Cost estimation is considered one of the important tasks in the construction projects management. The precise estimation of the construction cost affect on the success and quality of a construction project. Elemental estimation is considered a very important stage to the project team because it represents one of the key project elements. It helps in formulating the basis to strategies and execution plans for construction and engineering. Elemental estimation, which in the early stage, estimates the construction costs depending on . minimum details of the project so that it gives an indication for the initial design stage of a project. This paper studies the factors that affect the elemental cost estimation as well as the relation between these factors using Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) method. Final conclusions and recommendations were extracted for better elemental estimation accuracy in project management.
To obtain the approximate solution to Riccati matrix differential equations, a new variational iteration approach was proposed, which is suggested to improve the accuracy and increase the convergence rate of the approximate solutons to the exact solution. This technique was found to give very accurate results in a few number of iterations. In this paper, the modified approaches were derived to give modified solutions of proposed and used and the convergence analysis to the exact solution of the derived sequence of approximate solutions is also stated and proved. Two examples were also solved, which shows the reliability and applicability of the proposed approach.
Static Synchronous Series Compensator (SSSC) is a well known device for effectively regulating the active power flow in a power system. In this paper, the SSSC linearized power flow equations are incorporated into Newton-Raphson algorithm in a MATLAB written program to investigate the control of active poweer flow and the transient stability of a five bus and a thirty bus IEEE test systems, during abnormal conduction (three phase fault near buses). A comparison of the results obtained for the base case without SSSC and with it to investigate the effectiveness of the device on both of the active power flow and the transient stability.
The quality of groundwater in the Al-Hawija area was assessed using a water quality index. Data of nine physico-chemical parameters of 28 groundwater wells were used to calculate the water quality index (WQI). A heterogeneous water quality was reported, where in close proximity to the Lesser Zab River (LZR), it has low WQI values and permissible for human consumptions due to the dilution processes by fresh water; whereas, it becomes deteriorated in areas located far away the river. The values of WQI ranges from 22 to 336, indicating a good to very poor groundwater quality.
ZnS nanoparticles were prepared by a simple microwave irradiation method under mild condition. The starting materials for the synthesis of ZnS quantum dots were zinc acetate (R & M Chemical) as zinc source, thioacetamide as a sulfur source and ethylene glycol as a solvent. All chemicals were analytical grade products and used without further purification. The quantum dots of ZnS with cubic structure were characterized by X-ray powder diffraction (XRD), the morphology of the film is seen by scanning electron microscopy (SEM). The particle size is determined by field effect scanning electron microscopy (FESEM), UV-Visible absorption spectroscopy and XRD. UV-Visible absorption spectroscopy analysis shows that the absorption peak of the as-prep
... Show MoreSensing insole systems are a promising technology for various applications in healthcare and sports. They can provide valuable information about the foot pressure distribution and gait patterns of different individuals. However, designing and implementing such systems poses several challenges, such as sensor selection, calibration, data processing, and interpretation. This paper proposes a sensing insole system that uses force-sensitive resistors (FSRs) to measure the pressure exerted by the foot on different regions of the insole. This system classifies four types of foot deformities: normal, flat, over-pronation, and excessive supination. The classification stage uses the differential values of pressure points as input for a feedforwar
... Show MoreThe Sequencing Batch Reactor system (SBR) is a major component of the municipal wastewater biological treatment system and water reclamation that provides high-quality water that could be reused in restricted plants that which require large quantities of water despite the lack of water. The research aims to investigate the performance of a pilot plant SBR unit under real operation conditions that was installed and operated in Al-Rustamiya Wastewater Treatment Plant (WWTP), Baghdad, Iraq. Results showed that the BOD5/COD ratio of the raw wastewater was within the average value at 0.66 emphasizing the organic nature of the influent flow and hence the amenability to biological treatment. The results also ensured that the treatment pro
... Show MoreThis paper describes a newly modified wind turbine ventilator that can achieve highly efficient ventilation. The new modification on the conventional wind turbine ventilator system may be achieved by adding a Savonius wind turbine above the conventional turbine to make it work more efficiently and help spinning faster. Three models of the Savonius wind turbine with 2, 3, and 4 blades' semicircular arcs are proposed to be placed above the conventional turbine of wind ventilator to build a hybrid ventilation turbine. A prototype of room model has been constructed and the hybrid turbine is placed on the head of the room roof. Performance's tests for the hybrid turbine with a different number of blades and different values o
... Show MoreMalicious software (malware) performs a malicious function that compromising a computer system’s security. Many methods have been developed to improve the security of the computer system resources, among them the use of firewall, encryption, and Intrusion Detection System (IDS). IDS can detect newly unrecognized attack attempt and raising an early alarm to inform the system about this suspicious intrusion attempt. This paper proposed a hybrid IDS for detection intrusion, especially malware, with considering network packet and host features. The hybrid IDS designed using Data Mining (DM) classification methods that for its ability to detect new, previously unseen intrusions accurately and automatically. It uses both anomaly and misuse dete
... Show More