The Multi-method Comprehensive Review: Synthesis and Analysis when Scholarship is International, Interdisciplinary, and Immense

This article presents a new strategy for reviewing large, multidisciplinary academic literatures: a multi-method comprehensive review (MCR). We present this approach and demonstrate its use by the NGO Knowledge Collective, which aims to aggregate knowledge on NGOs in international development. We explain the process by which scholars can identify, analyze, and synthesize a population of hundreds or thousands of articles. MCRs facilitate cross-disciplinary synthesis, systematically identify gaps in a literature, and can create data for further scholarly use. The main drawback is the significant resources needed to manage the volume of text to review, although such obstacles may be mitigated through advances in “big data” methodologies over time.

Contrast Sensitivity Measurement Tests and Methods

Contrast is a measure of the amount of lightness or darkness an object has in relationship to its background. Usually, it is described as Contrast Sensitivity (CS), which actually is the inverse of the contrast threshold. More often than not, stimulus set includes grating patterns of various sizes that are presented in a stationary manner or are dynamically presented by reversing the contrast at different rates. A variety of tests were developed, in order to asses and evaluate contrast sensitivity, in many different ways. A classical method, to check for contrast sensitivity, is the Pelli-Robson contrast sensitivity chart. The Bailey-Lovie contrast sensitivity chart is another letter chart that deals with differences in the number of letters read on the high and low contrast charts, with a main drawback, the necessity to follow the size of the letters. The Functional Acuity Contrast Test is designed to identify vision loss from a variety of disorders, many of which are not detected by high or low contrast Snellen Acuity tests. The MARS Letter Contrast Sensitivity Test shows good agreement with the Pelli-Robson test and possibly it may be the alternative to the Pelli-Robson chart, in clinical practice and research.

Greener Pretreatment Approaches for the Valorisation of Natural Fibre Biomass into Bioproducts

The utilization of lignocellulosic biomass in various applications has a promising potential as advanced technology progresses due to its renowned advantages as cheap and abundant feedstock. The main drawback in the utilization of this type of biomass is the essential requirement for the pretreatment process. The most common pretreatment process applied is chemical pretreatment. However, it is a non-eco-friendly process. Therefore, this review aims to bring into light several greener pretreatment processes as an alternative approach for the current chemical pretreatment. The main processes for each physical and biological pretreatment process are reviewed and highlighted. Additionally, recent advances in the effect of different non-chemical pretreatment approaches for the natural fibres are also critically discussed with a focus on bioproducts conversion.

Analysis on Condenser with Different Refrigerants

: This research considered the analysis of condensers by using refrigerants R-134A, R-22 and R-744. The optimal values were obtained by varying different performance parameters. The simulation can be done by using CFD ANSYS Software. Experiments were conducted in order to justify the performance of refrigerants on the fins in condensers and compare the performance of refrigerants on the condenser and fins and find which one has the best Eco-friendly results. The simulated Ansys results showed that R-744 has better and more Eco-friendly results than R-134A and R-22. The main drawback for R22 deplets the ozone layer and is harmful to the environment and for R-134A has the metal particles of Al2O3 which heats the refrigerant immediately.

IoT Based Smart Energy Meter

We can see a person standing in front of our house from electricity board, whose duty is to read the energy meter and handover the bills to the owner of that house every two months. This is nothing but meter reading. According to that reading we have to pay the bills. The main drawback of this system is that person has to go area by area and he has to read the meter of every house and handover the bills. Many times errors like extra bill amount, or notification from electric board even though the bills are paid are common errors. To overcome this drawback we have come up with an idea which will eliminate the third party between the consumer and service provider, even the errors will be overcome. The idea of smart energy meter using IOT and Arduino has been introduced. In this method we are using Arduino because it is energy efficient i.e. it consume less power, it is fastest and has two UARTS. In this paper, energy meter which is already installed at our houses are no t replaced, but a small modification on the already installed meters can change the existing meters into smart meters.

Surface Heterostructure of Aluminum with Carbon Nanotubes Obtained by Laser-Oriented Deposition

Al is one of the most widely applicable metallic materials due to its advanced properties. However, its main drawback is its strength, which is relatively low compared to ferrous alloys. This issue may be resolved using different approaches. In the present work, a heterostructure of Al substrate with a modified surface with carbon nanotubes (CNTs) was studied. This heterostructure was obtained using the laser-oriented deposition technique. The obtained results showed a slight reduction in the reflectivity of the obtained Al substrate with embedded CNTs compared to pure Al. Additionally, the obtained surface heterostructure showed enhancement in microhardness and higher hydrophobicity. Simulation of the CNT embedding process revealed that CNT penetration strongly depends on the diameter. Hence, the penetration increases when the diameter decreases.

A Cluster of FPAAs to Recognize Images using Neural Networks

Analog computing has been recovering its relevance in the recent years. FPAAs are the equivalent to FPGAs but in the analog domain. The main drawback of FPAAs is their reduced integration capacity. In order to increase the amount of analog resources, in this paper a cluster of 40 FPAAs is proposed. As a use case, a 19-8-6-4 feedforward Neural Network has been implemented on such cluster. With the help of a DCT-based software framework, this NN is able to classify 28x28 MNIST images. Results show that the analog network is able to obtain almost the same results as the software baseline network.<br>

THE CONCEPT OF CONVERTING TEXT INTO A BIT MAP USING ANY FONT

The modern world is impossible to imagine without the exchange of information. Newspapers, magazines, books, printed advertising products play an important role and are constantly being improved and require more and more resources and opportunities. At the moment, due to the sharp growth of digital technology, there is a problem between the capabilities of hardware and software. That is, when transferring data from the electronic world to paper, the difference between the computing capabilities of hardware and software is displayed. This applies to print media that cannot convey the full volume and depth of what is displayed on the screen. Raster fonts are used for printing faster, the main drawback of which is their non-scalability. When studying fonts in embedded systems, there were problems with the fact that there are quite a few ready-made options for converting text to a bitmap without certain restrictions. The font displayed on the screen and printed directly by the printer or other device may differ significantly because the number of pixels that can be printed is too large. Therefore, there is a need to optimize the conversion of the font into a bitmap, ie reducing the number of points without losing the base of the glyph. The paper presents the conversion of a font into a bitmap using a program based on a ruler, ie the division of the image into lines, which is used in printing. In order to create the required bitmap image in the program, you need to specify a specific glyph and its size, as well as the device for which it will be used. The scan converter takes a path and applies a set of rules to determine which pixels will be part of the glyph image when printed or displayed on the screen. The obtained results allow us to print the fonts we like, instead of the standard ones.

Switched Capacitor Based Cascaded Half-Bridge Multilevel Inverter With Voltage Boosting Feature

Cascaded multilevel inverter (CMI) topology is prevalent in many applications. However, the CMI requires many switches and isolated dc sources, which is the main drawback of this type of inverter. As a result, the volume, cost and complexity of the CMI topology are increased and the efficiency is deteriorated. This paper thus proposes a switched-capacitor-based multilevel inverter topology with half-bridge cells and only one dc source. Compared to the conventional CMI, the proposed inverter uses almost half the number of switches, while maintaining a boosting capability. Additionally, the main drawback of switched-capacitor multilevel inverters is the capacitor inrush current. This problem is also averted in the proposed topology by using a charging inductor or quasi-resonant capacitor charging with a front-end boost converter. Simulation results and lab-scale experimental verifications are provided to validate the feasibility and viability of the proposed inverter topology.