Assessment Land Cover Change Using Normalized Difference Water Index (NDWI) In Bakun Reservoir, Sarawak

The location of Sarawak State in the equatorial region makes it an area of high rainfall. For this reason, hydroelectric power plants have been built in several catchments in Sarawak, especially in the Kapit area. This needs to be harnessed to improve the economy and social living standards of the people of Sarawak in particular. This paper presents the land cover change by analyzing the stratification change for 30 years (1985-2018) at Bakun Dam, Sarawak. This study uses Landsat 5 and Landsat 8 satellite data. Both data have to go through pre-processing such as geometric, radiometric, and atmospheric corrections. In this study, Normalized Water Difference Index (NDWI) is used to classify water areas, built human areas, and vegetation areas. Overlay analysis was applied to identify areas that had changed over the 30 years in the study area. The results showed the greatest changes from vegetation areas to water bodies for 30 years. The results showed that the most affected land cover was forest cover with a reduction of 740 km², which shifted mainly to water bodies with 669.9 km² and human development with an area of 68.7 km². The study area is less populated and anthropogenic influences are rather low, but deforestation is observed in the upper river basin. These events would change the hydrological behavior of these catchments in the future. Land cover mapping is very important to provide information to those responsible for planning sustainable development. In addition, land cover maps are important for land use planning and land use regulation to avoid land-use conflicts.

A Study of Postural Safety and Low-Cost Electromyography (EMG) Device Towards Grocery Workers in Kota Samarahan, Sarawak

Body posture is one of the most important parts when lifting an object as it can causes injury if the wrong technique and body posture were used. A worker will injure their low back if a bad posture is not in consideration. A good body posture is recommended among workers to reduce the chance of injury while lifting and improve their postural safety. The main objectives of this study are to observe the body posture of the worker during lifting and study the comparison of using lower back support when lifting. It also investigates the muscle activity of the worker during heavy lifting using EMG and simulates the worker's movement using CATIA Software for Rapid Upper Limb Assessment (RULA) results. The selected grocery was chosen in Kota Samarahan, Sarawak with 7 male respondents are identified to undergo this study. The results show that the worker with lower back support tends to show raw EMG signal with lower muscle activity compared to without using lower back support. Thus, using belt support can reduce muscle activity by up to 67.4% compare to not wearing back support. Raw EMG signals also show 3010 amplitude (mV) muscle activity if postural safety of the workers improved by following the NIOSH lifting Recommendations.

Enhancing the Usability of Tactile Map for the Visually Impaired

Assistive technology is initiated to aid those visually impaired to fulfil their tasks independently, rapidly, and easily. As such, tactile map is an assistive technology that has been widely used for navigation to enable those visually impaired to visualize the geographical information about a particular place. Nevertheless, its usability and availability in Malaysia are scant. This paper aims to investigate the usability issues of tactile map, identify the requirements and proposed a conceptual prototype named TacTalk. Qualitative research method in the form of face to face interviews were carried out with the visually impaired residing at Saint Nicholas’ Home for the Blind in Penang. Results from the findings identified four emerging usability issues: poor design of tactile map due to limited space, misinterpretation of information, complexity of symbols used and difficulty in memorizing directions. The proposed solution, ‘TacTalk’, refers to a ‘talking tactile map’ incorporated with audio support. TacTalk is comprised of two components, which are: a tactile map with built-in buttons, and a mobile application that plays the audio files. There is a connection between the buttons on the map and the TacTalk mobile application via Bluetooth. An audio instruction is played when the button is pressed by the user. The results of this work hope to overcome the fear of the visually impaired to travel alone. Hopefully, it can inspire and empower them to explore the use of assistive technology in future.

Design and Develop Low-Cost Device on Monitoring Environmental Indoor Air Quality in Factory

Environmental indoor air quality is one of the major concerns in occupational safety and health issues related to workers. Nowadays, the evolving of Internet of Things (IoT), the monitoring of the surrounding environmental desired parameters is more fascinating with the use of various sensors. Real time data now can be monitored with the Wi-Fi connection where the data being transfer across the network cloud with different platform service. This research focus is on the environmental monitoring for indoor air quality in terms of carbon monoxide (CO) in selected palm oil mill factory. This project aims to benefit the workers in a way where air quality is monitored. This low-cost device air quality monitoring (LCDAQM) used an ESPduino-32 to collect and process sensed data to the ThingSpeak platform service that can be monitored through web based or apps. The level of the carbon monoxide (CO) will light up the red LED when reach more than 50ppm which was set by OSHA. Result shows that level of CO in factory is unhealthy and need future engineering control action. The validation between LCDAQM and RS CO meter show the percentage error of 14.41%. Therefore, this study will help workers and factory to monitor and reduce the occupational safety and health (OSH) related problems to indoor air quality in factory.

Numerical Analysis of Supercontinuum Generated Microstructured Optical Fiber with all Normal Chromatic Dispersion

A micro-structured photonic crystal fiber (M-PCF) with all normal chromatic dispersion has been proposed for supercontinuum spectrum generation which is applicable in optical transmission and optical coherence tomography applications. Calculations of its different properties using finite difference method have shown that the proposed M-PCF has a high nonlinear coefficients at 1.06 μm, 1.30 μm and 1.55 μm wavelength with flattened chromatic dispersion, low confinement losses and broad supercontinuum spectrum. Moreover, it has been shown that the proposed design obtain high power and short fiber length at 1.06 μm, 1.30 and 1.55 μm center wavelengths by propagating sech2 picosecond optical pulses with 1.0 ps pulse width at a full width at half maximum.

Network Cliques and Organizational level of Influence among Managers: A Social Network Analysis

Responding to demands for transformed networking practices requires new forms of knowledge. Given their scale and complexity, networking problems can no longer be solved by way of extending intermediaries. Recent research on alternative approaches has focused on the understanding network structures formed by interactions between heterogeneous actors. Rather than linear extensions, network theory highlights cliques structure as a major determinant of performance derives largely from the frequent finding that managers that are embedded with influential connections are at increased likelihood of becoming influential themselves thus opening rooms for new knowledge and innovative technology and practices. It is suggested that the strong and consistent cliques are at least partially responsible to managing network complexity. This paper contributes to our understanding of such facilitation by investigating the networks in which managers exchange information. We report findings based on the study of managers in a maritime industry. Network surveys identified who the managers contacted for inputs and who they had talked to about the information by 6 months earlier. Snow-balling interviews collected farmer statements about their most valuable contacts and these statements have been analysed. The network analysis shows that managers with densely tied and occupationally homogeneous contacts grew their networks more than did managers with contacts that are loosely tied and diverse. The network analysis reveals an important principle: managers’s value knowledge delivered by persons of homogenous connections rather distance ones. It is argued that social network analysis is an appropriate method for studying influence development use in the context of networked organizations.

Impact of Product Packaging on Consumer Buying Decision

Packaging is an integral part of any product that attracts consumer. Many firms have used packaging as a promotional tool in their marketing campaigns. Hence, this research aims to explore the key factors of packaging that influence consumers in Fast Moving Consumer Goods industry of Bangladesh. Data was collected via structured questionnaire from 338 respondents and analyzed using Statistical Package for the Social Sciences to evaluate the strength of hypothesized relationship, if any, among the constructs, which include Color of Packaging, Materials of Packaging, Attractiveness of Wrapping Design, Labeling, and Innovative Packaging as independent variables or predictors and Consumer Buying Decision as the dependent variable. The results provide enough evidence to support the hypothesized relationship and useful information for managers in formulating strategies to influence consumers regarding buying decision behavior.

Risk analysis model in aquaponics

This paper about aquaponic risk analysis find to identifies the main risks in an aquaponic system and how they can be minimized. Monitoring and control of essential environmental parameters is important for maintaining a healthy and stable systemin aquaponic.

Environmental risk assessment of intensive beekeeping integrated with aquaponic system

The paper main objectives are to identify an analysis model for development of integrated aquaponics with intensive beekeeping. The socio-economic environmental impact assessment provides the opportunity to analyze the determinants of public attitude towards the use of multifunctional aquapson. In relation to the other agricultural production branches, beekeeping integrated into aquaponic systems is an environmentally friendly technology that does not use additional energy supply within the integrated production system and also recycles waste water from aquaculture through mechanical, biological filters and plant roots.

Transition towards a sustainable heating sector in municipality of Visoko with analysis of loading and optimization of solar collector carriers

Many traditional heating systems based on fossils face challenges such as lack of investment or unfavorable price regulation, low technical performance, impact on the environment and negative consumer perceptions. The CoolHeating project funded by the EU’s Horizon 2020 program, whose basic features and outcomes are presented in this work, promotes the implementation of small modular renewable heating and cooling grids for communities in South-Eastern Europe, including the town of Visoko as one of five target regions. Core activities, besides techno-economical assessments and social-environmental benefits, include measures to stimulate the interest of communities and citizens to set-up renewable district heating systems. In this work, an analysis was performed for implementation of small modular district heating system in Visoko, covering several public buildings and few neighborhoods in north-western part of town. Combination of different renewable energy sources were analyzed leading to an optimal and a very promising energy supply strategy due to its contribution to security of supply, financial stability, local economic development, local employment, etc. Possible financial savings for heating of 38% compared to current financial needs are determined. Structure optimization of solar collector holders was also performed, taking into account external influence, enabling savings in the structure material. This approach confirms feasibility of transition from traditional to renewable energy based heating system. Having in mind the modularity of such systems, similar solutions can be replicated in other South-Eastern European cities and other countries.