for classrooms as close as 17 m from the road with a barrier of at least 2 m high. Though not broadly generalizable, the findings provide a heuristic guide applicable for designing new schools or selecting attenuation interventions in existing city schools that are similar to those used in the study.

USING RELATIVE VISUAL PERFORMANCE TO PREDICT THE ABILITY TO MAKE INTERPERSONAL EVALUATIONS

In research of lighting for pedestrians, many experiments have been conducted to determine how changes in lighting affect the ability to make interpersonal evaluations. Here we consider an alternative approach, predicting performance using a model - Relative Visual Performance. The results show that face evaluation ability is affected by adaptation luminance and also by personal characteristics; observer age and skin tone of the observed person. While 2 lx is sufficient for a young observer to evaluate a Caucasian face, the typical situation in laboratory trials, higher illuminances are needed for older observers and for darker skin tones.

The development of a holistic image of the cryosphere

For the 20th century, during which cryology took shape, there was a typical situation of a gap between the natural sciences and philosophy. At the beginning of the 21st century, the rapid knowledge accumulation and the growing intra-subject differentiation in natural sciences led to the need of combining disparate ideas about reality and recreate a holistic scientific picture of the world on a new basis. The discovery of a variety of extraterrestrial cryogenic objects, as well as a large range of scales and rates of cryogenic processes, expands the understanding of cold. The establishment in 1991 in Tyumen of the Earth Cryosphere Institute, SB RAS can be considered the key to the development of holism in the study of the world of cold. Over the past 30 years, in the process of forming the Institute scientific team, the researchers were following the main task of implementing an interdisciplinary approach to the object of study. The realization of the principle was intented to build a holistic scientific picture of the world of cold, in the way of a specific form of the scientific knowledge systematization, which includes the construction of ontological models of systems of some objects, processes and phenomena, as well as the analysis of their connections. The application of a holistic approach to the study of the cryosphere contributed to the generation in the scientific picture of the World of new contexts of understanding the role of cold in the variety of physical phenomena on Earth and in space. These include such new concepts as cryogenic resources, cryologic time, cryodiversity, cryodeterminism, as well as the latest areas of cryology — cryotrasology, cryoheterotopy, etc.

A Practical Design Method for Reducing Postconstruction Settlement of Highway Subgrade Induced by Soil Creep

The postconstruction settlement of the bridge approach is usually uneven, which could create a bump in the roadway. Indeed, this is a typical situation at the end of the bridge approach and requires a solution. One of the main causes of postconstruction settlement is the creep of soil. This paper is aimed at generalizing a new design method for controlling highway postconstruction settlement by replacing subgrade with expanded polystyrene (EPS). In the new method, the creep coefficient can be calculated based on the Yin-Graham EVP model. Thus, the relationship between the overloading ratio (OLR) and overconsolidation ratio (OCR) is obtained. The new method involves five steps: (a) determine the creep coefficient based on the relationship between the creep coefficient and over consolidation ratio, (b) divide the ground into a suitable number of sublayers, (c) select groups of different overloading ratios and then calculate the average values of the additional stress and overconsolidation ratio for each sublayer under different OLRs, (d) calculate the postconstruction settlement under different OLRs, and (e) determine the replacement capacity for different sections. This method can be used for quantitative design according to different requirements of postconstruction settlement of foundation. Taking Huzhou Avenue as an example, the case study illustrates the calculation process of the new method in detail.

Civil Law Status of Transmission Equipment (Article 49 of the Polish Civil Code)

<p>The article provides an analysis of the civil law status of transmission equipment (devices) referred to in Article 49 of the Civil Code (transmission devices). Conducting business activity by a transmission entrepreneur in the field of utility services and waste disposal requires the use of transmission devices. These devices are located on real estate which are not owned by the entrepreneur and in a typical situation they remain permanently connected to such real estate. According to Article 49 of the Polish Civil Code, such devices do not constitute component parts of real estate if they are part of an enterprise. The assessment of the entry of transmission equipment into the composition of the enterprise and their ownership status, especially after entering the composition of the enterprise raises interpretation doubts. Determining who is the owner of transmission equipment is important because the owner of the equipment may be granted (Article 305¹ of the Civil Code) a transmission easement, which is a right related to the ownership of these devices. In this article, an attempt was made to resolve the aforementioned interpretation doubts.</p>

Traditional Usage of Plants of Costus Species in Assam, India

Customary use of plants in the treatment of ailments in Assam, India is a typical situation. Ethno medicinal study was led in a few topographically unique zones of the state and utilization of plants from Costus species were reported. The extent of study chose for the investigation range across seven organizational regions spread across Assam, India. The regions include Dibrugarh, Golaghat, Tinsukia, Dhemaji, Karbi Anglong, Goalpara and Kokrajhar. Different plants were reported and plants fitting with the said species were chosen for determining the relevance concerning its use in customary medication. The survey divulged that plants associated to three species of the genus Costus namely Costus speciosus, Costus pictus and Costus scaber were espied to be primarily ubiquitous in traditional medicine in the discrete contemplated regions. The species were predominantly utilized as prime ingrediants in hepatoprotactive and anti-diabetic formulations. Costus speciosus was perceived to be chiefly used in the treatment of hepatic disorders and ailments. Costus pictus was observed to be used customarily in the upper Assam region bordering Nagaland for treating diabetes and Costus scaber was being used in the area bordering Arunachal Pradesh for tending people with jaundice, snake bite etc. The research climaxed with the profiling of the costus species as annotated from the ethnomedicinal survey.

Social Medial Promotional Activities Influence on Purchase Choice Decision and Price of Perishable Food Items during COVID-19 in Lagos, Nigeria

This study aimed to research if promotional activities on social media influence purchase choice decisions, consumers impulse buying, the price for perishable food items, like vegetables, fruits, beef, fish, and others during the COVID-19 pandemics. Likewise, if there are differences between the original market price of goods before the COVID-19 pandemic and the promotional online prices during the pandemic, to investigate if the online price of delivering goods to consumer homes influence consumer quantity purchase decision, and if there is any relationship between consumer location and price of goods delivery during the COVID-19 pandemics. The results suggest that promotional activities on social media for perishable food items during the pandemic does not necessarily influence consumers purchase choice decision, but rather, influence consumer quantity purchase, and there is a difference between the original market price of goods before the COVID-19 – pandemic and the promotional online price during the pandemic. Likewise, there is a relationship between consumer location and price of goods delivery during the COVID-19 pandemics. The findings of the study showcase a typical situation of things during a crisis in a developing country, where people take advantage of situations to exploit the helpless. Prices of goods increased, and people had no choice but had to buy because man cannot do without food.

TRANSFORMATION OF THE DECISION SUPPORT SYSTEM MODEL FOR STANDARD SITUATIONS USING INTELLECTUAL AND ANALYTICAL METHODS

The article discusses the issues of improving the efficiency of decision support activities on a relatively large amount of information. The research relevance is associated with the increasing complexity of control objects, which leads to a decrease in the efficiency of decision-making based on the personal experience of decision-makers, up to complete impossibility. The purpose of the ar-ticle is to analyze the problems faced by decision-makers and the creation of methods to improve the effectiveness of decision-making in typical situations. The article examines the main compo-nents of the intelligent subsystem of the decision support system, which require the use of analytical tools, and also forms the methods interaction structure necessary for the effective formation of sce-narios of information support for decision making. To achieve the goals, a decision support method based on an intelligent component was used, which is aimed at creating an effective infrastructure to sup-port decision-making; methods of identification and categorization, designed to implement the most accurate and correct comparison of the characteristics (state) of the observed situation and the characteristics of a typical situation stored in the knowledge base; correlation methods aimed at finding dependencies between the characteristics of situations and scenarios to solve problems associated with these situa-tions; a method for constructing subject qualimetry, used to form a predictive model to assess the degree of compliance of the selected scenario for solving the current situation. As a result, it was de-termined that an important aspect of decision-making in typical situations is the most accurate identification of the state of the situation, the choice of the best scenario for implementing the solu-tion for this situation and the analysis of the consequences of the selected set of measures. To solve these problems, a method for identifying a situation, a method for finding solution scenarios and a qualimetric method for predicting the effectiveness of the selected scenario have been formed. The article concludes that decision-making activities based on the accumulated experience can be im-proved by using the proposed methods and implementing a decision support system with an intelli-gent component.

Modular Approach for Modelling Warming Up Process in Water Installations with Flow-Regulating Elements

The paper presents a new method for modelling the warming up process of a water system with elements regulating the flow in a stochastic manner. The paper presents the basic equations describing the work of typical elements which the water installation is composed of. In the proposed method, a new computational algorithm was used in the form of an iterative procedure enabling the use of boundary conditions that can be stochastically modified during the warming-up process. A typical situation, when such a modification is processed, is the regulation of the medium flow through two-way or three-way valves or applying additional heat source. Moreover, the presented method does not require the transformation of the differential equations, describing the operation of individual elements, into a linear form, which significantly facilitates analytical work and makes it more flexible. The example of analysis of the operation of water installation used for controlling temperature of the process gases in a chemical installation shows the functionality and flexibility of the method. The adopted calculation schematics enable changing the direction of the heat flow while the heat exchanger is in operation. Additionally, the sequence of calculation processed in modules describing operation of installation elements is elective (there is no situation that output parameters from one element are used as input parameters for other element in the same calculation step).

THE SEMANTIC GROUPS OF BORROWED WORDS IN THE RUSSIAN LITERARY TEXT: THE DYNAMIC ASPECT (BASED ON POLONISM)

Введение. Рассматриваются семантические группы полонизмов в русском художественном тексте XIX–XXI вв. Цель ‒ выявление и систематизация репрезентативных семантических групп полонизмов в художественном тексте XIX–XXI вв., а также анализ экстралингвистических и лингвистических причин их актуализации и ведущих функций. Материал и методы. На первом этапе рассмотрено блее 30 литературных произведений, отобранных по тематическому (о польских событиях), биографическому (авторы имеют польское происхождение) и языковому (тексты должны были быть написаны на русском языке, не являться переводами) критериям. На втором этапе для более детального изучения были взяты романы В. В. Крестовского «Кровавый пуф», З. Шишовой и С. Царевича «Приключения Каспера Берната в Польше и других странах» и В. Р. Мединского «Стена» как наиболее репрезентативные по объему заимствований из польского языка. Систематизация слов польского происхождения по семантическому принципу, дающая базу для изучения их функционирования в динамическом аспекте, подчинена концепции «Большого толкового словаря русских существительных» под ред. Л. Г. Бабенко (2005 г.), при которой общая типовая ситуация является основанием объединения имен существительных в семантическую группу слов. Результаты и обсуждение. Наиболее подробно описаны репрезентативные семантические группы полонизмов «религия», «питание», «социальные отношения», «военная служба». Выявлены как экстралингвистические, так и собственно языковые причины этого процесса: снижение в кругах читающей интеллигенции интереса к Польше в связи с дезактуализацией «польского вопроса», утрата значения религии, изменение жизненного уклада, нейтрализация социального неравенства, фонетическая и смысловая близость полонизмов и исконно русских слов. Показано, что ведущие функции полонизмов, а именно характерологическая, идентифицирующая, оценочная и уточняющая, в целом носят постоянный характер в литературе последних трех веков, их употребление отвечает традициям и задачам художественного повествования. В то же время меняется их количественный и качественный состав. Заключение. Анализ семантических групп польских элементов в русском языке показал устойчивую тенденцию к сокращению их количества в художественном тексте в исследуемом временном отрезке, кроме полонизмов военной тематики. Результаты работы могут быть востребованы в исследовании языковых контактов, динамических процессов русскоязычного художественного дискурса, в лексикографической практике. Introduction. The article deals with semantic groups of polonisms in the Russian literary text of the XIX‒XXI centuries. Aim and objectives. The article aims to identify, describe and systematize representative semantic groups of polonisms in the literary text of the XIX–XXI centuries, as well as to analyze the extralinguistic and linguistic reasons for their actualization and the leading functions. Material and methods. The material selection for this study was carried out in stages. At the first stage about 30 literary works selected by thematic (about Polish events), biographical (the authors are of Polish origin) and linguistic (the texts should have been written in Russian, not translations) criteria were considered. At the second stage for a detailed study the works by V. V. Krestovskii „The Bloody Pouf“, Z. Shishova and S. Tsarevich „The Adventures of Casper Bernat in Poland and Other Countries“ and V. R. Medinskii „The Wall“ were taken as the most representative in terms of borrowing from the Polish language. Systematization of Polish origin words on the semantic principle, which provides a basis for studying their functioning in a dynamic aspect, was subordinated to the concept of a „Large explanatory dictionary of Russian nouns“ edited by L. G. Babenko (2005), in which the general typical situation is the basis for combining nouns in a semantic group of words. Results and discussion. The article describes in detail the following representative semantic groups of polonisms: „religion“, „nutrition“, „social relations“, „military service“. The analysis of semantic groups of Polish elements in the Russian language showed a steady tendency to their number reduction in the literary text of the time period under study, except for polonisms of military subjects. The authors identify both extralinguistic and linguistic reasons for this process: the interest decline in Poland in reading circles due to the deactualization of the „Polish issue“, the loss of religion significance, changes in the way of life, the social inequality neutralization, the phonetic and semantic proximity of polonisms and native Russian words. The study also showed that the leading functions of polonisms, namely characterological, identifying, evaluating and clarifying, are generally permanent in the literature of the last three centuries. These functions of words of Polish origin are not directly related to their semantics, the use of polonisms corresponds to the traditions and tasks of artistic storytelling. Conclusion. The analysis of semantic groups of Polish elements in Russian language showed a steady tendency to reduce their number in the literary text in the studied time period, except for polonisms of military thematic. The results of the work can be used in the study of language contacts, dynamic processes of Russian-language artistic discourse, in lexicographic practice. Funding: The reported study was funded by RFBR and FRLC, project number 21-512-23003, „One’s own“ and „somebody else’s“ in modern Russian and Hungarian fiction.