Archives-March 2013

In this brief, a reconfigurable IDCT architecture is designed for multistandard inverse transform. The proposed architecture is used in multistandard decoder of MPEG-2, MPEG-4 ASP, H.264/AVC and VC-1. Two circuits share strategies, factor share (FS) and adder share (AS), are applied to the inverse transform architecture for saving its circuit resource.

The paper aims at assessing cost of governance and revenue assurance mechanisms. The methodology adopted by the paper involves the use of quantitative data for 9 years, from 2002 to 2010, which was generated from the annual report and accounts of the Central Bank of Iran. The data generated for the study was analyzed using graphs and simple percentage analysis. The finding of the paper shows that Cost of governance at state level has greatly increased in Iran. Similarly, the trend of Extra-Budgetary Expenditure put to question the implementation of budgets at the States. The paper concludes that the task of reducing cost of governance for revenue assurance at states level does not rest on the executive, legislature and judiciary alone. It is task demanding the collective effort of all stakeholders. Finally, the paper recommends that there is the need to reduce recurrent expenditure to sustainable level through reducing waste, inefficiency, corruption and duplication in government, as well as, make capital spending more effective.

The aim of this study is to explore the linkage between data mining and CBBE model to increase our brand knowledge by employing consumer questionnaire to determine the linkage between data mining and CBBE model. Two questionnaires are developed, one from the consumer opinions of analyzed with association rule to understand the relationships between the association rules and each stage of the brand equity pyramid; the other based on the literature review about brand equity factor and brand equity pyramid to design expert questionnaire to explore the linkage between brand equity pyramid and factors. Three main objectives in this study were: (1) to address solutions to the three questions related to brand image and each point of brand development; (2) to derive nine association rules in total by using association rules analysis; (3) to construct an expert questionnaire, and assess the relationships between the questionnaire items and measurement factors in the brand equity pyramid. The results not only helped to understand the status of their brand development but also provided strategies recommendations to improve the weak or underdeveloped stages in the process of brand building.

Binomials – as a subcategory of collocation- consist of two words from the same category which are joined with a linguistic link. Like collocations, binomials are mostly language specific. Therefore getting familiar with binomials for any translator is an important task which is usually overlooked. As a result, they produced body of language which usually seems unnatural from viewpoint of target language audience. This study attempts to evaluate the naturalness of translated binomials in the genre of political speeches and to introduce procedures producing natural equivalence. The result showed that although the literal translation procedure proved to render natural translation in 54% of cases, the translators overused this procedure (86%) and overlooked the idiomatic nature of binomials and thus produced unnatural or binomials which does not sense in English. Therefore they fail to render the intended political effect.

Explosion welding (EXW) is a solid state (solid-phase) process where welding is accomplished by accelerating one of the components at extremely high velocity through the use of chemical explosives. This process is most commonly utilized to clad carbon steel plate with a thin layer of corrosion resistant material (stainless steel, nickel alloy, titanium, or zirconium). Due to the nature of this process, producible geometries are very limited. They must be simple. Typical geometries produced include plates, tubing and tube sheets. Explosion welding or bonding is a solid-state welding process that is used for the metallurgical joining of dissimilar metals. The process uses the forces of controlled detonations to accelerate one metal plate into another creating an atomic bond. Explosion bonding can introduce thin, diffusion inhibiting interlayer such as tantalum and titanium, which allow conventional weld-up installation. In addition, explosive welding is considered a cold-welding process, which allows metals to be joined without losing their pre-bonded properties.

This work deals with the elaboration and the physical characterization of thermally modified wood with boiling palm oil. The heat treatment consists of dipping successively the wood into two baths of oil, the first one at a temperature about 200°C for 30 minutes and the second at ambient temperature of 23°C. This resulted in important color changes of treated specimens. The wood species used for the study are Sapelli and Ayous, two Cameroonian hardwoods. A compared study of the physical properties of treated and untreated wood was made. Hygroscopicity of heat?treated wood has been tested. Samples were dipped in water and then kept in a room with a relative humidity of 65% and a temperature of 23 °C. The samples were periodically weighed over a period of 8 days. The conclusion was that during a short period the water permeability of heat?treated Sapelli was 70 per cent lower than that of normal dried Sapelli. The same result was found for Ayous. Heat treatment significantly reduces the tangential and radial swelling. The Specific gravity of heat treated wood was almost constant, but higher than that untreated wood. After an adequate treatment, the moisture content of these woods after dipping in water for a long time was less than 7%. It is therefore possible for these treated woods to be used outside without biological attack due to moisture. In addition, the dimensions of treated wood were almost constant.

Man’s relentless quest for knowledge and its documentation have had profound impact on development of human race at every stage. The fast change in the quality of our lives over the centuries has been because of the knowledge flow in the information technology age of today. On a global basis, organizations are recognizing the importance of knowledge as a means to gain or sustain competitive advantage. Researchers have concluded that the only thing that is sustainable, for successful businesses, in the New Millennium – is what it knows, how it uses what it knows, and how fast it can know something new. In the past, the dilemma was finding enough information, but now the problem has shifted to identifying and managing the nuggets of mission-critical knowledge amongst the mountains of meaningless noise. Many organizations are primarily knowledge-focused. They obtain data and information and produce either a product or service. In this production process they use their own, and others, knowledge and information. Much of the knowledge in an enterprise is grounded in the minds of employees. The awareness of the value of knowledge to a business, coupled with its management, acts as an integrator that improves cross-functional communication and cooperation. Shared knowledge not only makes for a more effective, efficient and agile organization, but creates a common perspective and culture that produces a natural consistency of successful decisions and actions.

The title compound has been prepared in high yield from 9-benzyl-purine derivative by reaction with diethoxymethyl acetate (DEMA). The structure of the tricyclic compound, 7-(2-chlorobenzyl-3H-[1,2,4]triazolo[3,1-i]purine 2, was confirmed by X-ray analysis. Semiempirical calculations for predicting geometrical parameters are in excellent agreement with the X-ray crystal structure.

Imidazoles and formimidoyl-1H-imidazoles derivatives were prepared by reaction between formamidines and weak or strong base depending on reaction conditions in good yields. All these derivatives have been fully characterized by spectroscopic data.

Health Insurance can be broadly defined as a financial mechanism that exists to provide protection to individual and house holds from expenses incurred as a result of unexpected illness or injury. Under this mechanism, the insurer agrees to compensate or guarantee the insured person against loss by specified contingent event and provide financial coverage for which the insured party pays a premium.