Regression Discontinuity (RD) means a study that exposes a definite group to the effect of a treatment. The uniqueness of this design lies in classifying the study population into two groups based on a specific threshold limit or regression point, and this point is determined in advance according to the terms of the study and its requirements. Thus , thinking was focused on finding a solution to the issue of workers retirement and trying to propose a scenario to attract the idea of granting an end-of-service reward to fill the gap ( discontinuity point) if it had not been granted. The regression discontinuity method has been used to study and to estimate the effect of the end -service reward on the cutoff of insured workers as well as t

This paper describes a microcontroller-based function generator system. By the function generator sine wave, square wave, quasi-square wave, saw-tooth and triangular waveforms are generated over a wide frequency range according to user requirements. By utilizing processing capabilities of the microcontroller the hardware is minimized exceedingly. The output waveform shapes are digitally-controlled to achieve the required wave shape. The single chip microcomputer of waveform generation equipment offers the possibility of improvements in manufacture reliability, maintenance and servicing and increased control flexibility. The system is built and tested. The results of test were satisfactory and appreciated by test engineers at different ce

This work includes design, implementation and testing of a microcontroller – based spectrum analyzer system. Both hardware and software structures are built to verify the main functions that are required by such system. Their design utilizes the permissible and available tools to achieve the main functions of the system in such a way to be modularly permitting any adaptation for a specific changing in the application environment. The analysis technique, mainly, depends on the Fourier analysis based methods of spectral analysis with the necessary required preconditioning processes. The software required for waveform analysis has been prepared. The spectrum of the waveform has been displayed, and the instrument accuracy has been checked.

This project sought to fabricate a flexible gas sensor based on a short functionalized multi-walled carbon nanotubes (f-MWCNTs) network for nitrogen dioxide gas detection. The network was prepared by filtration from the suspension (FFS) method and modified by coating with a layer of polypyrrole conductive polymer (PPy) prepared by the oxidative chemical polymerization to improve the properties of the network. The structural, optical, and morphological properties of the f-MWCNTs and f-MWCNTs/PPy network were studied using X-ray diffraction (XRD), Fourie-transform infrared (FTIR), with an AFM (atomic force microscopy). XRD proved that the structure of f-MWCNTs is unaffected by the synthesis procedure. The FTIR spectra verified the existence o

Photonic crystal fiber interferometers (PCFIs) are widely used for sensing applications. This work presented solid core-PCFs based on Mach-Zehnder modal interferometer for sensing refractive index. The general structure of sensor was applied by splicing short lengths of PCF in both sides with conventional single mode fiber (SMF-28).To apply modal interferometer theory collapsing technique based on fusion splicing used to excite higher order modes (LP01 and LP11). A high sensitive optical spectrum analyzer (OSA) was used to monitor and record the transmitted wavelength. This work studied a Mach-Zahnder interferometer refractive index sensor based on splicing point tapered SMF-PCF-SMF. Relation between refractive index sensitivity and tape

One of the most popular and legally recognized behavioral biometrics is the individual's signature, which is used for verification and identification in many different industries, including business, law, and finance. The purpose of the signature verification method is to distinguish genuine from forged signatures, a task complicated by cultural and personal variances. Analysis, comparison, and evaluation of handwriting features are performed in forensic handwriting analysis to establish whether or not the writing was produced by a known writer. In contrast to other languages, Arabic makes use of diacritics, ligatures, and overlaps that are unique to it. Due to the absence of dynamic information in the writing of Arabic signatures,

A novel fractal design scheme has been introduced in this paper to generate microstrip bandpass filter designs with miniaturized sizes for wireless applications. The presented fractal scheme is based on Minkowski-like prefractal geometry. The space-filling property and self-similarity of this fractal geometry has found to produce reduced size symmetrical structures corresponding to the successive iteration levels. The resulting filter designs are with sizes suitable for use in modern wireless communication systems. The performance of each of the generated bandpass filter structures up to the 2^nd iteration has been analyzed using a method of moments (MoM) based software IE3D, which is widely adopted in microwave research and in

The ability of the human brain to communicate with its environment has become a reality through the use of a Brain-Computer Interface (BCI)-based mechanism. Electroencephalography (EEG) has gained popularity as a non-invasive way of brain connection. Traditionally, the devices were used in clinical settings to detect various brain diseases. However, as technology advances, companies such as Emotiv and NeuroSky are developing low-cost, easily portable EEG-based consumer-grade devices that can be used in various application domains such as gaming, education. This article discusses the parts in which the EEG has been applied and how it has proven beneficial for those with severe motor disorders, rehabilitation, and as a form of communi

Abstract 

This paper presents an intelligent model reference adaptive control (MRAC) utilizing a self-recurrent wavelet neural network (SRWNN) to control nonlinear systems. The proposed SRWNN is an improved version of a previously reported wavelet neural network (WNN). In particular, this improvement was achieved by adopting two modifications to the original WNN structure. These modifications include, firstly, the utilization of a specific initialization phase to improve the convergence to the optimal weight values, and secondly, the inclusion of self-feedback weights to the wavelons of the wavelet layer. Furthermore, an on-line training procedure was proposed to enhance the control per