Endoscopic Operating Platforms and Advancements

The first endoscope was created in 1805 by Philip Bozini in Germany. This endoscope was known as “Lichtleiter,” a light guiding instrument. In the 1950s, the first models of fiberoptic endoscopes were introduced. Since then, the technology associated with endoscopic surgery has grown by leaps and bounds. This article aims to explore current operating platforms and emerging technology associated with endoscopic surgery.

Formation of an Additional Motion Control Loop for the Nanosatellite to Adapt its Onboard Model to the Current Operating Conditions

The paper presents the formation of additional feedback in the loop of the attitude control system of a nanosatellite. Feedback is based on the assessment of the inertial characteristics of the nanosatellite. The influence of the accuracy of knowledge of the inertial characteristics of a nanosatellite on the formation of an optimal control law in the problem of reorientation was estimated. Statistical modelling has been carried out to assess the effectiveness of nanosatellite on-board sensors in the problem of identifying the inertial characteristics of a nanosatellite. Recommendations for the selection of sensor’s characteristics and time interval of data collection have been formulated.

Section 1. Introduction

This document has been prepared by the Water Technology Subcommittee of the ASME Research and Technology Committee on Steam and Water in Thermal Systems as a consensus of proper current operating practices for the control of feedwater and boiler water chemistry in the operation of industrial and institutional, high duty, primary fuel fired boilers. These practices are aimed at minimizing corrosion, deposition, cleaning requirements, and unscheduled outages in the steam generators and associated condensate, feedwater and steam systems for boilers, and steam system components which are currently available. This publication is an expansion and revision of the operating practice consensus documents previously issued by the Committee [1-3]. The tabulated values herein update and replace the ones previously published. Titles have been edited and clarified. The text has been reordered and modified where necessary. THE TEXT IS OF PRIME IMPORTANCE AND SHOULD BE CONSIDERED FULLY BEFORE USING THE TABULATED VALUES. One Appendix has been added to provide additional guidance.

2FAST2Q: A general-purpose sequence search and counting program for FASTQ files

The increasingly widespread use of next generation sequencing protocols has brought the need for the development of user-friendly raw data processing tools. Here, we present 2FAST2Q, a versatile and intuitive standalone program capable of extracting and counting feature occurrences in FASTQ files. 2FAST2Q can be used in any experimental setup that requires feature extraction from raw reads, being able to quickly handle mismatch alignments, nucleotide wise Phred score filtering, custom read trimming, and sequence searching within a single program. Using published CRISPRi datasets in which Escherichia coli and Mycobacterium tuberculosis gene essentiality, as well as host-cell sensitivity towards SARS-CoV2 infectivity were tested, we demonstrate that 2FAST2Q efficiently recapitulates the output in read counts per provided feature as with traditional pipelines. Moreover, we show how different FASTQ read filtering parameters impact downstream analysis, and suggest a default usage protocol. 2FAST2Q has a familiar user interface and uses a custom sequence mismatch search algorithm, taking advantage of Pythons numba module JIT runtime speeds. It is thus easier to use and faster than currently available tools, efficiently processing large CRISPRi-Seq or random-barcode sequencing datasets on any up-to-date laptop. 2FAST2Q is available as an executable file for all current operating systems without installation and as a Python3 module on the PyPI repository (available at https://veeninglab.com/2fast2q). We expect that 2FAST2Q will not only be useful for people working in microbiology but also for other fields in which amplicon sequencing data is generated.

A Method for Mill Monitoring Based on Inter-insert Periodic Correlation Using Singular Value Decomposition (SVD)

This paper introduces a method to monitor the wear of end milling tools in real-time production based on inter-insert periodic correlation. The aim is to detect abnormal behavior of the cutter as early as possible to prevent severe tool failure and subsequent losses. The approach takes advantage of the angular domain to segment the signal in periodic cycles of the same angular duration, which are then amenable to correlation analysis. An ordered separability index with latent correlation characteristics is proposed to assess the current operating state of the tool. A series of simulations with existing experimental data are run to test the feasibility of the proposed index and to calculate the corresponding confidence interval. This approach has a high potential to form an efficient tool condition monitoring system. Compared to the traditional teach-in method, this method is more independent of the cutting conditions (changes of velocity or direction) and has no requirement for a trial cut, making the method useful for small batch production and can reduce the rate of false alarms.

Assessment of Noise Signature for a Cavitating Centrifugal Pump

In recent days, sophisticated instruments have emerged to obtain an online measurement of performance parameters from centrifugal pump of different kinds and the signals can be directed to the hands of pump user through mobile application. With this in mind, a centrifugal pump of low specific speed was chosen for cavitation studies from 80% to 120% of nominal flow rate and for three different speeds. An assessment was carried out for cavitation noise signature from those operating condition of that pump. The result of cavitation noise based on peak magnitude as well as average revealed a nature in relation to cavitation coefficient and it greatly depends on the flow rate with respect to nominal flow rate. The noise envelope for the flow rate at best efficiency and above was having similar trend whereas at flows less than the nominal, it was totally different. So the criteria for finding the deviation in noise cannot be uniform for all flow rates. In this paper, the method adapted was to impose a trend line to the measured cavitation noise information and to find out the deviation with respect to normal operating condition. It was concluded that detection of abnormality in pumps due to cavitation effects requires the current operating condition to be diagnosed first and then proper criteria for deviation in noise has to be imposed.

Determining infrastructure requirements for an air taxi service at Cologne Bonn Airport

The worldwide increasing population density in major urban centres poses great challenges for transportation systems. Air taxi services could be a solution to this growing problem by bringing the existing transportation system to the three dimensional space. This paper analyzes the challenges and requirements of developing a vertiport intended for the use of air taxis at Cologne Bonn Airport. This research was conducted with the information available at the time of writing, for which a basis scenario is defined for the Cologne Bonn Airport where important aspects of an air taxi service are determined such as passenger demand and possible vehicles. The main aspects analysed were the requirements on the vertiport infrastructure and its location, as well as the requirements on passenger processing. For the defined basis scenario, results show that the preferential locations to develop a vertiport at Cologne Bonn Airport are the roof top levels of parking garages P2 and P3. Furthermore, it is shown that given the estimated passenger demand, a very high utilization factor of the defined infrastructure is to be expected. This paper provides a starting point for the development of an air taxi service at Cologne Bonn Airport. Further research is needed in key issues such as the financial aspects of an air taxi service, its integration into the current operating scenario of the Cologne Bonn Airport and the approval process for an air taxi service and the vertiport itself.

Ecovillages, Environment and Sustainability Practice

This paper focuses on the Ecovillages operation, environment, and sustainable practices implemented among the current operating Ecovillages worldwide. The main objective is to examine the critical factors affecting the sustainability of Ecovillages and their practice in managing their surroundings and environment. This study proceeds with a quantitative research method to further investigate the sustainability practice issues among the existing Ecovillages in the world. The data were collected through a self-administered questionnaire using an online platform. This study test four independent variables, namely energy efficiency, organic food, telework, and social media, towards the sustainability practice of the Ecovillages operation worldwide. Keywords: Ecovillages; Environment; Sustainable; Practice eISSN: 2398-4287© 2021. The Authors. Published for AMER ABRA cE-Bs by e-International Publishing House, Ltd., UK. This is an open access article under the CC BYNC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). Peer–review under responsibility of AMER (Association of Malaysian Environment-Behaviour Researchers), ABRA (Association of Behavioural Researchers on Asians/Africans/Arabians) and cE-Bs (Centre for Environment-Behaviour Studies), Faculty of Architecture, Planning & Surveying, Universiti Teknologi MARA, Malaysia. DOI: https://doi.org/10.21834/ebpj.v6i17.2819

Bearing Severity Fault Evaluation Using Contour Maps—Case Study

Increasing industrial competitiveness has led to an increased global interest in condition monitoring. In this sector, rotating machinery plays an important role, where the bearing is one of the most critical components. Many vibration-based signal treatments are already being used to identify features associated with bearing faults. The information embedded in such features are employed in the construction of health indicators, which allow for evaluation of the current operating status of the machine. In this work, the use of contour maps to represent the diagnosis map of a bearing, used as a health map, is presented for the first time. The results show that the proposed method is promising, allowing for the satisfactory detection and evaluation of the severity of bearing damage. In this initial stage of the research, our results suggest that this method can improve the classification of bearing faults and, therefore, optimise maintenance processes.