The concept of the active contour model has been extensively utilized in the segmentation and analysis of images. This technology has been effectively employed in identifying the contours in object recognition, computer graphics and vision, biomedical processing of images that is normal images or medical images such as Magnetic Resonance Images (MRI), X-rays, plus Ultrasound imaging. Three colleagues, Kass, Witkin and Terzopoulos developed this energy, lessening “Active Contour Models” (equally identified as Snake) back in 1987. Being curved in nature, snakes are characterized in an image field and are capable of being set in motion by external and internal forces within image data and the curve itself in that order. The present s

      The present paper concern with minimax shrinkage estimator technique in order to estimate Burr X distribution shape parameter, when prior information about the real shape obtainable as original estimate while known scale parameter.

 Derivation for Bias Ratio, Mean squared error and the Relative Efficiency equations.

 Numerical results and conclusions for the expressions mentioned above were displayed. Comparisons for proposed estimator with most recent works were made.

Abstract. This study presents experimental and numerical investigation on the effectiveness of electrode geometry on flushing and debris removal in Electrical Discharge Drilling (EDD) process. A new electrode geometry, namely side-cut electrode, was designed and manufactured based on circular electrode geometry. Several drilling operations were performed on stainless steel 304 using rotary tubular electrodes with circular and side-cut geometries. Drilling performance was characterized by Material Removal Rate (MRR), Electrode Wear Rate (EWR), and Tool Wear Ratio (TWR). Dimensional features and surface quality of drilled holes were evaluated based on Overcut (OC), Hole Depth (HD), and Surface Roughness (SR). Three-dimensional

In this paper, an experimental study was conducted to enhance the thermal performance of a double-pass solar air heater (SAH) using phase change material (PCM) for thermal storage at climatic conditions of Baghdad city - Iraq. The double-pass solar air heater integrated with thermal storage system was manufactured and tested to ensure that the air heating reserved after the absence of the sun. The rectangular cavity filled with paraffin wax was used as a latent heat storage and incorporated into the lower channel of solar air heater. Experiments were carried out to evaluate the charging and discharging characteristics of two similar designed solar air collectors with and without using phase change material at a constant

In modern hydraulic control systems, the trend in hydraulic power applications is to improve efficiency and performance. “Proportional valve” is generally applied to pressure, flow and directional-control valves which continuously convert a variable input signal into a smooth and proportional hydraulic output signal. It creates a variable resistance (orifice) upstream and downstream of a hydraulic actuator, and is meter in/meter out circuit and hence pressure drop, and power losses are inevitable. If velocity (position) feedback is used, flow pattern control is possible. Without aforementioned flow pattern, control is very “loose” and relies on “visual” feed back by the operator. At this point, we should examine how this valv

      In this work, a test room was built in Baghdad city, with (2*1.5*1.5) m³  in dimensions, while the solar chimneys (SC) were designed with aspect ratio (ar) bigger than 12. Test room was supplied by many solar collectors; vertical single side of air pass with ar equals 25, and tilted 45^o double side of air passes with ar equals 50 for each pass, both collectors consist of flat thermal energy storage box collector (TESB) that covered by transparent clear acrylic sheet, third type of collector is array of evacuated tubular collectors with thermosyphon in 45^o instelled  in the bottom of TESB of vertical SC. The TESB was